Museum Heralds Opening of New Home

At last. The Museum of Contemporary Art opens its $23-million Bunker Hill home with much festivity Nov. 30. An expected 40,000 guests will show up from local and international art circles, celebrating during a week-plus of partying designed to create an instant patina of excitement and establishment.

Lennie Greenberg, the president of MOCA’s board of trustees and coordinator of opening events, termed them a “thank you to the people who have been good to MOCA, who made it happen, who brought in money or gave money. People from the political structure. Donors of art, artists we have shown, museum directors and the people who are important in the art world today.”

The 10 nights of thank-you parties, according to MOCA trustee Jane Nathanson, are the “celebration of a dream.” There will be, for all invited, a “chance to see the building, the whole building.” Food and drink will be served in the massive loading areas, and, for probably the only time, museumgoers will see behind the scenes, or, as Nathanson said, “it will be like going backstage in a theater.”

Greenberg pointed out that the Temporary Contemporary, in nearby Little Tokyo, has been open for three years, “but this is really our home and this is what we have been working for.”

The invitations and catalogues, by New York’s Massimo Vignelli, scream out in fluorescent colors and the zippy designs reflect just how different this museum and the parties inaugurating it will be.

Putting together the details with Greenberg and Nathanson is a committee that includes Harriet Gold, Peggy Phelps, Bea Gersh, Adelaide Hixon, Jackie Silverman and Merry Norris.

The most special party, on Sunday, Nov. 30, will have a very limited guest list--just the MOCA staff and trustees. Then, on Dec. 1, the evening of the dedication of the museum building, the black-tie party list includes trustees, founders, city officials and event underwriters. The next night, trustees are back again, this time with artists represented in the inaugural exhibit, artists previously shown at the Temporary Contemporary, directors of other museums and people from the international art community.

On Dec. 3, IBM takes over the museum, but on Dec. 4, Peter Sellars’ play, “Zangesi,” opens at the museum, with 1,500 artists and supporters gathering for a black-tie reception.

And people will even squeeze in some time to look at the art.

PARKER CENTER PARTYING--Not really. No, the members of the LAPD haven’t taken to the social circuit full time. But two major events coming up this month do involve the boys in blue. Next Saturday at UCLA, in a spectacular produced by David Mirisch, tennis buffs will pay to play (gold sponsors will pay $3,000 and platinum sponsors $10,000) in what organizers are calling “the largest celebrity tennis tournament ever held.” Kate Jackson will host and players include Chad Everett, Kristy McNichol, Lloyd Bridges, Ricky Schroder. The money will be dispersed among child-abuse programs, projects involving missing children and specialized law enforcement training. . . . The other LAPD fund-raiser takes less physical effort--although it did take strength to fight through the 600 people who helped Suzanne Marx kick it off at a Regency Club party last month. Coming up--Liza Minnelli raising money for DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education). That’s the innovative and wide-reaching anti-drug program run in schools by the LAPD. At the Oct. 23 fund-raiser at the Universal Amphitheatre (which has First Lady Nancy Reagan as honorary chairwoman) the tickets will go for $250 and include a post-concert reception with Chief Daryl Gates. Coming in for kudos were Lillian Disney, the widow of Walt Disney, and their daughter, Diane Disney Miller. They hosted the Regency Club kickoff and also were being thanked for what one DARE insider said was an “extraordinarily generous contribution.”

SAVE THE DATE--This is a fun one. The Center Theatre Group does their annual shindig at the Century Plitt and then across the street to party at . . . wait a minute. Coney Island. Of course, it’s the premiere of “Brighton Beach Memoirs” Dec. 15, and Roz Wyman, the CTG Benefits overseer, says everything will be like the Boardwalk.