Children’s Benefits Choose ‘Phantom of the Opera’ Theme

Every seat from the orchestra to the balcony was paid for and filled for Childrens Hospital of Los Angeles’ Phantom Gala--weeks ahead. Because the committee held costs to $19 per person, the net will be a hefty $287,000.

From the beginning it was to be an all-heart, no-glitz evening, a family night at the Music Center. And there were families by the droves. William and Onnalee Doheny and Will and Libby Doheny organized 48 seats for a triple-generation celebration. Stephen and Louise Griffith flew in their offspring from New York because they hadn’t been able to get “Phantom of the Opera” tickets there. Eleanor Griffin came with her grandson, Warren Techentin. Dody and Otis Booth brought her daughter, Ashley Brittingham. Jeff and Isabel Arnett led a troop.

At intermission it was like an old-time ice cream social--no ice cream, but plenty of strawberries, Phantom-masked in white and dark chocolate, almond truffles and pecan cookies served on silver trays by waiters--all planned by Bonnie McClure, Susan Miller and Jan Shortz.

Not that anyone was hungry. Pre-performance there were dozens of groups at the California Club. Childrens Hospital chairman Dr. Richard Call and his wife, Nancy, were surrounded by Kate and Joe Regan, Nancy and Ray McCullough and Leslie and Jim Thompson. Elsewhere in the Fireside Room, Anne Wilson and Camron Cooper hosted friends.

In Toluca Lake, hospital board member Sid Petersen and Nancy invited three tables of guests for dinner before the show and trimmed up the house with some of the 1,900 black masks that were mailed last December to CHLA ticket buyers. Over at Engine Company 28 on Figueroa, Pam and Peter Mullin were the happy hosts.

Mostly it was a cheery evening. Nancy Burrows, a theater lover, however, was overcome by the performance, a situation that did little for her mascara.

CHIPPING IN: A night earlier, the CHIPS (Colleague Helpers in Philanthropic Service) asked Betsy Bloomingdale to be honorary chairman for their “Phantom” benefit. Easily, they produced a $125,000 night to benefit Children’s Institute International which serves abused children.

Marcia Wilson Hobbs, there with her mother and father, William and Betty Wilson, takes over the CHIPS presidency. She was getting congratulations from president Isabel Leahey; benefit chairs Lisa Bloomingdale Bell and Nancy Wibblesman; and Mary Emmons, executive director of the Childrens Institute International. More in the crowd were Beverly Morsey, Jane and Craig Gosden, Marjorie Miller, Barbara and Marvin Davis and Natalie and Gwynn Robinson.

JOIN THE THRONG: Amie Karen Cancer Fund has announced the founding of Rainbow II, a group of professionals to generate new community interest and to assist the Rainbow Women’s Guild in fund-raising for Camp Rainbow and the Amie Karen Center for Treatment of Children with Cancer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

SUCCESS: “We dedicate this evening to you,” Pepperdine University president David Davenport told Pepperdine Associates after campaign co-chairman Leonard Straus announced at the Beverly Hilton that the $100 million “Wave of Excellence” campaign had exceeded its goal with $134.5 million.

ESCALATION: Anne and Kirk Douglas were saluted with the Jacoby Award from the UCLA International Student Center at a dinner at the Beverly Wilshire . . .

Honorary chairs Sybil Brand, Cindy Chapman, Tanna Havlick, Susan Hook, Christine Huenergardt, Ellie Hustedt and Pat O’Connell were honored at tea--fanfare before the sixth annual Celebrity Fashion Show to benefit cystic fibrosis Saturday at the Sheraton Universal.

KUDOS: To the Friends of the Visiting Nurse Foundation of Los Angeles, observing a 50th anniversary of home health care today at the home of USC president James and Marilyn Zumberge in San Marino . . .

To Donald T. Sterling, Los Angeles Clippers owner, hosting champagne and caviar at his Beverly Hills estate for 500 sports/civic leaders, including Sherry Lansing, United Way president Leo Cornelius and MCA Music president Irving Azoff . . .

To the Streisand Foundation, granting $250,000 to the Environmental Defense Fund to endow the Barbra Streisand Global Atmospheric Change Chair; it will support the work of Michael Oppenheimer, Ph.D., director of the EDF Global Atmosphere Program . . .

PAST PERFECT: Pearl Bailey, special adviser to the U.S. mission to the United Nations, philosophized--”Some times are gonna be sweet and some times are gonna be sour, but you just gotta learn to swallow”--as she compared her ups and downs to those of Israel, and after she received the Hebrew University Golda Meir Fellowship Award in an emotional ceremony at the Hebrew University Women’s Committee Builders of Scopus dinner at Chasen’s.