Thanks, and No Thanks

Competition has been exceptionally stiff for this year’s Turkey Awards, which are bestowed upon those individuals and institutions in Orange County whose actions have made us ponder where it was we left that chopping block. . . .

The contenders have been many, from city officials who insist that arts groups stick to material that offends no one, to radio station deejays who try to increase their ratings by insulting recent immigrants.

But enough preliminaries: Let the Turkeys begin!

* The Festival of Britain. This was the event that towered above the rest this year in making arts lovers wonder whether the craniums of some of our cultural impresarios aren’t stuffed with day-old Wonder bread instead of brain cells. This “festival” began as a merchandising scheme, dreamed up two years ago by South Coast Plaza mall officials both to boost their sales and to improve trade relations between the United States and the United Kingdom. Fine so far. But then they got the notion that they could klass up the jernt by slapping their “Festival of Britain” logo on dozens of arts events, most of which would have taken place anyway. While all this questionable nonsense provided some beneficial side effects to various Orange County arts groups, BritFest nevertheless reduced the status of the participating artists to that of a greedy organ grinder’s monkeys. And it left the taste of stale mutton in the mouths of anyone who expected a genuine arts festival--where arts, not yuppie commerce, is the motivating principle.

* The City of Costa Mesa. For what? Let us count the ways. The self-proclaimed “City of the Arts” decided to start the new decade on the right(wing) foot by jumping aboard the bandwagon and restricting ways that city arts grant recipients can spend their money. Instead of firmly backing the notion that artistic freedom of thought should be encouraged and fostered by local government--as the city of Los Angeles did at about the same time--Costa Mesa officials hoped to assuage two vociferous critics of local arts groups (see John and Ernie Feeney, below) by caving in to their demands. As it happened, council members were somewhat thwarted by their city attorney, who reminded them about that pesky document known as the Constitution. Guidelines that were adopted essentially repeat existing state law, while still leaving it to city officials, rather than the courts, to determine definitions of obscenity. Very disturbing: Before passage of these “anti-obscenity” guidelines, not one city arts group had ever been accused, much less found guilty, of producing or presenting an obscene work. It’s also worth noting that while haggling over how its $175,000 in city arts grants might be spent, the council never batted an eye, nor attached a string, in approving $400,000 from the general fund to help promote--ta-da!--the Festival of Britain.

* KEZY-FM disc jockey Chris Little. He’s the pea-brain who came up with the “Foreign or Domestic” game show in which call-in contestants were invited to guess, as he phoned up neighborhood convenience stores, whether the clerk who answered was “Foreign or Domestic.” Here’s a suggestion for the National League of Convenience Store Clerks: Phone KEZY-FM and have their members guess whether the deejay who answers is “Human or Moron.” After a storm of protest, during which Little defended his brain(dead)child and claimed “You’ve got to go with the majority,” station management finally became convinced that this stunt was just a tad racist and dropped it.

* The Orange County Performing Arts Center. The Center’s cutting-edge theatrical productions, such as this summer’s umpteenth restaging of “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,” apparently are doing great business with the Invisible Man and Woman segment of our population, judging from the 33% turnout at the ticket window. Four years after opening, Center officials still can’t find a way to work in a pop-music series with some of the acts that bypassed Orange County for lack of an available 2,000- to 3,000-seat theater: Van Morrison, Sinead O’Connor, Jackson Browne and South Africa’s Johnny Clegg & Savuka. There was, however, room on the schedule for outside promoters to present Warren Miller’s latest ski film and impressionist Rich Little’s pithy, sophisticated political observations about the Middle East crisis, to wit, “(Let’s) beat the hell out of those towel-heads.”

* Newport Harbor Art Museum’s board of directors. Upon the departures of director Kevin Consey and curator Paul Schimmel, the board, led by billionaire developer Donald L. Bren, fired renowned architect Renzo Piano as designer of a new $20-million building. The board then sought designs from a New York architect who has never designed an art museum, and whose work generally is considered more conventional than the flamboyant buildings for which Piano is known. Corporate timidity wins over artistic vision. Again.

* John and Ernie Feeney. The Costa Mesa residents led attacks on Orange County arts groups--first against South Coast Repertory, because they suspected that the theater company had used city money to pay for a flyer urging support for the National Endowment for the Arts, then against the tiny Costa Mesa Civic Playhouse for its production of Christopher Durang’s caustic tract on Catholicism, “Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You.” This Turkey Award is not for the Feeneys’ outrage, as dutifully expressed to their elected representatives, but for their insistence that the city sponsor only those artistic endeavors that conform to the Feeneys’ standards of decency.

* South Coast Repertory. Officials at our esteemed, Tony Award-winning theater troupe have shown all the backbone of an earthworm when under attack from such conservative critics as the Feeneys and certain members of the Costa Mesa City Council. Only at the last minute, and after some press criticism, did they find time last weekend to attend a major statewide arts conference on freedom of expression. Yet co-founder David Emmes didn’t have any trouble finding time in his busy schedule to aggressively promote the Festival of Britain, which was co-sponsored by the city, South Coast Plaza and the British government. Maybe a pending $20,000 BritFest grant for SCR helped calm the seas?

* Underachieving public-school administrators. To stuffy educators who have banned, or have tried to ban, Bart Simpson T-shirts from local schoolyards. It’s bad enough that kids are being graduated from high schools without the ability to read. Now some educators would send them out into the world minus a sense of humor too. As Bart told his do-gooder neighbor in a recent episode: “Get bent.”

* The Orange County Airport Arts Commission. It’s pretty embarrassing in a county of more than 2 million people, one with an annual budget of about $3 billion, that for the last several years our Board of Supervisors has allocated less money for arts support than the cost of a plain burrito at Taco Bell. To wit: zero. Nein. Zilch. And when they finally did cough up a few thousand bucks this year, what did it go for? Art exhibits in the airport. The topper is that even after that, internal squabbling over the initial exhibit has cast doubts on the future of the program.

* New Kids on the Block. No, not for any lip-syncing they may have perpetrated on fans during their September concerts at the Pacific Amphitheatre. The big Turkey goes to Kid Donnie Wahlberg for his unforgivable, public humiliation of a fan who he thought said something derogatory to him. If that wasn’t enough, when another fan tried to pay respects and throw him a stuffed teddy bear, he rewarded her--by kicking her gift back into the audience and admonishing, “You oughta stop throwing things.” Yeah--like their money and affection.

And now, spleen vented, we also take the opportunity to give thanks for those events and people who made all those turkeys a little easier to endure.

* The Grove Shakespeare Festival. Somehow, they’ve managed to hang in despite having to deal with some City Council types who could give a protozoa a superiority complex. They’d do themselves, and those of us who admire their work, a favor by getting more aggressive and creative about finding alternative funding sources, so they might at last wean themselves from the city’s ever-stingier teat. But even with the money hassles, they’ve come through again this year with stellar moments in classical theater. A special toast to the anonymous but outspoken donor who pulled the 1990 season out of the fire with a last-minute $10,000 check. Take the kids to see the company’s annual production of Dylan Thomas’ “A Child’s Christmas in Wales,” and see for yourself why the Grove can engender such tangible expressions of admiration and generosity from a patron.

Another nod to actors Elizabeth Norment and David Drummond for their polished, accomplished and lively performances last summer in the lead roles of “As You Like It” and “Much Ado About Nothing.”

* The Irvine Barclay Theatre. Orange County’s newest performing arts center is off to an impressively eclectic start with its bookings--everything from local orchestras and community ballet groups to such larger-caliber imports as England’s Hull Truck Theatre company, and even some pop music acts. Maybe the example set by theater President Doug Rankin will provide an inspirational jab to its bigger, stodgier older brother in Costa Mesa. And maybe someday hippos will fly.

* Chris Gaffney & the Cold Hard Facts. Even though people know they’re a fraud now, maybe even because people know they’re a fraud now, Milli Vanilli still will probably move more albums this week than Gaffney will move in a year. But this Costa Mesa-based singer, songwriter, accordionist and guitarist and his crack outfit have livened up many a night during 1990 with their insightful, inciteful and 100%-real country music. As scintillating as the band’s debut album is, it still only hints at the power and vitality of Gaffney & Co. in person. Proof, once again, that all the music that glitters isn’t necessarily gold.

* The Anaheim City Council. When a group of 2 Live Crew critics demanded that it ban the group from appearing at the Celebrity Theatre, the council did the right thing and refused. As it turned out, consumers spoke louder than would-be censors, leaving the hall nearly two-thirds empty when the mediocre-but-celebrated rappers appeared earlier this month. Crew leader Luther Campbell has the constitutional right to spew his crude, gutter-level tirades against women; he’s finding out now, however, that a national furor doesn’t always result in ticket sales.