Music Center Honors Early Supporters

Visionaries who launched the Music Center and individuals who served on resident-company and support-group executive boards prior to 1971 will make up the guest list for Heritage of the Music Center’s first luncheon April 24.

Gloria Renwick heads the luncheon committee. For months she’s been deep into lists, books and files at the Music Center, researching the project. She’s ably assisted by Hannah Carter, Marj Fasman, Bonnie Green, Patricia Isaacs and Alyce Williamson--all with long connections to the prominent institution.

By saluting the dedication and generosity of volunteers and donors whose original support was essential to the Music Center’s creation, Heritage hopes to enrich the center. Those invited are being designated Historic Founders. It’s a purely honorary status; no dues for now.

Among those heading the Heritage Steering Committee are Caroline Ahmanson, Lila and Roy Ash, Francie Brody, Susan and Michael Connell, Virginia and Si Ramo, Dick Seaver, Jean and Russell Smith, Elizabeth Up de Graff, Esther and Tom Wachtell.

CHAMPION: “It’s not enough to put your mouth where your money is; you have to put your body there, too.” Jon A. Douglas, whose company bearing his name is a leader in the California real estate market ($6 billion in 1989), took the microphone for that quip after attorney Dennis H. Vaughn, chairman of the Southern California chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, named him recipient of the chapter’s “Champion” award at a gala at the Beverly Wilshire grossing $197,000.

Douglas follows a long list of sports and entertainment personalities; it was the first time a businessman nabbed the honor.

But, Douglas is an adept sportsman: He was National Junior Tennis Champion at age 10, a record-setting high hurdler at Lincoln Junior High in Santa Monica, an All-California Interscholastic Federation quarterback at Santa Monica High School, a Stanford quarterback who beat out former L. A. Raiders coach Tom Flores for the starting spot in the East-West Shrine game (then threw for two touchdowns and ran for another). He was drafted by the San Francisco 49ers and toured the world as a member of the U.S. Davis Cup team. He was also a Marine and a Phi Beta Kappa.

That didn’t mean Douglas wasn’t having difficulty re-inserting the new gold and onyx studs in his black-tie togs at the gala. They kept falling out.

Singer Clint Holmes dazzled the crowd. Dinner chairman William S. Mortensen as well as John J. Keating and Gary Collins also were on stage. Among those hosting tables was new board member Hugh H. Evans Jr. Linda and Denny Vaughn were off to Washington, D. C., after the dinner.

PRETTY PEOPLE: The haute of couture and the city’s prominents mingled for the Fashion Circle of the Costume Council (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) dinner dance at the Beverly Hills Hotel honoring Carolina Herrera and Neiman Marcus.

Designer Herrera appeared in her own open-backed, India-beaded gown. NM’s John Martens and Franklin Johnson and Adam Bianchi were among the gentlemen who invited her to dance. Joan Hotchkis is Circle chairman, and her husband, John (who was ecstatic about racing third--in a Porsche--in the Daytona-24) was talking about his “black-tie sandwich”: Leave the Fashion Circle party in black-tie, take the red-eye from LAX to New York, do business the next morning and return to L. A. the same day for that night’s black-tie Andrew Lloyd Webber tribute at the Regent Beverly Wilshire.

Dining and dancing were Kathy (party chairman) and Bob Ray Offenhauser (he in a red-trimmed Parisian tux), Mary and Reese Milner, Patricia and Uri Sheinbaum (she in a black Givenchy), Virginia and Gerald Oppenheimer, Bill and Keith Kieschnick, Suzanne and Irwin Russell, Hal and Rosalind Millstone, Edward Maeder (back from Stockton where he lectured to the Haute Couture Societe of Stockton on “The Rise and Fall of the Female Breast”), Maria and Sandy Mallace, Linda and Bill Blackburn.

KUDOS: To James P. Miscoll, honored by the Advisory Board of the California Museum Foundation; Ilene and Stanley Gold and Normie and Melvin Gagerman, honored by Hebrew Union College; Alan Miller and Randy Miller, by the 500 Club of the City of Hope . . . .

Also, to U. S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Jack F. Kemp, to be “lightly roasted and toasted” at the USC School of Public Administration’s ninth annual black-tie dinner Monday at the Regent Beverly Wilshire . . . . To Joan Kroc, to be feted Saturday by the St. Vincent De Paul Village in San Diego . . . .

To Cindy and Kevin Costner, honorary chairs of the Pasadena Playhouse benefit at the Pasadena Hilton hosted by the Pasadena Junior Chamber of Commerce and starring Rue McClanahan.

A TREAT: Fellows of Contemporary Art had a treat the other night. Fellows member Timm Crull, president and CEO of Nestle USA, Inc., hosted members for dinner to show off the new contemporary art collection displayed throughout Carnation Company’s new headquarters in Glendale. Ginger Krueger chaired the event. Among board members oohing: Russ and Hannah Kully, Cathleen and David Partridge and Peggy Phelps.

IN TOWN: One of the world’s leading specialists in leveraged buyouts, Henry R. Kravis, founder of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., rewarded his alma mater, Claremont McKenna College, with some chat on “Managing in a Smart Society.” The occasion was the Res Publica Board of Governors Luncheon at the Biltmore. Res Publica is McKenna’s premier donor group.

Kravis was introduced by Robert A. Day, chairman of the board of Trust Company of the West and chairman of CMC’s trustees. Another Claremont trustee and alum, Robert J. Lowe, brought Carl D. Covitz, California Secretary of Business, Transportation and Housing, as a guest.

KICKOFF: Spotlights gleamed on Jimmy Stewart at the cocktail party at the Bel-Air Hotel kicking off the 10th Jimmy Stewart Relay Marathon April 14 at Griffith Park.

But there was enough shine for others: Robert O. Kline, chairman of the Marathon for Saint John’s Child Study Center at Saint John’s Hospital; celebrities Gloria Stewart, Phyllis Diller, Kenny Rogers, O. J. Simpson. They hope for a gross of $500,000 with 1,000 teams of five each at $500 per team.

BIG PARTIES: Rena Old flew in from London to kick up her heels at the Footlighters’ Cabaret Ball at the Beverly Hilton. She was honored for 30 years service to Footlighters, who have aided needy children for 52 years.

Ball chair Charlene Chase promised gaiety, and decorations chair Kathy Jarvis delivered table adornments of masks, feathers and orchids. It was a show with music and dance spanning opera and rock, orchestrated by Footlighters Sandra Young and president Lou Ann Zellers . . . . Marymount’s Blue and White Ball at the Century Plaza paid tribute to Sister Colette McManus, who is leaving the school in June.

NEW HOMES: Both the Harriett Buhai Center for Family Law and Lula Washington’s Los Angeles Contemporary Dance Theater are celebrating new homes. The center has new, larger offices and the theater a new studio building; the latter staged two recent benefit dance concerts at Southwest College.