Consolation Prize Ranks as an E Ride

It’s ironic that the most celebrity-studded bash to ever hit Orange County--Elizabeth Taylor’s 60th birthday party at Disneyland Feb. 27--will be off-limits to locals. Only 1,000 of Liz’s closest friends can attend.

Orange County Supervisor Don R. Roth admits ol’ violet eyes hasn’t been crisping his wires, begging him to help blow out the candles. Ditto other Anaheim boosters.

But come May 3, there will be consolation. That’s the day Disneyland President Jack Lindquist, Roth, and about 80 other locals will fly to Paris to begin a weeklong birthday celebration of their own--the opening of Euro Disneyland at Marne-la-Vallee.

Other locals who have said oui to the $2,500 per-person junket are Orange County Chief of Protocol Mary Jones, Anaheim Mayor Fred Hunter and Orange County Supervisor Gaddi H. Vasquez.

Lindquist is polishing up his French--”I can say bonjour and that’s about it,” he jokes--and Roth says he is looking forward to “becoming a better spokesman about the expansion of Disneyland in Anaheim.”

Festivities begin May 3 with a reception at the Newport Bay hotel, part of the Euro Disney Resort complex.

“We’ll be a little bushed, so it will be a casual reception,” says Lindquist, who along with Roth (when he was mayor of Anaheim), led a contingent of locals to the opening of Tokyo Disneyland in 1983.

On May 4, the senior management of Euro Disneyland will join tour-goers for breakfast and “a project orientation,” Lindquist says.

Highlighting the trip will be a parade down Main Street featuring Anaheim officials.

“We’re calling the whole week a salute to Anaheim and Orange County,” says Lindquist, who will be joined by his wife, Belle.

The new park officially opens on April 12. But Lindquist likens that day to “the landing of troops on Normandy.”

“It sounds great, but it’s a very difficult day for us (Disneyland executives),” he says. So, rather than subject locals to the chaos of a christening, Lindquist pulled together the special excursion. “I wanted to set up a week where we could have a delegation from Orange County visit the park the way we would really like them to.

“We’ll see all of it, plus we’ll take a trip to champagne country and we’ll visit Paris for a day, have dinner at the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre.”

Other highlights include a Wild West dinner show and a special dinner in the park’s New York Hotel. “Our convention hotel,” Lindquist notes.

Disneyland is charging tour-goers for the trip to keep things above-board. “Because of our new Westcot project--all that we have going with the county and the city of Anaheim, we wanted everyone who went to be absolutely above any question,” Lindquist says. “We hope the trip will be informative, educational and helpful.”

Roth, for one, says the excursion represents a chance to be part of history. Again. “I led a delegation to Tokyo Disneyland and had a fabulous time,” he says. “And here I am, with an opportunity to visit Europe. I’m a great booster of the $3-billion expansion of Disneyland in Anaheim.”

Mary Jones, once Disneyland’s manager of community affairs, plans to visit Italy and England after she visits France. “I have family there,” she says. “And my husband, Wes, and I don’t get to Europe very often.”

Also taking the trip is Gerald Garner, chairman of the board of American Commerce National Bank in Anaheim. “I actually won this trip in an auction to benefit the Orange County Sports Assn. last summer,” says Garner, chairman of a June benefit for the Jewish National Fund that will honor Lindquist. He paid $10,000 to attend. “Come to think of it, I think the money I bid only paid for the air fare . I still have to pay for the ground portion.”

No problem, says Garner, who will take his wife, Joan, on the trip. “For me, this will be a nice little chunk of history. It isn’t everyday you get to see Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck become French.”