Old Globe Unveils Creative Center at Gala

All the world’s a stage--and many of the major players seem to have written hefty underwriting checks.

The Old Globe Theatre played host to its annual Founders’ Gala on Monday evening, an affair vastly ritzier than usual because the event celebrated the “premiere showing” of the new Jeannie Rivkin Creative Center.

Honorees included dozens of the deeply pocketed who dug deeply to endow the theater with a showy, grandly theatrical new complex of offices, conference rooms and public spaces.

The design, appropriately stagy, runs to whimsicality in the gilt-capped Corinthian pillars outside the trio of offices occupied by the theater’s trinity of producers and directors: Craig Noel, Jack O’Brien and Tom Hall. In the board room, the triomphe l’oeil ceiling changes from dusk to darkest night; turn on the lights and the stars appear.

The stars of the 5-year-old Advancement Campaign who paid for the new offices and who will fund other major additions turned out for the gala, which proceeded with a few speeches, much Champagne, free-wheeling tours and a splashier-than-most dinner dance.

Quite a few guests made a beeline for the new office of Artistic Director O’Brien, who had at that moment flown in from New York after the previous night’s Tony Awards ceremonies, at which he did not--to great local disappointment--win honors as best director of a play for his “Two Shakespearean Actors.” Parked in his office, however, framed and ready to be hung, was the Tony nomination.

O’Brien turned the Broadway results into a compliment to the guests. In an after-dinner address, he told the crowd, “This is my favorite social evening of the year, because--and I mean this--all the work that gets done here, all that we do, we do especially for you Founders because you do so much for us. For me, this event is the prize. Coming home to have dinner with my family is the best prize ever devised. You are my Tony.”

The audience cheered, paused to reconsider the speech and cheered a second time.

Special honors were given to the late Helen Edison, whose bequest made possible the new gift shop that bears her name.

“It’s a very nice gift shop, and it’s fitting that a gift shop should be Helen’s final gift to the Globe. She was responsible for the rebuilding of the theater, as the major donor after the fire,” Executive Producer Noel said, referring to the 1978 blaze that destroyed the original structure. “She was always looking for ways to promote the Globe so that fund-raising wouldn’t be such a drain on everybody, and we convinced her that a gift shop would bring in several hundred thousand dollars a year and be a lucrative source of income for us.”

Edison’s son, Bill Edison of Elk, Calif., attended the event and said it was his mother’s “last dream to build the shop. I’m sorry she didn’t get to see it, but I know it would please her.”

Globe President Bobbie Quick described the party as “the culmination of five years’ work by some incredibly dedicated people,” but said the process continues. “This is just the first phase,” she said. “There’s much more to come, and since we have many generous donors, we’ll be having more of these lovely evenings.”

The generous donors at this particular lovely evening finally settled on the Lowell Davies Festival Stage, tented under clear plastic, strewn with oversized confetti and vigorously populated by a band that rocked along between the courses of tricolored ravioli, poached chicken breasts and gateau marjolaine, catered by the Sheraton Harbor Island.

Guests included Jeannie and Art Rivkin, Mary and Dallas Clark, Mary Adams, Suzanne and John Berol, Ken Rearwin, Evelyn and Tom Page, Leslie Fox, Celeste and Gene Trepte, Sally and John Thornton, Valerie and Brad Tuck, newlyweds Lisa and Donald McVay, Evelyn Truitt, Dixie and Ken Unruh, Irene and Sylvan Cooper, Blaine Quick, Lyn and Stephen Krant, Susan and Bill Rick, Katy and Mike Dessent, Alice and Terry Churchill, Darlene Davies and Paul Marshall, Jinx Ecke, Susan and Dee Lew, Jane and John Barrons, Marilyn and Sam Young and Darlene and Donald Shiley.

LA JOLLA--The Coronado Speed Spinners Jump Rope Team (a group of youngsters who know the ropes, as it were), gave the 420 guests at Saturday’s annual Royal Heart Ball a quick, lively demonstration of skipping with a purpose--and with a beat.

Sponsored by the American Heart Assn., the ball dedicated itself to children by choosing the theme “San Diego’s Children--America’s Heartbeat,” and dedicated a portion of the $45,000 in net earnings to the AHA’s “schoolsite” educational program, which teaches youths the benefits of exercise and a healthy diet. Funds also will be devoted to cardiovascular research.

Given at the Sheraton Grande Torrey Pines hotel, America’s Heartbeat combined a bright red, white and blue theme with other performances by children, including a serenade by a choral group from the Valencia Park Center for Academics, Drama and Dance, and a display of heart proactive posters drawn by about 300 schoolchildren.

Of the youthful diversions, co-chair Susan Favrot said, “We’re trying to connect our ball-goers with where their money is going, not down some deep, dark hole, but to the kids. This is a first for the Royal Heart Ball in that we’re sponsoring one of the association’s most critical efforts, the schoolsite program.

Entertainments on the more adult side of the spectrum included silent and live auctions, dancing to the Mar Dels and an AHA-approved dinner of “heart healthy” chicken sausage, petite filet of beef and a variation on apple pie.

Participants included co-chairs Cindy Gowland and Kathyann Marsh, Richard and Patty Brooks, David and Jan Markiewicz, Steve and Cathy McNeil, Sue Ebner with Jeff Herman, Cindy Stuenkel and Brian Jaski, Guy and Fran Curtis, Wickliffe and Kathy Peterson, Jerome and Pamela Robinson and Howard Shiflett.

An uncooperative case of laryngitis deprived the guests at the May 27 underwriters’ party for the upcoming Jewel Ball of any of the patented “Colemanisms” from San Diego Padre announcer Jerry Coleman, who, for the evening, was content to (silently) play the role of husband of ball co-chair Maggie Coleman.

“If I don’t get my voice back by the next game,” he whispered, “I’ll just go fishing.”

Coleman’s voice was the only one not raised in gleeful anticipation of “It’s Your Move,” the 46th annual Jewel Ball, to be given Aug. 8 at its perennial site, the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club. Chairman Tricia Kellogg outlined what will be different about this year’s event, namely, the games theme, which will invite guests to play billiards, caroms, Scrabble, checkers, Parcheesi, lawn croquet and even pick-up-sticks in between listening to big-name entertainment and dining on a multi-course formal supper.

“The games are a shot of adrenaline to the party scene,” she said. “For those who say there’s nothing to do at a ball, there will be something to do.”

The cocktail buffet, given at home by Las Patronas member Nina Doede and her husband, arts benefactor Robert Doede, entertained principal underwriters of the lavish summer event, especially local Tiffany’s chief Mary Swanby. The jewelers have earmarked a reported $50,000 in underwriting and will design the centerpieces and table settings.

“After much study of who we should contribute to in San Diego, we decided that the Jewel Ball affects the most charities and helps the most people,” Swanby said. “We liked that idea.”

The ball annually selects a list of major and minor beneficiaries; among 1992 majors are Mercy Hospital, the La Jolla Cancer Research Foundation, Scripps Clinic and the San Diego Museum of Art.

Underwriters and principal committee members included Doris and Dirk Broekema, Elspeth and James Myer, Peggy and Peter Preuss, Bea and Bob Epsten, Charmaine and Maury Kaplan, Brooke Sheridan, Tricia McMaster, Lori and Dan Askew, Chris and Douglas Evans, Molleen and Ken McCain, Kathy and Mark Robinson, Melesse and Bob Traylor, Sukey Beasley, Patty and Don Gravette and Anne and Peter Smith.