‘92 Democratic Convention : Actress Makes Her Convention Debut : Politics: Academy Award winner and liberal activist Mary Steenburgen is visiting New York as a Clinton delegate from Ventura County.

Mary Steenburgen had arrived here only hours earlier and already she was in the thick of it, mingling with feminist and Latino activists in a crowded, art-filled 5th Avenue apartment.

The Academy Award-winning actress, one of Ventura County’s nine delegates at the Democratic National Convention, was the center of attention from the minute she entered the room.

For weeks, Steenburgen had anticipated this moment, which she likened to “standing on a road and seeing a small figure getting closer and closer, and as it gets near you realize that it’s a giant.”

As the Democrats gather here this week, Steenburgen will be playing many roles.

She is one of the more celebrated delegates for presumptive Democratic nominee Bill Clinton. She is also an activist in her own right--stumping for abortion rights, civil rights, increased AIDS research and women candidates for public office.

But what makes this week particularly meaningful for Steenburgen is her close friendship with Bill and Hillary Clinton. The Arkansas native has campaigned around the country with both Clintons, is staying with the candidate’s entourage here and plans to accompany Hillary Clinton to various events.

“This is one of the more interesting, exciting experiences in my life,” Steenburgen said a bit breathlessly, her face framed by curly black hair. “I’ve tried not to come with too many preconceived notions--just to be open to it and to learn from the whole thing.”

The 39-year-old Steenburgen has gained renown primarily by playing sweet, quirky characters in such movies as “The Butcher’s Wife,” “Parenthood” and “Miss Firecracker.” She won an Academy Award for best supporting actress in the 1980 film “Melvin and Howard.”

But the Ventura County resident has also established a reputation in politically active Hollywood as an actress who will go to bat for the things she believes in.

“Mary is a true trooper,” said Kathy Garmezy, executive director of the Hollywood Policy Center, which handles issues and media for the Hollywood Women’s Political Committee.

“The bottom line is that Mary is basically someone you can count on. She has not hesitated to call people she knows to say, ‘I would really love to have you involved.’ . . . She’s not a prima donna.”

In addition to her involvement with the women’s committee, Steenburgen was one of the first Anglo entertainers to join with black actors Danny Glover and Alfre Woodard in 1989 to start Artists for a Free South Africa. The organization was created to work against apartheid but has expanded its mandate to deal with racial issues in the United States as well.

Steenburgen traces her concern with race relations to her experience growing up in segregated Arkansas, the daughter of a freight train conductor and public school secretary. This was a time and place, she says, that bred “change agents,” among whom she counts both herself and Bill Clinton.

“When she was growing up, she would ask her daddy things about why certain people were treated differently,” said fellow actress and activist Christine Lahti. “Her parents were both very generous and aware people in terms of class and racial injustice.”

When Steenburgen talks about abortion, it is often related to her own children. Both 11-year-old Lilly and 9-year-old Charlie were born during her marriage to British actor Malcolm McDowell. The couple divorced three years ago.

Steenburgen expressed her feelings about the issue on the CBS public-affairs show “Face the Nation” last April after marching in the massive abortion-rights rally in Washington.

She had come to the nation’s capital, in part, “because I’m a mother of two children, one of whom’s a daughter, and I want to be able to look her in the eye and say that your mom did everything she could to help protect the rights that I grew up with.

“I would like to think that in America, as time goes on, you gain freedom, not lose freedom. And in my life, I have watched this freedom being eroded.”

She retains ties to Little Rock, where her mother and sister still live. She met the Clintons in the late 1970s through the Arkansas Children’s Hospital, which treats poor youngsters. She and Hillary Clinton both raise money for the institution.

The actress and the political couple became fast friends. Steenburgen and her daughter have gone on trips with Hillary Clinton and her daughter, Chelsea, who is 11. The Clintons have stayed at Steenburgen’s ivy-covered home in northern Ventura County. And, when Steenburgen needed to find a program for her disabled cousin, she turned to Bill Clinton for a referral.

During the tumultuous primary campaign, Steenburgen traveled with the Clintons in Illinois, appeared with them in Little Rock and Sacramento and hosted rallies for them in Los Angeles. She and Hillary Clinton have done television shows together. And she expects to do more of the same up until the election.

Not surprisingly, Steenburgen is defensive about the so-called character issues that plagued Bill Clinton during early campaign episodes. At issue were alleged marital infidelity and marijuana use and his draft record. She directs much of the blame toward television.

“This is somebody whose character I really know--not as a sort of media sculpture that was drawn, but rather as a real person,” Steenburgen said. “We’re all very fond of a black box in our living room that works on diminishment of images, that spoons somebody up in a very limited way. It can be a reduction at its worst.

“It was painful to watch somebody that I know as a whole person being picked apart and have people take really isolated moments or aspects in his life and construct a character out of them.”

She is equally unsympathetic toward the media’s handling of Hillary Clinton’s infamous “tea and cookies” line. She said that on two previous occasions she had heard the high-powered attorney specifically exhort feminist groups not to automatically exclude from their ranks women who choose to stay home to raise their children.

“She was asked about the appropriateness of a woman working in a state where her husband was governor,” Steenburgen said. “She said that she had gone out of her way to be sure there was no conflict. She said she guessed that she could have stayed at the governor’s mansion and given teas and baked cookies. It was real specific about the role of the governor’s wife.”

Steenburgen was elected a delegate from the 23rd District in Ventura County during the June 2 California primary. This is her first convention, which she calls a chance to see beyond “these images of loads of people making lots of noise and wearing funny hats.”

She showed up at her first New York event--a Saturday-evening fund-raiser that she hosted for Anita Perez Ferguson, the Democratic congressional candidate in the 23rd District--with daughter Lilly in tow.

As traffic honked noisily below, she offered an impassioned pitch for Ferguson’s candidacy at the $75-a-head event. Supporters expected the benefit to raise about $5,000.

In addition to attending floor sessions this week, Steenburgen has a full schedule of interviews. She also plans to attend the array of caucuses, strategy sessions and parties along with fellow delegates.

The actress appeared every bit the trooper at parties Saturday and Sunday, aside from a panic-stricken moment when she temporarily lost her daughter during a welcoming reception at Macy’s. Lilly had wandered off to get some sushi.

With enthusiasm building here for her candidate’s prospects in November, Steenburgen acknowledged that the notion of cavorting in the White House has crossed her daughter’s mind.

“Every child in America fantasizes about running wild in the White House for a few minutes,” Steenburgen said.

And what about her?

“I’d like to see what’s not on the tour, that’s for sure,” she said.