Unforgiving Outlaws Say Oscars Are Not Only Show in Town

Frankly, there were some who didn’t give a damn.

At San Bernardino’s Sturgos Center for Fine Arts, concerns whether Clint Eastwood would finally be taken seriously were eclipsed by worries over the fate of the razorback sucker.

At the All-Star Lanes bowling alley in Eagle Rock, Patrick Landry was more excited about a 7-10 split than he was about the best original song.

And at Charlie O’s Lounge at 5th and Spring streets, a man named Tony stared silently into the mirror behind the cash register, ignoring a blaring jukebox at one end of the bar and a flickering television set at the other.

“The Academy Awards?” he said after a long pause. “I don’t care a ding doo diddly about the Academy Awards.”

While the televised awards ceremonies occupied center stage at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and in millions of homes across America on Monday night, there were a few renegades in Southern California who pursued other interests.

Jan Matusak, manager of the Colorado River Resources Branch of the Metropolitan Water District, was among those who volunteered to skip the Oscar telecast and attend a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service meeting in San Bernardino.

The topic was the wildlife service’s plan to designate the Colorado River Basin habitat for four endangered species of fish--the razorback sucker, the Colorado squawfish, the humpback chub and the bonytail chub.

“I volunteered because I think it’s an important issue,” Matusak said. “But I’m a movie fan. I’ll hear who the winners are on the radio. It would be a boring trip home without the radio.”

In Eagle Rock, Patrick Landry was warming up at the All-Star Lanes.

Squinting down the alley, Landry rolled a strike as Billy Crystal began his opening monologue at the Music Center.

“Hey, this is my bowling night,” shrugged the 21-year-old star of the Scud Bud Bowling League. Besides, he added, “the Oscars don’t interest me much. You don’t see any of those celebrities coming down the street in my neighborhood, stopping by just to say hello.”

Cherie Lebrun, president of the L.A. West Gray Panthers, said she did not mind skipping the awards ceremonies on television to listen to the presentations of Santa Monica Police Chief James T. Butts and actor Peter Bonerz at the Ken Edwards Center in Santa Monica.

“The subject of our meeting is gun violence and the aftermath of traumatic injuries,” Lebrun said. “Movies glamorize violence. That’s why we need meetings like these.”

In the barren lobby of the gracelessly aging Barclay Hotel at 4th and Main streets, two men called Ted and Gordo sat quietly athwart a battered table, oblivious to the television set at the far end of the room.

“I have no interest in the awards,” Gordo said quietly. “You can’t eat one. You can’t sleep with one. So what good are they?”

Tony, the solitary drinker at Charlie O’s, looked a little surprised when asked what he preferred to watching the Oscar show.

“This,” he said, ordering another drink. “This is what I’m gonna do tonight.”

On the other side of town, Carrie Biggs-Adams, who helped set up a forum for mayoral candidates Monday night at the St. Joseph the Worker Church Hall in Canoga Park, admitted that skipping the Oscars “was a major commitment from me because I’m a television engineer.”

She said the meeting--during which candidates Richard Riordan, Nate Holden, Richard Katz and Joel Wachs argued their cases--was not scheduled to end until about 9:30 p.m., about the same time that the Oscar telecast was supposed to end, “and that means we’re all going to miss the whole show.”

“But that’s OK,” Biggs-Adams said. “I’ve got to believe these elections are far more important than who’s going to win an Academy Award.”

Times staff writers Shawn Hubler and Bob Pool contributed to this story.