Frocks and Frills at Every Turn

It’s sad the way some traditions fall apart and vanish. But not The Bachelors Ball, with a capital T. Nonagenarian next year, the organization staged a grandiose “From Russia With Love, a Night in the Winter Palace” in the Beverly Hilton Hotel on Friday evening.

A crowd of nearly 600 came frocked in fancy dress, danced with abandon and generally overindulged as only the young can. It’s something the group has done each year for 89 years since a small group of single men collaborated to host a party to return social invitations. This was before men cooked.

Mind you, the ball is not a simple costume party. It’s fancy--as in Renaissance, swarthy riverboat gambler, Elvis in sequins, King Ferdinand, Queen Isabella. Bo Peep and her lost sheep were there--Megan McKenney and Drew Planting--he kept dropping his fleece (and picking it up) on the dance floor.

Guests entered to the Russian anthem, viewed chandeliers brought in for the party, supped on borscht and were served mandarin orange parfait with vodka sauce by waiters parading to Tchaikovsky’s “Waltz of the Flowers.” All before the Russian dancers performed.

Ball chairman Steve Leland as Czar Nicholas, escorting Madalyn Seyer, as Alexandra, seemed quietly jubilant.

“The ball is better than ever,” said Robert Carpenter (a mandarin Imperial), escorting his wife, Janice (Pocahontas), a ball patroness. He was Bachelors president 30 years ago.

Said 1964 ball chairman Tom Kranz, whose wife, Travis, also was invited to be a patroness: “It’s like Mardi Gras.” Kranz noted that the ball was elegant in the ‘50s and ‘60s, turned minimalist in the ‘70s and has returned to its old grandeur.

The most au courant costumes were a jailbird “Jeff Gillooly” in stripes escorting “Nancy Kerrigan” in bandage--Scott Brittingham and his fiancee, Ella McCormick.

There was power in numbers: Bachelor Michael Flynn brought his table of guests, including date Janna Steele, in “Out of Africa” safari outfits. He had rented his hat in Queens and his jacket in Soho, before escaping the New York blizzard for the party. Hugh Hinton Evans III brought a table of friends--wild in pink bridesmaids dresses. Bachelor Boyd Smith’s table was a colorful mass of Mardi Gras jesters--Karen Sundry, Carole Klove and Bro Morris included--with floral plumes and poppers and balloons.

Before the ball, King Ferdinand/Bachelors President Arthur Hamilton Rasmussen Jr., senior associate for CB Commercial, presented white floral bouquets to patronesses including Ann Barrett (with husband, Olin, a former Bachelors president), Penne (with Bill) Durst and Kacey (with Peter) McCoy at a pre-party in a suite at the hotel.

Prominent during the evening: Bachelors secretary Robert M.L. Baker III, a riverboat gambler, with saloon girl Tammy Karpenko; George Hotaling III and his fiancee, Bernadette Hartfield; pirates Tony Manos and Sheryl Rados; Venetian-masked Bob Forward; royals Tom Blumenthal and Kerry Harker; bee and sunflower, Ken Funsten and Stephanie DeQuis; sheriff David Ludwick and Indian maiden Julia Coppersmith; Aladdin Mark Kelsey with Joanne Clark; an Alice in Wonderland Lucy Hartford with Mad Hatter Derek Bell, and a Swiss pair, Sheryl Hadley and Geoff Lands.

About 2 a.m., the party broke for French onion soup and chocolate chip cookies and milk.

Three of the Bachelors--Brad Farwell, Al Jarrin and Derek Bell--couldn’t get enough. They were catching an early morning flight to New Orleans for Mardi Gras.

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Weeping Women: The expressive tortured faces in the exhibition “Picasso and the Weeping Women: The Years of Marie-Therese Walter and Dora Maar” premiering at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, captured the creative attention of nearly 1,000 first nighters.

Said museum curator Stephanie Barron: “This show is a terrific boost”--especially, she pointed out, following on the heels of the recent good news that the museum would receive long-term financial support from Los Angeles County and the news of the acquisition of the May Company parking lot adjacent to the museum.

The exhibition, which next goes to New York’s Metropolitan and the Art Institute of Chicago, is made possible by PaineWebber. Said PaineWebber’s Mike Davis: “The arts provoke creative thinking, which is fundamental to our lives and to the way we do business.” PaineWebber Chairman and prominent art devotee Donald Marron of New York wasn’t able to attend.

William Mingst, who will soon become the L.A. museum’s new chairman, substituted for chairman Rob Maguire. Mingst said: “Los Angeles County Museum finds itself poised to step into the next century as a leading art center.”

Show curator Judi Freeman captured the attention of art-goers in one gallery as she analyzed, “Change the word from Sarajevo to Guernica, and essentially the same series of events took place.” But, she said, there is hope, “because show the image--the victims--and people will take action.”

Prominent collectors attending included JoAnn and Julian Ganz, Betty Asher, Max Palevsky and Marion Smooke.

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Psychiatric Advice: Charles Schulz said, “I love Charlie Brown--I would have liked him as a neighbor.” And the Colleagues loved creator-cartoonist Schulz--and Snoopy, Lucy, Linus, et al--this week at a love-in/Valentine’s Day luncheon. Good grief! More than five-cents worth of psychiatric advice was absorbed by 600 women as Schulz complimented Colleagues (headed by Ann Petroni) on their longtime efforts for abused children. Neiman Marcus provided the stunning Valentino show of chiffon, lace, oversized straw hats, double ruffled skirts, fringe and marcelled hair.

Happy with results were luncheon co-chairs Anne Johnson and Betsy Bloomingdale. Barbara Davis and Mary Milner, both back from Nancy Davis’ $1.5 million-net Race for MS benefit in Aspen, pronounced the show romantic.

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Ah! Chanel: With the black Coromandel screens and the beige sofas reminiscent of her Paris apartment, the late Coco Chanel was almost with the intimate group of 70 or so women who clustered around tables set with pale tulips on pink damask.

At the gathering last week in the Parisian Rooftop Salon of the new Chanel Boutique in Beverly Hills, guests viewed the spring/summer Karl Lagerfeld Chanel collection, whispering about the youthful short and bare look. Barbara Cirkva, senior vice president of Chanel in New York, joined Arlette Thebault, Chanel executive here.