Boxing of Olympic Proportions

This was a glorious night for the fighting city of Los Angeles. Turning back our clocks not an hour but to another age when this was, pound for pound, one of the great boxing towns in the business, Saturday night’s grand re- opening of the Grand Olympic Auditorium was like showtime at the Apollo. It had glamour, grandeur and so much entertainment that, well, the joint was jumping again, just like old times.

The fight card itself was a snappy and colorful one, from a boxing Elvis impersonator who got punched all the way down to the end of Lonely Street to the worth-waiting-for main event that featured another Oscar-winning performance by East L.A.’s golden boy, Oscar De La Hoya. ODLH won by TKO after spending 10 rounds turning the face of one Jimmi Bredahl the color of a ripe plum. (They should call him Jimm because the I is closed.)

The real star of the show, though, was the old hall itself. Seventy years ago, Jack Dempsey dug up the first shovel of dirt and Rudolph Valentino eventually sat ringside on opening night. When the doors swung open Saturday for the first time since 1987, champions of old from Ingemar Johansen to George Foreman took seats close to the action in their tuxes, several Hollywood heavyweights made themselves comfortable nearby and hundreds of old-fashioned fight fans occupied the balcony, filling the corner of 18th & Grand with familiar noise.

The Olympic was back in business.

What a swell place for a revival meeting. Spruced up, freshly scrubbed, wiped clean like a kid’s face full of peanut butter and jelly, the Olympic was shining again. This landmark where Gorgeous George once grappled and preened, where Sugar Ray Robinson and Gene Fullmer traded blows, where Depression era amateurs fought for Olympic gold and where L.A. Thunderbird roller-derby jammers cracked the whip, had sprung back to life, full of sound and fury and signifying a lot.

Simply stepping inside was a treat. It was like prying loose plywood boards from dark doorways, then sneaking on tiptoe into a great metropolitan museum of art, long since shut. On came the chandelier lights and all the paintings were suddenly alive, having a party. There against a wall sat Whistler’s mother, wearing stereo headphones, while a boy in blue stood wondering whether an earring would look cool with this outfit. Mona Lisa had a tattoo. It being the 1990s now, this was modern art.

Bob Arum, the fight promoter, compared the reopening of the Olympic to “reopening Ebbets Field to Dodger fans.”

Pretty apt. Of course, even in Los Angeles instead of Brooklyn, the Dodgers probably wouldn’t stick customers with the kind of ticket prices ol’ Bob did on this occasion, which probably accounted for the number of empty seats in the mezzanine. Not everybody who adores boxing has half a C-note sitting around in his or her wallet with nothing better to do.

This was a full evening’s entertainment, nevertheless. Once upon a time, the Olympic opened with a nice little 10-rounder between two flyweights, Jimmy McLarnin and Fidel LaBarba, that went the distance. For the opening of the new, improved Olympic, the inaugural opponents were a 266-pound Dane named Brian Nielsen who entered the ring wearing boxing trunks and a baseball cap and his opponent, a can of picante sauce named Ross Purity who hailed from Copenhagen’s sister city, El Paso.

Not much of a fight--Denmark fight fans will be happy to know their man won--but the fun was simply beginning.

Into the ring next stepped a character who was introduced as a Mr. Presley from Memphis, Tenn., who happened to be wearing a white cape sort of thing and thick black sideburns that began near his ear lobes and ended somewhere in the vicinity of his shoulders. Well, before you could count one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready and TKO, young Mr. Presley found himself with a unique horizontal view of the Olympic’s fine new ceiling lights. The referee stepped in and called off the concert.

By now, most of the 7,600 seats were filling up. There was a time when this was a room where anyone from Al Jolson to Barbara Stanwyck might be seen calling out encouragement to some pug. Boxing always did bring out the stars at night, and among those representing the arts this time were Ryan O’Neal (“The Main Event”) and Stan Shaw (“Harlem Nights”), both of whom portrayed fictional fighters on film; Cathy Moriarty (“Raging Bull”), who unforgettably played the non-fictional but equally unforgettable Vicki LaMotta, and, of course, Jack Nicholson, who generally prefers golf because it’s non-violent.

They all saw a pretty bloody scrap between James Toney and Tim Littles for the IBF super-middleweight championship, eventually won by Toney with a punch that sent Littles reeling backward as though struck by a bus.

Toney had a face full of red when it ended, the result of a head butt, and left Littles with these loving parting words, “I told you he was a bum.”

Then, on came Oscar.

Resplendent in gold, De La Hoya blew kisses and then put his hand to more practical purpose, lashing out at the face of Bredahl, who went down before George Foreman could swallow his first Dorito. But the young Dane was game. He got up, annoyed De La Hoya with a southpaw stance and got heavily into self-preservation, clinching whenever possible. This brought boos from the balcony--again, like old times.

When Bredahl was told after round 10 to give his poor purplish face the rest of the night off, De La Hoya celebrated by leaping onto every turnbuckle and waving to his many fans. Oscar said afterward, “It was a great honor to fight in the Olympic. My grandfather fought here and my father fought here. This was great for Los Angeles and myself.”

That it was.