Ice Skating Rink Reopens but Glides Along in Obscurity

It’s business as usual at the Ice Chalet in Laurel Plaza, except that the rest of the mall resembles a ghost town and many former patrons don’t know the rink is operating again.

The North Hollywood mall took a hit during the Jan. 17 earthquake from which it has never recovered. There is talk of plowing the whole thing under rather than trying to restore it to its former state.

But that didn’t stop the chalet from reopening, unlike other longtime tenants. According to chalet manager Michael Robertson, the rink has been open for business for almost a month.

“We are still offering open skating, and hockey and figure skating lessons, with special rates for groups and a full-service snack bar,” he says enthusiastically.

But attendance is down from pre-quake days, and he’s not sure it will come back.

“Some skaters began training other places,” Robertson says, “and a lot of people don’t even know we are still here.” The uncertainty about the future of the mall is not helping.

It’s been like skating into the wind, the last few months.

The rink suffered minimal damage from the quake, but a new entrance had to be created, according to Robertson. “We are using the back entrance--what was the service entrance--on Oxnard (Street) now,” he says. He adds that a canopy has been put over the doors so people can spot it more easily. He’s hoping more skaters will beat a path to the new door.

As for the future of the mall, he says: “All we can do is hope the management people decide to let us stay here. The Ice Chalet has been in this location since 1986. This is the place Richard Dwyer trained for the Olympics. As a matter of fact, he’s still training here. He’s going out on tour soon.”

When Robertson is asked if the chalet’s future doesn’t look like it’s skating on thin ice, he says: “Well, I try not to think that way. I think this is a wholesome place that is good for the community, and if we can stay here, we will.”

Meanwhile, over at the Universal CityWalk, it looks like clear sailing . . . er, skating. The annual ice rink, which will be open through the holidays, has been set up next to the Universal City Cinemas, and skaters are now gliding over the ice.

What bills itself as Southern California’s only outdoor skating rink can accommodate up to 150 skaters this year, says manager Brian Klavano, who adds that skate rentals and skating lessons are offered as well.

There is also an observation deck for people who are watchers, not doers, those who have too much respect for the welfare of their person to put their ankles through this kind of unaccustomed grief.

Klavano says this year the rink is 50 by 80 feet, almost twice as big as last year, to make room for the expected crowds. “We get every level of expertise here from the first-time skater to Olympian Tiffany Chin. The idea is just to get out in the fresh air and have some fun,” he adds.

While Klavano doesn’t have to worry about anything as drastic as having his venue plowed out from under him, he does have to think about the weatherman.

Rain dampens even the most resolute outdoor skater’s resolution. Too much sunshine and the ice is like something left over from a Tequila Sunrise, he says.

Telling Stories in and Out of School

Acting coach Howard Schwartz has something to offer patrons of the Calabasas Farmers Market: a parking lot for kids instead of cars.

It’s for parents, frustrated by children who want to know if it’s time to go home yet. Schwartz has a corner of the market to tell the kids stories, while their parents prod the produce to their heart’s content.

He’s also volunteered his service in several Calabasas schools like Bay Laurel and Meadow Oaks in their creative storytelling endeavors.

He says it’s his way of getting known and saying thank you to the community at the same time.

Schwartz, who lives in Sherman Oaks, says Calabasas has been good to him. He opened an acting school about 1 1/2 years ago in the little arts center on Old Topanga Boulevard near Calabasas High School. He had 12 students then. Now, he says he has 150.

His community enthusiasm doesn’t stop at creative storytelling and school visits. He says he’s organizing the first Calabasas Community Cabaret to be held Dec. 16 and 17 at 8 p.m. at Calabasas High School.

He says all proceeds will benefit the arts enrichment programs of local schools.

Schwartz says he held open auditions for the show, but not all that many people showed up for them. “I had to go out and round up some talent,” he says. “Some professional talent didn’t feel they could donate their time,” he adds.

He did make one sensational find, he says: an 80-year-old comedienne. He encouraged an interview with her, but that will have to wait for another time.

When called, she was unavailable. Schwartz says she was probably out driving around in her tank.

Lack of Blood Not Funny to Red Cross

This is not something you’d want to do after, say, seeing “Interview With the Vampire,” but anyone looking for a good deed to do over the holiday season might check into the nearest Red Cross center and give blood.

According to Rick Bauer, director of donor recruitment for the Red Cross district that covers Los Angeles and Orange counties, it’s no joke that blood supplies are dangerously low.

“Hospitals expect us to be able to meet their needs for blood, and we are getting to the point where we are not always certain that we will be able to meet them,” Bauer says.

“It could come to the point when patient care is affected and procedures will have to be postponed.”

Bauer says the supply nationwide is down 10% from what it was last year. “Usually we have a good supply going into the holidays, which carries us over to the first of the year when people are not so busy with other things to think about giving blood. This year it just didn’t happen that way.”

Bauer says he was heartened, though, by the response of people to the unusual open houses for donors at Red Cross centers on Thanksgiving. “We tried to let people know about the situation and how dangerous it is, and they responded well,” he says.

“We hoped to get about 250 pints on Thanksgiving Day from collection points in Los Angeles and Orange counties. We collected 457 pints of blood,” he adds.

Bauer says that includes the 141 pints collected on Thanksgiving at Red Cross centers in Van Nuys, Burbank and Valencia. What made it so impressive to him, he says, was that these were all individuals who walked in to donate. There were no corporate blood drives in effect.

Bauer says he knows that if people realize how low the supply is that donations will pick up. In the meantime, he says he’s thankful for all those who visited centers Thanksgiving Day.

Overheard:

“My mother is Catholic and my father is Jewish, so I really make out during the holidays from both sides of my family. The only thing I guess I don’t have covered is Buddha’s birthday. Do you get presents for that?”

Eleven-year-old in his Studio City home to a visitor, who wondered whatever happened to the days when Christmas presents meant a sweater and a book.