A Valley Filled With Monumental Efforts

“I don’t get it,” Deputy Mayor Barbie muttered. “What the heck is Spider-Man doing up there?”

It was a bit puzzling. This was Thursday and we were standing outside the newly reconstructed and reopened Bullock’s at the Northridge Fashion Center. The mall that nature had busted up like a dollhouse was back in business. But why, exactly, was this giant inflated Spider-Man, this goofy parade balloon, looming high above?

“Maybe,” I ventured, “he’s supposed to be a symbol of resilience and survival.”

The deputy mayor frowned. If I know Barbie, she’d have rather been inside, accessorizing. Instead, my old friend--recruited to the Riordan Administration from the mayor’s old haunt, Mattel Inc., to handle damage control for Hizzoner--was busy showing the mayoral flag.

“A symbol of nothing is more like it,” Barbie replied. “It’s just a spectacle, that’s all. If anything, he’s a symbol of impermanence. Here today, gone tomorrow. Get me a BB gun and I’ll show you how resilient our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man is.”

I shrugged, forgetting that Barbie was standing on my shoulder. Barbie slipped but reached out and snatched my right earlobe in the nick of time.

“Sorry,” I said.

To get better footing, Barbie dug her sharp little toes into the flesh behind my collarbone.

“This is bogus,” she said. “The Valley doesn’t need irrelevant balloon super-heroes. The Valley deserves real tributes to its heritage. I mean, Spider-Man never even lived in the Valley, did he? He’s a skyscraper kind of guy. Why doesn’t the Valley honor its own? Where’s the public art around here? Where are the monuments? No wonder people over the hill say we’re a cultural wasteland.”

I didn’t like her tone, so I reached over and held her in my fist, the way King Kong held Fay Wray, to teach her a lesson about the Valley’s cultural attractions.

That very day, I reminded her, my column described how “Fernando,” a statue at the Van Nuys Civic Center that serves as the mythic symbol of the Valley’s first resident, had inspired a battle between Valley community leaders. Some wanted to move the lean, muscular 6-foot, 11-inch Native American to Woodland Hills and some wanted him to stay put.

“I read it,” Barbie said. “And as I recall, the former city arts director compared Fernando to a bowling trophy.”

Yes, Barbie’s a great one for cheap shots. But I had a rebuttal.

“Tell me: How can Fernando look like a bowling trophy if he doesn’t have a bowling ball?”

Well, that shut her up. So I took the opportunity to enlighten Barbie about some other local treasures often overlooked by cultural snobs. We have a fine Father Serra near the San Fernando Mission, and there’s the Seven Dwarfs over at Disney. And the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in North Hollywood is a veritable trove. In its courtyard Barbie would find statues, busts and bas-reliefs of such notables as Jack Benny, Lucille Ball, Milton Berle, Sid Caesar, Rod Serling, Jackie Gleason, Johnny Carson, Bill Cosby, Mary Tyler Moore. . . .

“We’re bound to get a Roseanne someday,” I noted.

Deputy Mayor Barbie nodded, but I wasn’t finished.

“You know what?” I went on. “I bet you think Burbank was named after Luther. It wasn’t. It was named after its founder, Dr. David Burbank. He was a dentist. You’ll find his bust at the Burbank Public Library. And I bet you didn’t know that Amelia Earhart used to live around here. We’ve got a statue of her at North Hollywood Park.”

Barbie squirmed and I loosened my grip. Now I had her, quite literally, in the palm of my hand.

“Have you seen Amelia lately?” she asked. “She’s not looking too good. She really deserves better care, don’t you think? She and Fernando, too.

“Listen, I’d love to see a Roseanne go up. A statue, I mean. Not a balloon. All I meant was that the Valley deserves something more than a brief appearance by an inflatable Spider-Man. Recovering from the earthquake is no small feat. We’ve got another shopping mall back! We deserve more.”

“Such as . . . “

“Such as a tribute to the real essence of the Valley. I mean, we invented mall culture. We gave the world the Valley Girl. Yes, she’s hackneyed, but now she’s everywhere. A statue won’t do. Just imagine if all our malls and gallerias created their own interactive Valley Girl holograms. Shoppers could line up to seek fashion advice, or just directions to the nearest shoe store. Or maybe we could do a virtual reality thing--a Virtual Val.

“I’m not saying we should abandon traditional sculpture. I just think it should be more relevant. Like, can’t you just imagine a giant Michael Eisner looming beside the Ventura Freeway, twirling the globe on his fingertip like a basketball?”

Yes, I could see it too: Michael Eisner as an effortless Atlas. What a guy!

We headed for the toy store. The deputy mayor was standing on a shelf, checking out the new ensembles when somebody bumped into the display.

Barbie was knocked off her feet. She didn’t know what happened. There was fear in her eyes. “Aftershock?” she asked.

I assured her that everything was OK, but she seemed edgy.

“There’s at least one memorial we could do without,” she said.

“What’s that?”

“The Tomb of the Unknown Shopper.”

Scott Harris’ column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.