Even the Event Kickoffs Are Glamorous
Kickoffs on the Los Angeles social scene do not refer to football. Rather, they are parties that signal something big is ahead. In the past few weeks, supporters of Otis College of Art and Design, the Music Center and the Doheny Eye Institute have hosted kickoffs for glamorous events with champagne, wine and hors d’oeuvres--all evenings of glamour themselves.
Racing: Doheny’s Luminaires and Luminaires Juniors honored patrons and announced their upcoming evening of “Glamour and Night Racing” at Hollywood Park on May 10. The Chanel Boutique on North Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills underwrote a sumptuous cocktail party, valet parking and a show of highlights of the Chanel spring/summer ready-to-wear collection.
Spotlight: At the Music Center Spotlight Awards kickoff, Fraternity of Friends hosted a reception at Hunsaker/Schlesinger Gallery in Santa Monica to reveal plans to honor 12 talented Southern California high school students who will compete for $45,000 in scholarships at an awards ceremony April 23 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Telesis Foundation will host the competition, and Helen and Peter Bing will provide the scholarships. Producers of the show will be Walter Grauman and A.J. Carothers. Peggy Parker Grauman will chair the gala with assistance from Helen Bing, Anne Johnson, Fredric M. Roberts and Nicholas T. Goldsborough. For that kickoff, Fraternity President Mike Roos saluted the 150 members and Music Center donors attending. The benefit goal is $125,000.
Fashion Futures: To kick off the 14th annual Critics Awards Fashion Show gala for Otis College of Art and Design on April 20 at the Beverly Hilton, Betty and Maury Leonard recently hosted cocktails at their home to fete benefit chairwoman Nancy Vreeland and Rosemary Brantley, chairwoman of the Otis fashion design department. Designer Richard Tyler served as guest mentor this year to the 16 Otis students who will be showing their collections at the Hilton. Tyler and his business partner/wife, Lisa Trafficante, will receive the Otis Entrepreneurs of the Year Award, and Diana Troup, senior vice president of Barbie Worldwide at Mattel Toys, will receive the Otis Fashion Achievement Award. Tickets are $300.
High Tech: Each year the California Museum of Science and Industry and the trustees of the California Museum Foundation honor the California Industrialist of the Year and the California Scientist of the Year. This year Kent Kresa, chairman, president and CEO of Northrop Grumman (and a whiz, with his wife, Joyce, at roller-blading), was the honored industrialist. Two scientists shared the prize--Dr. Richard A. Lerner, president of the Scripps Research Institute, and Peter G. Schultz, UC Berkeley professor of chemistry and senior scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Northrop is a leading designer, systems integrator and manufacturer of bomber, fighter and surveillance aircraft as well as commercial and military precision weapons, space systems and electronics and information systems.
The scientists have separately explored catalytic antibodies (not Cadillac auto bodies, as was thought in one boardroom preceding a presentation on their work) and it’s rumored the pair are Nobel Prize material. It’s thought that their groundbreaking research on converting antibodies into enzymes and on enzymes targeting molecules to generate faster enzyme reactions has major applications for disease and for food production.
Dinner co-chairmen were Roy A. Anderson, Paul V. Colony and Marvin Elkin.
Kudos: To Andrea Van de Kamp, the first woman to head the Music Center Board of Governors since Dorothy Buffum Chandler, who became the first chairwoman when the Music Center opened in 1964. Currently the board is overseeing the Unified Fund Campaign headed by Sam Bell with a goal of $9.6 million.
Princess: The flowing-haired Princess Ira Von Furstenberg was the center of attention when John Martens, vice president and general manager of Neiman Marcus, hosted a Club Room luncheon in her honor and displayed her collection of decorative objects--coral, semi-precious stones decorating crystal and brass art objects. In the invited coterie were Dona Kendall, Joan Hotchkis (going to the Hotchkis house at St. Malo, France, for Easter), Kelly Day (she and husband Robert are hosting a dinner to say farewell to the Bistro Garden) and Baroness Sandra di Portanova of Acapulco.
Elsewhere on the Social Circuit
They say that the 10th annual Genesis Awards at the Beverly Hilton was the largest vegetarian function ever catered by the hotel--1,232 plates. The event was presented by the Ark Trust, a national nonprofit animal protection organization, to give awards to news and entertainment media for spotlighting animal protection issues. Celebrity presenters were Courtney Thorne-Smith (“Melrose Place”) and Murray the dog (“Mad About You”). Gretchen Wyler was event chairwoman and Dennis Franz and Leeza Gibbons co-hosted the awards. Among recipients was the movie “Babe.”
* In 1991 golfer Shelley Hamlin was found to have breast cancer. She’s had to re-earn her membership in the tour division of the Ladies Professional Golf Assn. And, she was the star of the show when the first USC/Norris Golf Clinic was held at San Gabriel Country Club to benefit Norris Cancer Center’s breast cancer research. Lorna Reed, a cancer survivor herself, helped organize the event.
* Mary Lou Loper’s column is published Sundays.
