A Belle Readies for the Ball : With Its Image on the Line, Atlanta Tries to Put Its Best Face Forward With a Little Help From a Hollywood Game Show Host or Two

This city spent almost two years trying to find a slogan and marketable image in time for the Summer Olympics. The winner? “Atlanta: Come Celebrate Our Dream.”

But judging from all the Hollywood hoopla and the television personalities flitting around town these days, you would think the city had settled on “Los Angeles East.”

The hosts of “Wheel of Fortune” and “Jeopardy!,” the official Olympic game shows, have been in town taping tie-in programs; Emmy-award winning producer Don Mischer is here designing the opening and closing ceremonies, and John Williams, who composed the music for “Star Wars,” “Jurassic Park” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” recently unveiled the official Olympic theme music via satellite hookup from Los Angeles.

If that’s Vanna White, this must be Atlanta.

One hundred days before the start of the Summer Olympic Games, the host city seems to have an identity crisis--again.

Olympic and city officials hope that will be the only crisis they face between now and the Games, scheduled for July 19-Aug. 4.

Almost from the day it was announced the city would host the event, Atlanta has been gripped with insecurity over whether it is sophisticated enough, exciting enough, pretty enough or safe enough to host two million visitors from around the world.

Large crowds tend to trip up the city. Atlanta is brought to its knees each April when a mere 200,000 college students come to cruise, drink and get rowdy during an annual spring bacchanal known as Freaknik. Businesses shut down, residents leave town and it can take an hour for cars to move three blocks through the heavy traffic. Locals, already tense over this year’s onslaught, which begins on April 19, have a hard time envisioning a gathering larger than that.

There also is concern about the quality of Olympic construction. Worried about safety, workers temporarily abandoned a construction site last month after a five-ton truss fell from a roof being built over a seating area for an outdoor pool. No one was hurt, but the accident happened almost a year to the day after a light tower buckled at the Olympic stadium, killing one iron worker.

The worker’s family has filed a lawsuit against the designers and the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games for unspecified damages.

The incidents, along with the discovery last summer that dormitories being built for the Olympic Village were sinking as much as nine inches more than expected, have raised questions about whether corners are being cut in the rush to complete construction.

Competing lawsuits have been filed concerning shoddy workmanship and cost overruns, but Olympic organizers maintain the venues are safe. Billy Payne, ACOG president, says his only worry, aside from whether international tensions will boil over and affect the participation of all 197 countries included in the Olympic movement, is the scorching summer sun.

“I wonder how close we are going to come to my prediction of 75 degrees in the summer,” he said, referring to the rather optimistic estimate he gave to the International Olympic Committee when Atlanta first bid for the Games. “The things I worry about are things we really don’t control.”

One such thing is controversy that might detract from the carefully crafted image the city seeks to project. Payne’s protestations aside, civic boosters view the Games as the ultimate marketing tool--hence the new slogan, which is being promoted through a reported $4-million marketing blitz.

In designing the all-important opening and closing ceremonies, Mischer said he spent two years talking with local people about the tone and content. While there will be nods to the international nature of the event, he said his goal is to reflect the “grace, beauty and diversity” of the American South while portraying Atlanta as “the world-class city that it is.”

Image makers walk a tightrope because the city’s identification with “Gone With The Wind” and the antebellum South seems at odds with present-day Atlanta, with its predominantly African-American population.

One controversy Olympic organizers hope to sidestep involves display of the Confederate battle emblem, which is incorporated into the Georgia state flag. By law, the flag must fly over state-owned venues. Opponents of the flag have promised to protest, but Payne is intent on staying above the fray. “We don’t have a dog in that fight,” he said. “We follow the law.”

Unlike Los Angeles, which netted a $236 million profit from hosting the 1984 Games, Atlanta organizers are operating with only a small margin of safety--$13 million, according to auditors. In Los Angeles--the only other city to stage the Olympics without government underwriting--the Games were mostly held in existing facilities. But $500 million is being spent on new Olympic venues in Atlanta.

Organizers still have not raised all of the $1.7 billion they need to stage the Games but expect to raise the remaining $195 million through ticket sales, broadcast rights and joint ventures.

The Atlanta Games are being called the most commercial in history. Corporate sponsors are largely financing it. Companies that gave $4 million to sponsor the Los Angeles Olympics were asked for $40 million for the Atlanta Games.

When game show producer Merv Griffin came to town March 28 with Alex Trebek, the host of “Jeopardy!,” and Pat Sajak and Vanna White of “Wheel of Fortune,” everyone involved seemed compelled to explain why television shows would sponsor the Olympics. They called the shows “the Olympics of the mind.” They talked of shared ideals. Trebek compared the athletes’ hard work with the way contestants prepare for his show.

In the end, however, Sajak admitted that the wildly popular programs had become sponsors because they thought it would boost viewership.