Warner Bros. Holds Party for Needy Kids

It’s not that foster mother Leslee Johnson doesn’t like to take her six children out to have fun. It’s just so expensive, with that many tickets to buy and mouths to feed.

“We don’t go out to lunch. We don’t go out to dinner. We don’t go out to theme parks,” the West Covina woman said. “With six children, there is nowhere we can go.”

But on Sunday, her entire family--along with more than 10,000 other underprivileged children and their parents, foster parents, guardians or chaperons--enjoyed themselves for hours at a makeshift amusement park at a movie back lot in Burbank, without any concern of having to pay for rides, food or drinks.

This year, Warner Bros. decided to extend its annual carnival-like employee holiday party to needy families across the Southland. The employee event was held Saturday, and volunteers from Warner and Sacks Productions Event Management, the party planner, staffed the free concession stands, rides and booths the next day.

“To us this is like a miracle,” Johnson said.

Hosting a holiday party for needy families “was something the people of Warner Bros. wanted to do,” said Barry Meyer, the company’s chairman and chief executive officer.

“All kids are entitled to have a good time during the holiday season, not just privileged kids.”

Across the sprawling 50-acre Warner Bros. Ranch campus, Ferris wheels, a petting zoo, fun houses and carnival games had seemingly sprung up between familiar movie and TV sets. The children’s invitations were arranged through social service agencies, community groups and charitable organizations.

Pulling wisps of cotton candy off a paper cone and eating them, David, a 13-year-old from Long Beach, said he liked the rides, but for him the best part was the free food. In three hours he downed two candy apples, two sodas and a dish of nachos in addition to two cotton candies.

“Watching these children’s faces is so rewarding,” said Leslie Griffith, an administrator with the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services. “To enjoy a fair, to eat as much candy as they want, to ride whatever they want . . . it gives these children a chance to do something they never get to do.”

Hermelinda Aranda, a grandmother from Whittier, said she found out about the party through their family social worker.

“It’s really neat,” she said of the carnival, described by her 8-year-old granddaughter Ashley as “Disneyland, but smaller.”

“Especially near the holidays, a lot of kids aren’t with parents. [This party] picks up their spirits,” Aranda said.