Suddenly, O.C. Leads the Hip Parade

By Kimi Yoshino

July 19, 2003 12 AM PT

Times Staff Writer

Never a cloud in the sky. Always 75 degrees. Very interesting neighbors.

This is Orange County -- as seen by the Fox TV network, which this summer launches “The O.C.,” a new drama set in an “idyllic paradise

The series is the latest in a string of recent show-biz takes that are putting the county -- once known just for its quiet tracts of stuccoed homes and reliably Republican voters -- in a new light for national audiences. As last year’s teen comedy “Orange County” proclaimed: “It’s not just a place. It’s a state of mind.”

Add all that to the success of Anaheim’s Angels and Mighty Ducks and the booming surf industry, hit bands like No Doubt and brands like Quiksilver and Orange County’s once-bland image is experiencing an unlikely transformation.

It’s becoming hip.

USA Today recently anointed it the “new capital of cool.” The local convention bureau, seizing a chance to capitalize on the emerging perception, boasts: “It’s not your father’s or mother’s Orange County.”

Goodbye, John Wayne. Hola, Gwen Stefani.

But many of Orange County’s most plugged-in citizens say the new Hollywood image is no more true than the old. They say Orange County is indeed hip, but in a deeper sense -- and people outside its borders are beginning to notice.

“Culture is not something you can build or buy,” said Shaheen Sadeghi, who built the Lab, an eclectic retail center down the street from glossy South Coast Plaza that is considered the “anti-mall” for Orange County’s hipsters.

“It’s something that has to be seasoned.... In the last 10 years, we’ve gained respect within the music industry and the fashion industry and the lifestyle industry. I think a lot of the trend-setting, influential people are realizing that, ‘Hey, this is a fresh place to tap into.’ ”

While “The O.C.” and its cliched portrayal of tony Newport Beach is the county’s latest evidence of celebrity, its hipness has been quietly springing from far more diverse wells: Westminster’s booming Little Saigon and Santa Ana’s mercado, and a youth and surf culture in Huntington Beach.

Artist lofts are being built in downtown Santa Ana. Construction crews this month broke ground on a 2,000-seat symphony hall in Costa Mesa. Half a dozen new elite resorts lining the coast make up what marketers tout as the “California Riviera.”

And a Democrat, Loretta Sanchez, represents part of the county in Congress.

Rhode Island native Josh Schwartz, the 26-year-old creator and executive producer of “The O.C.,” chose the setting for the series’ confined world based on his experiences attending USC -- where, he said, “Newport Beach kids are bred to attend.

“Doing something in Los Angeles was not as interesting to me,” Schwartz said. “In Newport Beach, it’s not as formal as Beverly Hills or L.A. Everyone walks around in flip-flops and eats their $60 entrees on paper plates. The whole style and vibe of it is much less formal than in Hollywood or Los Angeles.”

The show won’t premiere until Aug. 5, but Schwartz is bracing for criticism. Message boards on the show’s Web site already are jammed with concerns about how the county will be portrayed. In scenes from the show’s pilot, for example, the teenage characters, in the span of a day, venture from a sailboat to a fashion show to a drunken party at a beach house. Almost all of the characters -- even the extras -- are white and beautiful.

“There’s plenty of kids that don’t behave that way,” Schwartz acknowledged. “There’s also plenty that do.”

But those with a discerning eye will recognize some of the show’s attention to detail, using music from Orange County bands and wardrobe from trendy local brands like Quiksilver, Paul Frank, Billabong, Volcom and Hurley.

Indeed, Orange County itself is the show’s dominant character. Fox’s executive vice president of marketing, Roberta Mell, said the studio has customized promotions to air in 182 cities nationwide to introduce viewers to the area. One commercial states: “Orange County, Calif., is 1,711 miles from Little Rock, Ark. But ‘The O.C.’ is closer than you think.”

The ads picture a guy with a surfboard standing on a beach with a spectacular red sunset as the backdrop: “It’s nothing like where you live. And nothing like what you imagine.”

“There’s something sexy and desirable about living in Southern California and living on the beach,” Mell said. “It’s something people always aspire to.”

Whether “The O.C.” transforms Orange County the way “Miami Vice” helped perk up Miami Beach remains to be seen. But it could reinforce the county’s vibrant youth culture -- a reputation solidified as surfing continues seeping into mainstream America.

Surf industry sales reached $3.3 billion last year, led by Quiksilver, said Marie Case, a market researcher with Board-Trac, which monitors lifestyles and purchasing habits of young people who skate, surf and snowboard. Quiksilver’s revenue grew from $318 million in 1998 to $705 million last year.

More quietly, Orange County’s hipness is signaled by the increasing number of clued-in Angelenos who drive down to Orange County nightclubs.

Top DJ venues in Orange County -- like Detroit in Costa Mesa, cool with clubbers wearing flip-flops -- are “getting more and more hip,” said Jennifer Schwarz, an L.A.-based senior editor for MSN’s CitySearch, a Web site that catalogs places to go, eat, shop and be seen all over the world. “But things will always have their own Orange County twist.”

West Los Angeles mortgage broker Mike Rupp, 26, made the trek Wednesday to take in a jazz quartet at La Cave, a murky basement lounge next to a video store in a Costa Mesa strip mall.

Rupp goes out in Orange County a couple of times a month. Making the drive worth it is the chance to hang with easygoing, like-minded people, “getting to hold a conversation rather than just sitting around being fake,” he said.

On that balmy evening, his outfit was pure O.C.: Hawaiian shirt, jeans and leather flip-flops made by a San Clemente company called Rainbow Sandals. He hasn’t seen anyone in L.A. with the sandals, but he is confident it won’t be long: “This trend will creep up to L.A.,” Rupp said. “Eventually everything in Orange County does.”

Brad Abramson, a New York-based supervising producer for a 2002 special on the VH1 channel titled “Orange County: American Hip Factory,” agreed: “I don’t think Orange County suddenly became hip. I think it’s the reverse. America finally became hip to Orange County.”

Huntington Beach designer Paul Frank, whose home-grown business operates globally from a 55,000-square-foot Costa Mesa warehouse, said the county has finally gained respect. “It used to be you wanted to go to L.A. or Hollywood. Now, I bet kids are saying, ‘I want to go where this Hurley ad was shot,’ ” said Frank -- whose caricature monkey, Julius, has become an internationally recognized logo, plastered on everything from snowboards to wallets and watches.

“People used to say, ‘You’re not from L.A. You’re not from New York. How can you be such a good designer if you’re from hillbilly town Huntington Beach?’ ” Frank said. “Now it’s different.”

It’s true. Sadeghi, the mastermind behind the Lab in Costa Mesa, said he often acts as a consultant for Fortune 500 companies that are trying to tap into the county’s culture and lifestyle.

General Motors, for one, posed Sadeghi this question: “Why don’t kids in Orange County like our cars?” Jaguar, Nissan and Volvo are among several car makers that have moved their design studios to Orange County to tap into its creative energy.

Sadeghi is so convinced Orange County is gaining cachet that he is buying more property along Bristol Street in Costa Mesa to add to his “lifestyle villages” at the Lab and the Camp. He wants to create an area known as SoBeCa -- South on Bristol, Entertainment, Culture and Arts -- modeled after New York’s TriBeCa.

This kind of cultural packaging may be more sophisticated than Fox’s “The O.C.,” but for many people who live here, it’s just as contrived.

Consider Colin Laws, 26, of Fountain Valley, who is likely to spend a Saturday night checking out a local band at a bar like Hogue Barmichael’s in Newport Beach or scanning the club listings in the alternative OC Weekly. “I think I live in a cool place, but some of the stuff that’s going on is in places where people aren’t really looking,” he said.

What about “The O.C.?”

“I have never been to a fashion show,” he said, noting that he has little in common with any of the characters in the TV drama -- which, after all, is largely shot on soundstages.

Even the show’s signature image of pristine beaches with the white-capped waves and spectacular sunsets isn’t Orange County.

It’s Hermosa Beach.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Not your father’s Orange County

Old O.C.

Eating fried chicken at Knott’s

Righteous Brothers

John Birch Society

Gene Autry

Melodyland

Crystal Cathedral

Santa Ana Fashion Square