EatLA ... moving the Dodgers ... "Judas" remembers Crystal Cathedral Passion Play glory days ... Dale Hopper asks, "Where's my flying car and my robot pal?" ... Ilsa Setziol remembers Katherine Siva Saubel, Cahuilla Indian elder ... AEG sued over allegedly destroyed art ...
Street artists sue, saying AEG destroyed their art
AEG, which owns the Ritz-Carlton Residences at LA Live, is being sued in federal court for allegedly destroying artwork by three California artists, Mear One, Chor Boogie, and Shark Toof. They did their high-end street art in a penthouse at the Ritz-Carlton for an LA Art Show event, allegedly with the understanding that it was on-loan, and would be returned.
Attorney Daniel Zohar, who spoke with Off-Ramp host John Rabe and represents the artists and the local art group LA Art Machine, says AEG broke the agreement and broke laws that forbid art from being destroyed.
AEG refused to do an Off-Ramp interview, but did issue this statement: “AEG does not agree that plaintiffs in this matter have accurately or completely set forth the facts associated with this matter. Nor does AEG agree with the legal positions taken by the plaintiffs in their lawsuit. AEG looks forward to vigorously defending itself in court.”
Barry Cutler and the Crystal Cathedral
UPDATE 11/18/2011: (AP) The Crystal Cathedral will sell its iconic, gleaming glass building to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange. The move was approved Thursday by a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge after a bidding war between the diocese and Orange County's Chapman University for the sprawling 40-acre property, and was opposed by many Crystal Cathedral congregants who fear it will be the end of their church. The diocese will pay $57.5 million to use the building in Garden Grove, made of 10,000 panes of glass, as a long-sought countywide cathedral.
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The reputation of the Crystal Cathedral, in Garden Grove, has taken a big hit lately, after declaring bankruptcy last year, with fifty-million dollars of debt. The Diocese of Orange ($57.5 million) and Chapman University ($51.5 million) are in a bidding war for the 40-acre property. How far the Crystal Cathedral has fallen since Robert Schuller founded the ministry more than fifty years ago! Actor and Off-Ramp commentator Barry Cutler remembers the happier years.
Every year, the Crystal Cathedral put on two shows, The Glory of Easter and The Glory of Christmas. These were huge expensive productions, and, when I was involved, they used Equity actors. I played the role of Judas in two productions of The Glory of Easter, which would have made God or even Cecil B. DeMille jealous, which a cast of more than 300, plus a dozen Equity actors and dozens of farm animals, birds, horses and large cats.
Most of the major roles -- the disciples and Pharisees and such -- were filled with Jews like me. The major exception to this was the role of Jesus, played by Miles, a blond and blue eyed goy. He later moved back East and became a carpenter.
My audition for Judas was odd. While a pretty important character, Judas actually had very little to say. After I read the few lines I had, one of the directors asked if I could lurk. "Excuse me" I said, not sure I'd heard correctly. "Would you lurk for us, please?" So, versatile talent that I am, I lurked about the audition room and won the role.
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Much of the time, I felt as if I had run away and joined the circus. All those animals, fireworks (inside the Cathedral!), magic, a Sensaround earthquake, flying angels. At one of the early rehearsals, I was sitting in a pew while one of the techs worked with the flying angels. He was having some trouble with the mechanisms which flew the angels and, as I watched, one pretty, young angel slid lower and lower above me, nearly sitting on my face. Just thinking about an angel in that way while sitting in a Cathedral made me feel closer to the role of Judas.
At various times we had genuine Hollywood stars playing Pilate and Herod. While we other professional actors were very well paid for the time – $600 a week -- I was told the stars received about $60,000 a week. But Michael York, one of our Pilates, assured us that the money wasn't important to him. It was the message.
While it was a very professional production team, there were a few problems. Perhaps the greatest challenge to the actors was navigating the numerous steps and scurrying from one location to another, without slipping, sliding and sprawling in the abundance of holy ... dung. Once, when Herod appeared with a peacock on either side of his throne, the special effect flames sent one of the poor birds rising like the phoenix ... before descending in ashes.
Overall, it was great fun and a great success with the audiences, as well as very profitable. And the members of the church, many of whom played extras in the production, were wonderfully supportive and friendly. After each performance, most flocked around Miles/Jesus, for attention/healing, but one sweet woman always thanked me for taking on the burden of Judas … just before I went off to collect my silver/paycheck.
We did two shows each day, without curtain calls. Since, as Judas, I hanged myself about midway through each show, I would sit in my car in the parking lot and drink a beer as the first show wound down. Toward the end of each show, there was a spectacular effect in which Jesus rose to Heaven. Miles stood on a platform in front of two of the tall Cathedral windows. The windows opened to the night sky - and the parking lot where I sat - a laser beam shot up, smoke rose, and Jesus vanished … having been lowered beneath the stage while hidden by the smoke. I was always tempted to climb out of my car, mount the platform, and appear as Judas triumphant when the smoke cleared. But I preferred the silver.
Eat LA feeds the occupiers, champions parsley and celebrates the "Kobe Beef of Pork"
There’s artisanal cheese, small batch whiskeys, and heirloom watermelon— so why not fresh, free-range, acorn-fed pork?
This week, Eat LA tags along with a caterer who brings her food to the Occupy protestors in front of City Hall every Thursday. Then, writer Linda Burum breaks the big news, at last: raw, bellota iberico ham has arrived in Los Angeles! Finally, like so many plates of diner food, we finish off this week’s show with parsley: the ubiquitous, maligned green sprig most diners ignore. Off-Ramp host John Rabe talked parsley with chef Mark Peel, owner of Campanile and Tar Pit.
Loscon 38 sci-fi convention asks, where's our flying car? Dale Hoppert answers.
Nov 25-27, the LA Science Fantasy Society runs Loscon 38, the annual sci-fi convention. The topic this year is something that's been on Commentator Dale Hoppert's mind for some time. Where's my flying car and my robot pal. In other words, what happened to the future we were promised?
Frank Stoltze talks pot and heroin at Drug Policy Reform Conference
These are the questions asked at the 2011 Drug Policy Reform Conference held in downtown LA recently: will California, Washington State or Colorado vote to legalize marijuana in 2012? What are the solutions to the national overdose crisis that takes more lives than car accidents or gun violence? Why do blacks go to jail for drugs at 13 times the rate of whites even though they use and sell drugs at similar rates? KPCC's Frank Stoltze toured the conference and met a mom with two sons addicted to heroin, a Montanan fighting his state's lawmakers, and a cannabis journalist whom he asks, "Do we know if Jesus smoked pot?"
Ilsa Setziol remembers Indian elder Katherine Siva Saubel
Californians lost a cultural treasure when the California Indian elder Katherine Siva Saubel died a couple of weeks ago. As one of the last native speakers of the Cahuilla language, spoken by some tribes in and around the Mojave desert, Saubel spent much of the 20th century preserving her culture.
I met Saubel a decade ago, while doing a series on California Indians for KPCC. She told me on the phone that I could talk with her, but when I showed up at her house on the Morongo Reservation near Banning, she said she didn’t want to be recorded. She said she had a few errands she needed to run and asked if I would help. After a trip to the post office and some lunch, the then-80-year-old relented. I’d passed the test. Saubel didn’t suffer fools and she’d met plenty.
Driving around the reservation with Saubel was a lesson in California history, as well as Cahuilla culture. "All these trails were here before the missions," she said as we bumped along streets named after out-of-state tribes. "Even that Camino Real was an Indian trail. Seems like they should give us some kind of credit. A lot of us are still here."
At the casino, Saubel rolled her eyes over the plastic teepees and dream catchers in the gift shop — none of it had anything to do with California tribes. Back in the car, she said, "When I first came into Banning in 1925, there was nothing but orchards here: apricot orchards, almond orchards, a vineyard. Now it’s all gone. There's nothing there now, just homes and more homes."
Another thing that had changed was that so few people now spoke the Cahuilla language. "The reservation, when I came here, there was all these Indian people. They all spoke the language. They all understood one another. They all helped one another. They all talked to each other in their language. Now there’s nothing. No one to talk to now," Saubel said.
Saubel was born in the mountains near Warner Springs in 1920, a time when American Indians didn’t have the right to vote and when agents from the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs treated Indians with a heavy — often corrupt — hand. Saubel was a ceaselessly inquisitive girl and learned the old ways from elders. "My mother was a medicine woman," she told me, "We never went to the doctor because my mother would cure us with plants. That’s why I know the plants, from her." Her family survived the Great Depression by hunting and gathering.
In high school, Saubel demanded the owner of a restaurant on Indian land take down a “whites only” sign. As a young mother, she worked in the fields of her husband’s family farm. Then in 1958, she met anthropologist Lowell Bean and resolved to document the Cahuilla culture before it disappeared. In 1964, Saubel co-founded the Malki Museum to teach young Cahuilla and others about the culture. She wrote several books on Cahuilla life, lectured widely, was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame and served as the chair of the Los Coyotes Reservation.
Late in the day, Saubel toured me around her museum, a tiny brown brick building. She pointed out black and white photos of people she’d known, including an old man named Pedro Chino, one of the most powerful shamans. I asked her if there were any shamans left. She told me the last one died in 1989.
It was a day of laments, and Saubel rued a cultural shift among young Indians. "They're the experts now, you know. They don’t want to listen to old people," she said.
But some younger people did come to Saubel’s museum and lectures. And if future generations know how to find food in the desert or speak a bit of Cahuilla, they will have Saubel to thank.
Why not move the Dodgers into the downtown NFL stadium?
EDITOR'S NOTE: Jon filed this brilliant idea a year and a half ago. It's worth taking another look at it, given the latest developments in the NFL-AEG saga. -- John Rabe
It would enrage traditionalists and preservationists, but Phil Anschutz could solve nagging problems with football in LA, the Dodgers, and the legacy of Chavez Ravine.
I don't know Anschutz, the billionaire who bankrolled Staples Center, L.A. Live, and "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe." I don't know how he reacted when he heard about the Dodgers sale. And I don't know if he got all 1% and cackled like Mr. Burns on "The Simpsons," rubbing his hands together. But I hope so.
What I do know is that maybe the most controversial real estate play in Downtown LA since Bunker Hill is now possible, and it hinges on three questions. Could Anschutz’s company, AEG, buy the Dodgers? Could the company move the franchise to a billion-dollar baseball stadium downtown? And – here’s the kicker -- could it be partially financed by selling the land where Dodger Stadium now sits to developers … who would agree to build affordable housing there, righting an historic wrong?
I know nothing about any such deal. It all spills from my head, which for the record is the same head that thinks the return of "Beavis & Butt-Head" is a highpoint of 2011. But it could happen, and here’s how.
Since Anschutz doesn't talk to the press, media outlets asked AEG president Tim Leiweke if AEG would bid for the team. Leiweke wouldn't say, which is usually code for, "We started working on that precise idea three months ago." Anschutz has already shown he’s willing to drop the cash necessary to build a pro football stadium downtown. The trouble is the NFL, which has repeatedly sucker punched Angelenos trying to bring back football. But if Anschutz buys the Dodgers, he no longer has to battle the NFL. Change the building design, and AEG gets 81 games a year in the stadium instead of 8.
That brings us to Dodger Stadium, which, I’m sorry, is outdated and often unpleasant. Yes, the views are majestic. But, the majestic part ends the moment you leave your seat. The atmosphere can be downright thuggish, traffic in and out of the stadium is frustrating, $15 parking is painful, and the restrooms feel like leftover sets from Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.
The preservation community would go ballistic at the suggestion of leveling Dodger Stadium, which is why AEG and the developers would have to convince the city that the project ultimately does far more good than harm.
Remember that before Dodger Stadium, Chavez Ravine was home to poor families, most of them Latino, and promises to build public housing on the site were broken. The developers could get support for the plan by reserving some portion of their units for low-income residents and families. There would need to be ironclad agreements ensuring that the new Dodger Apartments and Chavez Condos make up for the mistakes of the past.
There would still be a lot to figure out. Financing is tight and parking and traffic studies would be required. Politicians would need to be convinced. And it would require the biggest project labor agreement in the history of L.A.
Still, it could happen. Whether we like it or not.
(Jon Regardie is Executive Editor of the LA Downtown News.)
Clayton Kershaw's Cy Young
KPCC's managing editor Nick Roman is not the only Dodger fan elated at Clayton Kershaw's Cy Young award, but he might be the only one -- besides Jon Regardie -- who thinks it's okay for the team to move downtown.
Locked out of the NBA with Clipper Darrell
By now, the LA Clippers should be well into yet another disappointing basketball season, but the NBA has canceled games through December 15th, and many doubt the season can be saved.
Off-Ramp’s Raghu Manavalan met with 18-year long Clipper fan Clipper Darrell, real name Darrell Bailey, in front of a desolate Staples Center to talk about his affinity for the Clippers, his attempts to camp out in front of Staples Center until the lockout ends, and the labor dispute's impact on the Los Angeles community.
Off-Ramp music for November 19, 2011
Liked a song you heard on this week's show? Find out what they were here!
Not featured on Grooveshark, Robert Davi's rendition of "Nice Work if You Can Get It" from Davi Sings Sinatra.