Reporter Brian Watt has a story about the Westmore Hollywood make-up family. Plus, the Supreme Court refuses to block immigrants' deportation, Steve Proffitt hits the road in the new Tesla S, Palm Springs Modernism week highlights mid-century architecture, and much more
Supreme Court refuses to block immigrants' deportation
Yesterday, the high court refused to block the deportation of thousands of immigrants, many of them here legally, who have pled guilty to committing a crime. One particular case in question is that of around Roselva Chaidez, a Chicago woman born in Mexico living legally in the U.S. since the 1970s.
In 2003, she pled guilty to mail fraud, but she claims she didn't know that that would put her at risk for deportation. For more on her case, and what the Supreme Court's decision means for immigrants who find themselves in trouble with the law, we turn to Kevin Johnson dean of the UC Davis School of Law.
City Hall Pass: Mayor's race, Measure A and more
Now it's time for another installment in our regular look at LA City politics with City Hall Pass, your ticket to all the latest news out of downtown with KPCC's Alice Walton and Frank Stoltze.
The big election is just a week and a half away so maybe it's time voters start paying attention. We'll talk about the candidates' various endorsements, where current Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has said about the candidates, and the chances that Measure A, the half-cent sales tax increase, will pass.
Hitting the road in the new Tesla S (Photos)
Even though it wasn't a working day, the Tesla S attracted a little attention when it pulled into the parking lot at KPCC. It came here with Susan Carpenter, auto critic at the Orange County Register, behind the wheel.
Creamy leather seats, everything is really high quality, but then, this Tesla goes for a bit north of $100,000.
The dashboard boasts a large screen, 17 inches-wide, running vertically across the center console like a steroidal iPad. There's another screen behind the wheel but there are no knobs and no buttons. Susan starts the car — if "start" the correct term — just by putting her foot on the brake.
It is quiet, most of what you hear is other cars, and the turn signal is deafening. We roll along the Pasadena streets, longing for open road, because this car, despite being electric, is really fast. Motor Trend clocked it at zero to 60 in under four seconds.
Despite seeming nearly flawless on paper, there was a horror story review of the Tesla S in the New York Times about a drive from DC to Boston. The reporter detailed how the car's batteries ran out of juice on a very cold day. The report was accompanied by a picture of the Tesla on the back of a tow truck, followed by tweets and blog posts by Tesla founder Elon Musk that the paper had somehow sabotaged the car with bad publicity.
As the owner of a Nissan Leaf, Susan knows about the potential pitfalls that come with owning an electric vehicle. Her Leaf gets maybe 75 miles on a charge, but she's always worried about making it there and back. Not with the Tesla. She's racing around in it like it was a Maserati.
For years now, fans of electrics have predicted a brave new world in which cars running on fossil fuels become dinosaurs, and the Tesla S is clearly the most sophisticated effort so far in the quest to displace the internal combustion engine. If the company survives and manages to produce more affordable cars, who knows? Along with all that instantly available torque, electrics have another big ace in the hole: amazing fuel economy.
And I have to say, this is one sweet little bundle of joy.
With sales down, do electric cars have a future?
For those who can't afford $100,000 on an electric car, there are plenty of others on the market now, besides the Tesla S. Automakers, including Ford and BMW, will put eight new models of plug-in vehicles on U.S. roads this year. The timing seems perfect with the cost of gas on the rise once again.
But so far, sales of electric cars have fallen far short of expectations.
Sales of the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf drove off a cliff at the turn of the new year, falling by more than half. And that's despite the government rebates, savings from gas, and other incentives to get behind the wheel. But will the appetite for electric cars grow as more of them hit the road?
For more on why this is and what that means for the future of electric cars, we're joined now by Paul Eisenstein, publisher of TheDetroitBureau.com, a website that covers the automotive industry.
Oscars 2013: Westmore family continues to make-up Hollywood, one generation at a time
“Hitchcock,” “The Hobbit,” and “Les Miserables” are the films vying for this year’s Academy Award for Best Make Up and Hairstyling. The Academy added the make-up category in 1981. But in 1931, the Academy presented an “extraordinary accomplishment” award to Ern Westmore for his make-up on the film “Cimarron.” If you’re a film buff, you’ve likely seen a make-up credit for one of the Westmore family members.
The Westmores created Hollywood beauty … in the faces of actresses like Bette Davis, Elizabeth Taylor, Sandra Dee and Farrah Fawcett. They also created beasts like the Hunchback of Notre Dame and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
“We’ve got a few monsters in our background,"says Marvin Westmore, part of the third generation of the family. His grandfather, George Westmore, was a hairstylist and wigmaker from England who started a salon in Hollywood at a time when actors did their own hair and make-up. Marvin says make-up was not his grandfather’s specialty…at first.
“A lot of his customers in the salon were 'ladies of the evening' and he traded make-up lessons for hairstyling services, and that’s how he learned to do beauty make-up.” Marvin says.
George Westmore founded the first studio make-up department at Selig Studios in 1917 and was known to make house calls for rising stars seeking the perfect look. Westmore’s six sons - Monte, Ern, Perc, Wally, Frank, and Bud - followed him into the craft. They led make-up departments at other studios: Perc was the master of disguises at what would become Warner Bros. Wally was at Paramount. Ern worked at 20th Century Fox, and Bud at Universal studios.
“Their artistic abilities were phenomenal,” says Sue Cabral Ebert, President of the Make-up Artists and Hairstylist’s Guild IATSE Local 706. “The beauty and the horror that you saw coming out of all of those different studios was directly because of their involvement.”
The Westmores helped found the Guild in the late-‘30s. About that time, they also created the House of Westmore, a huge beauty salon on Sunset Boulevard, where stars and regular folks could get their hair done … and get a peek at how the make-up artists created glamorous looks for the big screen. Diagrams from the House of Westmore showing various make-up techniques are on the wall at the Guild’s Burbank headquarters.
“We actually all followed these same examples for decades and even now, you still use them when breaking down how to change the shape of a woman’s face - or a man, when developing a character,” Cabral-Ebert says.
Marvin Westmore says that’s what make-up artists do: help develop characters, tell stories and solve problems. His father Monte Westmore worked two years on “Gone With the Wind.” Marvin’s credits include Rex Harrison in “Dr. Dolittle,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” and “Blade Runner.” When he used an airbrush to apply Sean Young's make up in “Blade Runner,” Marvin remembers thinking he was the first person to an air brush in motion pictures “until I saw this book on 'Gone with the Wind' and there’s my dad, doing Olivia de Havilland, putting her foundation on with an airbrush.”
Marvin's brother Michael did the make-up on “Rocky,” the television series “Star Trek: The Next Generation," and won the Best Make-Up Oscar in 1986 for the movie, “Mask.”
To create the “mask” he used photos of Dennis, who suffered from a bone-growth disease that deformed his skull and face and left his eyes more than three inches apart.
“I said, ‘I need an actor with their eyes as far apart as we can get ’em.’ And then they hire Eric Stoltz whose eyes are real close together,” says Michael Westmore. But he made a bridge that fit between the eyes that created the illusion that they were far apart.
Michael Westmore is continuing a family tradition of teaching the art of make-up. He appears with his daughter, actress McKenzie Westmore, on the SyFy network’s “Face Off.” It’s a competition series for special effects make-up artists. Michael advises contestants while they work.
Michael Westmore says over the years his family has worked in Hollywood, make-up techniques have evolved and so have the materials they use. But he says make-up artists are still part of moviemaking - even as more films use computer-generated images.
“It hasn’t really done away with make-up,” he says. “I mean, if they have Nicole Kidman doing a part or something, they put a nose on her.”
Chances are, a Westmore will always be around to put on that nose ...or whatever touch is needed to help develop the character.
Palm Springs Modernism Week highlights mid-century architecture
This week, fans of mid-century modern design and architecture are gathering in Palm Springs for that city's annual Modernism Week. Modernism Week actually lasts 11 days and began last weekend. Culture critic Edward Lifson joins the show with more.
LA philanthropist George Aratani dies at 95 (Photos)
George Aratani, a Los Angeles businessman who donated millions in support of a wide variety of Japanese-American causes, has died. He was 95.
Aratani founded Mikasa China and Kenwood Electronics, but he was also a major philanthropist who donated millions to local cultural centers, museums, religious institutions, and more.
Born in Gardena in 1917, Aratani was the only son of Japanese immigrants Setsuo and Yoshiko Aratani. The elder Aratani moved his family to Guadalupe, California, near Santa Maria, and established a successful farming and distribution entrepreneur.
When George Aratani was college-aged, he was sent to university in Japan where he learned Japanese and enrolled at Keio University to study political science.
"That experience was pretty monumental because that's when he honed his Japanese language, he rubbed shoulders with politicians, different high level individuals in Japan," said Naomi Hirahara, author of Aratani's biography,"An American Son." "It helped him later in his business as well as securing donations for Japanese American projects here in Southern California."
His mother died and his father remarried while he was in Japan, but Aratani finally came back to California to attend Stanford University in 1940 when his father became ill. When he father died a short time later, he took over the family business.
About a year later, Aratani and his family were ordered to evacuate as part of the U.S.'s Japanese Internment efforts during World War II. He ultimately ended up losing the family business.
"He kind of had to start from scratch after WWII," said Harihara. "He kind of took the same people that his father had employed for the farming business as well as his contacts in the military with the military intelligence service, and his knowledge of Japan and created an international trading business, Mikasa, which is an American company."
Aratani also started the Kenwood electronics company and a medical supply distribution company.
Aratani is survived by his wife, Sakaye, daughters Linda and Donna Kwee, plus seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
RELATED: George Aratani’s memorial service set for March 2 at 2 pm in Little Tokyo
GUEST:
Naomi Harihara, author of "An American Son: The Story of George Aratani : Founder of Mikasa and Kenwood"
Congressman Adam Schiff on the sequestration issue
Congress is currently on recess, but when they return, they'll have exactly four days to come up with a plan before $85 billion in automatic, across the board spending cuts take effect.
While on break, both sides have returned to their congressional districts to highlight the effects of sequestration. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi even sent members of her Democratic party home with a list of talking points.
Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff, who represents the 28th district in the heart of Los Angeles County, joins the show with more.
California GOP House members shifting to the center on immigration reform
President Obama called Republican Senators this week to talk about immigration reform. The House is content to wait until the Senate acts, but the President – and immigration activists – may want to call on California GOP members who are sounding more open to immigration reform than any time in the recent past.
It’s a different conversation about immigration these days among most Republican members of Congress from California.
GOP Congressmen John Campbell of Irvine calls the current immigration system "broken." Jeff Denham of Turlock says we "really have to address the issue" of the 11 million undocumented people in the U.S. today. And Darrell Issa of Vista says we "have to consider" citizenship for those who "are capable of meeting all the responsibilities."
Citizenship has been the line-in-the-sand Democrats have drawn on immigration reform. In the past, some moderates in the GOP embraced legalization for undocumented residents. But many on the right labeled any kind of legal status as “amnesty.” However, more Republicans are now bowing to political realities after Latinos overwhelmingly voted for Democrats in November.
In an immigration speech in Las Vegas last month, President Obama said comprehensive immigration reform must include a pathway to citizenship. GOP Congressman Devin Nunes of Fresno agrees, saying he has no problem with what the President said in his speech.
Congressman John Campbell says there should be a path to citizenship – for some. He says there's a difference between people who came here illegally and their children: "I think that’s a distinction which is credible."
Freshman Republican David Valadao of the Central Valley is the child of Portuguese immigrants. He estimates about half the undocumented immigrants in the U.S. have visa issues, stuck for years in the immigration bureaucracy.
"The other half, we’re going to have to figure out the way to make that work," Valadao says. "Those causing problems and making trouble, we’re going to have to find a way to make sure we get rid of them."
For those working and "trying to do good for their family," he says, "we have to a find a way to make sure that we give them the opportunity to have the American dream just like my parents did."
Though his parents became citizens, Valadao stops short of endorsing citizenship, saying the undocumented should earn “some kind of status” that allows them to work, educate their children, and pay taxes.
Fellow freshman Doug LaMalfa of Redding also stops short of committing to citizenship. He says it’s about fairness – not just to immigrants, but to Californians competing for scholarships and space in college classrooms. But LaMalfa says he’s interested in the “ongoing discussion” to find ways to "work this out in one fashion or another."
Congressman Darrell Issa – the only California GOP member on the House Judiciary Committee – fully supports citizenship.
"I don’t want people to be in this country permanently unless they have an opportunity to be full citizens," he says. "I believe that that’s inherently the American thing to do."
But not every California Republican has jumped on the immigration reform bandwagon.
Dana Rohrabacher of Huntington Beach says he can't accept any legislation that normalizes the status of people who are here illegally. He says granting legal status encourages more people to cross the border. His solution: make worker verification mandatory.
"I don’t believe in deportation raids or trying to put people into trucks and driving them to the border," Rohrabacher says. "But if we just very humanely say, 'I’m sorry, you can’t take this job because you’re here illegally and that job should go to an American or a legal immigrant,' then they will go home eventually. And that’s the more humane way to do it."
Rohrabacher is a minority, at least among California Republicans.
Hardliner Elton Gallegly retired and Brian Bilbray – another fan of self-deportation – was defeated in the November election. The state’s GOP delegation shrank from 19 to 15. And California’s growing Latino voting population is flexing its political muscle. Some say the more moderate stance on immigration is the California GOP reacting to a demographic shift, years ahead of the rest of the party.
Issa is pragmatic. He says doing "what's right" will be appreciated by people "throughout the spectrum." Good policy, he says, makes good politics in the long run good.
"Right now we have a broken system, that’s bad policy," Issa said.
But California isn’t like the rest of the country. The House of Representatives still has plenty of hardliners unwilling to vote for any immigration bill that includes citizenship. And as the number of California Republicans shrinks, the state’s clout in the GOP-led House on immigration and other issues shrinks as well.
An earlier version of this story misidentified Jeff Denham's district.
The Dinner Party: TSA spare change, 'Bwana Devil' and more
Every week we get your weekend conversation starters with Rico Gagliano and Brendan Newnam, the hosts of the Dinner Party podcast and radio show.
The TSA says that more than $500,000 was left behind by airport passengers at security checkpoints, this month in 1952 the first 3-D film, "Bwana Devil," was released, and a new study says rotten eggs and onions may lengthen your life.
Two CHP officers receive Medal of Valor for bravery
Two years ago, California Highway Patrol officers Sean Haller and Rafael Rivera responded to a call for help from Fresno County. Two of the county sheriff's deputies had come under fire as they were trying to serve a search warrant to a wanted arson suspect.
Both deputies had been shot and one was killed immediately, but Officer Haller exchanged fire with the suspect long enough for Officer Rivera to pull the other deputy to safety. That deputy later died of his wounds but the actions of CHP officers Haller and Rivera earned them each the Medal of Valor.
It's the nation's highest honor for emergency responders and they met with Vice President Joe Biden yesterday in a ceremony in Washington D.C.
California Highway Patrol officer and Medal of Valor recipient Rafael Rivera joins the show.
Report says California toxic waste management is weak
The The Department of Toxic Substances Control is charged with protecting people and the environment from the harmful effects of toxic substances. And there's a lot of them, for example, California produces more than two million tons of hazardous waste each year.
But a new report from the group Consumer Watchdog finds the DTSC isn't pulling its weight.
Liza Tucker, the author of that report, joins the show to explain.