Theater Review

Something different is going on at the Pierson Playhouse, where Theatre Palisades’ production of Larry Shue’s comedic play, ‘The Nerd,’ premiered Friday night. Directed by Brian Harris and produced by Martha Hunter and Andrew Frew, the play, set in 1981, stars Jeremy Di Paolo as Indiana resident Willum Cubbert and Eric Mello as Rick Steadman, the titular nerd. In addition to Di Paolo and Mello, the cast features Story Cunningham as Willum’s love interest, Tansy, who is about to move to Washington, D.C. to pursue a weathergirl career in local news and, in effect, end their relationship. Adam Rotenberg’s opinionated and cynical drama critic Axel (‘Ever seen anything good?’ Tanzy asks him) rounds out something of a relationship triangle. An obnoxious voice from Willum’s past, Rick happens to be visiting from Wisconsin in time for Willum’s 34th birthday party, a crossroads juncture for the aging architect. Willum feels obligated to invite Rick because this nerd had saved his life during the Vietnam War. With his tambourine and an autographed photo of Hugh Downs, Rick arrives at the party and levels it (his party games and a rendition of the national anthem become new forms of torture for the others). Then, Rick reveals that the brother and sister-in-law he lived with have abandoned him, so now Rick stays with Willum and does not want to leave. This gadfly continues to top himself as Willum’s b’te noire. Act II centers on Willum’s moral dilemma as he wrestles whether to keep his word to the man who saved his life in ‘Nam, or side with his friends, who scheme on how to get rid of Rick. Of all the plays staged by Theatre Palisades this year, ‘The Nerd’ may be the most perfectly cast. Di Paolo, as Willum, exudes a likeable, everyman quality evoking a milder version of ‘Funny People’ star Seth Rogen. And one’s acceptance of Mello’s energetic performance may ride on your tolerance level for classic (yet polarizing) Jerry Lewis’ man-child character, which people either love or find grating (this reporter is a Lewis fan). Richard Little and Hunter, as the Waldgraves, play the uptight, important people Willum must impress, and Dylan La Rocque, their spoiled brat, Thor (‘A poster child for Planned Parenthood,’ Axel cracks). This trio is definitely a play highlight, particularly Little’s put-upon Warnock Waldgrave. Hunter delivers her trademark high-strung comic acting as Celia Waldgrave, a shrill, nervous wreck. ‘The Nerd’ is a surprisingly physical play. In the course of telling this story, the nimble actors”all of them, really” go through enough physical machinations to audition for KOOZA Cirque du Soleil. The comedy in Shue’s piece can get a bit too silly in places, but overall, it entertains. The play is well directed by Harris, with a simple yet solid-looking set. Kudos to the costumers and the technicians behind the scenes. Judging by the seat-count post-intermission and some comments overheard, not everyone cared for the acerbic characters or the ‘existentialist’ humor. True, ‘Nerd’ has a mean streak running through it, or at least some subversive strains, that may not be fun for the whole family (some dirty throwaway lines, but nothing excessive). This writer, however, commends Theatre Palisades for experimenting with different styles, offering less conventional works, and taking risks. A community theater can continue to play it safe by leaning on oft-staged, Neil Simon crowd-pleasers, or can mix it up and introduce Palisadians to playwrights and pieces not as familiar. This is also a rare opportunity to see a staged play written by Shue, who died in his prime and left only two major works behind. Theatre Palisades’ 2010 season roster will include Michael Clooney’s ‘Cash on Delivery’ and ‘The Haunting of Hill House,’ based on a Shirley Jackson novel (in addition to more-familiar productions such as Simon’s ‘Chapter Two’ and David Auburn’s ‘Proof’). By crossing into trickier terrain, Theatre Palisades is challenging itself and challenging us, and the company should be supported for it. So leave your comfort zone at home and pay this ‘Nerd’ a visit. ‘The Nerd’ will play Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. at the Pierson Playhouse, 941 Temescal Canyon Road, through October 11. Tickets: Friday and Sunday, adults, $16; seniors and students, $14; Saturday, $18; seniors and students, $16. Contact: (310) 454-1970 or visit www.theatrepalisades.org

GHOULA (‘Ghost Hunters of Urban Los Angeles’), a Hollywood-based ghost-lore club, will hold its next monthly ‘Spirits with Spirits’ meeting at Patrick’s Roadhouse in Pacific Palisades on Saturday, September 13 from 6 to 8 p.m. Founded by Hollywood residents Richard Carradine and Lisa Strouss, GHOULA has been meeting on the 13th of every month since 2008. About 20 to 35 GHOULA members attend each meeting. This month’s outing marks the group’s first-ever trip to the Palisades for lore and libations at such (supposedly haunted) L.A. landmarks as Philippe’s French Dip Restaurant near Union Station, the Culver Hotel in Culver City, the Queen Mary in Long Beach, and Musso & Frank’s on Hollywood Boulevard. Carradine stresses that GHOULA is not a science-based, paranormal band of ghost-busters, but rather a social group. The meetings are casual mixers, and GHOULA provides a back-door way to learn about venerable establishments around Los Angeles. ‘Ghost stories are, in essence, a great way to look back in time,’ Carradine says. As for Patrick’s Roadhouse, located on Pacific Coast Highway at Entrada in Santa Monica Canyon, is it truly haunted? Carradine says that Patrick’s current owner, Silvio Moreira, has a story to tell regarding ghosts and Patrick’s, but he has been mum about the details. Moreira, a Portuguese immigrant who for many years worked at Patrick’s and now owns the popular breakfast/lunch destination, promises that all stories will be revealed at the event, when staffers will also divulge their potential ghost sightings as well. Current management aside, Carradine did stumble onto one of the legends about the Roadhouse, which buildings were once constituted a Red Car station and a hotel. ‘When the Red Car lines ended, the passenger depot for the Red Car line was converted into Roy’s Hot Dogs,’ Carradine says. An eccentric, colorful patron named Bill Fischler ordered a hamburger at Roy’s and complained that it was the worst burger he had ever tasted in this life. Roy’s owner said that if Fischler didn’t like the burgers, he could buy the place and make them himself. And so he did. He turned the hot dog stand into Patrick’s (naming it after his son) in 1969. ‘The success of Patrick’s,’ Carradine says, ‘forced them to expand into the adjoining building behind the stand, which was a hotel.’ Fischler died in 1997. According to Carradine’s research, ‘Bill Fischler haunts the restaurant, and his ghost supposedly scared a previous chef, forcing him to quit. He saw the ghost of Bill eyeballing him, making his displeasure known.’ Carradine finds the Fischler burger anecdote fitting. ‘To this day, Patrick’s prides itself on its burgers,’ says Carradine, who notes that President Bill Clinton, while staying in the area, pulled his motorcade over to Patrick’s on word that the burgers were so good there. Admission to the event is free but RSVP is necessary. Call 310-975-4635 or write to rcarradine@live.com GHOULA will provide the beverages, while Patrick’s, which is normally not open for dinner, will offer its full menu (including the burgers) at its usual prices.

Villa Aurora and USC’s Feuchtwanger Memorial Library will present an evening honoring German-Jewish writer Lion Feuchtwanger on the occasion of the 125th anniversary of his birthday this year. The celebration will take place on September 16 at 8 p.m. at the Villa Aurora, 520 Paseo Miramar. Marje Schuetze-Coburn, senior associate dean and Feuchtwanger Librarian at the USC Libraries, will provide insights into Feuchtwanger’s life and work. Villa Aurora writer-in-residence Klaus Modick will read in English from the author’s historical novel ‘Raquel’ (‘Die J’din von Toledo’), set in 12th-century Spain. A documentary film by Albrecht Joseph portraying Feuchtwanger and his wife Marta in their house in Pacific Palisades in the late 1950s will afford rare insights into their private life and the author’s writing process and projects. An exhibition featuring congratulations by Feuchtwanger’s esteemed contemporaries, gathered from a birthday book presented to the author in 1944, will complement the program. During the evening, guests will be offered the opportunity to receive a copy of USC Libraries’ 2009 publication ‘Against the Eternal Yesterday: Essays Commemorating the Legacy of Lion Feuchtwanger’ and will be presented with a copy of one of the author’s novels. To attend this program, call 310-573-3603 by September 14. Attending guests are required to take the shuttle service to Villa Aurora. It runs from street parking on Los Liones Drive, off Sunset Boulevard, as early as 7 p.m. the day of the event. Villa Aurora, with its unique ‘migr’ history, is an artist residence and historic landmark located in the former home of exiled German-Jewish writer Lion Feuchtwanger. To promote and foster German-American cultural exchange and to remember the European exiles who settled in Southern California, Villa Aurora offers a variety of salon- style arts and cultural programs, including public lectures, concerts, screenings and performances.

The spring dean’s list at Brandeis University includes MORGAN SCHWARTZ, daughter of Roberta Turkell and Peter Schwartz. o o o CATHERINE NUWER, daughter of Marc and Beverly Nuwer, was named to the spring dean’s list at Ithaca College’s Roy H. Park School of Communications. o o o AMY BAUM, a senior majoring in psychology and Spanish, made the dean’s list at the University of Rochester. She is the daughter of Gary and Tracy Baum and a graduate of Windward School. o o o GRANT LIPSCHULTZ, a junior at Syracuse University, made the dean’s list. He has declared a dual major in radio, TV and film and anthropology. Brother ROSS LIPSCHULTZ, who also made the dean’s list this past year, is a sophomore at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Both are Palisades Charter High School graduates and both were key players on the PaliHi volleyball team. Their parents are Jim and Mary Lipschultz. o o o DAISY CRUISE graduated from the Ryman Arts program in June. More than 150 participants from 100 zip codes gathered for 3-1/2-hour classes every Saturday morning at the USC Roski School of Fine Arts. The core program includes free out-of-school sequential studio courses that emphasize advanced drawing and painting skills, along with college and career planning. This is the only arts program in Southern California that is totally free and that selects participants solely on the basis of their ability and commitment. If your college student has made the dean’s list or received an honor and you wish them to be included in this column, please send information to features@palipost.com.

Hemingway! London! Lennon! Local Mover and Shaker Steve Soboroff Collects Typewriters Once Owned by Famous Writers

Long before the word processor (or computer keyboard), the lowly typewriter reigned as a writer’s best friend. Once upon a time, the greatest writers of 20th-century literature, from popular novelists such as Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler to short-story master Raymond Carver and Hollywood screenwriters Herman Mankiewicz and Paddy Chayefsky, used one of these contraptions to bang out their masterpieces. Today, the typewriter has been largely forgotten, seen only in old newspaper movies. But one Pacific Palisades resident not only collects memories of them, he collects the typewriters themselves. Real estate developer Steve Soboroff has amassed six vintage typewriters. Not a large number for a collection perhaps, but oh, what typewriters they are. ‘People collect all kinds of things, but these are really rare,’ says Soboroff, whose writing machines include those once owned by Ernest Hemingway, George Bernard Shaw, Tennessee Williams and Jack London. His most recent acquisition came mid-June, when he purchased a typewriter once owned by one of the greatest songwriters who ever lived: the Beatles’ John Lennon. But the typewriter that spawned Soboroff’s interest in collecting these nearly-obsolete writing machines was owned by a different kind of writer. ‘I loved Jim Murray,’ he says of the longtime Los Angeles Times sports journalist. ‘I grew up with Jim Murray’s columns.’ After he purchased the late columnist’s 1946 Remington in 2003, Soboroff’s love affair with the American typewriter was born. For three decades, Soboroff and his wife, Patti, have lived in the Palisades, where they have raised children Jacob, Miles, Molly, Hannah and Leah. For Angelenos who follow municipal politics, Soboroff, 61, needs no introduction. The chairman and chief executive officer of the Playa Vista Company has served on myriad boards, including the Advisory Board at UCLA’s School of Public Affairs. He is the former senior advisor to Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, a longtime supporter of Big Brothers of Greater Los Angeles and, just two months ago, he led the charge in underwriting the 18th annual Maccabiah Games in Israel. In 2001, with Riordan’s endorsement, Soboroff ran as a Republican candidate against Antonio Villaraigosa for Mayor of Los Angeles. Both candidates lost to re-elected incumbent James Hahn. About six months later, Soboroff joined Playa Vista, which incorporates housing, commercial office space, retail, parks and habitat protection in a community just below the Loyola Marymount University campus near Playa del Rey. So with all of these endeavors, how did this active entrepreneur and family man find the time to develop a soft spot for the 20th-century writing machine? The answer, of course, involves baseball. ‘When I was running for mayor, I bought a glove for $30,000,’ Soboroff explains. ‘It was the mitt Sandy Koufax wore when he pitched the no-hitter against the Giants [in 1965].’ When Soboroff resold the glove in 2003, it fetched $130,000 ‘ ‘the fourth highest amount for a glove ever sold,’ he says. Soboroff had some credit left on his auction-house account when he saw the Jim Murray typewriter come up on the block. He bid against the L.A. Times for the typewriter, and he believes his advantage was that, unlike the Times rep, he didn’t have to phone his superiors for permission to bid higher. Soboroff nabbed Murray’s Remington for $20,000. Since purchasing it, Soboroff has taken Murray’s machine around the country to raise money for journalism scholarships. ‘I’m willing to let this typewriter tour,’ he says. Murray’s typewriter whet Soboroff’s appetite, and he began scouring the Internet for celebrity estate sales. He tracked down a typewriter Hemingway employed during his years in Cuba. In Savannah, Georgia, where Hemingway’s 1940 Royal was displayed, ‘People were lining up to see it who had driven 300 miles,’ he says. Soboroff traveled to Boston to verify the authenticity of Hemingway’s Royal, matching the typewriter’s font against that found in Hemingway’s letters, which are housed at the Kennedy Library. It matched up. Next came a Remington noiseless portable purchased in 1935 by George Bernard Shaw. Jack London, whose letters are kept at the Huntington Library in Pasadena, became his next prize. Soboroff coughed up a pretty penny to purchase the ‘Call of the Wild’ author’s 1910 Columbia Bar-Lock, ‘one of the finest typewriters ever made,’ with an inlaid pearl design on the carriage. Tennessee Williams’ Corona model was only produced between December 1937 and April 1942, during the years when the playwright wrote such early works as ‘Cairo, Shanghai, Bombay!’ and ‘The Field of Blue Children.’ Lennon’s Imperial (The Good Companion Model T) was among the late Beatle’s possessions originally auctioned by his Aunt Mimi to a Liverpool charity involving musical therapy. Soboroff came across Lennon’s writing instrument during an estate sale overseen by Bonhams auction house in England. The portable was originally auctioned through Sotheby’s in 1999. However, the owner succumbed to the economic downturn and put it up for sale earlier this year. ‘I was going to get on an airplane to go get it,’ Soboroff says regarding his summer purchase, which was probably used in the late Beatle’s first attempts at songwriting as a teenager. ‘He was living with his aunt when he owned it,’ he says. There are also the typewriters that got away. At the estate sale for Bob Hope, the late comedian’s daughter did not want to include his. When the Neverland Ranch foreclosed, Soboroff was hoping that Michael Jackson’s typewriter would be among the assets sold. No dice. Soboroff does not consider himself a typewriter expert, nor does he associate with fellow aficionados. ‘I found two in a month, then went two years without anything,’ he says. But he has a love for the thingamajigs which may date back to an old Jerry Lewis skit, ‘The Typewriter.’ ‘There’s an aura with these machines that’s like a magnet,’ Soboroff says. ‘They’re so personal with people.’ Soboroff keeps an old typewriter ‘next to my computer in my office’ at Playa Vista, while the expensive ones are in a vault, somewhere outside of the Palisades.   ’The typewriter is making a comeback,’ Soboroff says, evoking a fellow Palisadian: ‘Tom Hanks is a huge typewriter collector. People are going back to their roots and trying to make their lives simpler.’ Typewriters (and their operating manuals) are not the only 20th century artifacts that Soboroff enjoys amassing. He has a collection of 250 first issues of magazines, ranging from Playboy, Fortune and Forbes to MAD, Ebony and Golf. But typewriters are special objects of history for the erstwhile political aspirant. So what’s the next typewriter in his crosshairs? Could it be the one F. Scott Fitzgerald pounded to craft ‘The Great Gatsby,’ considered by many to be the great American novel? Or the one Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond used to collaborate on ‘Some Like It Hot’? What about the model on which Budd Schulberg punched up his debut novel, ‘What Makes Sammy Run?,’ or the screenplay for ‘On The Waterfront’? Soboroff doesn’t know, nor is he in any rush to purchase typewriter number seven. ‘It’s like fly fishing in Sun Valley, Idaho,’ Soboroff says. ‘You have to wait and wait until you catch a big one.’