A NIGHT AT THE RITZ

The video is already playing as the Ritz-Carlton bellman unlocks the hotel room. His white gloves point around the French Provincial furnishings and Italian marble bathroom as an actress on the television screen begins a tour of the Dana Point grounds. It is an odd introduction to one of America’s best hotels--and Orange County’s most luxurious.

It starts out typically enough. Classical music. Regal lion logo. Phrases like “The Golden Coast” and “California Riviera” and “Old World Charm.” All this to describe a palatial cliff-top hotel with a panoramic ocean view, and decor that includes a $4-million “museum-quality” art collection--not to mention a 300-year-old castle fireplace.

People sip afternoon tea here, we learn. They watch the sun set while a tuxedoed piano player performs “The Girl From Ipanema.” They smoke after-dinner cigars in the Library and sip Civil War-era wine. You know, classy things that cost lots of money.

Then come the commercials . Peddling gift shop merchandise such as a $100,000 necklace and local stores with hand-painted frocks: “Do you ever get the impression that your designer dress is everyone else’s designer dress?”

And this novel appeal to the discount shopper: “Save enough on your jewelry purchases to pay for this vacation!”

In case you hadn’t noticed, Orange County’s swankiest hotel is pretty swanky.

So what is it like to stay a night at the resort adored by both hotelier queen Leona Helmsley and Robin Leach, television host of “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous?” Will you run into Michael Jackson or Magic Johnson or Bob Dylan at the ice machine? Can you afford to stay another day or should you just buy that used economy car for the family instead? These and other questions may be answered later in this story.

Although it calls itself the Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel, the hotel is actually in Dana Point--thanks to last year’s cityhood vote.

A 45-minute drive from central Orange County, the Ritz-Carlton sits on 17 acres overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The Mediterranean-style compound hugs two miles of shoreline and, at Salt Creek Beach below the bluff, the water is dotted daily with 50 or 60 surfers riding some of the best waves around.

Here in the sub-community known as Monarch Beach, the Ritz-Carlton is the shiny crown jewel in what developers envision as the Orange Riviera: million-dollar ocean-view homes and luxury hotels from Huntington Beach to Dana Point. But for now, there isn’t a resort on the California coast that rivals the Ritz-Carlton in location, service, proximity to Disneyland.

There are two pools, two spas, tennis courts, a golf course, a gym, organized volleyball, a beauty salon, complimentary day care that includes sandcastle building and lawn bowling. Eleven gardeners maintain the grounds, a routine that includes the weekly replacement of 4,000 flowering plants. And that’s just the outside of the Ritz.

It is a young resort, 5 years old in August, but an upstart even among luxury hotels, according to national travel guide publishers. The Ritz-Carlton received five-star and five-diamond ratings, respectively, from Mobil Travel Guide and Triple-A Travel Guide--among the most widely circulated guides in the country. The Ritz is the only resort in California to have received both top honors, and one of only 10 in the country.

“I remember the first time I drove up to see it years ago, and I thought, ‘My God, it’s the Riviera up on the cliffs!’ ” said Alice Wiesel, editor of the Illinois-based Mobil Travel Guide, a national consumer guide with an estimated 1.5 million readers.

“The service really sets it apart and, of course, the location on the ocean. There really isn’t anything else like it on either coast of the United States.”

Up the circular drive to the fountain with marble dolphins, the Ritz-Carlton entrance is low-key. A variety of uniformed employees park the car, load the luggage and escort you indoors. Check-in is at 3 p.m. There is no wait.

The lobby is understated opulence. Marble floors inlaid with brilliant rugs. Leather chairs to die for. Dark wood furnishings, 19th-Century art. This is about the time the pinky finger involuntarily extends.

The bellman, Rick, wearing a tan designer uniform and cap and white gloves, says “Good afternoon, ma’am (or sir).” Like all 850 employees of this hotel, he has been trained never to simply say “Hi!” or call guests “folks.” It’s either too presumptuous or too condescending. Pedestrian responses such as “OK” and “uh-huh” are shunned in favor of “certainly” and “my pleasure.”

Nightly rates for the 393 rooms range from $185 to $2,000 for the Presidential Suite. Prices are based on vista. Unless you like parking lots or views that “may be obstructed by a tree,” Ritz publicist Linda Adams says, the cheapest rooms have no view. For $260 your “courtyard” room affords a view of the garden and pool. Another $30 a night buys you the “coastline” room, with a partial view of the ocean. For $360 you get a panoramic view of the sea through the French doors opening on to your balcony.

Those seeking even more exclusivity might opt for the fourth-floor Ritz-Carlton Club, popular with executives and celebrities. Depending on how much you eat and drink, this could be considered a bargain. It costs $45 to $85 extra, depending on your room, but you can eat and drink around the clock for no additional charge.

In a cozy parlor with a veranda overlooking the waves, three concierges attend to the Club-level guests only, making dinner reservations and calling ahead for their cars. They keep stocked the open bar and the silver urns of coffee and hot water for English tea. Pastries and cereal and juices are spread across the antique chests in the morning; mixed fruits and cold cuts and sourdough bread and cheeses and scones arrive around noon; finger sandwiches go with afternoon tea; desserts are offered in the evening. And champagne is available all day long.

The hotel elevator only goes to the Club level with a fourth-floor room key, thereby keeping out the traffic--and perhaps overzealous fans.

As soon as the elevator doors shut, Rick begins explaining hotel-like things. His guest looks bored and interrupts him. So is Bruce Springsteen staying on this floor? Rick grins and says he doesn’t think so. He is polite enough not to roll his eyes.

Like most of the staff, he is engaging but speaks mostly when spoken to. He admits singer Janet Jackson and her sisters visited this floor the other week. As he unlocks the door, he does offer that Michael Jackson put a dance floor and sound system in this room to practice before concerts when he last toured. He stayed in the Presidential Suite two doors down.

The room, like many, is decorated in “sea foam” blues and grays. The white antiqued wood and rattan furnishings are a cross between French Provincial and French Polynesian that works. The bathroom is marble, the white Ritz towels plush. There is a phone beside the commode with a redial button. There are complimentary toiletries but no sewing kit. Instead there is hotel seamstress Lolan Tsang for repairs.

Even though it is at the beach, the Ritz-Carlton imposes a dress code. Oh, sure, it’s discreetly announced post-arrival by way of a “guest attire” brochure on the nightstand. But though the management is rumored to be relaxing some on this, bellmen and waitresses have been known to point it out to guests.

One guest reported that he was ever-so-politely refused service one morning by a waiter in the Cafe, the most casual restaurant. He was wearing green corduroy shorts and a golf shirt. “Does the gentleman have a jacket?” the waiter asked. The gentleman didn’t. He also didn’t want to wear one provided by the hotel, he said, even if it did match his shorts.

Guidelines are offered for each public room. Denims are permitted, during the daytime and only in one restaurant. Guests are asked to wear Ritz-Carlton terry cloth robes en route to the pool. Children are not spared. Even outside contractors must wear collared shirts. But listen, tennis shoes are allowed. And if you forgot yours, you can rent a pair here!

Ritz managers say they are somewhat torn about the dress code, but many of their guests, particularly Europeans, demand it.

“Let’s face it,” said an amused Philip Sellick, the hotel’s landscape director and just about the most casually dressed employee in the place, “formal wear in California is putting socks on.”

After unpacking the luggage and watching that in-house video to find your bearings, it’s time to check out the sunset. This, many guests will tell you, is the most alluring feature of the Ritz-Carlton. From your balcony or the beach, or from almost any ocean-facing hallway in the hotel, you can watch the sun drop beneath the horizon, and it is spectacular.

Some people fancy the hotel’s daily afternoon tea, served from 2:30 to 5 in the Library. Here, the surroundings are almost museum-like: 19th-Century nautical paintings, an antique carved ship, overstuffed sofas, and shelves stocked with leather-bound books, like Caruthers’ “History of a Lawsuit” and an 1883 edition of Chambers Journal of Popular Literature, Science and Arts.

The Lounge next door is like a long formal living room, with marble planters and striped cozy sofas. It’s comfortable, has a terrific view and is still in range of the piano player performing “Nobody Does It Better.”

As the sun faded down the sky, a frosted blond woman from Texas is talking rather indiscreetly with a group of men about her ex-daughter-in-law, who has just departed for the restroom.

“I love my ex-daughter-in-law. You know, she wants to get married. She really does. She goes to a lot of places but she meets the wrong men. She wants to be totally in love, totally happy. And you know, nothing’s totally happy.”

She ordered another drink as “People Who Need People” played on the ivories, then picked up her train of thought. “She wants a house overlooking the ocean with waves crashing on the beach, but when do you ever have all your dreams come true? Except at this place, eh?”

Hotelier Leona Helmsley, the embattled queen of New York’s towering Helmsley Palace who is awaiting sentencing on a tax-evasion conviction, stayed in a Ritz-Carlton suite a few months ago, according to general manager Henry E. Schielein. Helmsley declined to return phone calls, but Schielein proudly notes that she deemed it smashing and “very peaceful.”

Other guests have included former U.S. Presidents Richard M. Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan; the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia and Don Cornelius of “Soul Train” dance show fame, Ambassador and Mrs. Walter Annenberg and Malcolm Forbes.

Although hotels catering to the rich and reclusive can’t keep high-profile guests without a low profile, some 235 people evidently permitted the Ritz-Carlton to reveal their past visits in a “Who’s Who” list.

Nevertheless, hotel managers are ever-so-gracious when they decline to discuss juicy details.

Occasionally, one hears a stray rumor.

A local builder awaiting completion of his custom home spent $180,000 in room rent alone for a nine-month stay at the Ritz-Carlton. Bellmen recall how his children skateboarded down the elegant driveway to school each day.

Bob Dylan checked in as Mickey McGillicuddy. Michael Jackson rented the $2,000-a-night Presidential Suite and two adjoining rooms, then moved in a dance floor and sound equipment to warm up for his concert tour each day. Barbra Streisand, whose disguise left her looking like a Shiite Muslim, stayed a week before anyone knew she was there. Robin Leach, host of “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,” bared his backside for charity at the Ritz in June before a crowd of entertainment types that included Robert Wagner and Frankie Avalon.

About half of those who stay at the hotel are business travelers, and 15% of them are from foreign companies. The other half of the guest roster comes from Southern California--vacationers from Los Angeles, Beverly Hills, Bel-Air. They are often celebrating their birthdays or anniversaries or some other special occasion.

Catering to the unusual desires of the rich is something for which the Ritz-Carlton is more famous. At the chain’s Boston mother ship, Carol Channing had a kitchen installed in her suite and another woman had her entire room redecorated and repainted pink. In Dana Point, a couple with several children had a door put into a wall--price tag $3,000--so the family could move freely between rooms.

“You expect that at a hotel like this,” Schielein said. “People pay hundreds of dollars for wine, and they don’t blink an eye. But they are coming to a place where they expect those things to be available.”

The conversation is interrupted when Schielein stops a busboy loading silverware onto a stainless steel tray. The exchange underscores his attention to detail, a quality that travel guide editor Wiesel points to as an essential key to the hotel’s success. Wiesel claims to have spotted the general manager at 10 one night, straightening paintings in the lobby.

“Put a napkin on it and you won’t make so much noise,” Schielein instructed. The busboy did. “Good! Makes sense, eh? Thank you!” The busboy grinned.

“So,” Schielein continues, “how many restaurants can you go into where you can buy a bottle of wine that’s over 100 years old?” He laughs with gusto. “After all, you can’t take it with you!”

The one thing the Ritz-Carlton has that no other chain seems to offer is a smoking den. It was Schielein’s brainchild.

Schielein--who made his marriage proposal 25 years ago based on his right to smoke cigars without complaint--introduced the smokers’ lair at the original Ritz-Carlton in Boston, where he worked before coming to the chain’s Dana Point resort in 1986. It occurred to him one day, as he lit up one of his beloved Partagas and a woman winced, that there was no place in the hotel he could comfortably puff away. Six months ago he opened the Dana Point hotel’s Library to cigar and pipe smokers, and it has been written about in the New York Times, Playboy magazine and--surprise--tobacco giant Philip Morris Co.’s magazine.

The cheapest Port served is $6 a glass, the most expensive $145. “This stuff is as old as my mother,” one guest noted.

Although tea is served in daytime hours, this room is very manly. Pasadena Weekly publisher Jim Laris captured it this way:

. . . A beautiful cigartress, Angela, came over and offered us cigars from the Ritz-Carlton private stock, and we settled for two $9.80 Zino Veritas. (We would have felt guilty but the starving children in India don’t smoke anyway.) And we lit those beauties with those long Macanudo matches that come in a rich black-and-gold triangle-shaped box. And we could hear “Ebb Tide” being played at the piano bar across the lobby and the lights sparkled and the ocean waves tumbled on the beach. And we settled back and talked about important things like truth and God and love and girls in tight-fitting jeans and whether or not Lite beer Tastes Great or is Less Filling. And we just smoked and talked and talked and smoked. And those cigars lasted about an hour and 45 minutes. Which we decided came damn close to how long we were happily married.

Finally it was time to leave the Library. And we walked out and got on the elevator and a rather elderly lady with light blue hair and terminal rouge said, “PeeYew. My first husband died from cancer of the whole body because he smoked what you guys smell like.”

And Ron turned to me and said, “You know, it doesn’t get any better than this.”

Dinner time rolls around and, it is to be hoped, you took advantage of the unlimited-drinks-for-$65-a-night Club deal upstairs. Because supper in the Dining Room is going to cost you. This is little food on big plates. Five half-dollar-size lamb noisettes and potatoes the shape of rabbit’s feet.

It’s tasty and the service is china. The walls are the color of salmon, the lighting soft and low and flattering to the skin. Two servers are assigned to each table. The “back-waiter” never speaks. Drinking water is bottled Vittel. The lobster bisque, well, they do this thing where the bowl arrives to your table with two little bites in it, artfully arranged. Then they ladle the stuff in. It’s all very decadent and yummy, and one might even pick up tips from a waiter on how to sneak into the pool without checking in. Next trip.

All raves about the Ritz-Carlton invariably hark back to the gracious employees--”ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen,” as the corporate motto goes. There are two employees for every hotel room--or an average of one per guest. That’s more than twice the national average, and it shows.

Keeping the hotel’s 850 workers happy is fundamental, and it goes beyond wages, said Owen E. Dorsey, vice president of human resources for the Georgia-based Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co. Employees have to feel good about themselves, have self-esteem, he said. Part of that comes in the cachet of working for one of the country’s best resorts. Part of it comes from the yearly awards bash held two weeks ago that was likened by some workers to the Academy Awards.

Here, at the dinner-dance held in the hotel’s most sumptuous ballroom, dishwashers and maids arrive in tuxedos and chiffon and boogie with management, puffing away on cigars beside the big boss himself. After a full-course lobster and filet mignon dinner, five awards to the five-star employees of the year are announced: round-trip, weeklong trips for two to any Ritz-Carlton in America, plus $500 in spending money. The banquet is a wild, employees-only party for 500 people. Those employees who had to work it get their own banquet later.

And you wonder why the two guys the next morning, dressed in white golf shirts, backs bent over to pick up leaves along the hotel driveway, raise upright to wave goodby. They amble nearer the departing car, their trash bags in tow. “Have a safe trip!”