Top Matsushita Executives Plan Visit to MCA : Entertainment: It will be Akio Tanii and Lew Wasserman’s first face-to-face meeting.

MCA Inc. is quietly preparing to roll out the red carpet next week for top executives from Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., its new corporate parent.

Matsushita President Akio Tanii and a small contingent of executives from the Osaka, Japan-based company are expected to visit MCA’s Universal City headquarters beginning Tuesday, according to people familiar with the trip.

It will be their first call since Matsushita agreed to buy the entertainment conglomerate last year for $6.59 billion.

The visit also will bring the first face-to-face meeting between Tanii and 77-year-old MCA Chairman Lew R. Wasserman.

Tanii, Matsushita’s 62-year-old chief executive, didn’t attend the New York negotiating sessions at which Matsushita agreed last November to buy MCA in the largest Japanese acquisition of an American company to date.

“It’s a get-acquainted session. Everybody wants to get to know each other,” said one person involved with the visit.

An MCA spokeswoman confirmed word of the visit but declined to discuss details.

Several sources said Tanii and his fellow executives plan a Tuesday morning visit to the Beverly Hills offices of Creative Artists Agency, which represented Matsushita in the MCA acquisition.

The group is also likely to tour MCA’s Universal Studios facility and expects to attend a Tuesday evening dinner at Wasserman’s Beverly Hills home.

Tanii and Executive Vice President Masahiko Hirata, who negotiated the MCA acquisition, are expected to leave by Wednesday, although other Matsushita executives may stay longer, one person familiar with the trip said.

Faced with unease over the foreign acquisition of several American film studios in recent years, Tanii and his fellow executives have pledged to minimize their role in MCA’s operations.

The company owns major movie and television production units, along with extensive book publishing, movie theater and theme park operations.

Despite a similar promise, top officials of Sony Corp., which owns both Columbia Pictures Entertainment and the former CBS Records, have regularly visited the United States to monitor their entertainment properties.

Shortly after agreeing to buy MCA, Matsushita executives became embroiled in controversy when Secretary of the Interior Secretary Manuel Lujan Jr. asked that Matsushita donate MCA’s Yosemite National Park concession company to the American public.

Matsushita balked at the demand but eventually agreed to sell the unit to the National Park Foundation, a nonprofit organization, for a reduced price of $49 million in 1993.

One source said Tanii--who is far less known in the United States than his Sony counterparts--doesn’t plan any public appearances or statements during his trip. “It’s a private visit,” the person said.