Len Bedsow; Force Behind Arts Center

Len Bedsow, the controversial first executive director of the Orange County Performing Arts Center and former general manager of the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera Assn., has died.

He was 76.

Bedsow died Saturday in Port St. Lucie, Fla., of complications from a stroke, his friend and former light opera association publicist Tim Choy said in Los Angeles on Tuesday.

Although Bedsow retired more than a year before the Orange County center opened in the fall of 1986, he was credited with building the facility. He hired acousticians and supervised architects and contractors, raised millions of dollars and courted performers.

“I came in with a list of what I wanted to do, a bible of my intentions,” the former theatrical producer told The Times in 1986. “I wanted to use everything I had learned in this business.”

In getting the job done, Bedsow stepped on toes. One of the continuing brouhahas involved who was to occupy the glittery new stage. He was determined to prevent the facility from becoming an expensive community theater.

“Perlman. Stern. Ashkenazy. Galway. I wanted biggies. Biggies!” Bedsow said after he retired. “This place was not built for the Pacific Symphony. It was not being built to be a facility for less-than-world-class organizations, and that’s what the local groups are.”

Charles Lawrence, chief architect of the Orange County Performing Arts Center, said in 1986 that Bedsow “had a wonderful sense of showmanship. In a certain sense, that kept the momentum up with the fund raising.”

Bedsow “gave us the strategic direction to do what we did and how we did it,” Lawrence said.

Bedsow was 67 when he left, and said he had always planned to retire before the center opened, citing his age, health and the job stress. Criticism from community groups and a sexual harassment suit filed by a secretary in 1984 did not make him want to stay on. He branded the suit “an outright lie,” and it was settled out of court.

Brought up a New Yorker, Bedsow wanted to act. But World War II intervened, and he joined the Army and became a liaison to variety shows touring the front. After Paris was liberated, he helped produce musicals for the Army there.

Returning home, Bedsow became a stage manager and then a producer on Broadway, working on such shows as “Sophie,” “A Hatful of Rain” and “Dear Barbarians.” He also ran Samlen Productions, producing the Milliken Breakfast Shows from 1956 to 1961 and industrial shows for major companies.

He joined the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera in 1965 as director of operations and from 1974 until he took early retirement in 1980 served as the organization’s general manager.

Working out of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Los Angeles County Music Center, Bedsow supervised the presentation of the American premiere of “Evita” and other major shows such as “Gigi,” “Mack and Mabel,” “Hello, Dolly!” “Mame,” “Cabaret” and “Company.” He staged many of them in San Francisco as well as Los Angeles.

Bedsow also helped to found the Civic Light Opera Musical Theatre Workshop in 1967.

He is survived by his wife, Jane, and daughter, Susan Bedsow-Horgan, executive producer of the television soap opera “One Life to Live.”