Pageant in her blood
Suzie Harrison
As a kid, she hung out on the Festival of Arts grounds, watched
the puppet shows and got to know a lot of the artists. Now, Diane
Challis Davy runs the world-renowned show featuring living works of
art.
Famous artwork of every genre since the beginning of time are
recreated in the pictures of the Pageant of the Masters where she is
now serving her eighth year as the director.
Born at Hoag Hospital before there was a South Coast Medical
Center, the 45-year-old Challis Davy grew up in Laguna Beach with art
in her blood.
“My father had the Challis Galleries,” Challis Davy said. “He had
his gallery roughly from 1947 to the 1980s. Esther Wells Collection
was where my dad’s gallery was.”
While she was growing up, her step-mother was a Festival of Arts
exhibitor, and her mother is also an artist and model.
“I got to know a lot of the artists and families involved growing
up,” Challis Davy said. “Of course, the big thing about the Festival
is that it’s such a family.”
Challis Davy has heavy roots in Laguna and went to elementary
school, Thurston Middle School and Laguna Beach High School here.
“I was in the children’s theater when the Playhouse was on Ocean
Avenue,” Challis Davy said. “I loved theater and participated a lot.”
She was a part of the drama and art department in middle school
and high school and studied art with Hal Akins, who is an exhibitor
at the Festival. She was a Festival scholarship recipient her senior
year.
“As I grew older, I learned I was much more suited to working
behind the scenes,” Challis Davy said. “I incorporated my love of
theater and art into studying design at Cal Arts in Valencia.”
While in college, she spent a couple summers at the Chichester
Festival Theatre in England.
“I was willing to do anything backstage,” Challis Davy said. “It
was great working in a professional theater. The first year I worked
as a dresser and the second year I was hired as a prop maker.”
In 1976, she volunteered for the Pageant as a cast member just out
of high school.
“I loved it,” Challis Davy said. “I was in a picture called ‘The
Tea Party’ by Mary Cassat. It was really fun -- a way to be in the
theater without the stress of learning lines. It was everything that
was fun about the theater with none of the headaches.”
She recalls that everyone backstage was wonderful, enjoying
meeting a lot of nice people and that it was a breeze.
In 1979, after college, Challis Davy returned to home in Laguna
Beach and was looking for work. Her brother, who was a light board
technician for the Pageant at the time, told her of an opening for a
costumer.
“Costuming was my major at Cal Arts, so I applied and got the
job,” Challis Davy said. “I worked a couple of years as a costume
assistant and then became the costume director.”
In 1985, Challis Davy became the assistant director.
“It was a lot of fun. The director allowed me to do my first set
painting -- a background,” Challis Davy said. “I was helping with all
aspects of the show, whatever was needed, I could fill in and also
had the opportunity to make some design suggestions to the director.”
The summer of 1996 was Challis Davy’s first year as the director
of the Pageant. She remembers that they did not have a theme, it was
roughly organized and a real challenge to put the show together. One
very positive aspect was a great collaboration among persons had been
there 10 years or longer and worked well as a team.
“It was a pleasure because we do things as a team,” Challis Davy
said. “I felt tremendous support, and my first attempt at the show
was well received.”
That year had a choir of 40 to 50 on a large turntable. “It rocked
a lot of people’s boats, “ Challis Davy said. “There had not been
live music in the Pageant for about 20 years. It was really
ambitious, logistically something, a very difficult challenge.”
The show got an incredible response. Since then, the Pageant has
had live performances. Challis Davy thinks it is an integral element.
Her second year, she brought back a theme for the show. In 1976,
the theme had been all American artists for the bicentennial.
“A light bulb went off in my head,” Challis Davy said. “The
audience was clamoring for a theme, so I thought we should have a
theme. The theme was ‘Hidden Treasures.’”
By the third year, everything started to click very well and they
started speeding up the pace of the show.
“Adding live vocals, and of course, by that time, we established
having a yearly theme,” Challis Davy said. “Those three things
started to garner more interest in the show.”
People started saying that they had to go to the Pageant to see
what they were doing differently. Before, Challis Davy said, many
people said that they were attending the Pageant every five years or
so because it was essentially the “same old, same old.”
Her fifth year was the hardest and most controversial because of
the impending move to San Clemente.
“We did ‘California Dreamers,’” Challis Davy said. “There was all
this turmoil with the threatened move to San Clemente. The show and
all the staff members were so worried we were going to see the
Pageant as the end as we know it.”
David Young, who had been her longtime mentor, resigned from the
board in protest.
“We made the papers. The entire production staff signed a letter
to the board,” Challis Davy said. “The letter stated our opposition
to the proposed move.”
Behind the scenes they heard the move was a done deal and that
they had no further input. That had secret meetings, and the letter
they gave to the board they also copied for the press.
“It was a very gutsy move, but at the time we were all deadly
serious,” Challis Davy. “We have been through some trying times after
the fires and terrible mud slides.”
The going got very tough when the San Clemente turmoil was going
on. They went so far as to produce a slide show of the Pageants
history with images in the 20s and 30s and talked about the wonderful
tradition the Pageant is.
“We called it our love letter to Laguna,” Challis Davy said. “It
was included in the show, in the program. You can imagine the
surprise by our board members, because they were trying to drum up
enthusiasm for the move to San Clemente.”
Challis Davy remembers it being really tough and that had it not
been for the recall it could very well have been the demise of the
Pageant and the Festival.
With the Pageant and Festival staying at home in Laguna Beach she
said the next year’s “Beyond the Horizon” was probably the most
successful to date.
“As a whole, the board has given me the complete freedom to
experiment and try new things,” Challis Davy said. “I’m grateful that
they have faith in my ideas. That’s what makes it happen is the staff
members believe in my vision.”
Challis Davy stressed that the volunteers and the staff make the
show.
Last year’s “Heroes and Heroines” had 42 sets and was a big
success. The last four years the show has been sold out.
“It was a rough year on all of us, a tough year and the show had a
certain emotional and sensitive quality which is unusual for the
Pageant,” Challis Davy said. “We hoped it was appropriate for what
was going on in the country.”
One of the most moving scenes was the tribute to the firefighters
that was accompanied by a lone Scottish piper on the hill.
The Pageant is constantly striving to change and improve. For this
year’s Pageant, “Seasons,” there should be a lot of surprises, she
said.
“I’m going to make a promise,” Challis Davy said. “Were going to
-- you’re going to experience a change of seasons in the Irvine
Bowl.”
Tickets for “Seasons” went on sale Dec. 1.
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