Back to the future

Suzie Harrison

The public might not see what goes on in the new 10,000-square-foot

production facility on the Festival of Arts grounds, but it cost

about $3 million.

The festival’s planning committee has been working on addressing

the needs of the pageant’s production staff for the past 2 1/2 years,

and last week they saw these plans come to fruition with the addition

of a state-of-the-art production facility.

Festival Director Dee Challis Davy said they built it for the

pageant’s loyal production staff members, many of whom have worked

there from 15 to more than 25 years.

“It looks a little like a cathedral,” Challis Davy said. “We used

to call them workshops, now we call them the Pageant of the Masters

studios. Now it’s so grand.”

While touring the new, impressive facility, Challis Davy, along

with marketing and public relations director Sharbie Higuchi and

board president Bob Henry, reminisced about the decades of pageant

history each has seen. All three said the improvements were much

needed heading into the pageant’s 71st season.

Challis Davy said the old workshops were built in the late 1960s

or early 1970s. The new facility will allow everything in the old

workshops to be housed in the same facility.

Most of the shops have roll-up doors and the headpiece department

has its own studio, where it had been displaced before because of

space problems. Mary LaVenture, headpiece director, was busy moving

things in on Wednesday. She is thrilled to have her studio adjoined

to the other workshops, like it once was.

Jack Clancy, who has worked on set construction for 25 years, said

that he and Mike Micklich had to set up a temporary studio in San

Clemente during construction. The carpentry shop is where all the

pageant sets are built.

They started working on sets in October, and the old shops were

torn down the second week of September. Clancy called the building

“sophisticated,” and said he was impressed with how quickly it was

completed.

Challis Davy praised the work of architect Blair Ballard for the

design.

“You can see that Blair had a sense of what it’s like to work

here, the importance of light, the windows and skylights,” Challis

Davy said.

Challis Davy showed the space where a new laundry facility is

being placed, along with a vast amount of storage space for props and

equipment. The cathedral-like height of the ceilings will facilitate

taller sets, she added.

“A lot of the times they have to work on taller sets, so this

walkway balcony will be very helpful for that,” Challis Davy said.

“There’s a lift -- the workshops are built on two levels.”

It’s also wheelchair accessible and has ramps that can be used to

take the sets back and forth between the paint studios and the stage.

Sharon Lamberg and David Rymar, who have been the pageant’s scenic

artists for 18 and 26 years, respectively, were busy working on some

of the sets.

“It’s nice and light, great to work in,” Lamberg said. “There’s a

lot more room [and] the skylights are absolutely wonderful.”

She was working on William Wendt’s “In Laguna Canyon” for this

year’s theme, “Portrait of the Artist.”

The sculpture studio was also bustling, with veteran artists

working away to prepare for next season. Lead sculptor Judith Parker

and sculptor Lyle Brooks were working on several pieces -- a series

of Shakespearean vignettes and some cats, some of which had been

carved out for a piece called “Radio Active Cats.”

“I love it, the size, and it’s beautiful,” Brooks said. “We’re

very happy and much cooler. We have three major walls we can build

against. The old days we had one. It makes a really big difference --

we can easily work on two full-scale sets at once, which before we

couldn’t; we’d have to drag one outside.”

Board member Bob Dietrich said it all started with the board and

its planning in 2001. He said it took dozens of meetings with the

Planning Commission and a lot of communication to get all the plans

prepared for implementation.

“I put together a financing plan last year,” Dietrich said. “It

took significant effort. When you look at the capital improvement

phase, we spent about $3 million.”

He said phase two will cost about $6 million and the board is

really looking forward to the improvements.

Henry said that when he looks at the new facilities, he is

reminded of the first time he saw the pageant in 1953.

“The extreme consciousness to this art put Laguna Beach on the

map,” Henry said. “The response is international. When I was running

for the board and licking envelopes to members, they went to people

in England, France and Italy -- they’re all members of this group.

That’s incredible, and it all started with Dee.”

Henry said the progress the festival and pageant have made

astounds him. He remembers when it was two guys holding up the frame.

“Who in a million years would think it would grow from that to

this,” Henry said. “I know I’m right for this business when I see

that it still gives me goose pimples to see how it’s grown.”