Star Tribune from Minneapolis, Minnesota • Page 25

Variety Wee Minneapolis Star and Tribune Friday April 11983 1C On All Fools' Day, beware the all-too-innocent types kend 1 A L. i 1.KI' It's easy to beware the guy with loud sport coat who invites you to sniff the flower in his lapel. The problem lies in identifying the true funster, a mercurial sort who may seem to be a priest or a farmer or a cabdriver. He (or she, but for some reason it's almost always a he) lives in the shadows. He doesn't confine himself to April Fool's; he operates year-round.

He's cool, inventive, determined. You don't know you've been hit until later, if then. By Dave Matheny Staff Writer Considering the chameleon-like ability of the prankster to appear in various guises, perhaps the best thing we can do to prepare for what may happen today is to try to define the type. Forewarned is forearmed. Early evasive action may be the best course.

A few case histories from the files may help: i iiiU" f7f-i jJ'frt Staff Photo by Mike Zerby David Gordon at dance practice: "My works don't always have dialogue." People may talk about (but not in) Gordon's new work Love." Winfield's career ended suddenly. Some aircraft of the time were equipped with a device under the pilot's seat, a length of tubing equipped with a valve and topped by a funnel, which allowed pilot to answer call of nature without leaving seat. Far end of device exited bottom of aircraft in a metal L-shaped tube, with open end pointed towards tail. In normal operation, the device was used and the valve was then opened, allowing the contents of the tube to be sucked out by ambient low pressure. Person or persons unknown evidently turned L-shaped tube around, facing intoairstream.

Investigative board looking into Winfield's fatal crash observed that in its new configuration, the operation of the comfort device would be violently reversed when the valve was opened. Board reasoned that Winfield had used device moments before impacting mountainside. Board terminated investigation without pursuing matter of which person might have turned the tube around, commenting that Winfield was alone in the aircraft anyway and was known to turn these tubes around on other people's aircraft and may have turned his own around out of sheer habit. Comment: It should be noted that several members of the board still bore the marks of leg-hold traps on. their legs.

Howard A. Winfield, lieutenant colonel, U.S. Air Force: A ubiquitous officer type, one of a cadre of pranksters always on the move from one air base to another. Winfield flew around the country in medium bombers filled to the waist turrets with whoopee cushions and gadgets that went off in your face. A terror in the Visiting Officer's Quarters.

Junior officers were certain to find flashbulbs substituted for light bulbs in their rooms, beds short-sheeted, leg-hold traps in their closets. In later years he specialized in impersonations. Item: Subject arrived March Air Force Base, on board a British four-engine heavy bomber of World War II era on an RAF good-will tour, having secured cooperation of legitimate crew. Wearing a white uniform with unusual insignia depicting dogs wearing crowns, passed himself off as an obscure member of the British royal family. Subject carried briefcase handcuffed to wrist and refused to discuss its contents.

Spent four days on Hollywood cocktail circuit, at the end of which time, seemingly drunk, tearfully turned over briefcase to movie mogul. Subject stated that documents would "tear the lid off the entire frightful story of Mrs. Roosevelt's disgraceful affair with that chap Goebbels." Subject exacted promise from mogul that Eleanor Roosevelt would be played by Kim Novak and the Reich propaganda minister by Bela Lugosi. Filming of Verboten Love" began shortly afterward. Although studio later discarded story and terminated mogul's contract, mogul reportedly spent remaining years living in wretched one-room apartment trying to find financial backing for films variously titled "Ministry of Desire" and "Sprechen Sie Marvin Edwards, architecture student.

Unusual in that Edwards was an unintentional prankster. He nevertheless left as much pain in his wake as if he had planned it that way. In all known instances, Edwards caused discomfort and chagrin to others entirely through inadve rtence and fumbling rather than direct, conscious acts. Kern: April Fool 14C By Mike Steele Staff Writer David Gordon's newest work, choreographed for the New Dance Ensemble and premiering Tuesday, will be 25 minutes long, profligate with movement and (Gordon can't resist a grin here) "it will have no talking." This will come as a surprise to those of us who have neatly pigeonholed Gordon as "that New York postmodern choreographer who uses spoken dialogue irthis works." "When people who write try to get a handle on people who make works," he said wryly, "they pick the most characteristic thing, in my case talking, to define them. But my works don't always have dialogue.

Categorizing has its pitfalls." What's more, Gordon adamantly refuses membership in the postmodern dance category. Although he was right there in the front lines when the notion of postmodern was born, he swears he doesn't know what postmodern means and is quite certain he isn't. Our definitions die hard. Last year he choreographed a work called "Trying Times" for his dance troupe, the Pick-Up company (which will share the bill with the New Dance Ensemble Tuesday at 8 p.m. in the Children's Theatre).

The first half was the familiar blend of components people have come to expect from Gordon, the use of large objects, a lot of witty dialogue and some movementThe second half, however, was all movement set to the entire Stravinsky score for "Apollo." (Dare we say traditional dance? No. Not quite. But a departure, surely.) Just as the piece seemed to be ending, however, the dancers brought the amorphous objects back on stage and lined them up across the space like a panel of jurors, and a mock trial began. Gordon's wife, the elegant dancer Valda Setterfield, played the defense attorney. The charge? Failing to adhere to postmodern standards or, as someone said, being insufficiently obscure.

"Did you do it?" asked Satterfield. "Yes and no," replied Gordon. ''Will you do it again?" she asked. "Not if I can help it," he said. "Will you toe the mark?" she asked.

"Not if I can find it," he concluded. The verdict was left in the hands of the audience, which thought it was funny. Gordon was pleased. As is often the case, he was being half humorous, half serious. His two sides collide just as language and movement often collide in his dances and just as preconceptions of his work collide with the reality, which is often quite likable and unexpectedly jolly.

Gordon, you see, had the fortune (or misfortune) of being involved with the first Judson Memorial Church concerts in New York in 1962 along with Yvonne Rainer, Trisha Brown, Steve Paxton and others, that first generation of avant-gardists who came out of Merce Cunningham's fold. They were brainy, brash, iconoclastic and they created an artistic movement that looks now like it will equal the impact of the early days of Martha Graham, or even Cunningham himself, on Gordon 14C 'l iFvjt. jil' 'J JJIT. 'A A A "A A 'A A A A Marvin Edwards Charles Wistian Howard A. Winfield Change of ownership has Channel 11 employees worried, but optimistic next day.

Gannett officials said FCC rules prohibit them from discussing their plans for the station until they take over legal control. But sources close to the station confirmed rumors that Schonbak and DeVaney will be leaving Channel 11. The new station manager will be Joe Franzgrote, currently vice president and general sales manager of Gannett's Denver station, KBTV-TV. The corporate feelgoods insist that it's a relatively bloodless coup and that Schonbak and DeVaney aren't being axed by Gannett but rather are remaining in the employ of Metromedia and so are leaving the station voluntarily. That may be so, but it's not exactly convenient for Schonbak, 40, who came to WTCN two years ago from a Schenectady, N.Y., station owned by General Electric.

Schonbak and his wife, Deborah, recently moved into a optimistic that the new owners, the Gannett Broadcasting Group, will try to put the station's demoralized news department on a competitive footing with the other TV stations in town. Gannett, based in Atlanta, paid $75 million to purchase WTCN from Metromedia, Inc. a New Jersey company, last summer. The transaction wasn't approved by the Federal Communications Commission until a few weeks ago and the deal will be closed April 1 2, with Gannett taking over the WTCN-TV's studios are located in Golden Valley, but it's looking a little like Panic City at Channel 1 1 these days as the station's employees anxiously await a change in ownership. The impending changeover, scheduled for April 13, will cost station manager Ray Schonbak and general sales manager Al DeVaney their jobs.

Other Channel 1 1 employees fear they may follow Schonbak and DeVaney out the door. At the same time, they are new Minnetonka house that she designed; he had recently said he hoped to stay at WTCN. Schonbak, who will become an assistant to Robert Bennett, head of Metromedia's TV division, said Thursday that he will continue to live in this "market" (that's TV talk for DeVaney is going to WFLD-TV, Metromedia's Chicago station, where he will hold the same job he had at Channel 11. Franzgrote, in Minneapolis this Coleman 12C Nick Coleman Movies inside Neil Simon returns with 'Max Dugan' Page2C 'Moonlighting' works overtime Page16C 'Outsiders' drama inside a teen facade Page11C Segal film jerks still more tears Page 16C New dispatches from war of sexes Page 6C Walk, don't run to 'Macon's Run' Page 16C Black Stallion rides again Page 2C.