The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 124

BAR Orange County Television Listings llos Angeles Ounce Friday, April 10, 1987 Part VI WHAT'S BEHIND THAT S39-MILLION BOUQUET? cal: French 19th-and 20th-century artists but also a work by America's Grandma Moses. Among its world-famous works are paintings by Renoir and Picasso. With the firm's 100th anniversary coming up in October, 1988, Yasuda was already looking for "a suitable masterpiece to crown the festivities" when Christie's announced the auction of the Van Gogh work. Yasuda knew that only six of the seven original "Sunflowers" paintings done by Van Gogh in his Aries period from February, 1888, to May, 1889, still remained in existence, Kori said. The Dutch painter, unable to sell his works, committed suicide at the age of 37 in 1890.

The seventh "Sunflowers" was owned by businessman Koyata Yamamoto, who kept it on the wall of the tokonoma (place-of-honor alcove) in the living Please see' Page 18 By SAM JAMESON, Times Staff Writer TOKYO-To the Yasuda Fire Marine Insurance the auction of Vincent van Gogh's painting "Sunflowers" at Christie's in London was "a never-again" opportunity. That's why the company paid a record $39.85 million for it, a spokesman said here Thursday. Yasuda, Japan's second largest non-life insurance company, was not identified as the buyer March 30. But the company gave Christie's permission Wednesday to reveal its name in London after worldwide clamor developed over the mystery. It also issued a news release on the purchase here Thursday.

The price that Yasuda paid, more than three times the highest previously paid for a painting at auction, does not herald the beginning of a new price spiral or competition in the world art markets by either Japanese in general, or Yasuda in particular, said Yoshiro Kori, a section chief in the company's public-information department. Rather, he said, it was a one-time phenomenon. In Japan, Van Gogh's "Sunflowers" paintings are special, Kori said. The paintings of dazzling yellow sunflowers in a vase have a fame that no other Van Goghs indeed, no other Impressionist painting enjoy, he said. "Every Japanese in the country, even schoolchildren, knows the painting," he said.

Students in both elementary and junior high school study it in their art classes as one of the world's great art works. Photographs of the painting are included in textbooks, he added. A test with two randomly selected college students proved him correct. Shown a photograph of the painting, both, without coaching, were able to identify it immediately by title and artist. Both said they first saw it in school.

Realizing the meaning of "Sunflowers" to the Japanese public at large, Yasuda determined to buy it when it heard that the painting would be on the market, Kori said. The company, which for more than 60 years has acted as promoter of art exhibitions and sponsor of young artists in Japan, opened an art museum of its own to commemorate the completion of its new 43-story headquarters building in the Shinjuku section of Tokyo in 1976. That will be the new home for "Sunflowers," if all goes well. The museum, named in memory of Seiji Togo, a famous oil painter whom Yasuda started sponsoring when he was only 20, is located on the 42nd floor of the building. Already, it houses more than 450 works of art, mostly by Japanese and The $39.

85 -million "Sunflowers." HOWARD ROSENBERG 'NIGHTLINE' HANGS OUT BASEBALL'S DIRTY LINEN holds views like that can carry out what is clearly an important role in this day and age, and that is ending racism on all levels, not just on the field." Campanis had praised the athletic abilities of blacks, but suggested that they generally don't have what it takes upstairs in the old noodle to handle baseball's executive jobs. At another point, he also declared that blacks are not good swimmers "because they don't have the buoyancy." Had he been beaned with a baseball or something? Campanis was in the Houston Astrodome when he was interviewed live by Koppel after the Dodgers season opening loss to the Astros. In Campanis' Associated Press Don't blame Ted Koppel or ABC's "Nightline" for the demise of Al Campanis. "When I first heard what he said, my impression was that 'he can't be saying Koppel said by phone from New York Wednesday night. But Campanis was saying it.

Campanis, who was forced to resign Wednesday as Los Angeles Dodgers vice president in the stormy aftermath of a devastating and revealing "Nightline" interview two nights earlier, simply self-destructed. TV gave him the opportunity, but it was Campanis who pulled his own plug by making abhorrent statements about blacks that caused such negative reaction that his ouster by the Dodgers became mandatory. The "Nightline" staff believes Campanis is the first guest to lose his job because of what he said on the show. "I feel terrible that the man's career is over," Koppel said before Wednesday's "Nightline" following up the Campanis affair. "But by the same token, I don't know how a man who defense, it's not easy being questioned on TV in Houston by someone sitting in a New York TV studio.

Communication is ideal for the interviewer, awkward for the interviewee. The 70-year-old 'Campanis was connected to Koppel only through a tiny earpiece. He could hear, but not see Koppel. Not easy at all. But Campanis said what he said, and there was no mistaking it.

And what he said sounded very much like racism and was compelling evidence why blacks continue to be excluded from the managerial posts, board rooms and executive suites of professional baseball. Pictures were essential. The printed word alone would not have done Campanis justice. You also had to see his face, the almost casual, untroubled, bemused way in which he gave his opinion. The "Nightline" interview also was one of those rare times when live TV had a positive effect instead of being merely a ploy to give news more entertainment value by conveying a Please see Page 31 1 2i a (C 1 ABCs Ted Koppel, left, and ousted Dodger Vice President Al Campanis.

MOVIE REVIEWS THE FAST AND SASSY WORLDS OF MEN AND WOMEN 'Making Mr. Right' By SHEILA BENSON, Times Film Critic Susan Seidelman's "Making Mr. Right" (city wide) tackles a heartfelt subjectwhere have all the good men gone? with style and with one oddly touching performance, but with a curious lack of heart. The premise, that an android might solve the modern woman's troubles with modern men, sounds bright. Well, possible.

The movie is brassy, its milk of human kindness curdled, its comic eye jaundiced. The story gives a modern career woman, whose private life is a shambles, the job of humanizing a state-of-the-art android, Ulysses, into something a little more state-of-the-heart. Ulysses is about to be launched on a seven-year probe of deep space, and in order for him to capture the public's attention, it's felt he must have a few of the qualities warmth, caring, affection, even love that his look-alike creator, Jeff Peters, has sternly programmed out of him. It's not surprising: Peters lacks even a chemical trace of those qualities himself. The movie's zingiest performance, and the sole reason to even consider seeing it, is by John Malkovich.

In bright blond shoulder-length Dynel hair, he plays both the churlish scientist and the inquisitive, sweet-spirited android with such wizardry that they seem to be two separate actors. It's not simply the film's superior special effects (courtesy of Bran Ferren). Malkov-ich's motions as Ulysses have a brilliant range of control; they seem to emanate from some interior gyroscope and to pick up dexterity as he learns more of human emotions. For Peters, Malkovich calls forth bottled-up inner anger; he is fierce and unapproachable in his scientist's shyness and distaste for the non-scientific world. Please see Page 28 'The Secret of My Success' By MICHAEL WILMINGTON The new Michael J.

Fox movie, "The Secret of My Success" (selected theaters), is a misfiring comic fantasia on business success in the Reagan era. In it, we're asked to believe that Brantley Foster, an ambitious young college graduate from Kansas, newly arrived in Manhattan and stymied in his efforts to conquer its corporate world, would, in quick succession: 1. Be hired as a mail room boy at Pemrose Industries by his arrogantly vacuous uncle. 2. Offhandedly seduce his aunt.

3. Reject her efforts to help him. 4. Develop an alter-ego as a young Pemrose executive commandeering an empty office, issuing fake memos and attending meetings with his thoroughly confused colleagues. 5.

Do both jobs simultaneously for several weeks under the suspicious eyes of two sets of bosses-while dashing around indefatigably and changing his clothes in stalled elevators. 6. Offhandedly seduce the company's most brilliant and beautiful female executive, who is coinciden-tally also his uncle's mistress. 7. Dazzle half a dozen of New York's prime financiers at a party, while using two different identities.

And. Well, perhaps we should leave a few surprises for the end always assuming there is anything in this Please see' Page 28 ORANGE COUNTY WEEKEND GUIDE Theater: Gotta Dance! Arthur Giron's "Charley Bacon and His Family," developed through South Coast Repertory's 1986 Hispanic Playwrights Project, is now featured on the theater's Main-stage. The story of a man who maintains his dream of becoming a dancer through the daily grind of his banking job plays Tuesday through Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 7:30 p.m., with matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2:30 p.m. Saturday at the Gem Theatre in Garden Grove, the Grove Theatre Company opens its production of Abe Polsky's "Devour the Snow," a courtroom drama about the infamous Donne: Party tragedy.

Performances are Wednesday through Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 3 p.m. 7:30 p.m. April 19 and 26 Film: Authors, Authors "Waiting for the Moon," opening in Orange County today at the Balboa Cinema, has been critically acclaimed as a civilized and intelligent look at the 39-year relationship between author Gertrude Stein and her friend and secretary Alice B. Toklas. Linda Bassett and Linda Hunt portray the two women in this film by director Jill Godmilow and co-writer Mark Magill.

"84 Charing Cross Road," at the Town Center in Costa Mesa, brings together Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins in a story that celebrates the power of the written word. The film is based on correspondence between New York writer Helen Hanff and a London bookseller. Music: Full Menu Maurice Allard will lead the 140-member Orange County Master Chorale in a partially staged account of Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa.

Soloists include Jon Humphrey as the Evangelist and Kenneth Cox as Jesus. Staging is by Susan Lee. There will be a 90-minute break for dinner. The performance will resume at 7:15 p.m. Keith Clark will conduct the Pacific Chorale and Pacific Symphony in Verdi's Requiem at 7 p.m.

Sunday. The vocal quartet will consist of soprano (CQ) Juliana Gondek, mezzo-soprano Leslie Richards, tenor Cesar-Antonio Suarez and bass Thomas Paul. The concert is sponsored by the Orange County Philharmonic Society. Dance: Jose Limon Company The Jose Limon Dance Company will offer modern dance works at 8 p.m. Saturday at UC Irvine's Fine Arts Village Theatre.

The program will include Limon's "A Choreographic Offering" and "There Is a Time" and Susanne Linke's "Also, Egmont, Bitte." UCI also will offer a two-day ethnic dance festival at 8 tonight and Saturday at the Fine Arts Concert Hall. Participating groups include the college's Ballet Folklorico and Spanish Dance Ensemble and the professional Dunaj Folk Ensemble. For additional cultural and entertainment events in Orange County, see Page 21. Compiled by Randy Lewis, Chris Posies and RkkVanderKnyff. PERFORMANCE ART WORK FOCUSES ON EARTH'S PLIGHT By RICK VANDERKNYFF Performance artist Rachel Rosenthal often uses her work to address man's mistreatment of earth, and a three-week solo sojourn through the Mojave Desert last year helped sharp- en her awareness of the problem.

"I think it made me much sadder ORANGE because I experienced firsthand the COUNTY feeling of loss and guilt," Rosenthal said in an interview this week. "No matter how much wilderness I tried to climb into, there was always garbage everywhere. Always signs of human detritus." Rosenthal a GAIL FISHEI? 1 Ls Angeles Times ft, DON TORMEY MUSIC REVIEW Keith Clark, above, conducts Pacific Symphony; contralto Maureen Forrester is soloist. MAHLER'S THIRD BRINGS OUT THE PACIFIC'S STRENGTHS seminal figure in the esoteric realm of performance art, channeled her sadness and anger into a work, "L.O.W. in Gaia," that will be performed in La-guna Beach's Forum Theatre at 8 p.m.

today and Saturday. The solo performance is a "chronicle of, and a meditation on" her Mojave trip. "It has to do with our relationship to the earth and how we are currently stuffing the earth By DANIEL CARIAG Times Music Writer In the quality of its players their many strengths, abundant instrumental resources and virtuosity as a unit the Pacific Symphony has achieved, after more than seven ORANGE full seasons, high COUNTY professional sta- tus. The orchestra's membership comprises an elite group of INSIDE CALENDAR FILM: "Three for the Road" reviewed by Michael Wilmington. Page 16.

RESTAURANTS: The Barn in Costa Mesa and Chart House in Newport Beach are reviewed by Charles Perry. Page 22. STAGE: "Mr. Roberts" is revived by Cypress College. Review by Cathy De Mayo.

Page 23. TV: Tonight on TV and cable. Page 29. In the quality of its performances, the ensemble's record does not match its promise. Over the years, it has played both well and disappointingly.

A vein of lackadaisicali-ty runs through the body of its work, a vein all the more disheartening when one hears the orchestra on its better nights. Wednesday night at Segerstrom Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center proved to be such an occasion, and the orchestra's performance of Mahler's Please see PACIFIC, Page 12 Rachel Rosenthal full of garbage, some of which may be so poisonous that we may do her in, and, of course, us with it," Rosenthal Please see ROSENTHAL, Page 9.