The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 70

VIE Cos Angeles (Times Friday, April 22, 1988 Part Other VIEWS Glamour Is No Drinking Companion By STEVE ALLEN I have never encountered a woman writer who devoted more than a few sentences to expressing respect and admiration for the amount of alcohol a man could consume without making a fool of himself. But men who write, whether they themselves drink or not, seem to be impressed by an excess, which in reality clearly has the most tragic effects. The habitual use of liquor is annually 5tPVP Allpn responsible for suf- tteve Alien fering many tjmes greater than that occasioned by AIDS. Thousands of innocents are killed yearly in accidents caused by driving while drunk, countless crimes committed, barroom brawls and sexual offenses, not to mention the gradual destruction of living tissue that at any given moment is sending millions to their deaths. Why, in the light of this unremitting wave of destruction and foolishness, anyone should express any emotion beyond sympathy for an alcoholic friend has, since childhood, been something that I could not understand.

A y- nv jt ft In' SSatmfc AjrVViiMiMiA' i I 1 JHbk i hi ubm There is nothing of the holier-than-thou in this judgment. My own mother was a partial alcoholic, as were some of her brothers and sisters. Although alcohol was not the only cause of destruction of the fabric of my mother's family, the Donahues, it was high on the list of contributing factors. When I was young, I used to take an occasional drink and have, in rare instances, become as intoxicated as anybody else in my social circle. But in every instance, I behaved like a boob and later wished I had not done so.

Again, I am no saint and have no wish to legislate others' morality. If people wish to drink themselves into an ongoing series of bouts of asininity, not to mention Please see OTHER VIEW, Page 8 JOHN MALM1N Los Angeles Times Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, with his wife, Ethel.and Jesse Unruh, on his way to the Embassy Room of the Ambassador Hotel just before the shooting. R.F.K.

Remembered Nearly 20 Years Later, the Events at the Ambassador Hotel Still Evoke Pain and Sorrow Marylouise Oates Getting a Busy Signal on the Party Line Ki III' i XL ly Id urn in I 1 -1 I IfV'tl recall became more specific. "After I was shot, I went out into the area where the podium was and I was the first person to be noticed that they were shot, which was an indication that there was a shooting back there. And my parents had viewed that on television and were quite shocked by the fact that their son was shot. Then my friends, about six of us, got into a taxi cab and I went to Central Receiving Hospital with my leg propped up. I was not operated on at Central Receiving.

I was just given emergency care and then Bobby was brought in and the priorities were toward him, which was fine. It was all hectic and pandemonium." The Labor Director In 1968, Paul Schrade was 43 and a regional director for the United Auto Workers who campaigned extensively for Kennedy. He was shot in the head that night. Today he still lives in Los Angeles and remains active in public affairs. "I was on the platform in the hotel ballroom with Bob, one of those who was thanked by him for helping him in his California campaign.

We were really joyful at that point because it was a very difficult election and we won and we were pleased so much about that. "And I got off the platform early and went into the pantry area to wait. It was so crowded in the Embassy Room and Bob came by me and said, 'Paul, I want Please see KENNEDY, Page 4 By GARRY ABRAMS, Times Staff Writer It is a week of eerie coincidence regarding Robert P. Kennedy, dead now almost 20 years. The long-suppressed files of the Los Angeles Police Department investigation into Kennedy's 1968 assassination were finally released from state archives in Sacramento on Tuesday.

The opening of the voluminous papers to the public prompted a fresh round of speculation about whether the June 5, 1968 shooting of the Democratic presidential candidate was the result of a conspiracy or as most believe and as the courts have concluded the work of a lone assassin, Sirhan B. Sirhan, now serving a life term in prison. And Saturday, about 500 friends, supporters, former campaign workersas well as students too young to remember the 42-year-old Kennedy's bid for the White House will gather at Loyola Marymount University for a retrospective conference, "R.F.K. Remembered." For some it will be the first time they have met since Kennedy was gunned down in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel moments after happily claiming victory in the California primary. In interviews with The Times this week, some who were there that night or had close ties to Kennedy-recalled those final moments.

The Campaign Volunteer Irwin Stroll was a 17-year-old cam- BORIS YARO Los Angeles Times ROBERT GABRIEL Angeles Times Sen. Robert F. Kennedy is being comforted shortly after the shots rang out. Ex-campaign volunteer Irwin Stroll, right, was hit in the leg. shooting began.

I was standing about four feet away from Ethel the senator's wife and I'm not really clear in my memory. I guess your mind makes changes on you and blocks out certain situations." Stroll did not immediately realize he had been hurt. "I didn't even know that I was shot. I thought I was kicked in the leg until I looked down and saw that the color of my pants had changed from blue to dark blue. Right after that we heard the senator was shot." As he talked about the confusion of that night two decades ago, Stroll's paign volunteer invited to the Kennedy victory party that night.

He was one of five people, besides Kennedy, wounded in the spray of gunfire triggered by Sirhan. Now a successful Los Angeles interior designer, Stroll said he has never talked publicly about his experience. "I think I was standing on the podium waiting for Sen. Kennedy to make his victory speech and we were all going to the party afterward. So I proceeded with the family, as I was told to keep walking to the hotel kitchen.

After we walked through the kitchen doors, the This year, the Democratic Party plans to play a serious game of political catch-up. According to a plan being evolved by the Democratic National Committee and the nonpartisan Citizen Action organization, when the phone rings at the homes of several hundred thousand voters registered as Democrats, it will be signaling a direct pitch for the Democratic presidential candidate. Ira Arlook, executive director of Citizen Action, said the phone call will be designed to touch the issues the individual voters believe are crucial to the country. It's a significant step out of the rear for the DNC, which has lagged considerably behind the Republican National Committee and state GOP parties in its ability to have close touch with its registered voters and to build from that contact with a significant small-donor base. The plan, within weeks of being formalized, would have Citizen Action (that's the umbrella group of citizen-issue organizations in 24 states) organize a massive phone canvass of its members, including a fund-raising operation.

That would all begin after the July Democratic Convention in Atlanta. Citizen Action is nonpartisan, Arloff stressed, and it and its individual components (like Campaign California here) get involved in electoral politics only when two conditions are operating: that there are issues at stake in the election that are on the organization's agenda and that there is a significant difference between the candidates on these issues. Because of its stance on issues, Arlook said, it would be unlikely that the organization would support the sure-shot Republican nominee, Vice President George Bush. The kinds of issues that Citizen Action and its affiliates stress and organize around are toxic hazards, nuclear power, health care, jobs, insurance rates and a wide range of pocketbook consumer issues. The organizations, which got under way in the mid-1970s, have flourished.

Now, the combined membership of the federation of state Citizen Action organizations is well over 1.75 million and, according to Arlook, growing at a rate of Please see OATES, Page 5 Photographs ire from "Jewelry by Architects" by Barbtrt Radlce, published by Rizzoli. Big-Name Architects Build New Image as Designers of Jewelry dio and store he helped found) to make a ring. Intrigued by the results, Munari extended his request for jewelry to top architects around the world. Three years and more than $1 million later, he lays claim to Fashion ROBERTO GENNARI Ring in gold, lapis lazuli and rock crystal, left, is by architect Leila Vignelli; Peter Eisenman designed the grid ring in onyx, lapis lazuli and gold. By MINNA TOWBIN PINGER Go on, ask for an Arata Isozaki original.

"But he designs buildings," you say, thinking of the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art. True, but he does more. Isozaki is among 21 world-class architects and interior designers who have put their hands to jewelry design and are showing off the results at the Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles. The whole group architects Richard Meier, Stanley Tigerman, Michael Graves and Robert Venturi among them was commissioned by Italian industrialist Cle-to Munari. And whether or not most people would dangle small temples from their ears (Venturi came up with that idea for earrings), this eclectic collection gives insight into the designing mind.

It's not the first time that the maverick Munari has encouraged architects to cross the boundaries of their discipline. He introduced a flatware collection in 1976, calling on some top names in Europe to do it. And later, in 1982, he asked Ettore Sottsass (better known for his Olivetti typewriter designs and for "Memphis," the Milan-based design stu- i 'I an international collection of 200 pieces and is lending a large part of it to the museum exhibit. His originals are not for sale. But he has arranged for limited-edition copies to be made and sold at prices that range up to $22,000.

"It took months to make a prototype," Alcssandro Munari, nephew and business partner of Cleto, says to explain the prices. The originals and the reproductions are made in Vicenza, Italy, by a group of craftsmen retained by the Munaris to work exclusively on the collection. "We had to educate them to make these new and unusual shapes," Munari says. "Sometimes for one ring, we had to Inside View ABBY: "Straight" male throws her a curve. Page 2.

ANN LANDERS: It's another stock answer. Page 11. BRIDGE: Alfred Sheinwold column. Page 10. COMICS: Page 9.

MORE FASHION FEATURES ON PAGE 6. make it 10 times." New York architect Peter Eisenman's design for a ring is particularly troublesome to construct. It is an intricate, cube-shaped grid inlaid with turquoise, lapis and onyx. "It was so hard to capture the geometric form," Munari explains. Mario Bellini, known for his industrial designs, submitted sketches for a ruby-studded gold bar that stretches across three gold finger bands.

And Sottsass, who also rejects the idea that a ring should be limited to one part of the hand, designed a ring the width of a hockey puck a gold disc covered with multicolored abstract shapes. The show at the Craft and Folk Art Museum offers a visual lesson in the different styles and approaches of the designers. Michael Graves presents the most "jewelry-like" jewels. He is known for his classical, almost lyrical approach to design, and his necklaces and rings, small and decorated with delicate swirling motifs, look as if they might have come Please see ARCHITECTS, Page 7.