The L.A. law of golf on courses in the vicinity of Sunset Boulevard is that celebrity rules. There's as much talk of glitz as of golf.
Here, then, are some L.A. stories.
We begin at the Los Angeles Country Club and its well-regarded North course. George Thomas -- the main man in this area when it came to architecture -- is the designer. It's often been said that the United States Golf Association would like its Open there. But L.A. North prefers anonymity. Tough task.
In fact, the club doesn't accept entertainers as members. Randolph Scott, who was famous for his roles in westerns, is supposedly the only movie star admitted as a member. That's because he demonstrated that the bulk of his wealth came from the oil business, not films.
Then there's the story of Esther Williams, the swimmer-actress of bygone days. The club honoured her with a fancy dinner, but she showed up in illegal garb -- pants, that is. LACC didn't allow women to wear pants then, and only recently changed the rule. Williams refused to wear any of the allowable outfits the club kept for emergencies, left the dinner planned in her honour, and the story was played up in a big way here.
That was then, and this is now, and the LACC still doesn't want members from the world of entertainment. It did admit PGA Tour star Fred Couples recently -- a club member told me that was because Couples, who played L.A. North frequently anyway but wasn't a member, spent a summer working closely with kids. Couples likes to do that, and the club apparently appreciated his efforts.
But Couples, of course, is a star of fairway and green, not stage and screen. He's an athlete, not an entertainer. About the nearest an entertainer or somebody big in show biz can get to the club in any permanent way is to live adjacent to its fairways.
Aaron Spelling, the wealthy television producer, owns an unbelievably opulent home adjacent to the 13th fairway at L.A. North. It must be 50,000 square feet. Size matters, I guess.
Or does it? Spelling isn't a member at L.A. North, mind you, I have no idea whether he wants to belong. The entertainers belong to the Riviera Country Club and especially to the Bel-Air Country Club.
Peter Falk of Colombo fame was seen at Riviera swinging away from the first fairway. From a distance his follow-through appeared to put him off balance. Take a lesson, Colombo.
Riviera has had a pile of entertainers as members. Dean Martin, who died in 1996, loved hanging out at the Riv. He had breakfast alone at a window table overlooking the course most mornings, then hit a dozen balls on the range as his caddy, Art Rios, watched.
Rios, a famous Riviera caddy, was known as the Godfather. And the notorious O. J. Simpson, who lived nearby in Brentwood, was a member before his, shall we say, legal complications.
Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy were also members at Riviera. Their film Pat and Mike was, in part, shot there. So was the Dean Martin/Jerry Lewis film The Caddy. And also some of the execrable film Follow the Sun -- Ben Hogan's life story.
But there's no place like Bel-Air for showstopping star stories. Howard Hughes had arranged a date with Hepburn but was late for their rendezvous. He landed his plane on the eighth fairway, where Hepburn was playing. The club didn't appreciate Hughes using the fairway as a landing strip, and gave him the hook. His membership was revoked.
By the way, if you hit a hook at Bel-Air, it's dubbed a Heidi Fleiss, named, of course, for the infamous Hollywood madam.
The crooner Bing Crosby, a scratch golfer, also had a showdown at Bel-Air. He was hitting shots from the 10th tee, which sits in front of the pro shop, across the canyon toward the green. He was told to stop, because the par-three hole was never meant to double as a driving range. Bing didn't like being taken to task. I was told he picked up then and there and never returned to the club.
Others have stayed the course. Jack Nicholson belongs to Bel-Air, where he's known for some legendary antics as well as his golf. A member told me Tom Cruise just joined and has bought a gigantic home under construction just to the left of the 11th hole.
Actors show up at Bel-Air day in and day out. "Yeah, but most of them have massive egos and think they can do anything they want," a Bel-Air member said. "L.A. has the right idea by not letting 'em join."
Maybe so, but golf is another name for glitz here. In L.A., the world's a stage, and some stages are courses. Ah, if only the ground could talk. Then we'd really hear some stories. I heard a few that can't be published in a reputable newspaper, so if you get out here, keep your ears close to the ground. In L.A., golf and gossip go well. I promise. E-mail: lhruben@ibm.net.