“Most likely,” entrepreneur Gary Mandell said this morning, City Councilman Andy Weissman is the reason that there will be Thursday night concerts in the Courtyard of City Hall for at least four weeks this summer.
A threatened mess was deftly sidestepped.
“There was not going to be any money, and so Andy took the initiative and expedited the matter,” Mr. Mandell said.
With the collapse of Redevelopment Agencies statewide, the main funding stream, the Summer Music Festival, a 17-year Culver City tradition presided over for 11 seasons by Mr. Mandell, teetered on the brink of extinction during the winter.
Briefly, Mr. Mandell and others had considered shifting the Boulevard Music Festival – named for his business – to City Hall and expanding it.
“I wanted to see what Ideas I could come up with to help generate more money,” he said. “Then Andy set up a meeting with (City Manager) John Nachbar and (Community Development Director) Sol Blumenfeld.
“Andy did more. He arranged for the steamcleaning company” to scour the Courtyard after each of this summer’s concerts.
“If it had not been for his work, it certainly would have been a lot more complicated.”
Instead, at least four concerts will be staged under the banner Culver City’s Boulevard Music Summer Festival.
Mr. Mandell said Mr. Weissman’s welcomed intervention was appreciated because he, the impresario, chafes when he stands before the City Council with a 3-minute time limit on making his crucial case.
“It is always difficult to figure out something in three minutes,” he said. “In their format, it also is difficult to have an open dialogue and discuss something with the Council.
“You may walk up there and make a point. But it is not an open dialogue. It’s like Beat the Clock. I never have worked well under those kinds of terms when the clock is running and I am trying to get my thoughts together.
“I always work better open-ended. That’s the way I always have done my music. I never have done an album where you have to have it done in three weeks or four weeks.
“I do it until it’s finished,” Mr. Mandell said.
And that explains the value of Mr. Weissman’s assistance. No clocks were ticking. The gentlemen could dicker or negotiate in a relaxed atmosphere.
