From Sacramento — It's now the holiday season, so let's start this by being positive: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver got it exactly right when they named filmmaker George Lucas to their California Hall of Fame.
The writer-director-producer is best known for his "Star Wars" and "Indiana Jones" blockbusters. But for me, a fellow California native, Lucas' most remarkable and entertaining contribution was his breakthrough 1973 hit "American Graffiti."
Here's a creative role model who grew up in small-town Modesto in the Central Valley -- cruisin', draggin', listening to Wolfman Jack -- and captured his and millions of California teens' night lives in a semi-autobiographical, iconic flick. Lucas set the story in 1962 Modesto, when he was 18.
The low-budget film became one of the most profitable ever and made Lucas a multimillionaire before age 30.
It capsulized the music and culture of a generation.
"Hey, hey, hey, baby. What do you say?"
"Paradise Road."
"Jesus, what a night!"
So it's inconceivable that anyone could argue against Lucas' selection by the state's First Couple to join the California Hall of Fame. That's not true with everyone selected, however.
And that has been the case ever since Shriver created the hall in 2006 to help revive the all-but-ignored state history museum two blocks from the Capitol. It seems to have worked. Attendance is way up and, if nothing else, the privately funded museum is a destination for school tours.
The fourth batch of 13 hall of famers will be inducted there Tuesday night in a sort of Hollywood mock-up ceremony featuring a red carpet strung alongside some light-rail tracks. It's bound to be cold and damp. Very un-Hollywood, except for the stars.
Besides Lucas, 65, the other new living members are: entertainer Carol Burnett, 76; former Intel chief executive Andrew Grove, 73; decathlon champ Rafer Johnson, 74; football coach and commentator John Madden, 73; novelist Danielle Steel, 62; bodybuilder Joe Weider, 90, and test pilot Chuck Yeager, 86.
There will be five posthumous inductees: reform Gov. Hiram Johnson, industrialist Henry J. Kaiser, philanthropist Joan Kroc, slain gay-rights activist Harvey Milk and Native American artist Fritz Scholder.
