1993 Year

Last year is dwindling in the rear-view mirror, tumbling down the memory hole, shuffling off to the Valhalla of Used Eras to await the whimsical verdict of the nostalgia gods. A serious year in many respects, a time when San Fernando Valley residents were left dazed by streaks of crime, felt the heat of a catastrophic fire, and elected their guy mayor of Los Angeles.

A jury Wednesday found the Port Authority negligent in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, a long-awaited victory for victims of the terrorist attack that killed six people and injured more than 1,000 eight years before the Sept. 11 attack destroyed the buildings.

Nirvana, whose breakthrough collection "Nevermind" finished second to U2's "Achtung Baby" in 1991's album-of-the-year poll, hits the top in 1993 with its follow-up, "In Utero." The Seattle trio and the close-second Smashing Pumpkins spearheaded a resurgence of alternative rock in the annual balloting of The Times' pop music contributors.

The fire advanced at a ferocious pace, growing as it devoured the trees and shrubs of Laguna Canyon. It seemed that nothing would stop it short of the ocean itself. Orange County had never encountered such a wildfire, exploding with fireballs and cloaking Laguna Beach in a sickening, hot cloud of ash and embers. Residents, awestruck by the sight, rushed home from work and from errands with their minds racing: Where is the family? Will a garden hose embolden us to stay? No, we've got to go.

Technoids. Bell-heads. Digit-nerds. Men who wear white socks. These are the new powerbrokers in Hollywood. Indeed, these are the people who may someday own Hollywood. And they've never eaten at Spago or been to a premiere. The TV and film businesses underwent a transformation in 1993 that had nothing to do with the usual round of musical chairs among studio chiefs (although there was that too).

Imagine the author of "The Bridges of Madison County" showing up in Stockholm to collect the Nobel Prize for literature. Or Snoop Doggy Dogg and Mariah Carey joining the Berlin Philharmonic and outclassing the field with their exquisite versions of delicate Shubert duets. That's the kind of year it's been for Steven Spielberg.

Usually it's considered a triumph when something breaks into the mainstream. It means that that phenomenon or group is now widely regarded as part of American life. But when that something is AIDS, the breakthrough signals both victory and failure. And so it is that 1993 has been a year of dark conquest. The plague has reached a new level of visibility--with Tony Kushner's Pulitzer-winning "Angels in America" on Broadway, HBO's "And the Band Played On" and the just-opened film "Philadelphia."

Flashback. After Joey Buttafuoco claimed he never slept with Amy Fisher, his loose tongue during a TV interview brings him serious trouble, indirectly leading to a guilty plea that sent him to prison for statutory rape. Let's see, now, the interview was on "A Current Affair." No, no, it was NBC's "Today." Or was it "Arsenio"? ABC's "Nightline"? If not Ted Koppel, maybe Dan Rather? Larry King? Surely not Barbara Walters.

What a difference a year makes. True, 1992 wasn't quite as grim as 1991, when finding 10 films remotely worth putting on a list was a feat in itself. Last year was more like a crack sports team without a bench, strong in the starting positions but lacking in the kind of depth, especially where Hollywood films were concerned, that makes for a memorable 12 months. This year, the problem with constructing a 10-best list is not deciding what to put on but what to leave off.

This has been a year in pop music of convulsion and, for some, revulsion--a time when the public debate dealt as often with an artist's character as with quality and craft. The main question at the start of 1993 was whether Nirvana and a wave of other alternative bands, including Smashing Pumpkins and Pearl Jam, could live up to the promise of a remarkable series of 1991 and '92 major-label debuts.

Edward Smith wanted to remind students Thursday about the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. Not the one two years ago. But the one that preceded it a decade ago, the one that claimed the lives of his wife and unborn child. So the Simi Valley resident asked the fourth-grade students at Somis School to stand during a ceremony to honor victims of the Sept. 11 assaults.

A former Santa Ana gang member turned small-town Alabama preacher pleaded not guilty to murder and attempted-murder charges Friday in the 1993 drive-by shooting of rival gang members. Geronimo Galvan Burgos, 29, being held on $250,000 bail in county jail, did not speak during the brief arraignment. He was arrested in Alabama last month. Police allege that Burgos was in a car from which numerous shots were fired at rival gang members.

Earthquake preparation is an ongoing project, but needn't be tedious. A rule of thumb is to check or replace supplies when clocks are changed to or from daylight saving time, twice a year. And when assembling a survival kit, don't forget about food and water for pets. How Much? Recommendations vary as to the appropriate amount of emergency food and water to store. Many experts advise one gallon of water per person per day for three to seven days.

It was six years ago this month that a tip led police to a clearing in a remote San Fernando Valley canyon. There, they found the bloodied bodies of five slain catering truck workers. The crime is still unsolved, prompting the Los Angeles City Council to double the reward--to $50,000--it had offered for information leading to a conviction or convictions in the case.

Police suspect that the four child molestation incidents in December 1995 may be the work of the same individual that they believe attacked as many as 32 children in 1993. At least half of the earlier attachs involved students on their way to school. Here are the locations of some of the attacks.

The 1993 New York Mets lost a major league-high 103 games, but they did it with style. They lost with sprays of bleach bursting in air and bombs blasting on clubhouse floors and outside players' car doors.

It was another year of living dangerously. Turn on television in 1993 and there was proof galore that America seemed awash in violence. Terrorists tried to blow up the world's tallest building. A gunman blasted commuters inside a railway car. A 12-year-old girl was abducted from a slumber party and strangled. Followers of a fiery preacher met a fiery end. And that Reginald Denny tape repeated over and over and over. And that was only the fare served up on the evening news. Film at 11.

What did 1993 bring television viewers in Southern California? Our search was both thorough and relentless. We looked high and we looked low, and this is what we found. High--The ouster of John Lippman as KCBS-TV Channel 2 news director on April 30, after lasting less than a year. Recruited from Seattle, Lippman was a catastrophe, managing to alienate or enrage much of his staff while guiding the trickiest, trashiest, most irresponsible, least trustworthy local news coverage in memory.

Foreign Language Film: "Belle Epoque" Spain Costume Design: Gabriella Pescucci, "The Age of Innocence" Sound: Gary Summers, Gary Rydstrom, Shawn Murphy and Ron Judkins, "Jurassic Park" Film Editing: Michael Kahn, "Schindler's List" Art Direction: Allan Starski (art direction) and Ewa Braun (set decoration), "Schindler's List" Cinematography: Janusz Kaminski, "Schindler's List" Original Score: John Williams, "Schindler's List" Original Song: "Streets of Philadelphia" Words and music by Bruce