Bernice

Re "In Other Words," by Susan King, Dec. 29: While the feature film versions of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novels and stories are for the most part wanting (though from this vantage point, parts of the Kazan/Pinter "Last Tycoon" work very well), the best regarded film adaptation of a Fitzgerald story is probably "Bernice Bobs Her Hair" (1976), scripted and directed by Joan Micklin Silver for PBS' "The American Short Story." Silver and her young, talented cast really captured the feel and nuance of Fitzgerald's story; Shelley Duvall was outstanding as Bernice.

The trap was set. All that was left for Los Angeles County sheriff's investigators to do was wait and see if the unthinkable was true. Suspicions had grown that one of their colleagues - a respected captain with more than 150 deputies under her command - was funneling secret information to an alleged Compton drug trafficker. So investigators sent out a phony plan as bait, according to records and interviews, detailing their intention to do surveillance on a house near the suspected trafficker's home.

Newlyweds: An article in Sunday's California section about two 95-year-olds who married in Camarillo identified the couple as Bernice and Rich Jenkins. Their married names are Bernice and Rich Richard.

HONOLULU - Palace intrigue? Check. Royal rapscallions? Some. Kings and queens and gorgeous things? You'll find those too. You thought we were speaking of Britain, perhaps? Well, no, although Britain celebrated Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee in June. Instead, we're turning to Hawaiian royalty, who ruled a kingdom now so popular that 7.3 million people visited last year. Royal watchers will find almost as many twists and turns in the story of the Hawaiian monarchs as they do among England's overlords.

Hot Springs A Novel Geoffrey Becker Tin House Books: 318 pp., $14.95 paper I call them papercut writers -- brave souls who just about make us bleed, writing on the edge of what we can stand. A reader is lulled into trotting along to the edge of darkness with characters who, gosh, officer, they seemed normal. Who are we to judge? What do we really know about other people's lives? This Bernice character in "Hot Springs," a young woman who has given up her baby for adoption and cons her boyfriend into helping her kidnap the child five years later . . . is she crazy?

Allan McCollum is one of 30 young artists included in the current MOCA blockbuster, "Forest of Signs." In a concurrent one-man show titled "Perfect Vehicles," McCollum presents a suite of work based on an idea he has been developing since 1979. With roots in Conceptualism and Minimalism, McCollum is more a theoretician than an object maker, and "Perfect Vehicles"--six solid concrete ginger jars, 6 1/2-feet tall and identical but for the fact that each is painted a different color--offers plenty of food for thought for those of rarefied appetites.

Sally Guisinger of Brea, who works with a group of senior citizens, has been making noises about obtaining a number of kazoos, preferably the old-fashioned metal type, but she will take the heavier plastic ones; so far, her search has hit only sour notes. Can you strike a chord with Guisinger by recommending a source, or will your silence be considered a blow that might prevent her senior citizens group from banding together for old-time music?

For Drew Birtness, the last straw came when he realized he was arresting the grandchildren of suspects he had picked up years ago. The Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy had been working the streets of East Los Angeles for 21 years, long enough to be hardened by the shootings and deaths and gangs--but also long enough to try something new. "I was tired of picking up kids' bodies off the street," he said.

Rachel Prieur and her brother Ryan were captivated by a radio commercial flooding the airwaves in Dallas. It offered children a shot at stardom — maybe even a part on a Disney show — and all they had to do was show up for an audition. The teenagers begged their parents to take them. Crammed into a hotel ballroom with 200 other children, they took turns reading short monologues in front of a judge. Their father, Bruce Prieur, said a representative for "The," the company that staged the event, told him his children had talent and had qualified to participate in a larger showcase at Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, where they would meet top talent scouts.

Reporting from Orinda, Calif., and East Palo Alto, Calif. -- Residents of a densely packed neighborhood in East Palo Alto, Calif., awoke to explosions and fire Wednesday when a small plane carrying employees of an electric car company crashed in dense fog, killing all three aboard and spewing debris over several homes. The twin-engine Cessna 310 hit 60-foot-high transmission lines, and its fuselage was found tangled in wires. The victims, who were not immediately identified, were employees of Tesla Motors Inc., a San Carlos, Calif.

For years, Bernice Abram was a well-regarded manager at the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. She rose through the ranks, eventually making captain at the department's Carson station, where some 160 deputies served under her command. As the city's de facto police chief, Abram was well-liked, hosting "coffee with the captain" meet-and-greets at local restaurants. But last April, Abram's ascent was unexpectedly halted, sources said, after federal agents wiretapping an alleged Compton drug trafficker overheard what they believed was the captain's voice.

When federal agents eavesdropped on the telephone conversations of several drug trafficking suspects, they heard talk of marijuana sales, money transfers and cross-country drug shipments. They may have also detected something far more surprising: a Los Angeles County sheriff's captain. Law enforcement sources have confirmed that Bernice Abram, who is in charge of the sheriff's Carson station, was put on leave after federal authorities notified sheriff's officials that their captain may have been heard on the narcotics wiretap.

Hot Springs A Novel Geoffrey Becker Tin House Books: 318 pp., $14.95 paper I call them papercut writers -- brave souls who just about make us bleed, writing on the edge of what we can stand. A reader is lulled into trotting along to the edge of darkness with characters who, gosh, officer, they seemed normal. Who are we to judge? What do we really know about other people's lives? This Bernice character in "Hot Springs," a young woman who has given up her baby for adoption and cons her boyfriend into helping her kidnap the child five years later . . . is she crazy?

Re "In Other Words," by Susan King, Dec. 29: While the feature film versions of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novels and stories are for the most part wanting (though from this vantage point, parts of the Kazan/Pinter "Last Tycoon" work very well), the best regarded film adaptation of a Fitzgerald story is probably "Bernice Bobs Her Hair" (1976), scripted and directed by Joan Micklin Silver for PBS' "The American Short Story." Silver and her young, talented cast really captured the feel and nuance of Fitzgerald's story; Shelley Duvall was outstanding as Bernice.

Newlyweds: An article in Sunday's California section about two 95-year-olds who married in Camarillo identified the couple as Bernice and Rich Jenkins. Their married names are Bernice and Rich Richard.

Bernice Lavin, 81, who co-founded the beauty products business Alberto-Culver Co. with her husband, died Monday at her home in Glencoe, Ill., after a long illness, company officials said. In 1955, Lavin and her husband, Leonard, a salesman, purchased a Los Angeles beauty supply company, discontinuing most of its products to focus on the Alberto VO5 Conditioning Hairdressing line.

Old Town Irvine is not in the heart of the Orange County city of 98,000, but the formerly ramshackle structures at Sand Canyon Avenue and the Santa Ana Freeway are attracting upscale shoppers who like the idea of a hotel made out an old lima bean silo and a fast-food place made from a blacksmith shop. The $20-million project is being developed on 6.5 acres contributed by the Irvine Co., a partner in the project with Robert B. Smith, James W. Ray, Michael D. Ray and Bernice Anglea.

Some were born and raised here. Others--such as the U.S. Olympic water polo teams--took up residence in Orange County while training for the 2000 Olympics.

Bernice Galansky Kert, a biographer who started researching her first nonfiction book at the age of 50 and wrote about the female companions of two larger-than-life men, has died. She was 81. Kert died of respiratory failure Saturday at CedarsSinai Medical Center, said her daughter Elizabeth Kert. "The Hemingway Women: Those Who Loved Him -- the Wives and Others," which detailed the tangled relationships of Ernest Hemingway, was published in 1983.

The Rev. Bernice King, daughter of The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., will join a prominent Atlanta pastor today in a march that opposes same-sex marriage as part of a larger, church-centered movement. The event has been criticized by gay-rights organizations, which say it betrays the legacy of the slain civil rights leader. King's widow, Coretta Scott King, has supported marriage rights for gays and lesbians, as have civil rights figures such as Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.