David Dillon

Mark Savage can't decide whether he wants to be Stephen Sondheim or David Dillon, the guy who wrote the male nudie show "Party." Savage is the talented director-writer-lyricist-composer of "The Ballad of Little Mikey," a frustratingly immature coming-of-age musical that had a successful 1994 run at the Celebration Theatre. "Mikey" is back in all of his, uh, glory, this time at Highways in Santa Monica.

From the crash two weeks ago of a training pilot into an aircraft carrier, killing five, to Sunday's accident involving the San Diego-based destroyer Kinkaid, the Navy has been plagued by a nightmare of men killed at sea and in plane crashes. Lt. Sean Michael McPhee, 24, a navigator from Santa Rosa, Calif., was killed when the Kinkaid collided with a freighter off Malaysia.

Twelve days after an unprecedented 48-hour safety review, the Navy is hearing that it needs more CPR classes, better handling of hazardous materials and safety training when a sailor first boards a ship instead of waiting for the division's training session. But, even as the Navy was reviewing the reports, an SH-2F Seasprite helicopter crashed into the ocean near Okinawa, leaving two men injured, including the Chula Vista pilot, and the co-pilot missing.

Did you hear the one about the stand-up comic who tried to make a go of it at downtown L.A. night spots? It's no joke to 53-year-old Perry Kurtz, comedian by night, mattress salesman by day. And it's been a test of his good humor. He got a dismal reception, for instance, at the Redwood 2nd Street Saloon, the L.A. Downtown News said. I could have predicted that -- the Redwood is full of newspaper people, lawyers and bail bondsmen, none of whom are great listeners.

The captain of the Navy's amphibious landing ship Dubuque has been charged with two counts of violating lawful orders for failing to rescue a boatload of Vietnamese refugees who claim they later resorted to cannibalism to survive. Capt. Alexander G. Balian, 48, flew to San Diego on Sunday after being notified of the charges and is scheduled to appear Wednesday at a hearing, Cmdr. David Dillon, a Pacific Fleet spokesman, said today.

The Navy frigate named after Vietnam War hero Lt. Cmdr. Wilmer Paul Cook performed a solemn mission Monday, scattering its namesake's ashes at sea 22 years after the combat pilot died in battle. The Cook left port in San Diego Monday morning and paused off the coast for the 20-minute service before resuming training maneuvers, Navy spokesman Cmdr. David Dillon said.

Playwright Norman Krasna wrote a lot of potboiling sitcoms for the Broadway stage, up until that genre's dying gasps in the late 1960s. They were all craftsmanlike, simplistic and required comic expertise to pull off. Cypress Civic Theatre's staging of Krasna's "Full Moon" is without that expertise and provides a good example of why Krasna's work is rarely produced today.

The Navy called off the search Monday for a Marine who was thrown into the ocean after his military helicopter lost power and slammed into an amphibious assault ship 20 miles off the coast near Camp Pendleton. Twenty-two other Marines and three sailors were slightly injured in the Sunday evening accident. It took place during the final operation of a major Marine and Navy military exercise that began nearly two weeks ago.

Contract negotiations between representatives of Southern California's three largest supermarket chains and 65,000 union workers continued at a secret location Thursday. But as the give-and-take continued for a second day, there was no word of any breakthrough. New proposals had been delivered to the Vons, Ralphs and Albertsons chains, United Food and Commercial Workers spokesman Mike Shimpock said, but he offered no details.