Timothy Childs

Timothy Childs must know something that has evaded most of us. There he was a few years ago . . . edging toward 50 . . . owner of his own big-league Los Angeles real estate investment and asset development company . . . bank official, too . . . married, his wife also a financial pro . . . active member and officer of a Music Center board, also of the Foundation for the Joffrey . . . donor of a writing commission for the Taper Forum that went to David Mamet . . .

The J. Paul Getty Trust, the visual art world's ultimate one-percenter with about $8 billion in net assets, has decided that it can't get by on investment income alone and will begin raising money in earnest to pay for special projects. J. Timothy Child, a fundraiser for the University of Chicago since 1989, will assume the newly created position of vice president of institutional advancement on June 11 - the first time in its 30-year history that the Getty has hired a chief fundraiser.

The J. Paul Getty Trust, the visual art world's ultimate one-percenter with about $8 billion in net assets, has decided that it can't get by on investment income alone and will begin raising money in earnest to pay for special projects. J. Timothy Child, a fundraiser for the University of Chicago since 1989, will assume the newly created position of vice president of institutional advancement on June 11 - the first time in its 30-year history that the Getty has hired a chief fundraiser.

Timothy Childs must know something that has evaded most of us. There he was a few years ago . . . edging toward 50 . . . owner of his own big-league Los Angeles real estate investment and asset development company . . . bank official, too . . . married, his wife also a financial pro . . . active member and officer of a Music Center board, also of the Foundation for the Joffrey . . . donor of a writing commission for the Taper Forum that went to David Mamet . . .

Timothy Childs, 46, has been elected chairman of Southern California Savings, Beverly Hills. Childs will continue to serve as chief executive. In addition, John M. Yunker, previously a principal of EC Management Corp., has been named president; David W. Dresnick, 46, chief lending officer, was named senior executive vice president and Charles M. Hawley, 46, chief financial officer, was named executive vice president.

Eleven community and business leaders have been elected to the board of the Music Center's Performing Arts Council, the policy-making body and fund-raising arm of the Music Center. The 62 board members serve mostly three-year terms. The new members are: Sandra (Mrs. Sheldon) Ausman, co-chair of the 1986 Music Center Mercado; Edward W. Carter, chairman emeritus and director of Carter Hawley Hale Stores Inc.

"This doesn't feel like a stuffy opera party," declared Nancy Vreeland, as her eyes scanned the room of tuxedoed men and elegantly dressed women. "We don't have a stuffy opera," replied her friend. Despite the formality of clothes and major jewels, there was little stuffiness at the home of Jane and Marc Nathanson on Saturday night when 130 Los Angeles Music Center Opera supporters met for dinner.

A $1-million damage suit has been filed by a man who claims that Louisiana State University reneged on a promise to give him a job if he would help in recruiting a female basketball player from Houston. LSU has denied all of the allegations and asked that the suit by Timothy W. Childs be dropped. The suit does not name the basketball player. Childs' lawyer, Jack Dampf, said the recruit signed to play at the University of Houston.

Stage director Mike Ockrent, known for giving a new shine to old-fashioned musical theater, died in New York on Thursday of acute leukemia. He was 53. Ockrent directed and helped adapt such hits as "Me and My Girl" and "Crazy for You." The sixth annual rendition of a version of "A Christmas Carol" that he co-wrote and staged opened in New York on Tuesday, and he was scheduled to direct a new musical adaptation of "The Night They Raided Minsky's" at the Ahmanson Theatre next summer.

As "The Kentucky Cycle" makes its upcoming rounds--beginning with UCLA's Freud Playhouse in October--the primary co-producers will be the Center Theatre Group, the Kennedy Center, and the Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation. The first two are no surprise. CTG presented the two-part, Pulitzer Prize-winning epic earlier this year at the Mark Taper Forum.

The 25-year-old "Godspell" is getting a make-over for the '90s. Ross Perot (played by a woman), Whoopi Goldberg (played by a man) and the Psychic Friends Network are all part of the Theater League's "Godspell" revival at the Alex Theatre in Glendale this week and in Thousand Oaks' Probst Center Nov. 19-24 (with other stops scheduled in Phoenix and Kansas City). Not that the musical's story, based on the Gospel of St. Matthew, is changed.