Public Record, The: Event producer creates an affair to remember

Growing up in San Jose, Dick Taylor thought he was going to be an actor. He graduated from amateur talent contests to local television, hosting Record Hop and a children's show called Hocus Pocus Clubhouse.

In pursuit of an acting career, Taylor moved to Los Angeles to attend classes at the Pasadena Playhouse. After a year, he decided to get out and act, but he also got into public relations "because it was a place I was familiar with," he says, referring to his local television background. He did land a job as "an Actor" and toured in The Impossible Years with George Goebel, he says. "It was a wonderful experience." The show closed in Chicago after eight months and he returned to California, where he got back into public relations.

One of his clients was the Cocoanut Grove at the Ambassador Hotel. Within a few months, the Grove hired him full time, within a few months of that, everyone was fired except Taylor. "It was a turbulent time," he explains. In 1971, the Cocoanut Grove was turned into Sammy Davis Jr.'s Now Grove. Taylor became entertainment director for the 1,000-seat room, and his first booking was Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughn and Billy Eckstein on the same bill.

"I was there two years and the neighborhood changed, and so did nightclub entertainment," he says. Las Vegas was coming on strong and the Grove couldn't afford to compete. "I tried to bring [the Cocoanut Grove] back," Taylor says. "My last booking there was, unfortunately, also the end of the Cocoanut Grove."

Taylor was reminded of his last booking when he saw the opening scene of the recently released Beyond the Sea. He recalls the announcer saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, Bobby Darin at the Cocoanut Grove."

That was July 1972. After that, Taylor returned once more to public relations and marketing. In 1980, he ended up at Rogers & Cowan, which he describes as one of the country's largest entertainment firms at the time. In 1986, he became a partner and CEO. Rogers & Cowan was sold to a British conglomerate a year later, but Taylor stayed until 1991, when he joined Hill & Knowlton.

There, two major clients were Ford Motor Co. - for whom he produced "Impact at Ford Field" to open the $500 million NFL stadium in Detroit - and Puerto Rico - for whom he produced a 500th anniversary celebration in New York City's Times Square that was carried live on television.

Also at Hill & Knowlton, he spent eight years on Rose Bowl/Tournament of Roses Parade production, including lining up celebrity grand marshals. "That became eight years of my life in Pasadena on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, and I'm too old for that," he says.

Taylor moved to the Coachella Valley in 1997, though he remained with Hill & Knowlton until 2003, when he opened his own company in Palm Springs: Dick Taylor Productions. Although he has traveled extensively, he currently is "trying very hard not to leave the desert," he says. Locally, he has produced the Steve Chase Humanitarian Awards (which he does for free as a community service), the Spa Resort Casino grand opening and, most recently, the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino grand opening.

Although Taylor has a large contingency team that includes a stage director, choreographer, composers, arrangers, and performers, his company has only two full-time employees. Taylor maintains creative control, but Bryan Burch serves as co-executive producer. For the Fantasy Springs opening night, they brought in a 60-member team.

Taylor's creativity often takes shape as he meets with clients. "It's like a dream," he says, referring to the way ideas pop into his head. "You make it up and you hope that what you say is going to happen. Fortunately, I have enough friends in the industry that we are able to deliver."

He also shares ownership of the Balagan show with DreamCast Entertainment in Las Vegas. He struck up the partnership after meeting DreamCast owner Misha Matorin, a former Cirque du Soleil performer, when he wanted a cirque show for the Steve Chase awards a couple years ago. In addition to producing the current Balagan run at Fantasy Springs, he sells and produces the show throughout the West.

Taylor labors beyond planning, booking and preparation. "We are working our tails off the night of the event," he says. "We have the responsibility and accountability, between Bryan and I, of each element of everything that is going on. I am not wrapping cheese balls in the kitchen, but when it comes to anything that the guests are experiencing, it really comes down to our necks are on the line." Even after the event, there are accounting and follow-up tasks, including editing archival videos for the client's use.

Taylor typically handles three sizeable events at a time. But don't ask him to produce your kid's birthday party or bar mitzvah unless you're prepared to shell out the bucks. The smallest event he'll produce has a $25,000 budget. Although he has worked with $7 million event budgets, the largest local budget (he won't reveal which one) was a mere $3.2 million.

Of course, if you're promoting a $200 million project for which you want to create a lasting impression, a million-plus budget is a drop in the bucket.

Taylor tailors events

When Dick Taylor heard the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians was investing $200 million on a resort property, he flew into action. "I worked very hard to get a meeting with the CEO, Jim McKennon," he says. At their June 2004 meeting, Taylor told McKennon. "You know, I think I can be very helpful to you in creating a grand opening that I think will have more impact than just bringing in a concert and having a dinner. .... My goal would be to create an opening that leaves your guests with an impression of the property and keeps it in their mind and the media's mind: 'Wow, what is this property about?' Let's leave that memory in people's minds and not just the fact that you had an opening."

"We try to create events that are meaningful to not only the guests and media, but also that translate to the public what the property is about," Taylor says.

"Everything we try to do - everything I have ever tried to do in production - is to be unlike people have experienced before, to create something different."

For example, Taylor says, for the Fantasy Springs opening, he wanted more than champagne with a strawberry served as the evening wound down. "I told the kitchen, 'Don't just give me a strawberry. Give me an apple, but it's got to be a strawberry."

While creating an overall total sensory experience, Taylor also paid attention to details - from the color of ambient lighting to the color of fireworks reflecting Fantasy Springs' design palette and original music accompanying the fireworks finale.

"We don't use pat stuff," Taylor says.