He's disturbed by 'Orgasms'

In an op-ed last week in the Daily News, Paul Carnes of Woodland Hills objected to the banners hanging around town for "Orgasms," now being staged at Canoga Park's Madrid Theatre. He wrote:

For the past couple of weeks, I have been visually assaulted in my travels around the west San Fernando Valley by banners advertising a play called "Orgasms."

It seems that the success of an earlier play that used another graphic term from Human Sexuality 101 in its title has lowered the degree of propriety once accorded public spaces. It also has ratcheted up the ante on what it takes to get one's work noticed in the theater world these days.

There's always something. Anyway, also on my weekend radar:

   • The feds have joined the probe into alleged overbilling of the DWP by Fleishman-Hillard, the L.A. Business Journal reports in a free story. The LABJ's Amanda Bronstad also has a front page story on the quickening disappearance of feed stores and other equestrian services from the L.A. landscape.

   • Los Angeles Magazine's August "Best of L.A." issue has a piece by Karen Wada on a remarkable but little-known stalwart of Democratic politics. Willie Campbell, 89, has been a mentor to Kathleen Brown, Diane Watson and Maxine Waters, a friend of Hillary Clinton, and "has changed American politics, one cup of tea at a time." There's also a piece on documentary maker Stacy Peralta. CityBeat has its "Best of L.A." issue out too, with a front page jab: $4.95 cheaper than 'L.A. Magazine'.

   • Echo Park's landmark Pioneer Super Market closes for good tonight, destined to be converted into yet another Walgreen's. Nita Lelyveld visits in the Times.

   • D.J.Waldie calls for "a new form of stewardship" over the city of Los Angeles's vast land holdings in the Owens Valley, in the Times' Sunday Opinion section.

   • Kate Sullivan's unpleasant interview run-in with Pamela Anderson that we mentioned last week went national Sunday on Page Six in the New York Post. Sullivan's aghast the Post made no effort to confirm that she or the incident are real — and misspelled photographer David LaChapelle's name.