Southern California residents can drop off unwanted medications at police stations, hospitals and schools on Saturday, April 29, for a collection intended to reduce prescription drug abuse.

National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day is from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. To find a drop-off location, visit the Drug Enforcement Administration’s search tool or call 800-882-9539. People can anonymously drop off pills, patches and well-sealed liquids. Needles and syringes will not be accepted.

During last year’s collection, Californians disposed of 32 tons of unwanted drugs, according to the state Department of Public Health. In Irvine, for instance, 480 pounds of medication were collected from three sites at the October event, said police spokeswoman Kim Mohr.

Unused medications left in homes may be stolen, misused or accidentally consumed. And medications that are disposed of improperly can create an environmental hazard.

The state agency said nearly twice as many Americans abuse prescription drugs than use cocaine, hallucinogens, heroin and inhalants combined. Studies have shown that most abused prescription drugs come from family and friends.

A report released this week by the Orange County Health Care Agency found that nearly half of all overdose deaths were due to accidental overdose of prescription drugs. The report noted the importance of focusing  prevention  efforts  to  address  the  rising  opioid  use  among  residents.

French luxury goods group Kering has booked what it calls “outstanding” revenue growth in the first quarter of 2017, thanks to record sales at its Gucci label.

Developers have agreed to reduce the number of apartments proposed for Brea Place, a mixed-use project at State College Boulevard and Birch Street that includes housing, commercial space and a hotel.

After roughly two hours of discussion, the Brea Planning Commission late Tuesday asked Hines, the Texas-based development company, to return with a new proposal reducing the number of apartments from 747 to 690.

The change could be presented at the Planning Commission meeting on May 23.

All five commissioners voiced concerns about the project’s density, particularly toward the north end of the property adjacent to residences. The height of the building at that end will be dropped from five stories to four.

“It’s obvious that it is just too much mass,” Commissioner Pat Fox said. “I don’t see any relief from traffic.”

Plans for the southern end of the project, adjacent to the Brea Mall and Brea Marketplace, will remain as proposed, with 16,900 square feet of commercial space, 462 units in a five-story building and a 150-room Marriott hotel.

Brea Place has been discussed over several packed Planning Commission meetings. Dozens of community members have addressed the commission, both in support and opposition of the project

Along with traffic concerns, opponents have pointed to the lack of a new environmental impact report based on current data.

There is an addendum to the 2003 EIR, however, and City Planner Jennifer Lilley has said all of the technical studies for the addendum were based on 2016-17 data.

“I don’t think a new EIR is needed,” Commissioner Melanie Schlotterbeck said. “I’m comfortable with the addendum.”

The project requires Planning Commission approval, but does not have to go before the City Council, though it could be appealed later to the council.

The science of robotics may not quite be so advanced as to create an android like the “Star Trek” character Data, but as “Uncanny Valley” shows us, we’re probably a lot closer to that threshold than most of us realize.

Thomas Gibbons’ 2015 play takes us into a “not-distant future” world not unlike today, yet one where technology is on the verge of creating artificial life forms so startlingly human as to be able to blend in with mainstream society.

When that occurs, ethical issues are sure to follow, and that’s what interests Gibbons, “Uncanny Valley” and International City Theatre’s Los Angeles-area premiere production.

The play’s crux is the relationship between Claire (Susan Denaker), a neuroscientist whose career has been devoted to creating an intelligent, sentient non-biological humanoid being, and Julian (Jacob Sidney), the result of her latest efforts.

Julian starts out, in the opening scenes, as a head, neck and upper torso resting on a table – but as “Uncanny Valley” proceeds, he gains more body parts until he’s a fully functioning, ambulatory, autonomous being.

The nuts-and-bolts aspects of robotics are, as we learn, the least challenging to Claire. What concerns her more is whether Julian can be made to behave so similarly to people that those meeting him for the first time are unaware he’s an artificial being.

The play’s title refers to the observable effect people have when confronted by a robot that seems human: They’re at first fascinated, but the more lifelike the humanoid becomes, at some point that eerie feeling of fascination turns into revulsion.

As Julian’s teacher, Claire explains what makes people individuals, what constitutes proper social behavior, and what humans consider “normal” in each other versus what’s viewed as unacceptable.

At first endearingly stilted, Julian is taught how to approximate having feelings. At ICT, the teacher-student bond is moving; equally so are musings by Julian that have concerned humankind for centuries: “Why have I been created? What is my purpose?”

Once “Uncanny” gets us to accept Julian as a person in his own right, it tosses us a curveball: He’s been created for the purpose of being, in Julian’s words, “a cup-holder” for the mind, personality and memories of Julian Barber, a billionaire industrialist whose funding made possible the research, development and creation of the Julian robot.

Ailing from cancer, Barber has been “harvested” for the properties that make him an individual, with Julian’s “matrix” having been surrounded by the dying Barber’s DNA.

Once we realize the Julian of Act Two is, in effect, a human-machine hybrid, we begin to see the kind of dark paths technology might soon pave, albeit unintentionally – and we wonder how deep is the “new” Julian’s understanding of people and human nature.

Accordingly, Sidney paints the fully evolved Julian as an almost theatrically flashy sharpster – witty, yes, but someone whose quick thinking is almost terrifying.

As Gibbons’ absorbing script and director caryn desai’s engrossing staging show, the interactions of people and their artificial living creations are just as complex and riddled with uncertainty as human relationships – even more so, given the ethical questions raised by the existence of autonomous, sentient artificial humans.

In impressively unpretentious fashion, Gibbons raises such issues and others of a more existential nature. Under desai’s creative hand, “Uncanny Valley” is something extraordinary, the type of theater ICT has always excelled at: Intelligent, intriguing, thought-provoking, exhilarating, and magnificently crafted.

Denaker shows us that while they run deep, Claire’s emotions are tempered by a wry sense of humor about herself and the world – yet she’s also the pure scientist who thinks, studies and observes 24/7, motivated by science itself while indifferent to any external financial or political agendas.

Sidney masterfully shows Julian’s astonishingly rapid growth and evolution from a newly conscious being to a perpetually curious student eager to soak up knowledge and understanding and, finally, so far past any point imagined or projected by his creators as to boggle the mind – and chill the blood.

Tesshi Nakagawa’s scenic design gives the production a quasi-futuristic look, and Kim DeShazo attires Denaker and Sidney in similarly monochromatic tones of black, white and silver, so that Claire and Julian are, in effect, gleaming, product-of-science mirrors of one another.

Avoiding everything facile, Gibbons’ brilliant play blurs the lines between man and machine and has us pondering the nature and purpose of all conscious life forms.

‘Uncanny Valley’

When: Through May 7. 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays
Where: Beverly O’Neil Theater, Long Beach Performing Arts Center, 330 East Seaside Way, Long Beach
Tickets: $47-$49
Length: 1 hour, 50 minutes
Suitability: Adults, teens and older kids
Information: 562-436-4610, InternationalCityTheatre.com

One of San Clemente’s rites of spring takes place yearly in the Talega Business Park, where connoisseurs of craft beers can spend an afternoon sampling suds from more than a dozen Southern California breweries.

The 7th annual San Clemente Micro-Brew Fest was a collaboration of the San Clemente Chamber of Commerce and Left Coast Brewing Company. The chamber raises funds from the event to support events held in honor of Marine Corps units at Camp Pendleton. Left Coast, the homegrown San Clemente brewery, hosts the brew fest.

San Clemente is emerging as a hub for craft beers, evidenced by at least four of the vendors being local – Artifex Brewing Co., Pizza Port, Lost Winds Brewing and the host, Left Coast.

For Left Coast, the festivities didn’t end when the festival concluded Saturday, April 22. The next day, Left Coast’s tasting room hosted a break-out party for a seasonal beer dubbed PassioNATE Blonde, a blonde ale with passion fruit.

The brewery created it in collaboration with San Clemente pro surfers Nate Yeomans and Tanner Gudauskas.

PassioNATE Blonde is available for a limited time on draft in Left Coast’s tasting room, 1251 Puerta del Sol, San Clemente.

Known for beautiful lace slipdresses, Elizabeth Fillmore presented her 10 styles for spring for the more fashion-focused brides —  ranging from a sleek hammered satin sheath to a chiffon embroidered lace vintage-inspired halter gown, which featured an asymmetric godet chiffon skirt and a black chiffon bow down the back. She also offered beautiful tulle pleated tiered gowns, some of which featured removable overlays that could be worn over the shoulders.

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Randi Rahm’s spring bridal collection of versatile, mix-and-match and customizable couture pieces are the perfect fit for a modern bride who wants to change up her wedding day look, or even wear it again. She also re-created a white version of the “Rose Gown,” recently made famous by reality show “The Bachelorette,” to the collection for good measure, because who doesn’t love a crowd favorite?

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EXPRESS TO INDIA: Fern Mallis will go to great lengths to line up guests for her Fashion Icons series — so much so she took a 15-hour flight to New Delhi last year to invite Christian Louboutin.
The shoe designer will join her at 92Y May 17. While Mallis had only met Louboutin to say hello here and there over the years, she said Wednesday, “You can safely say I went to India to secure this.”
During a dinner last fall in New York, her friend Sabyasachi Mukherjee, a designer from India, mentioned that he was doing a shoe collaboration with Louboutin. After learning that the shoe designer was on her wish list for 92Y speakers, he promised to invited her to the launch. In November, Mallis flew to New Delhi for the weekend to attend the launch dinner where she was seated next to Louboutin. After chatting about her talk series, she dropped off a copy of her book “Fashion Icons” at his hotel the following day and turned up for the official launch later. “I would go anywhere to support Sabyasachi but my purpose was totally to spend some time with Christian and secure this interview,” Mallis said.
Having visited India

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The Oscar de la Renta Pediatric Center, built in memory of the designer by Grupo Puntacana Foundation, opened Wednesday in the Dominican Republic’s Veron Punta Cana region of La Altagracia.
The event was attended by Dominican Republic’s president Danilo Medina and Annette de la Renta. Oscar de la Renta died in 2014.
The facility will provide professional health services to the population of more than 15,000 children now living in the underserved communities in and around Veron Punta Cana.
The facility will be managed in partnership with the Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine, Dominican Republic Ministry of Public Health, Servicio Nacional de Salud, Akron Children’s Hospital and Grupo Puntacana Foundation.
The pediatric center will treat between 50 and 60 children a day, ranging in age from newborns to 15 years old. Services will be rendered free of charge, with a modest fee for laboratory services. The facility will diagnose and treat common illnesses, offer regular check-ups and immunizations, take X rays and scans, and track children’s growth progress.

The Oscar de la Renta Pediatric Center in the Dominican Republic. 

“We are very pleased to open the Oscar de la Renta Pediatric Center and bring high-caliber medical care to the children of Punta Cana,” said Frank

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Abercrombie & Fitch Co.’s chief executive officer Fran Horowitz took a 1 percent cut in total compensation in 2016 compared with what she received in 2015.
The information was disclosed in the company’s proxy filing Wednesday afternoon with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The annual meeting of shareholders is slated for June 15 at the company’s headquarters in New Albany, Ohio.
Horowitz became ceo in February 2017, and her title was listed as president and chief merchandising officer, the positions she held at year-end.
Horowitz’s compensation in 2016 totaled $4.76 million, which included a 9.4 percent jump in base salary to $1.1 million and stock awards of nearly $3.6 million. The balance of compensation falls under the classification as “other,” which includes the company contribution to a 401(k) plan and insurance premiums.
In 2015, her total compensation was $4.8 million, which included a base salary of $1 million, a stock award of nearly $1.5 million and option awards of $615,544, as well as “other” compensation for insurance premiums and the company’s 401(k) contribution.
The filing also said her base salary for 2017 is $1.2 million, reflecting her promotion to ceo in February.

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