In a place where the mid-December weather is a sunny 74 degrees and ugg boots can be seen paired with bikini tops, “winter” isn’t really a season, but more a state of mind.
But when it comes to putting the “holly” in Hollywood, Santa Monica’s seasonal ice rink is one of the ways that Los Angeles knows it's time for hot cocoa and candy canes.
The patch of ice at the corner of 5th and Arizona is a truly beloved holiday tradition. Whether it’s besties in matching sweaters jamming to Taylor Swift Night, couples (young or otherwise) looking for an excuse to hold hands or families out for a night of holiday joy, the rink is the center of Santa Monica’s winter activity.
It’s also a technological marvel capable of supporting skating in what would be otherwise unthinkably warm conditions.
But even with all that said, it still understates the true nature of the rink because while it can hardly be described as a “berg”, it is the tip of a far-reaching, frozen empire helmed by a second generation Olympian who was able to carve true Hollywood career out of the ice as the Man who Produces Winter.
Wilhelm "Willy" Bietak is more Jack Frost than Santa Claus in appearance. Lithe and still nimble at 72, he manages to hit the ice several times a year at one of the many locations Santa Monica based Willy Bietak Productions builds each year.
He has a storied career with skates before coming to Los Angeles. A multi-year champion in his native Austria, Bietak also competed in the Olympics and at the World Championships.
It was during one of those competitions that his post-skating life would take shape.
"I was competing at the worlds in Lyon and ran into Doris Fleming who invited me to a production meeting," Bietak said, referring to the mother of Olympic figure skating champion Peggy Fleming. That 1971 encounter led to his first production job as location manager for "Peggy Fleming to Europe with Love," a television special filmed at Prince Ludwig's castle in Germany, Davos, Switzerland and other European locations.
That led to other opportunities and Bietak came to America 1971, initially planning a brief visit to learn the production business. Instead, he became a performer in Fleming's show, met his future wife and embarked on the American Dream.
"We joined Peggy's show and did a whole summer tour," Bietak said. "That was the start of my romance with Cathy (Steele). I ended up marrying her a few years later."
The transition from performing to producing accelerated through work on projects including "The David Frost Show" and "Guinness World Records." Bietak eventually started a company with Dick Foster, staging ice shows at venues including Caesars Palace in Las Vegas but it was touring shows that provided the challenge that would ground the rest of his career.
In order to move ice rinks to indoor theaters (and later cruise ships) around the world, a new way of creating ice had to be developed.
"We have a unique ice system that nobody else has other than Disney has one very close to this," Bietak said, noting the proprietary engineering allows ice to form even in warm weather. "There's a lot of operators that use plastic pipes and that's fine when the weather is cold, but when it gets like this it becomes very marginal."
The shift to seasonal rinks began about 20 years ago when Pepsi Cola approached the company to produce a rink in San Francisco's Embarcadero Center for a Pepsi Crystal promotion. That project evolved into permanent seasonal installations at Union Square, Pershing Square in Los Angeles and eventually Santa Monica.
Bietak, who lives nearby, visits the Santa Monica location about once a week and still skates occasionally, though less frequently than in his competitive years.
The seasonal rinks now serve a dual purpose as both community amenities and practical use for equipment between touring productions. However, Bietak's company operations extend far beyond California's winter ice rinks.
In 1999, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines put out a bid for ice skating shows on their cruise ships. Bietak's company won the contract and now produces shows for 17 ships, each receiving new cast changes once or twice yearly.
The cruise line productions require an unprecedented scale of talent recruitment. The company employs about 300 principal skaters annually, with producers traveling internationally for auditions, including recent trips to Japan and the World Figure Skating Championships in Boston.
"We're scouring the world for talent," Bietak said. "Everyone that's in my company comes from the skating world and we want to have the best skaters and the best productions and the best creativity."
The company also produces themed theatrical productions, including "Broadway on Ice," which toured the theater circuit with Olympic champion Dorothy Hamill and other stars. An "Opera Festival on Ice" production at the Royal Opera House in Oman combined live opera singers with Olympic champion skaters performing on ice installed on the theater stage.
"They have this gorgeous Royal Opera House that is really one of the nicest ones in the world," Bietak said. "We had four opera singers live and the skating cast including Olympic champions."
The combined company efforts make it one of, if not the, largest employer or skaters in the world but despite the scale of his cruise ship and theatrical operations, Bietak maintains enthusiasm for community rink projects.
"We have thousands of skaters," he said of the Santa Monica operation. "We like to have both business and passion. We love ice skating and love the fact that this is really a great sport for kids and adults alike. It's great to have the physical exercise. It's a thing that parents and kids can do together, that friends can do together. It creates a bonding."
He recalls his own introduction to skating at age 11 in Austria, noting many friendships formed then persist today across continents.
Recent challenges have tested the seasonal operations. Last year's wildfires forced temporary closures, and the original engineer who designed the company's ice system died several years ago. Still, the company recently built a new system using the established design.
As for the future, Bietak sees continued interest driven by competitive skating's visibility on sports channels and the emergence of new talent that draws audiences to rinks and inspires the next generation of skaters.