L'Orangerie is fabulously elegant and very French. The Buffalo Club, owned in part by Don Johnson, and frequented by the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio and Arnold and Maria. It's a private club that allows nonmembers to dine with a reservation. Excellent food, great crowds, a handsome wood-paneled interior and live bands every night. Manhattan Beach, south of L.A., is a darling noncommercial town of charming residences, one of the city's nicer beaches, a strip of boutiques and some rather good restaurants.
Concerts are free.
The Los Angeles Zoo sponsors free musical entertainment, puppet shows and other performances on weekends in July and August. Look for Peruvian music in July, African dancers and drummers in August. If These Walls Could Talk. Find out how everything, from a doghouse to a skyscraper, is constructed. At the California Science Center through Sept. 6.