WHAT'S HAPPENING : DINING.

Festivals galore: This is probably the busiest weekend of the year for wine and food festivals.

Wolfgang Puck's annual American Wine & Food Festival at Universal Studios' backlot is at 6 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $175. Call [phone].

Taste of Encino is at the Naval & Marine Corps Reserve Center, 6337 Balboa Blvd., Encino, from Friday evening through Sunday evening. Admission is $3 ($1 for seniors and children under 13, free for children under 5). Tastes are $1 to $4. Information: [phone].

The Great Tastes of Brentwood from noon to 6 p.m. Sunday is at 11611 San Vicente Blvd. in Brentwood and charges no admission. Tastes are $1 to $5 each. Information: [phone].

Sunset Magazine's annual Tastes of Sunset is on Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. This year, it's at the Pasadena Exhibition Center, 300 E. Green St. Tickets are $10 ($8 for seniors, $5 for children under 13, free for children under 5). Information: [phone].

SOURCE: - Larry Lipson

family

Truth exposed: The classic children's story of political correctness - ``The Emperor's New Clothes'' - continues at 1 p.m. Saturdays at Theatre West's Storybook Theatre, 3333 Cahuenga Blvd. W., Hollywood.

``Emperor'' is the tale of a pompous ruler flattered into parading about in his skivvies by a swindler. To make matters worse, the king's legions of boot-licking toadies compliment his invisible ``outfit,'' which nearly causes a B.V.D. fashion trend.

Only when a child speaks up with politically incorrect news - that the emperor's new clothes are bogus - does the populace learn to tell the truth.

Theatre West's version of the play includes interactive bits with the audience and an invisible clothes fashion parade.

Tickets are $8. Call [phone] for more information.

SOURCE: - Janet Weeks

film

Mother Goose has a nose ring: Academy Award winner Anna Paquin plays a sad 13-year-old who becomes ``mother'' to a gaggle of orphaned geese in ``Fly Away Home,'' director Carroll Ballard's bouquet to kids and wildlife.

Ballard is joined once again by cinematographer Caleb Deschanel, his partner in ``The Black Stallion,'' and the result is a beautiful and moving story of Canada geese who must be taught to migrate.

Jeff Daniels plays Paquin's father, an eccentric metal artist who, like his daughter, must learn to love after heartbreak. The two forge their relationship by the creation of a gooselike, ultralight airplane, which Paquin pilots south, the birds in tow.

Shot in northern Ontario, Canada, the scenes of Paquin - nose ring and all - flying with the geese are gorgeous. Scenes of Daniels and Paquin slowly melting the ice between them also prove stirring.

One caveat: Contrived plot twists toward the end nearly ruin the simple spell of the movie. But not quite. ``Fly Away Home'' is an uplifting story about good triumphing over evil, and it's told without a single exploding alien.

SOURCE: - Janet Weeks

theater

Office politics: Corporate ladder climbers get knocked down a rung or two in the playfully satiric ``How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,'' which has been riotously revived and sent out on tour after its Broadway run.

The 1961 musical skewers corporate culture as it follows a lowly window-washer who, armed with a how-to book and his own wiles, rises rapidly through the ranks of a mega-company. Director Des McAnuff, working with much the same creative and design team as he did on ``The Who's `Tommy,' '' has come up with a zippy, colorful production that combines early-'60s style with high-tech video design - resulting in a whimsically cartoonish backdrop of Manhattan skyscrapers and a lobby atrium with leaping fountain.

Frank Loesser's score is jam-packed with by-now-beloved tunes, including ``Been a Long Day,'' I Believe in You,'' ``Brotherhood of Man'' and ``A Secretary Is Not a Toy'' (which takes on all-new meaning in the sexual-harassment-purging '90s).

Headliner Ralph Macchio (a k a ``The Karate Kid'') is appropriately cute and frolicsome as the enterprising young ladder climber, though he's surrounded by such talented singer-dancer-actors that he dims by comparision. No matter; you'll love the show anyway.

``How to Succeed'' is at the Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood. The final performances are at 8 tonight, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 and 7 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $22 to $48, available through Ticketmaster, [phone].

SOURCE: - Daryl H. Miller

music

Back on fiddlin' road: For bluegrass fiddler-singer Laurie Lewis & the Grant Street Band, 1994 was not a good year.

That March, the group was involved in a serious auto accident when Lewis fell asleep at the wheel, she admits. The van rolled, throwing mandolinist-singer Tom Rozum 30 feet. Recovery has been long and difficult.

Lewis, Rozum and Grant Street appear tonight at Pasadena's Neighborhood Church.

Growing up in the Bay Area, Lewis was exposed to traditional music at the Berkeley folk festivals of the '60s, where she heard such greats as Doc Watson, Mississippi John Hurt and the Greenbriar Boys.

In the early '70s, she began performing in various bands and competing in fiddle contests, twice winning the California State Women's Championship.

Blending early country music with swing, bluegrass, Cajun and Tejano, Lewis extended the borders of traditional music through her work with such outfits as the Good Ol' Persons and Blue Rose. She formed her own Grant Street String Band in 1979.

Lewis and Rozum's latest album, ``The Oak and the Laurel'' (Rounder), mixes old and new, including covers of classics by the Carter Family, the Louvin Brothers and the Everly Brothers, as well as contemporary material by Peter Rowan and David Olney.

The Neighborhood Church is at 301 N. Orange Grove Blvd., Pasadena. Show time is 8 p.m. and tickets are $17 at the door. Information: [phone].

SOURCE: - Fred Shuster

CAPTION(S):

3 Photos

Photo: (1) In ``Fly Away Home,'' Anna Paquin plays a 13- year-old who, with her father's help, teaches a gaggle of orphaned Canada geese to migrate by taking to the skies in a specially designed ultralight airplane.

(2) Stalled by an auto accident, Laurie Lewis & the Grant Street Band, Peter McLaughlin, left, Lewis, Tom Rozum and Jerry Logan are back in action.

(3) Shauna Hicks and Ralph Macchio star in ``How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,'' at the Pantages.