BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- It used to be that President Clinton, down in the polls and accused of a lack of character, tried to control his much-publicized awe of Hollywood and the stars who work there.

But no more, at least not last night, when Barbra Streisand's bold voice filled the starlit air at a gala honoring Clinton, and not when Tom Hanks cracked jokes, and not when the Eagles and the Neville Brothers played their greatest hits for members of the well-heeled crowd who had gathered to share the moment.

Driven by either money or passion, Clinton, the current front-runner in his reelection effort, is embracing the entertainment industry again, as he did early in his presidency before he faced a barrage of criticism. Harry Thomason, his once-exiled Hollywood friend, has resurfaced as a key adviser. Judy Collins sang for Clinton at a rally in Little Rock, Ark. And singers and film stars arrive in droves for his most expensive fund-raisers. None were as expensive as last night's presidential gala on the rolling lawn of the California supermarket magnate Ron Burkle. A ticket for dinner and a preferred concert seat sold for $12,500. The concert and a private reception were $5,000; and a seat just for the show was $2,500. The total take for the Democratic National Committee was $4 million, according to campaign officials. Clinton aides shrugged at the image of a president rubbing shoulders with the show business elite during the final stretch of his presidential campaign. "The past couple of weeks have shown us that the president has support from all across America, from all different types, as well as from his friends in the entertainment industry," said the Clinton campaign spokesman, Joe Lockhart. Republicans, no strangers to large-scale fund-raisers, even here in southern California, seemed almost envious -- for Clinton's ability to attract $4 million at a single event, and for not being stained by relationships with stars who helped him. "The fact is, the need for the money is so much greater than the downside fears, so you just swallow hard and do it," said Marlin Fitzwater, a White House spokesman in the Reagan and Bush administrations. "In his case, it may not matter at all," Fitzwater said. "Everyone knows he's a Hollywood star lover. I don't think he suffers at all. It's another part of the Teflon exterior that protects him from scandal and the like. There isn't anyone in America that doesn't know he's a star lover." Last night's gala was held less than a month after Clinton's star-studded birthday party in Radio City Music Hall in New York City -- a $10,000-a-ticket festival that was hosted by Whoopi Goldberg and that featured performances by Carly Simon, Aretha Franklin, Jon Bon Jovi and Tony Bennett. The events hark back to the early days of the administration, when Clinton, in his first winter and spring in office, made time in his presidential schedule to visit with Billy Crystal, Streisand, Richard Gere, Richard Dreyfuss, Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, Quincy Jones, Sinbad, Christopher Reeve, John Ritter, Hammer, Sam Waterston and Lindsay Wagner, as well as twice with Sharon Stone. Then, White House aides and Cabinet secretaries included Hollywood producers and stars in policy briefings in hopes of receiving advice on how to market their plans. At one health care briefing, strategist James Carville looked around at the producers and entertainers and exploded in profanity. Later, Carville unapologetically told a reporter, "They started telling me how many degrees they had. Somebody blurted out, `I have a PhD in communications from UCLA.' Well, wowee-kazowee!" The White House became so entangled with Hollywood that other aides began griping and advising Clinton to create some distance between the two. Washingtonian magazine columnist Chuck Conconi wrote: "He needs to separate himself from the Hollywood crowd." At about that time, Thomason, Clinton's old friend and a Hollywood producer who played a key role in putting together Clinton's inauguration, was blamed for wrongly injecting himself in the wholeasale travel office firings and was rarely seen around the White House. But in the past several months, he has appeared anew, first with a significant role in planning out the Democratic National Convention last month and the train trip that brought Clinton there. Yesterday, Clinton announced he would be one of the primary negotiators preparing for the presidential debates.