Rudolph Valentino Anniversary

Ninety-eight years ago today, Silent Screen actor Rudolph Valentino died in New York City at the age of thirty-one. While the TikTok crowd probably doesn’t know of him, approximately 100,000 fans lined the streets of Manhattan for his funeral at Campbell’s Funeral Home (also where Judy Garland’s service was held). An art deco statue titled “Aspiration” was erected in 1930 in DeLongpre Park, Hollywood.  Roger Noble Burnham, who also created USC’s mascot, The Trojan, was the sculptor. While the fans loved Valentino, City Commissioners required that the tribute honor but not resemble the dead matinee idol.



Still there today!



And this not-so-stellar bust of the actor is there, too.



For many years, a mysterious woman in black would arrive at the Hollywood Forever mausoleum where Valentino was buried, deliver a single red rose, and disappear. Others have taken over the duty as the years have gone by. When I went in 2014, Hollywood Forever Cemetery tour guide Karie Bible was filling in for that role.





See more of my caricatures at my main website.

Jean Harlow At The Chateau Marmont

On the anniversary of actress Jean Harlow’s untimely passing in 1937 at the age of 26, I thought it appropriate to do a post about the room she inhabited at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood. According to Vanity Fair, she stayed in rooms 32-33 with third husband, Harold Rosson. Harlow expert, Darrell Rooney (co-author of Harlow in Hollywood), adds that Rosson had a house, but it was being rented so they rented this apartment at the Chateau to live in as man and wife, since Rosson refused to live at Harlow’s Beverly Glen residence. Rooney also believes there probably aren’t any photos of the star at the Chateau, as her “time there was marred by appendicitis and a hospital stay.” A photo of Jean, Rosson, and her mother and stepfather (below) is often referred to as having been shot at the Chateau, but it was taken at their private residence instead.



In probably the most reliable book about the history of the hotel, Life at the Marmont (1987) by former owner Raymond Sarlot and Fred Basten, it says this about her stay:

On the afternoon of September 20, 1933, a black Pierce Arrow touring car, its wire wheels reflecting the hot California sun, made its way up Marmont Lane and parked directly in front of the colonnaded entry to Chateau Marmont.…The newlyweds had come to the Marmont, bypassing the revitalized Garden of Allah and nearby Sunset Tower, in search of a honeymoon suite. It was Hal’s choice. He had had a soft spot in his heart for the Marmont ever since he learned of Albert E. Smith’s takeover. It was Smith who had given Rosson his first break in show business, hiring him as a teenage bit player with Vitagraph in 1908.…“Jean and I are going to love this place.” It was fifteen minutes later when Harold Rosson, accompanied by Ann Little [hotel manager], returned to his bride. With one hand,…Rosson jangled the keys to Suite 3BC. He followed the sweep of his arm, pointing to the third floor windows that stretched nearly the entire length of the Marmont’s north-south wing.…Ann Little invited Jean inside, but she declined. “I’ll take a rain check,” Jean sighed, sounding wilted. “I’d better get home [her Beverly Glen Drive residence] before I keel over.” She pulled a small square of chiffon from her handbag and dabbed at her forehead.…It would be a full week before the Rossons took occupancy of 3BC at the Marmont, but Jean didn’t wait that long to acquaint herself with her new surroundings. Less than twenty-four hours after Hal had signed the guest registry, a revitalized Jean appeared at the front desk. She was accompanied by a stately blonde woman and a suavely handsome man who identified themselves as Mr. and Mrs. Bello [her stepfather and mother]. “We’re here to look around,” Jean told Ann Little. “Is my rain check still good?”

While still retaining much of its charm from the 1930s, the Chateau Marmont has had a few renovations over the years. It is extremely difficult to find vintage interior shots of the hotel. As fate would have it, I connected with Dennis Lee Cleven in a Jean Harlow Facebook group, and he graciously supplied me with photos from his 1981 visit to one half of the Harlow honeymoon suite.

I was there way back in 1981 and it was refurbished after that. Apartment 33 is the one which cinematographer Harold Rosson and Jean Harlow lived during their 1933 marriage at The Chateau Marmont at 8221 Sunset Boulevard.

Is it just me or does this 1981 shot from Dennis make anyone think of “Come on knock on my door…” from “Three’s Company”?



How 33’s door looks today:



The living room, 1981:



December 2002:



April 2018:



A peak into the bedroom, circa 1981:



December 2002:



April 2018:



Dennis in the kitchen, 1981:



December 2002, with new tile:



April 2018:



Here’s where things get interesting. The entry hallway, circa 1981:



April 2018. The arches and fire sprinkler match up, but in the 1981 photo, there is a door at the end of the hallway; in 2018, it has been sealed up. This would lend credence to 33 once being connected to 32. Unfortunately, I have not stayed in 32 yet! Bucket list…



A closeup of the now removed door to…?



In my chat with Dennis, he was under the impression that the adjoining room was 34, not 32.

I stayed there in 1981 and I called the front desk and I asked which apartment was hers and he said the one I was in (33). One thing I have asked before is where did that door lead to down the hall? Did it go to a bedroom which is now apartment 34? I found it rather confusing back then and it’s a mystery that I've not solved. 

I’d like to solve it, too! I need to see logistically where 32 and 34 are situated in relation to room 33. Stay tuned!

UPDATE: Dennis just found a shot of the bathroom from his 1981 visit:



From my stay in 2002:



My 2015 stay:



And my most recent visit to this room in 2018:



See more Chateau Marmont room photos at my main website.

The RKO Globe: Up close and (semi) personal

Any classic cinema fan worth their salt is familiar with the RKO Radio Picture trademark that was featured at the beginning of their films. Maybe you are familiar with “Citizen Kane,” “Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer,” and “It’s a Wonderful Life”? The globe and radio tower weren’t just part of celluloid; they actually existed at the corner of Melrose Avenue and Gower Street in Hollywood, on top of Stage 21.



Now a part of Paramount Studios, the radio tower is gone, but the globe remains, barely visible from below as cars and pedestrians pass by.



As fate would have it, I had the opportunity to see the globe at eye level recently, and fortunately I had my camera.



Could you get a better framed detail view? The Hollywood sign AND the globe!



The old RKO studios where bought out by Desilu (“I Love Lucy”) in 1957, then sold to Paramount ten years later. It appears that the Globe was threatened back in 2015. According to the Los Angeles Visionaries Association:

Paramount’s new Master Plan calls for demolition of eight stages and multiple other ancillary buildings. One of the stages intended for demolition is Stage 21 at the corner of Melrose and Gower. The historic RKO Radio Pictures Studio Globe that sits atop Stage 21 is currently slated for demolition.

I’m not sure of the behind-the-scenes status, but I am glad it’s still there!

See more photos at my main website.

8150 Goes Bust!

It was no surprise to me when I saw last night on the Esotouric Tours instagram account that the Frank Gehry monstrosity that was to replace the midcentury modern Lytton bank building (which replaced the Garden of Allah hotel) was now officially kaput. Gonzo. Belly-up. Finito. The lot is now up for sale, according to a WEHO times article.

Here’s a pictorial history of this lot, beginning with the Garden of Allah hotel (1927-1959) shown above, followed by the Chase/Lytton Bank (1960-2021), designed by architect Kurt Meyer:



…followed by an overhead view I shot just before it was leveled:



After the bank was removed:



…and then the rest of the strip mall was removed, too. This is how it looked when I photographed it last month:



I surmised a few months ago that when the lot stayed bare with no construction going on that something was amiss with the Gehry-planned development.

Why did this occur? Very simple. A lot with a building that could be considered “historic” is a headache for developers. It equals bad press because of the potential loss of the historic building and it often means expensive and lengthy legal battles to overcome the demolition pushback. Townscape Partners secured legal approval to demo the bank in 2018; they revised the original Gehry plan to incorporate some historic touches to appease both bank and hotel fans. And then the pandemic hit. The way business is done changed and the need for another mixed use property with an expensive piece of poo on it decreased. 

Still…the bank had to be removed, otherwise the potential for future legal battles to save it could have returned. Thus, the empty lot you see now that is up for grabs again.

Here’s a vintage shot of Robert Benchley and Charlie Butterworth that seems appropriate for this story. The accompanying publicity blurb said that they “…kept open house in the Garden of Allah and invited passing friends in for drinks all night long. Here they are posing as they might have looked by dawn’s early light.”



The silver lining? This design is DOA.



See more photos at my main website.

Garden of Allah / 8150 update

I have been following the progress of the current mound of dirt on Sunset Boulevard and Crescent Heights, which was once the site of the Garden of Allah Hotel. What treasures/secrets were buried there when the hotel was razed in 1959? Oh, to be able to sift through the soil and see if there are any remnants of the infamous complex where F. Scott Fitzgerald, Errol Flynn, Humphrey Bogart, and Marlene Dietrich once resided. From my seventh floor vantage point, I don’t see anything…yet. Hard (and sad) to imagine that a Frank Gehry monstrosity will eventually rise up from this lot.



Here’s what Allah looked like back in the 1950’s:



A vintage menu:



Looking at the offerings is like opening a time capsule. You can tell so much about an era/society by what they eat. 

Stay tuned to see how the excavation progresses.

See more Garden of Allah photos at my main website.

Monday on Sunset Boulevard, 1986

Another case of close, closer, and closest with this August 1986 shot of Sunset Boulevard, aka The Strip. Zooming in I can see my favorite haunt, The Chateau Marmont hotel. Bottom left is a billboard for “Howard the Duck,” one of the most notorious box office flops of all time:

I was staying in Westwood at the time it was released and captured the UCLA billboard up close:

Back to the original photo, the lower left shows Carney’s Restaurant, located inside a yellow Union Pacific rail car that opened in 1975.

A contemporary shot of Carney’s:

On the right side of today’s 1986 shot, the historic Schwab’s pharmacy is still standing:

How it looked in the 1940’s:

And how this area looks now, as the original building was replaced with this shopping center:

See more Sunset Boulevard photos at my main website.