Marmont Monday: Franco illustrated

Actor/Director/Artist James Franco published a book in 2014 titled Hollywood Dreaming: Stories, Pictures, and Poems. It contains a piece titled “Chateau Dreams,” which takes place at the Chateau Marmont on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. If you’ve read my blog, you know it’s pretty much favorite place. And Willis loves it, too. The above shots were taken by Mona Kuhn for the debut issue of MisterMuse magazine. I immediately recognized the headboard from the Chateau:



The below Mona Kuhn polaroids of Franco were also taken at the Chateau and have circulated on eBay for awhile.



Some have sold, some have not.



I decided to pair some of my Chateau shots taken over the years with the appropriate prose from Franco’s piece:

Chateau Dreams

I picture them all, in different positions,
And the same positions,
And I, like a sculptor, would position them, and mold them.
Or like a choreographer put them through the same paces,
Again and again.



There is an area off the main hotel building
Where the bungalows are.
At the center of the arrangement of chalk bungalows
There is an oval pool like a blue pill,
Huddled by ferns, palms, and banana trees
Tended to be wild,
Webbed by a nexus of stone walkways.



In the day, in summer,
Mermaids and hairy mermen drape the brickwork.
At night the underwater lights electrify the pool zinc blue;
The surface cradles the oven-red reflection of the neon Chateau sign



Above Sunset, above the paparazzi and miniskirts.

There is a painting of a blond sailor,
Dressed in blue and red and white,
A stoic version of myself.
For nine months in ’06, while fixing my house,
I stayed in the bungalows,



First in 82, next to the little Buddha in the long fountain
Trickling.



Lindsay Lohan was about.
The Chateau was her home and the staff were her servants.
She got my room key with ease;
She came in at 3 a.m.;
I woke on the couch, trying not to look surprised.
Instead of f***ing her.
I read her a short story about a neglected daughter.
Every night Lindsay looked for me.
My Russian friend Drew was always around like a wraith—He, like the blond painting,
was my doppelganger—
Writing scripts about rape and murder.
A Hollywood Dostoevsky, he gambled his money away.



We played a ton of Ping-Pong.



In ’82, John Belushi died from a speedball in Bungalow 3;
In ’54, forty-three-year-old Natalie Wood in Bungalow 2;



In 2005, Lindsay Lohan lived in Room 19 for two years
Because she “didn’t want to be alone.”
Ambulance calls were a regular antidote to her demon rights.



Midway through my stay,
I changed to Bungalow 89.
In that room,
I read a bunch of Jacobean plays
About revenge, seduction, and lust.



In Bungalow 89 there was the sailor on the wall,
Glass-eyed and pale,
My stoic self.



The room was on the second level,
The exterior walls hugged by vines.

Every night Lindsay looked for me and I hid.
Out the window was Hollywood.

See more Chateau Marmont cottage/bungalow photos at my main website.

Mineo Monday

Actor Sal Mineo is typically remembered for his role of Plato, the young boy seeking a father-figure who latches onto James Dean’s character in “Rebel Without a Cause” (1955).



Along with Natalie Wood’s character, the three form a somewhat dysfunctional family, with Mineo and Wood competing for the affections of Dean. They bond one night at an abandoned mansion, as they secretly hope to all find what they have been missing throughout their already troubled lives.



Sharp-eyed viewers will recognize the mansion as the same one that Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) lived at in “Sunset Boulevard” (1950) with her ex, Max (Erich von Stroheim). The Getty mansion has long since been dozed.



But I digress…

While the censors of the 1950s would not allow any hint of Mineo’s character being gay, the actor’s performance made it very clear. In real life, Sal Mineo, he was quoted as saying, “I got a girl in every port — and a couple of guys in every port, too.” His life was tragically cut short in 1976 at the age of 37 during what was most likely a botched robbery. When it comes to celebrity deaths, no site is better than Scott Michael’s. During my last visit to Hollywood, I decided it was time to visit the spot where the murder took place. I texted Michael’s to narrow down the actual spot at Mineo’s West Hollywood apartment complex (known as the Hollyview Manor at the time) and within seconds, I received the photo below.



That’s a true friend. Below is how it looked the day I visited.



Michael’s pointed out to me that the odd sloping concrete shown in my photo:



…matches the one from the crime scene photo shot the night Mineo was murdered in the back alley of the complex:



This shot of a policeman looking for evidence was shot in the front of the building:



How the complex looks today:



Edited from Scott’s site:

Sal was renting an apartment in West Hollywood, at 8569 Holloway. Marvin Mitchelson, the famous lawyer, owned the building. On Thursday, February 12, 1976 at about 11:30 p.m., Sal returned home from the Westwood playhouse, where he was rehearsing the play, “P.S. Your Cat is Dead.” He parked his blue Chevelle in the garage, and just as he exited the garage a man with a knife confronted him. Mitchelson’s mom and neighbor Raymond Evans heard Mineo scream, “Help! Help! Oh my God!” Evans rushed to the scene and found Sal lying in a pool of blood trailing 10 feet to the sewers. Evans saw that Sal was losing color in his face and tried giving him mouth to mouth. The Sheriff arrived and found Sal in the fetal position. They turned him on his back, cut open his jacket and shirt to attempt resuscitation, but the stab wound was fatal. After 5 or 6 minutes of gasping, Sal was dead at 37. He was stabbed in the heart.…The case was still unsolved for a year and a half, until a Michigan prison inmate Lionel Ray Williams did a bit of bragging to fellow prisoners that he had killed the star. They pimped on him, and in 1979 Williams was convicted. He is serving 51 years to life. All for a random, botched robbery. Now he’s out – released after serving about 25 years.



A shot of Williams:



While searching on the web for more info about Mineo’s murder, I discovered a documentary film had been made that professes William’s innocence, saying that his incarceration was based on racial motivations rather than the truth. Documentary filmmaker Letitia McIntosh interviewed Williams himself, who claims he didn’t know Mineo and that it had to be somebody else. What McIntosh leaves out is that Williams confessed to numerous people (including a girlfriend and wife) to killing someone famous that night. If you can stand the staccato prose of James Ellroy, you can read his compelling account here.

What do I think? I wasn’t there. Not my circus. I just take photographs.

See more photos at my main website.

Chateau Christmas

The Lafayette Hotel in San Diego isn’t the only Daveland favorite place to get decked out for the holidays; the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood has tastefully put the red and green into their hallowed halls. When you enter this legendary landmark, you are greeted by poinsettias and wreaths.



Best looking poinsettias I have seen this season!



The entryway elevators just need a touch of mistletoe to complete the picture!



“Live” garland has been strewn around the stairwell rails. This must be hell to clean up!



The lobby desk:



In the lobby display, green surrounds the art and merchandise that will cost you some green to acquire:



In the bar/dining room area, more greenery:



The Christmas tree in the lobby restaurant which is my favorite place in the entire hotel:



The pool had its share of wreaths and poinsettias, too:



I dare you to find some that look better than these:



For brunch after my swim, the fluffy pancakes (which are truly fluffy, not just marketing speak) were accompanied by Meyer lemon butter. Off the charts sensational (note the famous Chateau bacon surrounding the plate).



See more Chateau Marmont photos at my main website.

Monday at the Mirador

Back in the day, El Mirador was a popular name in real estate. For Palm Springs, it represented the hotel that opened on New Year’s Eve, 1928. Set on 20 acres of prime desert property, according to vintage postcards, amenities included swimming, tennis, golf (the desert’s first!), riding, skeet and other sports that could be enjoyed all winter long in this “Garden of the Sun.”



The Spanish-Colonial Revival-style bell tower was a Palm Springs landmark.



A shot of the Olympic-sized swimming pool:



Closer…



Ah, desert living at its best. Lazy days by the pool.



How about the blow-up toy on the left? At first I thought it was a cheetah, but zooming in it appears to be a fish of some kind.



Anyone remember Eddy Howard?



The hotel/tower were featured in a number of advertisements, including this one for Hertz:



The hotel was converted into the Desert Hospital in 1972. The original tower burned down in 1989, but was rebuilt from the original plans. How it looks today:



Over in West Hollywood, there are the El Mirador apartments, built in 1929 and designed by S. Charles Lee:



Over the last decade or so, this building has been embroiled in historic preservation legal battles. When I walked by in December, it appeared that they were being renovated.



See more Palm Springs photos at my website.