It's HOLLYWOOD--Get Surreal!!!

A travel journal to Hollywood by El Gallo Best of IgoUgo

Let's not even pretend this is a normal place or that you are here as an objective observer, okay? You want weirdness (or at least tacky decadence). You'd love to see a known star leap to die in front of you. So let's go see the dreck.

  • 2 reviews
  • 5 stories/tips
Viper Room, bra collections, Elvis meets Michael Jackson, Belushi and Phoenix deathsites, dinosaurs on rooftops, eye shadow, and a galaxy of stars set in the street of broken/shimmering dreams. Then...lunch.

Quick Tips:

Try to keep things in perspective. Just keep telling yourself it's only a movie. Unless confronted with incontrovertible evidence otherwise.

Best Way To Get Around:

Why not walk? Hollywood's a small town...just ask any scriptwriter trying to break in.

Musso & Frank GrillBest of IgoUgo

Restaurant | "Musso & Frank Grill / Chasen's"

I'm not listing any hotels, because you'd be nuts to LIVE in Hollywood. But if you want to eat there, why not try one of the remaining 'old Hollywood' places, where the stars once hung out, maybe a few still do, and you can just sort of feel 'the business' in the atmosphere.
Mussos (6667 Hollywood Blvd (323)467-5123) is pricy and get get snotty. But what the hell. The lamb chops are good. Or just grab a martini and rubberneck.
Chasen's Hollywood Cafe (1600 Highland (323)464-7776) still has that old air, even though Liz and the film colony no longer hang around. Worth a stop in honor of the studio system.
  • Member Rating 3 out of 5 by El Gallo on September 8, 2000

Musso & Frank Grill
6667 Hollywood Boulevard Hollywood, California 90028
(323) 467-5123

A broken heart for every heart down there on Hollywood and Vine..... Well, maybe. Pee Wee Herman has one. It might disillusion you to know it, but these stars set in the sidewalk are not just endowed as an honor. Stars apply to be honored, and pay $7500 for the privilege. And some get turned down, which has got to hurt. (Dr. Joyce Bothers, for one--I'm sure you can understand THAT).
But if you want to do a special moment for any of the departed idols, there are maps to what stars are where (all pre-Hubble, too). For openers, here's a list of street addresses where you'll see some of the majors:
Elvis------------6777 Hollywood Blvd.
John Lennon------1750 Vine St.
James Dean-------1719 Vine
Marilyn Monroe---6744 Hollywood
Marlon Brando----1765 Vine
Greta Garbo------6901 Hollywood
Hollywood and Highland is, for some reason, an epicenter of oddball museums. Scoff if you will, but don't you really wonder what's in Fredericks of Hollywood? Collections of all that is skin deep. Obviously, these are places you get your picture taken in front of.
Ripley's Believe It Or Not museum is topped off by a life-size tyrannosaurus Rex and includes hundreds of actual exhibits of the strange stuff the syndicated column has regaled us with for years. Where else would this stuff be kept?
The 'serious' version of Ripley is the Guiness Book of Records, and bygum, they have their collection of hyperbole right next door.
If you don't see any celebrities on the street (two chances: fat and none) you can see the next best thing in the Hollywood Wax Museum. Tom Cruise they've got already-also Elvis and Michael Jackson (see if you can tell the difference between the waxwork and the real Michael). Two hundred or so stars of yesteryear stand there and let you gawk.
If wax replicas of famous stars don't trip your trigger, how about the bras of famous stars? Well, then, step right up to Fredericks of Hollywood, where all those little catalogs came from. Amid the crotchless, zipless, topless, sheer, clingy, and beguiling factory is a tribute to the serious side of the lingerie business--an exhibit on the 'evolution of lingerie' (this evolution ENDS with a big bang) and a museum of the unmentionables of the unforgettable. (Jane Russell's Howard Hughes-designed bra for 'The Outlaw' is only one small part of the never-ending story).
But you can get closer to skin deep than lingerie--right around the corner is Max Factor, where they're happy to show you the ins and outs of war paint, including the long-standing relationship between cosmetics and the entertainment industry.
It's off the block, but for the final step in understanding Hollywood and Southern California, you can slip down to 6060 Wilshire and see the Petersen Automotive Museum. What does the Munster Hearse of the Batmobile say about us as a culture? Which is more personal, a car or a bra?
Next Boulevard over from Hollywood is Sunset, ranking between Hollywood and Melrose in the fame charts. And, okay, by the time you get over to Laurel, where Sunset Strip really starts, you're in West Hollywood, but it's the psychic geography that counts here--and here it is.

At 8221 is the giant castle known as the Chateau Marmont Hotel. Garbo lived there, Howard Hughes lived there. John Belushi died there, which is all anybody remembers these days. Be sentimental, moon the place for John as you drive by.
Next door is the Roxbury (maybe you saw that movie, too). Favored by Rod Stewart and a lot of English musicians.
The Arglye, at 8358 was once home to John Wayne.
Thunder Roadhouse in the same block is owned by Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper, so the story about Mickey Rourke and Patrick Swayze riding their Harleys into the place are probably true.
House of Blues, at 8430 is partly owned by Dan Aykroyd, and is very crowded most nights, with frequent star sightings.
The Comedy Store next door is still going as strong as it was when young unknowns Dave Letterman, Robin Williams, Whoopie Goldberg, and Roseanne Barr made their bones there.
Around on 1200 Alta Loma, the Sunset Marquis is a sort of boutique hotel with a built-in recording studio. Erick Clapton, Billy Joel, and Bruce Springsteen have hung out at the Marquis while putting down a few tracks downstairs.
And at 8852 Sunset is the Viper Room, a major wild spot where music and film stars play. It was mostly known because Johnny Depp owned it---until River Phoenix died out front.
If this doesn't get you hot, read 'Hollywood Babylon' by Kenneth Anger and try again.

Okay, it's 'Mann's Chinese Theater, now, but it's still the ultimate pagoda, sitting there un-selfconscious of it's preposterous glitz. You can take in a film there, just to be able to drop the fact in conversation back home, or if you're too cheap to buy a ticket, just mooch around the courtyard and check out the most famous footprints on earth.
The story has it that Norma Talmadge accidently stepped in wet cement while attending the 1927 premiere of De Mille's 'King of Kings', but you know what stories are worth in Hollywood. At any rate there are now over 160 prints enshrined in the cortyard. And if you get tired of feet and hands, start looking for the odd ones, like Jimmy Durante's 'schnozzola', Whoopi's dreadlocks, Betty Grable's legs, and your occasional butt-print or tit-print.
And YOU can be part of that audience--sitting there clapping on cue and taking it all in LIVE, un-edited, a sort of version of real life.
If you have your heart set on being in the Peanut Gallery during Jeopardy or Frazier, you should make reservations ahead of time. The central clearing house is Audiences Unlimited (818) 506-0067. Reserve your seat now--tickets are free. (But then, they don't pay you to participate, either). If you have a specific show in mind and want to go direct to the sutido, some of the biggies include:

CBS (213)852-2624 Wheel of Fortune, Price is Right, Family Feud
Fox (213) 856-1520 Various risque comedies
NBC (818)840-3537 The big enchilada--The Tonight Show, with Jay Leno
Parmount (213) 956-5000 Frasier, Wings, Leeza (and while you've got them on the horn, reserve a tour of the historic Paramount studios)
Warner Bros (818) 954-1744 Their current shows, plus you can make reservations for a tour of the studio.

About the Writer

El Gallo
El Gallo
Monkey Junction, Afghanistan

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