And this is the other end of Hollywood Blvd in the 1940s (notice the Christmas trees that are the same as in the previous post. I wish the Chamber of Commerce would do these decorations today) near the Chinese Theater. The Roosevelt Hotel is in the background and a corner of neon from the Paramount Theater sign can be seen:
Also looks like an Owl Drug Store in the foreground as well.
When the Roosevelt opened in 1927 it was hailed as the "social occasion of the year" Among those invited were a who's who of the elite of Hollywood at the time: Mary Pickford, Doug Fairbanks, Norma Talmadge and her sister, Constance, Pola Negri, Richard Barthelmess, John Gilbert, Harold Lloyd, Greta Garbo (maybe she attended with Gilbert?), Gloria Swanson, Rod La Rocque, Janet Gaynor, Will Rogers, Clara Bow, Sid Chaplin, Sid Grauman, Wallace Beery and Charlie Chaplin.
According to articles from back in the day, most of them showed up!
The Roosevelt was 12 stories and featured 400 rooms. The Chinese Theater with its famed forecourt and Hollywood premieres was across the street. Those involved in financing the hotel were Fairbanks and Pickford, Joseph Schenck, Louis B. Meyer and Marcus Lowe.
Thanks to Fairbanks, who was president of the Academy at the time, the first Oscar ceremony was held in the Blossom Room (they were called Merit Awards back then) on May 16, 1929.
Ross Columbo broadcast a national radio show from the famed Cinegrill and in the 1950s and 1960s,
This is Your Life was telecast live from the hotel.
Shirley Temple is said to have taken tap lessons from Bill "Bojangles" Robinson on the ornate staircase. Lew Ayres is said to have discovered there. Errol Flynn reportedly prepared his gin recipe in the back room of the barber shop during Prohibition. Gable and Lombard stayed in the Penthouse for a whopping $5 a night.
Marilyn Monroe posed on the diving board of the pool for her first suntan lotion print ad.
The owner in the 1950s went about redoing the interior and painting the place sea foam green. In the mid-1980s, Radisson bought the property and spent $35 million restoring the interior and facade to its former glory.
The Roosevelt has appeared on film in
Sunset and
The Fabulous Baker Boys,
Internal Affairs,
Beverly Hills Cop, II and
Catch Me If You Can as well as guest spots on television in such shows as
Moonlighting.
Reports of the Roosevelt being haunted have long been part of its lore. Monty Clift is said to haunt suite #928 on the ninth floor. He stayed at the Roosevelt during the making of
From Here to Eternity and is said to have paced the hallways memorizing his lines. Marilyn Monroe is said to appear looking at herself in a mirror that is now located in the lower lobby.
The Roosevelt is the hub for the TCM annual Film Festival in Hollywood.
The Paramount Theater opened in 1926 as a lavish first run legit theater a year before the Chinese Theater made its debut. Called the El Capitan when it opened, the interior was designed with a heavy influence of East India by architect G. Albert Lansburgh. The exterior building, designed by famed Los Angeles architect Stiles O. Clement, in a Spanish Colonial motif included carved icons from drama and literature. The first production at the Paramount was a legit theater offering
Charlot's Revue featuring Bea Lilly, Gertrude Lawrence and Jack Buchanan.
In 1942, the theater was converted to a movie theater and renamed the Paramount. Redone in a more Moderne style,
Reap the Wild Wind, directed by Cecil B. DeMille, premiered there on March 18, 1942, under the new name. It remained the flagship theater for Paramount until the Supreme Court passed down the Paramount Degree that forced studios to divest their theater holdings.
Constant remodelings dimensioned the opulent interior and the Paramount became a second run theater.
In the 1980s, it was acquired by the Pacific Theater chain where it languished.
In 1989, under a new law that allowed studios to own movie theaters, the Walt Disney Company leased the theater from Pacific. Spending $14 million, they restored the interior to its original opulent design and rebranded it the El Capitan. It became their flagship theater in Hollywood.
It reopened in 1991 with premiere of
The Rocketeer. The giant Wurlitzer organ was brought down from San Francisco's Fox Theater.
Next door to the west of the El Capitan is the Masonic Temple that is now the home of
Jimmy Kimmel Live and the drug store (formerly Owl's) that at one time had a miniature of Hollywood Blvd from the 1940s in its store window is now a Disney store.
Happy Holidays!