I’ve just spent well over an hour scouring photographs, documents, and collapsing inward inside my own head trying to piece together my trip to Hollywood during the Summer of 1995. If I had to do it all over again, I would be sure to keep some notes as to what I did on an important trip like this. For example, in the picture at left, I have no idea why I’m posing in this doorway! When it comes down to it, the dates aren’t all that important, but they are nice to know. Fortunately, I have enough memories and photos to keep the trip alive in my head for the time being as I try to record what we did.
I’ve sometimes tried to get a picture of what we did when by looking at what I was wearing in the photos. Of course, this information is only handy if I am actually in the photos. But since we visited a plethora of graves and movie locations of which I snapped photos without being in the picture, I can’t always determine when it occurred. But here is my best shot:
I flew in on Friday, June 23 to the Ontario airport. I came solo, leaving Lisa behind at our Woodman Park Apartment. The timing of this trip was based on the dates of the Ray Courts Hollywood Collector’s Show that was at that time being held at the Beverly Garland hotel in Burbank. After Bob picked me up, he immediately took me out to my first sushi lunch, a scrumptious all-you-can-eat buffet. Again, this was the first time I ever had sushi, so Bob treated. I’m still thinking about that lunch…and I’m sure you’ve heard me mention my love of sushi many, many times. Here was where it all began.
I don’t recall what we did that Friday night, but I suspect we headed toward Los Angeles and stayed at the Beverly Garland hotel that night. On Saturday, June 24 was the Courts Show. I remember talking to Stan Laurel’s daughter Lois quite a bit. She was there selling t-shirts with her husband Tony Hawes. Also lingering about was one of the Sons’ founders Chuck McCann. My friend Henry Sorenson had sent me his Our Gang book (by Maltin and Bann) to try and acquire some autographs for him, a feat I accomplished marvelously. Out in front of the hotel was the taxi cab that was used in the Robert DeNiro film Taxi Driver. As a huge DeNiro fan, I had my photo snapped inside.
During the show, I met a friend of Bob’s named Steve Cox who was the author of several books, among them a tribute to the Munchkins from The Wizard of Oz. We had some lively discussion about some surviving Munchkins and this information proved to be extremely valuable later in the Summer. More on that later…
We must have left the show to go out for lunch at some point and stopped off to visit a little wagon that was supposedly used in Laurel and Hardy’s The Bohemian Girl. Although I’ve never been totally convinced about the validity of that claim, I did publish a small sidebar to my “Hollywood ’95” article in Dante’s Info #13 entitled MAN INJURED BY LAUREL AND HARDY PROP. Here’s what it said:
Just seconds before this photo was snapped, Bob persuaded me to climb aboard this trailer, which just so happens to be the one they used in The Bohemian Girl. Unfortunately the air conditioner for this former key shop had a sharp corner which gashed into my head (note pained expression) drawing something thicker than water. Another bloody mess.
As I mentioned in the Dante’s article, after the show we all met up for dinner at the Smokehouse. In attendance were John and Janet Duff, the Wileys, and Our Gang member Dorothy deBorba. John and Bob were in rare form that night. When Bob suggested to John that this would be a good place to show a movie, John responded “why don’t you bend over and we’ll show it on your ass.” I silently laughed at the ludicrous situation for about ten minutes.
The next day we returned to the Courts show briefly and then Bob and I embarked on some location scouting and grave-hunting. This will all be discussed further in subsequent postings…
While on the subject, here’s Bob in the midst of grave huntin’
Completely off the subject, here’s Bob’s Our Gang autograph wall, no longer on display
On Monday, I believe, our group (being Bob, the Wileys, and me) went on a tour of the Warner Bros. Studios. Nothing really impressed me about this tour that I can recall other than the fact that there were numerous props and locations that were used in The Adventures of Lois and Clark. Little Jimmy and I perhaps shared our first inside joke here as it seemed that the whole tour was based around this one single TV show. I also vaguely remember that we went through the wardrobe department and scouted some John Wayne locations (from The Shootist) on the small backlot. Either cameras were not permitted, or I found nothing to take photos of, because all I have is the one shot below of the famous studios (which I now know wasn’t even taken during our visit, but later in the week when we were in the area).
Later that day, I’m fairly certain, Bob and I visited the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace, a location I would return to (and discuss further) in 2007. This would be my first visit to a Presidential Library, birthsite, and grave all wrapped into one. Below are the three photos I snapped at this location.
The home where Richard Nixon was born
The graves of the Nixons
After visiting the library, Bob and I stopped over at our friend Randy Skretvedt’s house for a brief visit to drop off some negatives that Bob had borrowed from Randy. He also gave Bob and me each one of his books Laurel and Hardy: The Magic Behind the Movies and inscribed mine thusly: “For Brad – A real L&H scholar – Thanks for helping me learn about the boys!”
On Tuesday, Bob and I did more scouting throughout the afternoon and then went to a production of Miss Saigon at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles that evening. It was a great performance that I heartily enjoyed. Most interesting though, was that while waiting outside of the theatre for the show to begin, we saw Penny Marshall just sitting there smoking a cigarette. It didn’t even occur to me at the time to have my photo taken with her…and I had nothing for her to sign, so I didn’t even approach her. This was not my only fortuitous celebrity encounter of the week. We also saw Pat Morita in downtown Los Angeles filming a scene for some unknown film.
There are some better stories to tell as we get further into the week. To be continued…
To follow the trail of celebrities and autographs from the Courts show, click here…
To follow the trail of L&H locations during the week, click here…
To see the famous graves I visited this week, click here… (under construction)
See the Richard Nixon posting here…
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