Old Hollywood

Before Hollywood became the commercial movie-making empire of today, it was a small, close-knit community founded on the glamour of movies and stars that graced the silver screen. For those seeking to remember the Hollywood of the past, here’s a step up from watching classic black-and-white films: Take a trip to where the stars lived and ate.

Musso & Frank Grill

Instead of buying a Hollywood tour, buy a meal at Musso & Frank Grill, the oldest restaurant in Hollywood, open since 1919.

“People refer to it as film noir ““you walk in and it’s a bunch of dark wood and deep red leather booths,” said fourth-generation owner Jordan Jones.

Working out of his great-grandfather’s office, Jones admits that the business is still very much family-oriented ““ whether it was birthday celebrations as a child or the place where his parents ate when they were dating, Musso & Frank Grill has more than just a history of famous clientele.

Not only have famous actors such as Charlie Chaplin, Jimmy Stewart, Marilyn Monroe, Douglas Fairbanks and Greta Garbo dined at Musso & Frank Grill, but prominent American writers including F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot, Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner also frequented the establishment.

“All these characters, the people that made Hollywood what it is today spent so much time here ““ you feel that kind of energy when you walk in,” Jones said.

With the screenwriters guild across the street in the 1930s and 1940s, unhappy writers would often escape the film industry with a drink at Musso & Frank’s bar, as did Orson Welles on various occasions.

With the business still in the family, wallpaper from the 1930s, servers from the late 1960s and the legacy of serving Hollywood since 1919, Musso & Frank keeps old Hollywood traditions alive.

“You can’t amount the history we have had here and not have some of that feeling stick to the walls,” Jones said.

Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel

While the Academy Awards are known today as a highly publicized and commercialized event, it actually started off as a small dinner held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel.

The Roosevelt, a Hollywood landmark, was built out of a movement to make Hollywood Boulevard into an area for entertainment, not just business.

“The Roosevelt is important to Hollywood because it was built by movie people for Hollywood,” said author and Hollywood expert Marc Wanamaker.

In 1928, the Roosevelt was opened with the backing of Hollywood characters Sid Grauman, Mary Pickford and Fairbanks.

The hotel itself was named after President Theodore Roosevelt because of his rugged individualism, with which people of the movie industry associated themselves. Roosevelt also commissioned the first film to be made in 1898 of the Spanish-American War.

Once open, the Academy Awards dinner was held in the Blossom Room in 1928, with the first Academy Awards ceremony following a year later.

The Blossom Room was originally decorated in the Japanese style since it was the favorite style of Chaplin, Fairbanks and Pickford.

While people came to party at the Roosevelt, they also came for business and to stay during film production.

“Almost every star from the silent era into the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s era had come through the hotel at one time or another: Everyone from Clark Gable to John Barrymore to Carole Lombard … would all eventually come through that hotel in one way or another,” Wanamaker said.

In fact, Monroe took some photos at the Roosevelt as she posed on the pool’s diving board.

To treat herself, Monroe also liked to stay at the cabanas with her husband, even though they owned property in Los Angeles.

While filming “From Here to Eternity,” Montgomery Clift would practice his bugle for the role and disturb the other hotel guests.

Errol Flynn also mixed drinks in one of the back rooms of the hotel during Prohibition.

Whether it is Monroe haunting a mirror or the faint sounds of Clift practicing his bugle, the Roosevelt reportedly contains pieces of old Hollywood still within its historic walls.

*Formosa Cafe *

Whether it’s the headshots of actors past on the wall, the current celebrity clientele or its appearance in films, Formosa Cafe is another restaurant that offers the tradition of dining with the stars.

“It feels like an old comfortable place you can just hang out,” said third-generation owner Vincent Jung.

Stars such as Marlon Brando, Monroe, Humphrey Bogart and Frank Sinatra did exactly that there ““ hung out.

Formosa Cafe has been around longer than its name, as the establishment was opened in the 1920s around the same time Pickford and Fairbanks developed the United Artists studio across the street.

With its proximity to the United Artists film studio, both stars and workers went to Formosa Cafe. Monroe ate there while filming “Some Like It Hot.”

The story goes that Jimmy Bernstein won the restaurant from his brother in a poker match and then partnered with Lem Quon in 1939. Quon, Jung’s grandfather, was the man who created The Formosa Cafe.

In order to expand the cafe, Quon purchased a railroad car from the Pacific Electric Railway and added it to the restaurant.

With the railroad car still attached, The Formosa Cafe represents a slice of history from Hollywood’s beginnings in addition to its famous clientele.

As far as its presence in films, Formosa Cafe can be seen in “L.A. Confidential” as the film-noir-like diner where the two detectives harshly question a woman who turns out to be Lana Turner.

“Lana Turner did really eat (at Formosa Cafe) in real life ““ that’s what’s so funny about “˜L.A. Confidential,'” Wanamaker said.