No,
your DVD player doesnít need adjusting. The first half-hour
of Martin Scorseseís
biopic of Howard Hughes (initially intended to be directed
by Michael Mann)
recreates the old magenta-and-turquoise, two-strip Technicolor
look of 30s Hollywood.
Set, naturally enough, around LA,
the studio filming was in Canada,
at Mel’s Cité du
Cinema, Montreal,
and at Saint-Hubert, Quebec.
For instance, the 'Cocoanut Grove' was recreated on
a soundstage – as it was for George
Cukor's 1954 A Star Is
Born – but this time in Canada.
The legendary hangout of the stars, where the Oscars
were presented in the 30s, was part of the old Ambassador
Hotel, 3400 Wilshire Boulevard at Catalina Street,
midtown LA.
The wonderfully kitschy fake palms were stripped out
in the 70s, and the hotel itself has closed down in
the 80s. Since then it's been used solely – and
frequently – as a film location. It can be seen
in dozens of films including The
Graduate, Se7en,
Rocky and Apollo
13. Howard Hughes actually lived at the Ambassador
for a while, and it was in the hotel's kitchen that
Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in 1968.
You
can see the entrance to the Cocoanut Grove in Jim
Carrey comedy The Mask
(as the entrance to the 'Coco Bongo Club') and in
the training sequence of S.W.A.T. Incredibly, this historic landmark has– after
years of wrangling – finally been demolished.
You can check out the hotel's history at www.theambassadorhotel.com.
The
Aviator location: The
real Hancock Park home of Howard Hughes: Muirfield Road, Hancock Park
Another
great LA
landmark, Grauman's Chinese
Theatre, was also duplicated in Montreal
This time, it's the extravagant mock-Oriental exterior,
used for Hughes' nervous arrival with Jean Harlow
(Gwen Stefani) at the premiere of Hell's
Angels.
Apart
from the logistics of closing down Hollywood's main
thoroughfare long enough to stage a huge crowd scene,
this stretch of Hollywood Boulevard has been massively
redeveloped since the 30s.
John
Schlesinger, facing similar problems with the
apocalyptic climax of his 1975 film of Nathaniel West's
Day of the Locust,
duplicated three blocks of central Hollywood on the
Paramount lot. This also allowed the crafty addition
of a convenient sidestreet directly opposite the famous
movie house. Coincidentally, it was the frenzy of
the Hughes premiere in 1930 which inspired the mob
hysteria of West's book.
The
Aviator location: The
'Beverly Hills' nightclub: Southwestern Law School, Wilshire
Boulevard
The
exterior is fake, but Scorsese's
film uses the actual interior and lobby of Grauman's
Chinese Theatre, 6925 Hollywood Boulevard. The
heart of Hollywood, Grauman's
was rebranded for years as Mann's Theatre, but has
now thankfully reverted to its original 1927 name,
and retains its magnificently barmy glory. It's a
tourist trap, of course, swarming with resting actors
togged up as Darth Vader or the Frankenstein monster,
who'll flog you tours of moviestar homes, but who
can resist checking out the celeb footprints on the
forecourt?
See
the old Bullock's entrance again as a Connecticut
hotel in the 1937 comedy Topper
Grauman's Chinese
is seen in Blazing
Saddles and the 1937
A Star is Born
See the exterior of Pantages
in Tim
Burton's Ed Wood,
and its interior in The
Bodyguard (the Oscar ceremony) and
Species
(as the decadent 'Id' club)
San Bernardino International
Airport has hosted filming for Congo,
Volcano,
The X-Files,
Bad Boys,
The Fast and the Furious
and Terminator 3: Rise
of the Machines
