Saturday, October 09, 2010
We saw the movie Wall Street(part two) Frankly, I did not think this was nearly as good the first version. But I would be remiss, if I did not say the rest of the world seems to love it. But in this theatre in LA it got a very weak response!
In view of the heat I would have stayed to eat at the movie theatre, but Maggie was game to see something different and we headed to a grand old place called Cheebo for great pizza. Once again Maggie is very upset as we got no star sighting. She is constantly keeping her eyes peeled for movie stars.
Our Tuesday jaunt was to The Getty. One of the worlds great art institution was founded by J Paul Getty to contain his art collection collect and has grown into one of the world's great institutions. It known not only for its collections, but for the work in research and conservation. The Getty Foundation is very generous in sharing their knowledge with other institutions around the world and bring at their expense many young curators and conservationists to Los Angeles to further their studies, including some I have known from the National Gallery in Ottawa.
The centre occupies 750 acre property was obtained in the hills of Brentwood above Los Angeles proper in 1983, construction began in 1987 and The Getty opened in 1997. No trip to LA should happen without a visit to this wonderous place. Designed by the architect Richard Meier, one can hardly take it all in. J Paul Getty made his money in oil, had five wives, difficulties with his children and had mostly a sad life. Most of that is forgotten now, The Getty has brought some redemption.
We next headed on the freeway to get a good photo of the Hollywood sign. We took the Laurel Canyon exit.. and drove the whole drive right into Hollywood. A LOT of people live on the streets that run off the canyons.. and everywhere you see signs of erosion, hillsides that have had fires go through and pieces of hillside being held in place with bricks and garbage bags. And, as Maggie said, if you miss a turn off, you are going to go MILES before you get to turn around to come back to go to the party. The next time, when going to the movies, and I see a scene shot at some party in the hills, I shall remember this drive!
We found the best street for taking Hollywood sign pictures. If you should go it is Beachwood, running off Franklin. Franklin is the first major street North of Hollywood Boulevard..
That night we went out to the Chateau Marmont for dinner. Maggie had booked this well ahead and it is definitely THE place in LA for dinner. This old hotel, home to so many stars over the years, is actually very small, built as you would expect in a French Chateau style right in West Hollywood. If the weather were not 110F we could have walked very easily. We had a wonderful dinner in the garden, with Maggie peering at every face to find a star.
Finally she whispers"There is John Kraniski from "The Office" I must admit that I didn't actually get a very good look myself.
Then when we got back to the apartment there was a phone call for Maggie on her cell. I had left my credit card. SO back Maggie went to get the card, and was back in under 15 minutes(That is how close we were to the centre of things) She very excitedly reported that she had shared an elevator with Courtney Love who was heading up from a swim! And, by the way, mine was only one of eight cards left that night This was a really fun special night, but if you go remember to book ahead. I doubt, unless you just landed your multi million dollar movie deal, you could just walk up and get a table in the garden at the Marmont.
Wednesday Off today to the Warner Brothers tour of their lot. We arrived in good time for a tour and had a look around. I remarked that there seemed to be a few apartment buildings right on the lot and wondered how you got to live there. More later on that!
We had a great young gal as tour guide. Dana had just graduated from university in Washington state. Her boy friend got a job with Nickelodean, and while visiting him she had taken the Warner Brothers tour, loved it, applied and got a tour job right away! She was also doing an MBA in entertainment business part time. Remember this bright light.. she may be running the place one day.
I loved the tour, and was quite stunned just how many different street locals and situtations were represented. Nothing goes to waste.. Those were not apartments we saw, but offices with exteriors made to represent apartments. All the office towers have different styles to represent different areas of design.. very clever.
I especially love visiting The Friends set of Central Perk. It is quite amazing just how compact it all is. Dana reports that Warners makes still makes more money from reruns of Friends than of their current shows Two and Half Men and The Big Bang Theory combined. Warners Bros. also has one of the worlds biggest property fascilities. Production designers from all sorts of companies in film and tv will start with the props available at Warners.
We spent a bit of time at the end of the tour in the gift shop making sure we had a good CD of Bugs Bunny and friends, for Peter, one of the all time Bugs fans.
And on the way home, we made a quick stop at The Pacific Design Centre. The first of these buildings, is home to a host of design and building companies working in LA. Again it is a design marvel and not to be missed.
And, fittingly for a trip to LA we ended our great time with a taping of the Jimmy Kimmel show. I loved this! And as we were waiting we spent some time looking at the hand and foot prints and signatures lining the side walk outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre. Maggie reports Kimmel surrounds himself with family(he has an uncle as a security guard,) and his band leader was a high school friend and it is a really really good band. His guests where Joel McHale and Busy Phillips who looked vaguely familiar to me, and are currently working in something or other. Kimmel has a very effective and engaging manner. He is a most generous of hosts.. gets the guests going and shuts up. The warm up guy was first rate, the banter was fun , the audience was encouraged to hoot and holler (we were very good at this!) and a great time was had by all. ANd then we left the studio, up to street level and into another stage area where we were entertained by a GREAT group called Sharon Jones and the Dap King. I must admit I had not heard of Sharon Jones, but Maggie had and I loved her.
Such a fun night all in all. We made our last stop to the Silver Dinner for take out.. reading all the invitations to play readings, ads for agents and looking at all the pictures of the old time days on the walls. I loved the Silver.. lots of old timers sitting at the bar telling lots of tales of past lives, parts missed and parts still to be had!
Six days of a great great time.
Although for most of us we think of LA has all about movies and tv, it has now one of the great performing and visual arts cities of the world.
For buildings of the best of contempory design there is no place in the world like it and how I loved visit them.
Thanks Maggie for the best present ever,
as Bugs would say..
That's all folks!
In view of the heat I would have stayed to eat at the movie theatre, but Maggie was game to see something different and we headed to a grand old place called Cheebo for great pizza. Once again Maggie is very upset as we got no star sighting. She is constantly keeping her eyes peeled for movie stars.
Our Tuesday jaunt was to The Getty. One of the worlds great art institution was founded by J Paul Getty to contain his art collection collect and has grown into one of the world's great institutions. It known not only for its collections, but for the work in research and conservation. The Getty Foundation is very generous in sharing their knowledge with other institutions around the world and bring at their expense many young curators and conservationists to Los Angeles to further their studies, including some I have known from the National Gallery in Ottawa.
The centre occupies 750 acre property was obtained in the hills of Brentwood above Los Angeles proper in 1983, construction began in 1987 and The Getty opened in 1997. No trip to LA should happen without a visit to this wonderous place. Designed by the architect Richard Meier, one can hardly take it all in. J Paul Getty made his money in oil, had five wives, difficulties with his children and had mostly a sad life. Most of that is forgotten now, The Getty has brought some redemption.
We next headed on the freeway to get a good photo of the Hollywood sign. We took the Laurel Canyon exit.. and drove the whole drive right into Hollywood. A LOT of people live on the streets that run off the canyons.. and everywhere you see signs of erosion, hillsides that have had fires go through and pieces of hillside being held in place with bricks and garbage bags. And, as Maggie said, if you miss a turn off, you are going to go MILES before you get to turn around to come back to go to the party. The next time, when going to the movies, and I see a scene shot at some party in the hills, I shall remember this drive!
We found the best street for taking Hollywood sign pictures. If you should go it is Beachwood, running off Franklin. Franklin is the first major street North of Hollywood Boulevard..
That night we went out to the Chateau Marmont for dinner. Maggie had booked this well ahead and it is definitely THE place in LA for dinner. This old hotel, home to so many stars over the years, is actually very small, built as you would expect in a French Chateau style right in West Hollywood. If the weather were not 110F we could have walked very easily. We had a wonderful dinner in the garden, with Maggie peering at every face to find a star.
Finally she whispers"There is John Kraniski from "The Office" I must admit that I didn't actually get a very good look myself.
Then when we got back to the apartment there was a phone call for Maggie on her cell. I had left my credit card. SO back Maggie went to get the card, and was back in under 15 minutes(That is how close we were to the centre of things) She very excitedly reported that she had shared an elevator with Courtney Love who was heading up from a swim! And, by the way, mine was only one of eight cards left that night This was a really fun special night, but if you go remember to book ahead. I doubt, unless you just landed your multi million dollar movie deal, you could just walk up and get a table in the garden at the Marmont.
Wednesday Off today to the Warner Brothers tour of their lot. We arrived in good time for a tour and had a look around. I remarked that there seemed to be a few apartment buildings right on the lot and wondered how you got to live there. More later on that!
We had a great young gal as tour guide. Dana had just graduated from university in Washington state. Her boy friend got a job with Nickelodean, and while visiting him she had taken the Warner Brothers tour, loved it, applied and got a tour job right away! She was also doing an MBA in entertainment business part time. Remember this bright light.. she may be running the place one day.
I loved the tour, and was quite stunned just how many different street locals and situtations were represented. Nothing goes to waste.. Those were not apartments we saw, but offices with exteriors made to represent apartments. All the office towers have different styles to represent different areas of design.. very clever.
I especially love visiting The Friends set of Central Perk. It is quite amazing just how compact it all is. Dana reports that Warners makes still makes more money from reruns of Friends than of their current shows Two and Half Men and The Big Bang Theory combined. Warners Bros. also has one of the worlds biggest property fascilities. Production designers from all sorts of companies in film and tv will start with the props available at Warners.
We spent a bit of time at the end of the tour in the gift shop making sure we had a good CD of Bugs Bunny and friends, for Peter, one of the all time Bugs fans.
And on the way home, we made a quick stop at The Pacific Design Centre. The first of these buildings, is home to a host of design and building companies working in LA. Again it is a design marvel and not to be missed.
And, fittingly for a trip to LA we ended our great time with a taping of the Jimmy Kimmel show. I loved this! And as we were waiting we spent some time looking at the hand and foot prints and signatures lining the side walk outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre. Maggie reports Kimmel surrounds himself with family(he has an uncle as a security guard,) and his band leader was a high school friend and it is a really really good band. His guests where Joel McHale and Busy Phillips who looked vaguely familiar to me, and are currently working in something or other. Kimmel has a very effective and engaging manner. He is a most generous of hosts.. gets the guests going and shuts up. The warm up guy was first rate, the banter was fun , the audience was encouraged to hoot and holler (we were very good at this!) and a great time was had by all. ANd then we left the studio, up to street level and into another stage area where we were entertained by a GREAT group called Sharon Jones and the Dap King. I must admit I had not heard of Sharon Jones, but Maggie had and I loved her.
Such a fun night all in all. We made our last stop to the Silver Dinner for take out.. reading all the invitations to play readings, ads for agents and looking at all the pictures of the old time days on the walls. I loved the Silver.. lots of old timers sitting at the bar telling lots of tales of past lives, parts missed and parts still to be had!
Six days of a great great time.
Although for most of us we think of LA has all about movies and tv, it has now one of the great performing and visual arts cities of the world.
For buildings of the best of contempory design there is no place in the world like it and how I loved visit them.
Thanks Maggie for the best present ever,
as Bugs would say..
That's all folks!
# posted by katie @ 7:13 AM 
