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sit there drinking coffee,” says
Sergio, “and waiting for a call from
his agent for a job.” Johnny Depp
stills eats at Musso’s – and always
in Sergio’s section. So do the Rolling
Stones, who have known Sergio
so long and like him so much that
they fly him to their concerts. Keith
Richards favors the same secluded
high-backed booth where Orson
Welles used to hold court. Marilyn
Monroe always sat in full view of
everyone, in booth number three.
The bar hosted a nonstop
cocktail hour for a West Coast
edition of the Algonquin Round
Table; L.A.-based authors such as
Raymond Chandler
(The Big Sleep)
drank with literary transplants
William Faulkner and F. Scott
Fitzgerald. They were all writing
scripts for the studios. (Chandler
once observed: “If my books had
been any worse, I should not have
been invited to Hollywood, and if
they had been any better, I should
not have come.”)
PARVA-SED
APARTMENTS
W
riters were on my mind as
I drove down Hollywood
Boulevard to the gritty fringes of
Filmland. I swung left on Ivar Avenue
and nodded my respects to the
once-grand Knickerbocker Hotel.
Faulkner lived there during his studio
sojourn and managed to work on
Absalom, Absalom!
in his spare time.
Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio
often met in the hotel bar. While he
was making
Love Me Tender,
Elvis
OLD HOLLYWOOD
58
winter
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spr ing