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THE PARAMOUNT GATE
After Ivar Avenue and its close-up
shot of the darker face of the movie
capital, I needed a nice bright overview,
a panorama of golden-age glamour.
One reason I’d come to Hollywood was
to drift dreamily back in time, to revisit
a glittering era when stars’ limousines
purred up to the studios and movie idols
waved to fans shouting their names.
So I headed for the most evocative
sight in the city of celluloid dreams.
Paramount Pictures’ 1926 gate is
to Hollywood what the Parthenon is to
Athens: a relic from a mythical age.
Through this arched portal passed Mae
West and W.C. Fields, and at this movie
studio, director Cecil B. DeMille parted the
Red Sea.
The gate also appeared in
Sunset
Boulevard.
Gloria Swanson plays forgotten
silent film star Norma Desmond, desperate
to make a comeback in pictures. A security
guard greets the former leading lady
at the Paramount gate, her portal to a
descent into madness that ends with the
famous line: “All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m
ready for my close-up.”
In those days, stars could motor
directly to the gate, but today it lies well
beyond a security kiosk. If you drive in, the
guard will ask you to make a u-turn and
drive promptly back out. But he might just
let you take a picture as you go.
Paramount Pictures shares a common
back wall with the Hollywood Forever
Cemetery, the final location call for many
celebrities. The flower shop offers a map
to the stars’ graves – an ironic twist on the
“star maps” hawked to Hollywood tourists.
Within the cemetery, the squall of L.A.
traffic faded away, and I was surrounded
OLD HOLLYWOOD
60
winter
|
spr ing