Winkies At Last!
Friday, September 14th, 2007
It’s no secret that one of my favorite flicks in the world is the bizarre David Lynch dreamy feature Mulholland Dr. One review I read of the film describes it as a movie that will ”get under your skin” and that is exactly what it did to me. On the surface, if you care to check it out, you may find it utterly confusing and completely repulsive, so enter with caution. But as I say, I like it…so I was very interested to visit one of the locations from the film during one of my trips to California. Read the rest of this entry »
On the morning of Saturday, July 28, 2007, the buses were all convening at the Culver Hotel where Bob and I had spent the night. Some were transporting guests who had stayed at the Westin near the LAX (the location of 
At left and below is a series of shots from the classic horror flick The Exorcist. Truth be told, I hadn’t seen the film in a long, long time (yet I naturally will never forget many aspects of it – like the tried-and-true projectile vomiting scene, for instance). But because it had been so long, I scarcely remembered the classic stairway sequence from the film – although I didn’t have the heart to tell Bob, who was excited to escort me to this location in Washington D.C. on the Georgetown University Campus. But once I returned home and re-viewed the scene where Father Karras plummets to his death outside of Regan’s house, I naturally appreciated the fact that I had taken the picture at the bottom of the page…which is also special because it was the very first one of our Virginia trip taken on August 4, 2007. Enjoy! 
Originally, to me, the Culver Hotel was merely a Laurel and Hardy film location. Seen in several of the Laurel and Hardy silents, such as Putting Pants on Philip, We Faw Down, Leave ‘Em Laughing, and Forty-Five Minutes from Hollywood, among other Hal Roach silents starring Our Gang and Charley Chase, the hotel has always stood tall among the little town of Culver City where so many classic films were made in the 1920’s and 1930’s. The hotel has also gained much noteriety as the lodgings for the actors portraying the Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz. The Chevy Chase film Under the Rainbow helped perpetuate the myth that the little actors were a bunch of perverted sots…and that film, too, also filmed its exterior shots at the Culver Hotel. 
Thursday, July 31, 1980 brought a very exciting series of events at the Hollywood Sons of the Desert convention. While the preceding days brought excitement in meeting fellow Sons, watching Laurel and Hardy films that I had never seen before, and my first brushes with L&H royalty and fame, this day was really the kicker. This day would bring my first exposure to L&H film locations and many celebrities from the films of L&H and the Our Gang. It was my first trip to the Music Box stairs, Big Business house, downtown Culver City, the first time I saw Hal Roach himself, as well as Spanky, Buckwheat, Butch, and many other Our Gang members. What a day!