When the Disney-MGM Studios opened in 1989, CEO Michael Eisner’s opening speech dedicated the park “to Hollywood—not a place on a map, but a state of mind that exists wherever people dream and wonder and imagine.” He memorably welcomed guests to “a Hollywood that never was – but always will be.”
What he meant is that Disney’s Hollywood is dreamlike; passed through a lens of nostalgia and optimism. As usual, Imagineers took the reality of Hollywood and made it romantic and timeless. It’s idealized and blurred, with all the skill of storytelling and placemaking Disney can muster. it’s the Hollywood we collectively imagine and dream of, even if it never truly existed to begin with. And yet, it’s not fiction.
Today, we’re going to investigate the real histories of six iconic structures at Disney Parks that sprung not from the minds of Imagineers, but from real landmarks of Tinseltown. It’s all in hopes that, next time we step into Disney’s Hollywood Studios, California Adventure, or Walt Disney Studios Park, we can see things differently… Let’s take a look.
1. Hollywood Tower
Image: Joe Wolf, Flickr (license)
THE REAL PLACE: “Hollywood Tower. 1929. Sophisticated living for film luminaries during the ‘Golden Age’ of Hollywood.” A prologue to an episode of The Twilight Zone? You may not be far off… But in reality, those are the words enscribed on a brass plaque at the entrance to the real Hollywood Tower. Built in 1929, the building truly was the height of living at the time, with 50 apartment units, three penthouse suites, underground parking, and a rooftop pool.
Built in a French Normany Renaissance style, the tower is imposing and elegant. Though it once resided alone on a hill, today it overlooks the Hollywood Freeway, with – can you believe it? – a glowing neon sign reading “HOLLYWOOD TOWER.”
Image: Disney
IN THE PARKS: Depending on where you are in the world, there are two Hollywood Tower Hotels in two very different styles. At Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida, the original Twilight Zone Tower of Terror is an imposing, sunset-hued Spanish Colonial Revival tower of minarets, twisted columns, and pointed spires looming at the end of Sunset Blvd. Exposed exterior maintenence stairways lead to a neon sign (just like on the real Hollywood Tower), but given that Disney’s version is meant to look lightning-scarred and abandoned, the flickering, sparking sign doesn’t look quite as well-kept.
Image: David Jafra, Flickr (license)
A Twilight Zone Tower of Terror exists at Disneyland Paris‘ Walt Disney Studios Park, as well. There, though, the Hollywood Tower Hotel looks very different. It’s a light sandstone color with oxidized teal domes and Egyptian-influenced ironwork in a Southern Californian-influenced “Pueblo Deco” architectural style. It’s not as imposingly positioned or as tall, but it’s still an attractive building… except for the lightning burns and the crumbling attachments where wings of the hotel have apparently been evaporated.
Neither looks exactly like the real Hollywood Tower. Though strangely, the Parisian version does have a striking similarity to the “space warehouse prison powerplant” looming over Disney California Adventure’s Hollywood Land, which looks quite a bit like an art deco 1920s hotel affixed with pipes, satellite dishes, and warning stripes… Odd!
2. Pan-Pacific
Image: Los Angeles Public Library
THE REAL PLACE: When the Pan-Pacific Auditorium opened in 1935, it instantly became the premier event venue of Los Angeles. From 1935 to 1972, sporting events (including UCLA and USC men’s basketball), car shows, and the Ice Capades were performed there, not to mention visits by the Harlem Globetrotters, Elvis Presley, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Richard Nixon. The 100,000 square foot auditorium with seating for 6,000 was – by most accounts – surprisingly simple: essentially a very, very large rectangular gymnasium in a wooden structure, able to be reconfigured for concerts, sporting events, speeches, and more.
What made “the Pan” so iconic were the four soaring, muted green pylon flagpole towers, noted as one of the finest examples of Streamline Moderne architecture – an aerodynamic, stripped-down Art Deco emphasizing sleek, cylindrical forms conveying motion, progress, and speed. Those fins were instantly recognizable, and that made the Pan-Pacific an iconic Los Angeles resident known the world over.
Image: Los Angeles Fire Department Historical Archives
The Pan-Pacific was closed in 1972, made obsolete by the opening of the Los Angeles Convention Center. In 1978, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places, and while several attempts were made to repurpose the structure as an ice rink or community center, it fell into disrepair. The Pan-Pacific burned down on May 24, 1989.
IN THE PARKS: The soaring, streamlined towers of the Pan-Pacific became equally iconic for a new generation when they were recreated in nearly full scale (albeit in a vibrant turquoise) as the entry gates to the Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park, leading to the 1930s Hollywood Blvd. entry land. The park opened on May 1, 1989, meaning that the real Pan-Pacific and its Disney counterpart coexisted for three weeks.
Image: HarshLight, Flickr (license)
When we told the story of the Declassified Disaster: Disney California Adventure‘s five-year, billion-dollar overhaul, part of the package was a new entry land for the park: Buena Vista Street, celebrating a 1920s and ’30s Los Angeles. The Pan-Pacific Gates were re-used there, too, placing them opposite Disneyland’s beloved Main Street Station. Beyond the gates lies another real-life building brought back to life…
3. Carthay Circle Theater
THE REAL PLACE: The Fox Carthay Circle Theater was opened in 1926. Made of whitewashed concrete with an iconic octagonal bell tower, the theater was designed in a Spanish Colonial Revival style with its inner auditorium placed in a cylinder raised above the roofline, almost resembling a circus tent. The elegant, soaring, and spectacularly majestic movie palace instantly became one of the world’s finest, with Pacific Coast Architect writing that it was a theatre “masked as a cathedral”.
The theater was renowned for its never-ending list of premiers, including 1939’s Gone with the Wind. In Disney terms, though, its most well-known debut was of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs – the world’s first full-length animted feature film, and the movie that critic expected would spell the end of Walt Disney.
By the 1960s, the single-auditorium theater had become overshadowed by multi-plexes. It was demolished in 1969 and today, two low-rise office buildings stand in its place. (A slightly younger sister, the Fox Village Theater, is still standing in Los Angeles’ Westwood Village and is a sight to behold.)
IN THE PARKS: In 1994, a squashed-down spire of the Carthay was one of the structures added along the Disney-MGM Studios’ Sunset Blvd. expansion, though it was merely a facade over a souvenir shop.
However, the Carthay really made a comeback in 2012, at the grand re-opening of Disney California Adventure post-facelift. The 1920s-Los Angeles themed Buena Vista Street now terminates in a scaled recreation of the Carthay Circle Theater, acting as the park’s central icon.
Image: Disney
Though early plans apparently called for an exhibition of Walt Disney’s story inside the theater, it ultimately became a bar and restaurant (though at least the restaurant is decorated with original cel art from Snow White). It’s appropriate that the Carthay stands directly counterpart to Disneyland’s Sleeping Beauty Castle, as its a multi-faceted rememberance: the theater is an icon of film history, an icon of Los Angeles, and an icon of Disney history.
4. Crossroads of the World
Across the United States, the era of the shopping mall appears to be coming to an end. The new trend? Outdoor “town centers” mixing retail, dining, and entertainment. But is the trend really new? The Crossroads of the World was designed by architect Robert V. Derrah (responsible for the iconic 1939 Streamline Moderne Coca-Cola Building), and when it opened in 1936, it was called America’s first outdoor shopping mall.
Image: Los Angeles Conservancy
THE REAL PLACE: Crossroads of the World featured a central building designed to resemble a streamlined ocean liner with portholes and ship railings, with a massive icon tower rising from the front. Small, bungalow style cottages around the ocean liner created villages mixing Spanish, Italian, Tudor, Mexican, Turkish, and New England styles. The idea was that the buildings would represent the corners of the world (with 57 shops and cafes housed on the street level, and 36 offices in the second stories) with the ocean liner tying it all together to create an international shopping port.
In the 1950s, the whole complex was converted into offices (Alfred Hitchcock once set up shop there), so while you can still visit the Crossroads of the World, don’t expect to shop. In 2019, the Los Angeles City Council approved a measure to revitalize the Crossroads area with 950 apartments and condos, a 308-room hotel, and 190,000 square feet of commercial space… a project lambasted as “the Manhattanization of Hollywood” by detractors.
Image: Disney
IN THE PARKS: The Crossroads of the World icon tower was recreated at Disney’s Hollywood Studios just inside the park gates in the inner plaza leading to Hollywood Blvd. (Sort of the equivalent of the flag flying on Main Street’s Town Square). Though the tower was recreated, the ocean liner wasn’t. Instead, Disney’s tower just contains an open-air pin-trading stand at its base. So even though the Disney version is still prominently labeled “Crossroads of the World,” you might never have connected it to a travel-themed shopping-mall-turned-office-park of the same name in Hollywood!
The other change is obvious: Disney’s version has a four-foot tall mouse stepping on the turning globe… what a pessimist might call a somewhat surprising display of corporate bravado!
5. Ivy Substation
Mission Revival architecture was a style that arose in the late 1800s, drawing inspiration from California’s Spanish missions. Typically, this style is marked by “simple” aesthetics: tiled roofs, thick arches springing from piers, exterior arcades, bell towers, and – most identifiably – curved, Baroque gables.
THE REAL PLACE: One prominent example is the Ivy Substation in Culver City, built to house power equipment needed for the Pacific Electric Railway – the electric-powered “Red Car” trolleys that criss-crossed Los Angeles. The large Ivy Substation was filled with rotary mechanical rectifiers that converted alternating current (AC) to direct current (DC) to power the lines – the beginnings of the electrical age.
The Ivy Substation was closed in 1953, and remained empty, even as it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1981. In the 1990s, the building was revitalized by the Culver City Redevelopment Agency and the City of Los Angeles, and today it’s the headquarters of and a 99-seat theater for the experimental theater non-profit, the Actors’ Gang.
Image: Disney
IN THE PARKS: The recreation of the Ivy Substantion at Disney’s Hollywood Studios has seen far more uses than the real Substation did, and in a much shorter lifetime.
When the park opened, the large Mission Revival building on Hollywood Blvd. was appropriately called “Pacific Electric Pictures,” offering guests the chance to “star in your own home video version of a Hollywood spectacular.” About a year later, it recieved one of Disney’s famous IP overlays, becoming “Calling Dick Tracy.” Guests could still take part in making their own home video, but now it would be a mystery tied to Touchstone’s 1990 film Dick Tracy starring Warren Beatty, Al Pacino, and Madonna.
When Dick Tracy flopped at the box office, the space quickly re-opened in January 1991 as a gift shop called Legends of Hollywood… but then closed two months later. When it re-opened in May, it was called L.A. Cinema Storage – a clever (if chaotic) “warehouse” of souvenirs. The cluttered interior of the cavernous building was overwhelming, but Cinema Storage remained as one of the park’s key retailers until 2014. That’s when the building underwent its biggest transformation yet.
Image: Disney
Today, the building based on a substation that powered the Red Car Trolley is… the Trolley Car Café – the park’s Starbucks. It’s always interesting to see how Disney adapts each parks’ Starbucks location to make sense in context, and Trolley Car Café does so beautifully with the “vintage” Starbucks logo and neon sign feeling just right along Hollywood Blvd. Now the interior is bright, open, and nods to the Ivy Substation with electrical supply rigs.
Image: Disney
Of course, even though Disney’s Hollywood Studios now has a trolley cafe in an old substation (and even though you’ll see metal tracks down Sunset Blvd.), the park doesn’t really have an electric trolley ride. But Disney California Adventure does! The Red Car Trolley can be found “tooting” it way up Buena Vista Street and then down Hollywood Blvd.
6. Grauman’s Chinese Theater
American showman Sid Grauman will forever be remembered as the founder of two of the most recognizable movie palaces in the world: the Egyptian Theater and the Chinese Theater. The latter, in particular, is almost certainly the most iconic movie theater on the planet. The Chinese Theater – located at 6925 Hollywood Blvd. – is an architectural wonder. Costing $2.1 million when it opened in 1926 (about $30 million today), the theater is a gorgeous combination of Chinese accents atop subtle art deco shapes.
The idea was to give viewers a sense of China, which most Americans knew practically nothing about in the 1920s. That’s why the theater’s architectural style is sometimes called “Exotic Revival.” Two gigantic coral red columns topped by wrought iron masks hold aloft the signature copper roof (which, like the Statue of Liberty, has oxidized to a cool blue patina over the last century). The design features a Chinese dragon across the façade, with two authentic Ming Dynasty Heaven Dogs guard the main entrance.
Perhaps the theater’s most well-known feature, though, is the Forecourt created by 40-foot tall curved walls. There, nearly 200 celebrity handprints are embedded in concrete blocks that make up the plaza. Like the Carthay, the Chinese Theater is known for its premieres (which continue unto today – it’s still a first-run movie theater). Famous premieres include 1933’s King Kong, 1939’s Wizard of Oz, 1977’s Star Wars (an event so legendary, Disney opted to return there for The Force Awakens premiere, passing over their own El Capitan Theater).
Image: Disney
IN THE PARKS: Like the Carthay Circle Theater, Disney’s full-scale recreation of the Chinese Theater stands prominently in the center of one of its parks. In fact, the Chinese Theater’s legendary glow at the far end of Hollywood Studios’ Hollywood Blvd. makes it as obvious and anchoring a park icon as Cinderella Castle at the end of Main Street! The Chinese Theater recreation is accurate down to the lobby, and when the park opened in 1989, it even contained the undeniable “thesis” attraction of the park – the Lost Legend: The Great Movie Ride, touring guests through some of the most iconic scenes in cinema history in an epic, 20-minute dark ride.
Image: Disney
Curiously, though, the Chinese Theater was never the official icon of Disney’s Hollywood Studios. It was outbid at opening by the Earffel Tower – a “studo” style water tower meant to emphasize the “working studio” aspect of the park. Even when the studio folded and the water tower was torn down, the Chinese Theater didn’t become the icon. Instead, in one of the most absurd Disney Parks decisions ever, a giant hat was set in front of it. Since the hat’s removal, the Hollywood Tower Hotel has stood in as a de facto icon on marketing and merchandising. Maybe that’ll change once the new Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway ride opens inside the theater.
History relived
Image: Disney
One of the things that’s so spectacular about Disney Imagineering is their attention to detail; their commitment to getting the background so right, it fades functionally from view. No one would insist that Hollywood Blvd. at Disney’s Hollywood Studios or Buena Vista Street at Disney California Adventure really recreate famous Southern Californian features to serve as facades for restrooms, snack stands, or attractions…
And yet, those with an eye for history will find the Wilshire Bowl building, Academy Theater, Municipal Light Water and Power building, J.J. Newberry building, the Bullocks Wilshire building, and dozens more brought (back) to life. Our friend Werner Weiss at Yesterland brilliantly captured (in his inimitable style) the real stories behind those dozens of recreations between Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disney California Adventure. Be sure to make the jump there to find the details you never ever knew you missed.
But even if our look today only captured the BIG buildings and obvious recreations, take a moment next time you step into Disney’s Hollywood-themed spaces to consider the co-mingling architecture and atmospheres that made the real Tinseltown such a land of splendor and awe for Walt Disney and others who stepped into the movie town at the height of its Golden Age…
