Fatty Arbuckle's Cafe Today
You may remember how a couple of weeks ago how we told you about Fatty Arbuckle's Plantation Cafe. Well, because we love you guys (all three of you), we drove over to Culver City and photographed this centerpiece of Culver Studios. It was also used in the background of Gone with the Wind (it was not, as some believe however, Tara). They used all the old sets on the back lot -- like King Kong's Skull Island and the sets from Cecil B. DeMille's King of Kings -- burnt them in a huge fire to film the burning of Atlanta.
The studio eventually became part of RKO, passing through the hands of Joseph Kennedy, DeMille, Howard Hughes, and became the home of Desilu Productions in 1956. Then it went on to Grant Tinker in the eighties, and then Sony Pictures who finally sold it to PCCP Studio City in 2004.
An unbelievable number of movies and tv programs were filmed there, including ET, Rebecca, A Star is Born, Citizen Kane, Ozzie and Harriet, I Love Lucy, Lassie and The Andy Griffith Show, not to mention Baywatch (for awhile), Mad About You, Peyton Place, and Batman.
Small Couch
Like puppies, sometimes couches come in very small sizes. This one is obviously the runt of its litter and was probably thrilled just to have a home. Now of course, it's out on the street, making its own way in the world. We wish you well tiny couch!
Thunderbolts and lightning...
Isn't it funny that Queen mentions "thunderbolts" in "Bohemian Rhapsody" and yet, there are no bolts of thunder?
And speaking of unlikely and surreal, how about that thunderstorm last night? We counted between lightning and thunder and it was RIGHT OVER US. And then, it rained.
Dude. We thought it was the rapture. We didn't mind being left behind as long as we get to go back to sleep.
Palms on the Internet
We're not the only ones buzzing about Palms. Check out the odes available at
LA City Nerd and
Los Anjealous. Palms is the new black!
Sushi Karen!
Palms and kuaptic are excited to introduce a new friend -- sushi karen! to the neighborhood. Tucked right across the street from the Best Buy on Washington, Sushi Karen is unassuming, but once inside, one notices that they've taken steps to jazz up the joint. Still, it retains the feeling of the best kind of stripped down, bad music playing, mini-mall sushi bar. The nigeri is excellent -- large pieces of well cut, fresh fish on rice. It has an auxilary menu including various types of teriaki (for the five people left in LA who don't eat sushi) and stellar short ribs. it has all the usual appetizers -- edamame, gyoza, green salads and miso soup, but the real show stopper is the sashimi, which is plentiful and well sauced, and of all this, the tuna carpaccio is the star. A huge dish, festooned with translucent tuna, dabbed with olive oil, a bit of soy sauce and rice vinegar. Heaven! Within walking distance! (Photo from The Delicious Life)Sushi Karen, 10762 Washington Boulevard, Culver City, CA
Standing corrected
If you're a regular kuaptic-ite, you've read our dissertations on couches and why people always take the pillows before abandoning them to a lonely life in the streets -- well, there's an exception to every rule! This couch was indeed left with its cushions (but what cushions!!) Trimmed with wood, this guy has very little to recommend him, his attached bump cushions (very eighties!) and his seemingly tye-dyed pattern. This evidence indicates that couches left with cushions are in fact worse off in general.
Farewell, Adele
Maria Altman has sold the painting of her aunt, Adele Bloch-Bauer, by Gustav Klimpt, to the Neue Gallery, a New York Gallery dedicated to Austrian decorative arts sponsored by cosmetics mogul, Ronald Lauder. He calls it their Mona Lisa, and calls it a "once in a lifetime acquisition."
The painting was sold at Sotheby's for 135 million dollars, the most paid for a painting ever. It is believed that LACMA had offered the same price for all five of the paintings Maria Altman recovered from Austria earlier this year. It's too bad that she decided to break up the collection which once hung in the home of her uncle, Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer, who commissioned them from Klimpt, Austria's most well known fin de siecle painter.
Before the paintings were returned to Maria Altman, Vienna hung the city in representations of the portrait, with the words, "Farewell, Adele" inscribed underneath. She was leaving the city of her birth forever. Soon, her brief visit to Los Angeles will be over, but you can still see her at LACMA until the end of the month.
LACMA, 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036
The Plantation Cafe
One of Fatty Arbuckle's shortlived post scandal careers was as the proprietor of Fatty Arbuckle's Plantation Cafe in 11700 on Washington Blvd. in Culver City, across the street from the site of Arbuckle's elementary school -- opened back when the sunset Strip was merely a dirt road. Lavishly decorated by the head of the MGM art department, the cafe opened in 1928 with star studded fanfare, performances by the Talmadge sisters and was part, along with the Cotton Club, and King's Tropical Inn, of the hopping Culver City club scene. Culver City was close to the coast -- convinient for the bootleggers to bring in their wares. The clubs drew the non-famous in hopes of of dancing side by side with the stars while listening to the likes of Louie Armstrong, Lionel Hampton or Eddie Frazier and the Plantation Orchestra.The club's name was spelled out on the front lawn in flowers and Arbuckle himself was presented with a life-sized statue of himself made entirely of blossoms.Los Angeles is a fickle town and when the stock market crashed in 1929, the Plantation Cafe suddenly found itself empty as even the rich and famous stayed home and pinched pennies. Arbuckle sold his interest in the restaurant and nightclub and went east to New York.The Plantation House remains, as part of Culver Studios. Why the Plantation motif remains a mystery.
Fatty Arbuckle
Fatty Arbuckle had the dubious distinction of being the movie business' first scandal. Born in Kansas in 1887, Roscoe Arbuckle (who only used the name "Fatty" professionally, and otherwise detested it) was catapulted to fame in Mac Sennett's Keystone Kops movies. He made famous the "pie in the face" gag so familiar to many of us.
Though he married, he was known about town as a man of huge appetites, in booze, partying and women. Nonetheless, he managed to, at the height of his career, scandalize the nation by being involved in the death of a young actress (and we use the word "actress" here loosely) named Virginia Rappe. It was Labor Day weekend 1921, Arbuckle was to be found partying down and living it up in San Francico's St. Francis Hotel. The young woman was known to be sickly, and have a number of issues when using alcohol. When she was found moaning and barely conscious, she was hospitalized, dying shortly thereafter from a ruptured bladder.
A rumor was started that Arbuckle had crushed her while trying to rape her. (In fact it's thought that she was suffering from a botched abortion.) The Hearst papers ran with it and his career was destroyed. He tried a number of ways to make ends meet after that, drifting through marriages and careers until he died in 1933. He was 46. He was cremated and scattered over the Pacific Ocean. Buster Keaton, his lifelong friend said that he died of a broken heart.
Gardens of Dispute
An ugly thing is taking place in our fair city today -- the 350 members of an urban garden at 41st and Alameda are being evicted today by deputies and riot police. Seven people have been arrested, and a number of protesters remain, chained to trees and picnic tables. They contend that the farmers are growing food for their families and that it gives hope and beauty to an area blighted with urban malaise. Unsuprisingly, a number of celebrities are involved, notably Daryl Hannah, Joan Baez and Willie Nelson.
Owner Ralph Horowitz let it be known that he would be willing to sell the property to the farmers for $16 million. An unsubstantiated report is floating around contending that the farmers were able to put the funding together, and that Horowitz refused. For whatever reason, he seems bent on building a warehouse on the property. We don't usually editorialize in this manner, but, what a bastard!
Dreams Do Come True
The word on the street is that someone has bought the Ennis-Brown House, with an eye to pouring the $10 million dollars into it the the house so desperately needs. This includes replacing the textile blocks and the retaining wall that will keep the house in its cherished place on the hillside. Instead of at the bottom of it.
UPDATE: The Ennis-Brown House hasn't been sold, but it is being repaired, which we're prepared to settle for!
In the Mummy's Tomb
American Cinematheque is putting on a Golden Age of British Horror eventat the Egyptian for most of this month. Tonight, they have a Christopher Lee double feature: The Horror of Dracula and Taste the Blood of Dracula. Tomorrow, they move on to X the Unknown and The Crawling Eye. Or you can check out the schedule yourself. So turn off the Ghost Whisperer and go check out the real thing!
Art Walk
It's rare that you think of the words "Culver City" and the words "art walk" as going together. But walking between a number of small galleries on Washington and La Cienega was a refreshing change on a hot weekend. It was not as staid and overpriced as the West hollywood Artwalk, but more professional and put together than the Brewery downtown. They had everything from some excellent music poster stuff, to huge pieces made entirely of matchbook covers. Our only beef was that a number of galleries appeared to be heavily sponsored by The Man. And Scion swag notwithstanding, it would be nice if they would be a little quieter about it.
Couch Gathering
Sometimes couches flock together, for warmth, for comfort. Couches are herd animals you know. (They like it much better when there's more than one of them in your living room. Takes the pressure off -- so to speak). However, these couches have chosen poorly. Overland is no place for defenseless couches -- too much pollution, speeding cars, Sony execs. Definitely trouble!
Goat Sucker
There are many fictional creatures that roam the streets of Los Angeles -- vampires, dragons, agents who actually work for a living. Among these illusions, the chupacabra is probably the ugliest (though the agents give them a run for their money!) An urban legend dating from the early ninties, the chupacabra made its first appearance in Puerto Rico, where a number of animals turned up dead and empty of blood, with holes in their necks. In fact, "Chupcabra" stands for "goat sucker."The notion quickly spread through Central and South America (where it was bolstered by the centuries old tale of the "Mosquito Man" who drained animals of their blood through his proboscus-nose.) and up into the US, where he has made visits in areas as disperate as Los Angeles and the Carolinas, and has been "often" been spotted in "Michigan."Chupacabras have been known to look as strange as an ugly animal with skin problems, to spiney aliens (complete with large black eyes) and even lizard or Golem-like creatures. Unfortunately, they remain creatures of legend; most of their sightings can be attributed to mass hysteria, and often the animals who have been their victims have been killed by other animals, drained of blood by insects or even done in by human beings. Unless there's been some kind of massive, multi-naional government conspiracy.So keep your eyes open, your cameras ready and your goats close to home!
You may remember how a couple of weeks ago how we told you about Fatty Arbuckle's Plantation Cafe. Well, because we love you guys (all three of you), we drove over to Culver City and photographed this centerpiece of Culver Studios. It was also used in the background of Gone with the Wind (it was not, as some believe however, Tara). They used all the old sets on the back lot -- like King Kong's Skull Island and the sets from Cecil B. DeMille's King of Kings -- burnt them in a huge fire to film the burning of Atlanta.
