Los Angeles Guide
Hollywood and West Hollywood
HOLLYWOOD has long epitomized the American dream of glamour, money, and overnight success, acting as a magnet to both tourists and hopefuls drawn by the prospect of riches and glory. Even if their real chances of success were infinitesimal, enough people were taken in by the dream to make Hollywood what it is today – a charged combination of optimism and despair. Nonetheless, this dark side has only served to enhance Hollywood's romantic appeal, giving it an allure that no amount of myth-busting or bad press can taint.
More or less, the borders of Hollywood follow the contours of Griffith Park, the lower stretch of the eastern Hollywood Hills, Melrose Avenue, and part of Sunset Boulevard, excluding West Hollywood. Just beyond the eastern edge, at Griffith Park Boulevard, is a district whose early development was similar to Hollywood's. Silver Lake, the initial site of the movie studios, is now a center for Latin American immigrants and a well-established gay community. To the northwest, Los Feliz was home in the 1920s to many of the residences of Hollywood bigwigs, and nowadays is a charming mixed-income community with a few examples of notable architecture on its northern slope. Further north lies Griffith Park, the site of LA's famed observatory, among other less well-known institutions.
The district's main drag, Hollywood Boulevard, is still essential viewing – the basis for much LA myth and lore. This strip and its southern neighbor, Sunset Boulevard, were the central axes of the golden age of Hollywood, from the 1920s through the early 1950s; even now the stars live above it in exclusive homes in the Hollywood Hills, perched on snaking driveways behind locked gates – the most tangible reminders of the wealth generated in the city. The economic core of the area lies in WEST HOLLYWOOD, actually a separate city, attracting a diverse mix of gays and lesbians, pensioners, bohemians, and a fast-growing community of Russian immigrants. Youthful poseurs and music lovers congregate on the legendary Sunset Strip, a traffic corridor loaded with legendary, divey, and posy nightclubs and bars, and huge, towering billboards.