The Downside of Progress

Some days ago, I was revelling in the development of downtown Los Angeles. As I write this, I continue to revel. But always, there are two sides, are there not? As I was driving home on Monday along Sunset Boulevard I came upon the fenced in remnant of a long time restaurant fixture. At first I did not realize that it had been The Old Spaghetti Factory.

This was probably the second restaurant I had my first visit to California a brief vacation in my New York graduate school days'.  The first was "The Copper Penny" also on Sunset circa the late 1970's. The Spaghetti Factory had basic pasta food. It was nothing cosmic culinary speaking, but the kitschy atmosphere, lots of Tiffany lamps, overstuffed furniture, alcoves that included brass bed stands made part of a table, a faux train car with long table for large parties, was incredibly comforting. It was a place that all ages could enjoy. A friend of mine had self-thrown birthday gatherings there for something like 10 or more years right up to this May. In building and growing, as good as that is, a city absorbs some casualties that maybe, if somebody was not thinking entirely in greenback terms, would not be necessary. Maybe some of the losses are just too big, and maybe, in more reflective moments, they temper my joy at the growth I see in places that heretofore were concrete deserts. Maybe it is because we are such a young country and nothing is really old to us and so the idea of sparing something 50 or 100 or 150 years old just isn't a priority. There are groups out there, pockets of people, who will battle to save something, like say, the old May Co. on Fairfax and Wilshire,

where Gracie Allen used to shop, now part of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, but, there are not enough of them, and too many storied places to save. So, we are not like the Italians, whose modern buildings are often built over ruins thousands of years old. It doesn't hurt us enough to tear down some 40s movie theatre. That's what 67 years. Big deal! Oh, but it is when you see photos of those places that are gone now, that you never saw, and visualize those places you did get a chance to see before they were taken away. It's like taking away the connection to the past, to the people who passed those doors, whose lives surrounded those places. That's why going to Europe is so astounding, because here you are in exactly the place, with some of the same stones, often entire buildings, that was literally touched by a Michelangelo, or a Prince, or a King of ages past. It's a little bit of knowing them.

So, I got to thinking of some of the places that are lost now to posterity--not all huge things or places, in LA, a lot of it Hollywood related. The original Brown Derby (there were several, the only one I actually went to in the early 80s was around Hollywood and Vine) was on Wilshire, across from the Ambassador (now a reduced unrecognizable version of itself, the remains apparently to form the center of the school that will built there at some point) is now the "Brown Derby" shopping center. A pathetic derby is painted on the signage. There used to be a big doorway shaped in the form of a derby that entered the restaurant filled with celebrities and their photographs. 

 

The strip mall that long ago replaced it is a cacophany of fast food eateries. Diagonally across the street there are more fast food eateries for the business people who rush through their lunches. How many of these do we need, truly?

How long has Chasen's been closed? Ten years, five? I can no longer remember. Turns out 17. 

Its center was also left intact so that a Bristol Farms could be built surrounding it, across the street from a 24 hour Ralph's. I content myself with the one lunch and one dinner I shared with friends there after the Chasen heirs announced the landmark would soon be no more. They were still using chafing dishes and sterno, a lovely fifties glimmer of how things used to be done in the glamor days. I can still taste my filet mignon, with a perfect bearnaise sauce. A lovely pastiche of the Old Hollywood my generation and those who have followed missed.

Somewhere in my old polaroids from 1977 or 1978, I have a picture of the original Schwab's. By then, it too had been closed, and was an architectural ghost. The Virgin

Records Stores stands on that Hollywood hallowed ground near Crescent Heights.

 

It's not that I don't love the mega media store. I do. I love the techno glitz too. But why does one have to die to bring the other to life? The Grove kind of got it right, keeping a part of the old Farmer's Market adjacent to what I hear is THE most popular shopping center in the United States. I can't live without those dented metal tables and Patsy's Pizza (if you are from New York, as I am, this is the real deal).

Some things just plain confuse me. Since 1965 there has been a restaurant (with various names) on the 32nd story of what used to be the Occidental, then the Transamerica, then the SBC, now the AT and T Building.  Back then, some important people from Stanford University did a million dollar study and opined that downtown LA would be centered where this first skyscraper was built between Hill and Olive, 11th and 12th. Only it did not happen for nearly 50 years. And now the sparks of residential and business life are finally growing around the building. The restaurant, with its always spectacular view in every direction, was closed on July 31 purportedly to make executive offices for oodles more profit, when to those of us regulars it seemed like this was the time for the restaurant to redefine and shine.

The other day I ran across the name of one of the many old theatres, this one in Long Beach, which is developing mightily these days so that the ocean is virtually blocked out of view unless you own one of those million dollar condos. It was called the Fox West Coast Theatre. I looked up where it had been, 333 Ocean Boulevard. They even took the statue outside the theatre and made it part of the current building, which itself, I think was probably built in the 1960s, because that's when the ornate theatre that aspiring actors and actresses from the Long Beach Community Playhouse used to frequent, was torn down.

I have no answer for what should be done. It's easy for me to say preserve, preserve! And anyway what is the difference in the large scheme of things? Sometimes, though, the loss just makes me sad.