[Curiosities] Interesting Curiosities About Hollywood

[-TITAN]

 

1. You pay to have your star on the walk of fame in Hollywood. $30,000 to be precise. 

 

2. Charlie Chaplin made his movie mocking Hitler with his own money because Hollywood was afraid of losing money if they took a stand. 

 

3. Frank Sinatra has three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. One for film, one for music and one for television. 

 

4. In 1920’s the Hollywood-sign was lit by thousands of light bulbs and the guy who changed the burnt ones, lived in a little cabin near the sign.

 

5. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, recorded a $167 million loss ‘on paper’ because of “Hollywood Accounting.” Warner Brothers effectively made sure that the movie lost money by paying itself a $212 million “distribution fee” off the top. 

 

6. One major reason that Hollywood emerged as the center of filmmaking is that early on, most moviemaking patents were held by Thomas Edison’s company in New Jersey, and filmmakers were sued to stop their productions. To escape this, they began moving out west, where enforcement was difficult. – Source

 

7. The Kids in the Hall got their name from an old Hollywood practice of blaming the young writers that hung out and wrote jokes on the fly in the hallways of live TV talk/variety shows when a joke bombed. “I got this from the kids in the hall.”

 

8. The blinking light atop the Capitol Records Tower spells out the word “Hollywood” in Morse code, and has done so since the building’s opening in 1956. 

 

9. Legendary Hollywood producer Hal Roach would employ someone called a “wildie” who was either an insane person or a drunk to sit in his writers’ room and spout crazy ideas whenever they had writer’s block. 

 

 

10. According to the diary of H. J. Whitley, known as the “Father of Hollywood”, on his honeymoon in 1886 he stood at the top of a hill looking out over the valley. Along came a Chinese man in a wagon carrying wood. The man got out of the wagon and bowed. The Chinese man was asked what he was doing and replied, “I holly-wood”, meaning ‘hauling wood.’ HJ Whitley had an epiphany and decided to name his new town Hollywood.

 

11. The world-famous ‘HOLLYWOOD’ sign came about in 1923, when a real estate agent called Harry Chandler decided to advertise properties in the locality. It cost him $21,000 to raise the ‘HOLLYWOODLAND’ sign that was initially meant to stay on for eighteen months only. In 1949, the sign was edited to read just ‘HOLLYWOOD.’ The Hollywood sign itself has several interesting (and tragic) stories associated with it, including that of broadway star Peg Entwistle, who committed suicide by jumping off the ‘H.’ As it needed frequent renovations and upkeep, the Hollywood Sign Trust was set up in 1995 to look after this legendary landmark.

 

12. The name “Hollywood” is often applied to any film or TV production location within Greater Los Angeles, whether or not it is physically located within Hollywood. For example, from the time it relocated from New York in 1972 until its host retired in 1992, The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson was announced as being broadcast “from Hollywood” when in truth it originated from a studio facility in Burbank, California.