Roosevelt Hotel
The Roosevelt Hotel was built on sprawling strawberry fields as a
benchmark of glamour and elegance. It was named in honor of President
Theodore Roosevelt and it opened it’s doors on May 15, 1927. It was
built at the then staggering cost of $2.5 million.
The Roosevelt Hotel is listed on the National Registry of Historic
Places. The elegant two-story Spanish-Moorish colonial lobby with its
beautifully hand-painted wooden-beamed ceiling, Spanish-tiled floors,
and leaded-glass windows, have been faithfully restored to their 1927
splendor. From its beginning in the late 1920’s and continuing today,
the hotel has been a favorite “location” site for television shows and
feature films, music videos and fashion photography. Recent film shoots
include Almost Famous, The Dorothy Dandridge Story, Blow, and the Steven
Spielberg feature starring Tom Hanks and Leonardo DiCaprio, Catch Me if
You Can.
The Roosevelt Hotel and its Blossom Ballroom are most recognized
throughout the world as the first home of the Acadamy Awards on May 16,
1929. Stars associated with the hotel include Ralph Edwards (This is
Your life), David Niven (made his way in Hollywood from a broom closet
that was his room) and Rudee Vallee who left his personal and
professional momentos to the hotel in his estate.
In the early 30’s, when jazz was the latest rage, the hotel opened
“The Cinegrill”, an intimate bar and club that hosted the best in jazz
and cabaret entertainment for the next 60 years. F. Scott Fitzgerald,
Ernest Hemingway and Salvador Dali (who was designing movie sets at the
time) were among the creative customers who gathered at the Cinegrill to
“talk shop”. In the past decade, stars like Ertha Kitt, Cybil Sheppard,
Tony Danza, Shirley Horn, Julie Wilson, Margaret Whiting, Kaye Ballard
and Michael Feinstein have played the room to adoring audiences.
Legendary Broadway musical star, Mary Martin, made her paid debut at the
Cinegrill for $35 per week. When she couldn’t find a babysitter, she
would bring her infant son along - the future “J.R. Ewing” on T.V.’s
“Dallas” - Larry Hagman. In the past decade, stars like Ertha Kitt,
Cybil Sheppard, Tony Danza, Shirley Horn, Julie Wilson, Margaret
Whiting, Kaye Ballard and Michael Feinstein have played the room to
adoring audiences.
It is said that Bill “Bojangles” Robinson first showed Shirley Temple
their famous staircase dance on the tiled steps leading from the Lobby
to the Mezzanine level. Rumors also persist that during Prohibition,
Errol Flynn mixed his notorious gin recipe in the back of the hotel’s
barbershop.
Marilyn Monroe posed for her first commercial advertisement - for
toothpaste - on the diving board of the hotel’s pool. It is said that
Marilyn stayed at the hotel often in the 1950’s, preferring a second
floor Cabana Room (246), overlooking the pool. Montgomery Clift resided
at the Roosevelt during the 3 months of filming From Here to Eternity.
Clift would often pace the hall outside his 9th Floor room, rehearsing
his lines and sometimes practicing the bugle, much to the consternation
of other guests. The story is told that on particularly windy nights one
can hear Monty’s ghost playing the bugle in the 9th Floor corridor.
Linda Goodman, world-famous astrologer and author, wrote her best
selling books, “Sun Signs” and “Love Signs” in suite 1207 at the hotel.
Goodman said many “magical and enchanting things” happened in the suite
and that it definitely had “a haunting quality” about it.
www.hollywoodroosevelt.com
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