Head down Hollywood Boulevard and you will pass the iconic Chinese Theatre. If you don’t know it is there it is almost a surprise when you drive up because it is set back a little from the street and looks smaller in life then it does in movies or on television.
The original Chinese Theatre was commissioned following the success of the nearby Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre, which opened in 1922. Built by a partnership headed by Sid Grauman over 18 months starting in January 1926, the theatre opened May 18, 1927, with the premiere of Cecil B. DeMille’s film The King of Kings. It has since been home to many premieres, including the 1977 launch of George Lucas’s Star Wars, as well as birthday parties, corporate junkets, and three Academy Awards ceremonies. Among the theatre’s most distinctive features are the concrete blocks set in the forecourt, which bear the signatures, footprints, and handprints of popular motion picture personalities from the 1920s to the present day. [SOURCE]
We got to see them setting up for a movie premier which was interesting but limited our access to the site. This is a place I would like to go back to and see more of the history. We missed the Egyptian Theatre because until I was doing research on the Chinese Theatre I had no idea it existed. More in a future post of the Hollywood Walk of Fame that is in front and along the street of the theatre. Definitely a place worth stopping but maybe the sketchiest place we visits in L.A.
