My thanks to the good folks at Esotouric for uncovering this little gem: a rare 1916 view of the Gates of Babylon set from D.W. Griffith’s “Intolerance” – one of the great epics of silent-era cinema. The enormous set was built where Sunset Boulevard and Hollywood Boulevard meet in Los Feliz. Once filming was done, they just left the set standing where they built it until it was finally torn down in 1919. In 1923, the Vista Theatre was built on that spot where it remains to this day. (Check out Esotouric’s weird and wonderful historic tours of LA at https://esotouric.com/)

Another view from 4500 W. Sunset Blvd:

In this photo we can see the southwest corner of Prospect Ave and Talmadge St, showing the Gates of Babylon set:

We can surmise from the above photo that the the whole block bordered by Sunset to the south, Hillhurst to the East, Prospect to the north, and Talmadge to the west was vacant and so it was the ideal place to build the Intolerance set as Griffith’s Reliance-Majestic Studios was originally built around 1914 at 4516 Sunset Blvd was diagonally across the street, where the Vons supermarket now is.

This is what the Gates of Babylon scene looked like, and is what the builders of the Hollywood and Highland mall took their inspiration from: