I spent ten minutes looking for information on a 1951 movie called “Hocus Pocus (all I could find was the Disney one starring Bette Midler) when it finally dawned on me that the Las Palmas Theater, pictured here at 1642 Las Palmas Ave, Hollywood on the night of June 7, 1951 presented live theater. With live actors! And a live audience! Starting out in 1936 as the Hollywood Little Theatre, it had seating for 388 people, which is a fairly decent sized house of the area. According to losangelestheatres.blogspot.com, “Hocus Pocus” was a comedy by Harold Sherman, so I trust that the people in this atmospheric photo had a fun night.
And here is an advertisement of the opening of “Hocus Pocus”
Denny B. says: “It’s been many things over the last 50 years. I went there once for the LA premiere of John Waters’ Female Trouble. Divine arrived in a limo with a leather clad motorcycle brigade. Somewhere I have a pack of Lucky Strikes that he signed for me.”
The Las Palmas Theatre is now a nightclub. This is how it looked in June 2024.
So, Miceli’s would be to the left of the Las Palmas; wonder what was to the right in this photo with the neon “cocktail” sign? Our only clue is big “H”! (A 1971 photo shows that location to be the Galleon Room.)
Looking at the Las Palmas pics, in the 60’s looks like it was the House of Chili that you see the H in
Wow the links connected to links can almost be deadly. Went through the theater blog and into the filming locations exploration of that 1980’s flick “Angel”. By the time I got back here it was like a month long trip through Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.