Stardust Monuments: The Saving and Selling of Hollywood PDF
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Stardust Monuments I N T E R F A C E S Studies in Visual Culture Mark J. Williams & Adrian W. B. Randolph, editors Dartmouth College This series, sponsored by Dartmouth College Press, develops and promotes the study of visual culture from a variety of critical and methodological perspectives. Its impetus derives from the increasing importance of visual signs in everyday life, and from the rapid expansion of what are termed “new media.” The broad cultural and social dynam- ics attendant to these developments present new challenges and opportunities across and within the disciplines. These have resulted in a transdisciplinary fascination with all things visual, from “high” to “low,” and from esoteric to popular. This series brings to- gether approaches to visual culture — broadly conceived — that assess these dynamics critically and that break new ground in understanding their eff ects and implications. For a complete list of books that are available in the series, visit www.upne.com. Nancy Anderson and Michael R. Dietrich, eds., The Educated Eye: Visual Culture and Pedagogy in the Life Sciences Shannon Scott Clute and Richard L. Edwards, The Maltese Touch of Evil: Film Noir and Potential Criticism Alison Trope, Stardust Monuments: The Saving and Selling of Hollywood Steve F. Anderson, Technologies of History: Visual Media and the Eccentricity of the Past Dorothée Brill, Shock and the Senseless in Dada and Fluxus Janine Mileaf, Please Touch: Dada and Surrealist Objects after the Readymade J. Hoberman, Bridge of Light: Yiddish Film between Two Worlds, updated and expanded edition Erina Duganne, The Self in Black and White: Race and Subjectivity in Postwar American Photography Eric Gordon, The Urban Spectator: American Concept-Cities from Kodak to Google Barbara Larson and Fae Brauer, eds., The Art of Evolution: Darwin, Darwinisms, and Visual Culture Stardust Monuments The Saving and Selling of Hollywood (cid:275) A L I S O N T R O P E (cid:275) Dartmouth College Press(cid:2)(cid:275)(cid:2)Hanover, New Hampshire DARTMOUTH COLLEGE PRESS An imprint of University Press of New England www.upne.com © 2011 Trustees of Dartmouth College All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Designed by Eric M. Brooks Typeset in Albertina Pro and Verlag by Integrated Publishing Solutions University Press of New England is a member of the Green Press Initiative. The paper used in this book meets their minimum requirement for recycled paper. For permission to reproduce any of the material in this book, contact Permissions, University Press of New England, One Court Street, Suite 250, Lebanon NH 03766; or visit www.upne.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Trope, Alison. Stardust monuments: the saving and selling of Hollywood / Alison Trope. p. cm. — (Interfaces: studies in visual culture) Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-1-61168-045-4 (cloth: alk. paper) — isbn 978-1-61168-046-1 (pbk.: alk. paper) — isbn 978-1-61168-195-6 (ebook) 1. Motion picture industry—California—Los Angeles—History. 2. Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.)—Description and travel. 3. Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.)— History. 4. Popular culture—California—Los Angeles—History. I. Title. pn1993.5.u65t68 2012 384’.80979494—dc23 2011040628 5 4 3 2 1 For my father • S o r r e l l• • Contents • INTRODUCTION Spotlight Hollywood: The Power of Place 1 1 Essential Hollywood Curating Motion Picture History in the Museum 11 2 The Great Whatzit? Self-Service Meets Public Service in the Hollywood Museum 45 3 Out of Bounds Remapping Hollywood as Themed Experience 89 4 Hollywood in a Box Channeling Hollywood through Home Entertainment 127 5 Handheld Hollywood 171 Acknowledgments 191 Notes 195 Bibliography 225 Index 233 INTRODUCTION Spotlight Hollywood The Power of Place In 1950, anthropologist Hortense Powdermaker published Hollywood, the Dream Factory: An Anthropologist Looks at the Movie-Makers, the result of a one-year fi eld study surveying the inner workings, power dynamics, and social system that fueled Hollywood’s fi lm industry in the postwar period. In it, she observes, “Hollywood is a unique American phenomenon with a symbolism not limited to this country. It means many things to many people. . . . Rarely is it just a com- munity where movies are made.”1 Around the same time as Powdermaker published her anthropological sur- vey, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce produced a tourist brochure claim- ing, “Hollywood is . . . an entity which cannot be contained by street boundar- ies; for, in the fullest sense, Hollywood’s boundaries are the world.”2 Some forty years later, Michael Eisner, then chairman of Walt Disney Stu- dios, commented on the allure of his corporation’s latest venture — a Holly- wood theme park called Disney-mgm Studios. For Eisner, the theme park rep- resented “the Hollywood that never was and always will be.”3 Anthropologist. Tourist guide. Industry heavyweight. All off er remarkably similar descriptions of Hollywood, yet none concretely defi ne it. Instead, all of them capture what it is not — a neighborhood and in- dustry hub — while hovering around Hollywood’s more symbolic and ineff a- ble qualities. Hollywood is placeless, timeless, and emblematic, and if as Pow- dermaker suggests, “it means many things to many people,” then Hollywood is also multifarious, if not contested. • 1 •
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