Preservationist Sees Curtain Falling on Film Landmarks

Friday was one of those days when Hollywood preservationist Doug Carlton must have felt like his back was against the wall.

And it was as he slumped sadly against the plywood safety wall that a demolition crew had erected at the southeast corner of Sunset Boulevard and Beachwood Drive. Behind the barrier, a bulldozer was razing one of Hollywood’s oldest film studios.

“They can’t tear this down!” yelled Carlton, 50, founder of a group called Keep Old Los Angeles. “Universal Studios was born here. This is a holy place. The Founding Fathers of film wrote the Constitution here.”

The wrecking crew paused only briefly to stare at Carlton before resuming its attack on the building, its old-fashioned soundproofing material dangling from ripped-open wooden walls.

By the end of the day, Carlton would find out he was mistaken about the history of the old studio building.

It would be another day of setbacks for the man who is considered a gadfly by city officials but an angel by his admirers.

For 17 years, the blunt-spoken Carlton’s one-man mission to preserve Hollywood’s past has often put him at odds with bureaucrats and businessmen.

He has proposed scraping away Hollywood Boulevard’s asphalt paving to unearth the 85-year-old trolley tracks that run down the center and returning vintage streetcars to the world-famous street.

He has suggested that Hollywood be designated a national park, so rangers could protect its fading ambience. He wants the boulevard’s storefronts refurbished and its street lights and bus benches replaced with replicas of ones from the 1930s. The look of Hollywood’s golden era would stimulate movie making along the street, Carlton says.

He has argued in favor of creating jobs for Hollywood’s army of street people and runaway teen-agers, urging that they be hired to restore old buildings such as the ramshackle Brown Derby restaurant site on Vine Street.

His friendship with Hollywood’s homeless, in particular, has rankled some.

Carlton started his morning Friday by chatting with a group of punk-dressed youths gathered outside a boulevard coffee shop. But when he stepped inside to buy a cup of coffee, Carlton was refused service.

Back outside, Carlton was joined by Phil Becker, an advertising manager from the San Fernando Valley’s North Hills, whose hobby is photographing Los Angeles’ old buildings.

“They’re building a fake Hollywood in Florida,” Becker said. “But we have the real one right here. The real Hollywood is ignored.”

Becker accompanied Carlton to Sunset Boulevard to look at the studio demolition. He took photos as Carlton opened his briefcase and pulled out an old picture of Universal founder Carl Laemmle’s 1912 silent-picture studio. This was the place, Carlton said.

But was it?

The building is owned by Sunset Gower Studios, which will replace the demolished sound stage with a parking lot and later an office building. Construction manager Bob Morse dated the old studio building to 1919.

But it was never Laemmle’s, Morse said. A check of records shows that previous owners were Horsely Studios, Francis Ford, Stern Bros. and Columbia before it became part of Sunset Gower.

“They put out second-rate things there,” Morse said. “Somebody said ‘Dennis the Menace’ was shot there. And the C & R commercials.”

Late Friday, officials of the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency also downplayed the historical significance to the studio, which they described as weakened by dry rot and earthquake damage.

CRA Hollywood Project Manager H. Cooke Sunoo also was downplaying Carlton.

“A few years ago he spread the word that the CRA was going to destroy the Clark Gable house,” Sunoo said. “Everybody got excited. But it was the ‘Orchard Gables’ house. It had nothing to do with Clark Gable.”

Back at his Argyle Avenue apartment, Carlton shrugged off the day’s downhill slide.

He may have made a mistake on the Laemmle studio address--which was apparently on the opposite side of Sunset. But bureaucrats made a bigger mistake by letting another vintage Hollywood studio fall to the wrecking ball, Carlton said by telephone.

“Look,” he said, “that place still was one of the oldest studios in town. They screwed up. Somebody has got to start looking out for Hollywood.”