Night on Broadway Brings Back Glamour Era

Discover LA by Metro:

Golden Era of Broadway Glitters for Night on Broadway

Saturday, January 27, 2018 — Rain or Shine

Broadway (1st – Olympic) Free Art Fest, 3 pm – 12 midnight

Hundreds of artists and exhibits will captivate you in theaters and on Broadway in a multi-block street festival. For 2018, the festival will open earlier — at 3 pm — and run until midnight. Six theaters and many open-air stages will present a star-filled lineup of entertainment.

On this amazing evening you can experience six of Broadway’s historic movie palaces. Five of these theaters — the Million Dollar, the Los Angeles, the Palace, the Globe, and the Orpheum — are rarely open to the public. Only the United Artists Theater (in the Ace Hotel) regularly holds events.

For Night on Broadway, live entertainment will headline historic theater venues and a lively outdoor festival stage. Six of Broadway’s glorious historic theaters will be filled with acts ranging from acrobats to performance art and comedians to recording artists, while the storied corridor itself will come alive with a large slate of outdoor activities and entertainment, including a Ferris Wheel. The mult-block, arts-focused street festival will bring together Broadway’s iconic streetscape and historic theater venues into one fantastic event.

The Golden Era of Broadway Comes Alive in the Theaters

Night on Broadway has the feel of multiple premieres on a street lined with movie palaces. Each of the seven featured theaters is a gem in itself — the combination is an amazing jeweled evening. Being in these theaters brings the Golden Era of Broadway to life.

Hundreds of artists and exhibits will captivate you in theaters and throughout a multi-block street festival crowned by a five-story Ferris wheel overlooking Broadway.

These highlights from 2015’s event give an idea of the even more spectacular Night on Broadway planned for January 27, 2018.

Mary Pickford Favored Moorish Design for United Artists

In 2015, the United Artists Theatre at Ace Hotel showed the classic feature film “Metropolis.” The Theatre at Ace Hotel originally opened as the United Artists on December 26, 1927 with “My Best Girl,” a silent film starring Mary Pickford and Buddy Rogers.

Click on photos in the gallery below to view as a slide show

 Beaux Arts Meets Art Deco in The Orpheum

In 2015 The Orpheum featured performances by String Theory. The Orpheum opened on February 15, 1926, as the fourth and final Los Angeles venue for the Orpheum vaudeville circuit. After a $3 million renovation, started in 1989, it is the most restored of the historic movie palaces in LA. It has a Mighty Wurlitzer organ, installed in 1928, that is one of only a few remaining in Southern California venues.

Click on photos in the gallery below to view as slide show

Charlie Chaplin Helped Fund The Los Angeles Theater

The dazzling Los Angeles Theatre hosted Wilderbe in 2015. The Los Angeles Theatre was constructed in late 1930 and early 1931. It was commissioned by H.L. Gumbiner, an independent film exhibitor from Chicago, who also built the nearby Tower Theatre. The theater features a French Baroque interior, with a grand central staircase. The opulent interior is said to have been modeled after the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles. It was the last lavish movie palace built on Broadway, as the area began to feel the effects of the Great Depression and faced competition from new theaters on Hollywood Blvd., three of which are still in operation — El Capitan, Grauman’s Egyptian, and Grauman’s Chinese.

Click on photos in the gallery below to view as slide show

 

Easy Metro Access

Take the Red/Purple Lines to Pershing Square, use the 4th Street exit, and walk two blocks to Broadway. Special Night on Broadway destination discounts are available to attendees who show their Metro TAP cards. A list is on Night on Broadway‘s website.

Complimentary bike valet service will be provided at 5th Street in the festival area, coordinated by the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition and Broadway’s DTLA Bikes.

2018 Night on Broadway Festival map

 

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Museums of the Arroyo Day

Six Museums Free —

One Afternoon of Living History

 

Costumed docents add to the festivities at Heritage Square on Museums of the Arroyo Day.

Discover LA by Metro:

Discover LA’s History at Six Museums

Free on Sunday, May 21, 2017

Update: May 19, 2019 from noon – 4 pm

Step back in time on Sunday when six unique history-based museums will be free from noon to 5 pm, in celebration of the annual Museums of the Arroyo Day. Although it is almost impossible to see all six — Heritage Square, The Autry’s Southwest Museum, the Lummis Home and Gardens, the Los Angeles Police Museum, the Pasadena Museum of History, and the Gamble House — which ever ones you see will be a treat.  We made it to three and look forward to three more this year!

Heritage Square

Heritage Square, established in 1969, is a living history village which preserves nine 1800s structures from across Los Angeles.

Octogon House, built in Pasadena in 1893, was moved to Heritage Square in 1986.

The Hale House, built in 1887 a short distance from the museum, and was donated and moved in 1970.

The Valley Knudsen House originally was in Lincoln Heights. It features Eastlake, also claaed Queen Anne, Victorian style elements.

Heritage Square is a living history museum.

Lummis Home and Garden

This is a rare opportunity to visit the Lummis Home and Garden — hand-built by journalist, historian and librarian Charles Fletcher Lummis over a twelve years from 1898 – 1910. Often credited with representing the beginning of the Arts & Crafts architectural movement, the home is now only open limited hours. It is also well know for its native California plant garden.

It took Lummis twelve years to hand-build his home.

Matilija poppies are a striking native California flower.

Charles Fletcher Lummis, who helped found the nearby Southwest Museum,

Desert willow blooms look tropical.

The Los Angeles Police Museum

See the jacket worn by Dragnet’s Sargent Friday (Jack Webb) and scores of real police memorabilia at the Los Angeles Police Museum in Highland Park. This hidden gem opened in 2001 and displays LAPD history from its 1869 beginnings. Snap your own booking photo and experience a vintage jail cell.

Getting There

Getting to Museums of the Arroyo Day is easy by Metro. Take the Gold Line to either the Memorial Park or Southwest Museum station and catch shuttles from the museums near these stations.

There will be two free shuttles — one runs between the Gamble House, Pasadena History Museum and the Los Angeles Police Museum; the other between the Police Museum, the Lummis Home and Gardens, and the Southwest Museum.

No shuttles will go to Heritage Square, which is .4 mile walk from the Lummis Home.

From the Gold Line Memorial Park station it is an .8 mile walk to the Gamble House, passing the Pasadena Museum of History. Walnut Street goes over the freeway to both museums.

 

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No Pants Metro Ride Takes Off Again

Cheeky riders hang out on the Expo Line.

Discover LA by Metro:

Bottoms Up on the Red Line and Expo Line!

On January 8th, 2016, the 9th Annual No Pants Metro Ride travels from Union Station to Santa Monica, starting at 1 pm.

Started by New York City provocateurs Improv Everywhere in 2002, No Pants subway, tram, and metro rides now happen in at least 32 cities in North America, Australia, and Europe, from Adelaide to Zurich, and even in Jerusalem.

GuerilLA is organizing this year’s event, which starts at Union Station and travels on the Red Line and the Expo Line to the Santa Monica Station, where participants will gather at nearby Tongva Park, a short stroll from the station, then go to an afterparty. While traveling without pants is not illegal, going totally bottomless violates the law and is strongly discouraged.

Participants will meet in the north or south patios and travel in six groups, assigned by the first letters of their last names, and will depart at staggered times to avoid overloading the trains. See the GuerrilLA instructions page for details including meeting times and locations.

We traveled last year with a group from the Culver City Station to Union Station, where we met with other groups and moved on to the Hollywood/Highland Station. The atmosphere was festive, and the expressions of passengers and passersby were delightful.

Here are a few photos from last year:

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The Expo Line Goes to the Sea!

Discover LA by Metro:

Strike Up the Band: First Expo Line Train to Santa Monica!

May 20, 2016, 12:00 PM

Hundreds of Metro riders were on the Culver City Station platform waiting for the first train to Santa Monica.

Hundreds of people were on the platform at Culver City Station waiting for the first Expo Line train to Santa Monica. We were there, too — we had to be!

The train was almost full when it arrived — many people got on the train along the way from 7th/Metro Station. Most of the passengers were regular Metro patrons, although there were also some media people and VIPs. There was also a phalanx of Sheriff’s deputies at the doors, anticipating the crowd waiting at Culver City.

Cell phone paparazzi greet the first Expo Line train between LA and Santa Monica.

As the train pulled in, there was a rush of excitement. But when the doors opened, the deputies had to restrain the crowd because there was so little space on the train. We had expected this, so we were there early and staked out a spot on the platform where the front doors of the first car opened. We were able to squeeze in along with only a half-dozen other riders.

We had visions of the infamous subway and train crowds at rush hour in Japan, where white-gloved employees pack riders into the cars so efficiently and forcefully that there is literally no personal space left. Fortunately, Metro doesn’t employ pushers.

Those who were unable to get on were visibly disappointed, but the train operator announced that another train would be coming in a few minutes. No one tried to push past the deputies and the train departed with cheers from the lucky passengers on board.

A crowd waited for the train on the platform of the Westwood/Rancho Park Station.

Because we were at the front of the first car, we were very close to the door into the operator’s cabin. A Metro media staff member was standing next to us, and he asked the supervisor in the cabin to slide down the window in the cabin door, allowing us to photograph the view through the front windows of the train.

Healthy crowds awaited this first train at every one of the new stations: Palms, Westwood/Rancho Park, Expo/Sepulveda, Expo/Bundy, 26th St./Bergamot, 17th St./SMC, and Downtown Santa Monica.

Just as at the Culver City Station, the anxious potential riders were disappointed to find that there was no room for them. The exception to this repeated scene was at the Expo/Bundy Station, where one of the riders announced that this was her stop and she wanted to get off the train. Once she squeezed her way out, one lucky person was able to squeeze in.

 

Crowds jammed the train platforms at every station for the first Expo Line train to Santa Monica.

The crowds on the platforms at Culver City Station and the following six stations were nothing compared to the huge, boisterous group waiting at the Santa Monica Downtown Station. Arriving riders were asked to leave the train, exit the platform, and go to the back of the long lines of people waiting to get on board. Fortunately, the weather was sunny, with a cool sea breeze helping to keep the wait comfortable.

Huge, boisterous crowds at the Santa Monica Downtown Station waited to get on the trains.

Kamisha Myvett operated the first passenger-carrying train to Santa Monica.

This was an auspicious beginning to the new Metro service, which will take about 46 minutes to traverse the distance between 7th/Metro Station in Downtown Los Angeles and  Santa Monica Downtown Station. After six decades, you can once again ride the rails between Downtown Los Angeles and Downtown Santa Monica following much of the route of the old Red Cars.

The Metro Duo is very excited to have been on the first passenger-carrying train on the completed Expo Line. Thanks are due to Kamisha Myvett, who smoothly operated this very heavily loaded train and graciously informed disappointed riders that there would be room on the next trains. Thanks are also owed to Paul Gonzales, Metro’s media staffer in the first car, for enabling our photography through the front windows of the train.

Artist Judithe Hernandez created 24 panels of artwork at Downtown Santa Monica Station based on ancient myths and legends of Europe, Mexico, Japan, India, Latin America, Iran, Russia, Native America, Polynesia and Africa.

The New Expo Line Map

The Metro Expo Line runs between Downtown LA at 7th Street/Metro Center and Downtown Santa Monica.

 

 

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Please contact us to license usage of images or text.

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