Climbing onto the Million Dollar Theater's Marquee

Gentle reader,

Greetings from your friendly historic Los Angeles sightseeing tour company, now offering walking tours like Saturday’s excursion through Raymond Chandler’s Noir Downtown.

For our latest post that’s hidden from the rest of the internet, we wanted to share an unusual view of two once prominent Downtown landmarks: Jo Mora’s sculpted allegorical figures, now obscured by the new marquee tacked on the Million Dollar Theater. They are just across Broadway from the Bradbury Building.

That big marquee’s been on our mind, with last Saturday’s 115th birthday tour celebrating the Bunker Hill novelist John Fante and the places and people who inspired his fiction. We cut Fante’s birthday cake in its shadow, and our friends at Grand Central Market graciously honored the author in backlit plastic, too.

To get up on the marquee, you need to get on the good side of Tom Ruff, the theater’s dedicated caretaker, projectionist and historian. And you need not to be claustrophobic or klutzy, since the route is narrow, dark and unsteady, across a board that rattles as you cross it.

But if you ever get the chance to make that trek, we recommend you do, because…