Tattered Tinseltown or post-Hollywood Los Angeles
Recession Indicators or Mariah Carey at The Eagle
Post-Crashout Musk or Vivian Wilson on Hasan Piker’s stream
It Bars or Silverlake Lounge
Sperm Racing or the LA tech scene
The city has main character energy.
First the fires and now the protests have ensured that the city, once Hollywood’s stage set for everywhere else in the world, has maintained its role despite consumer tastes shifting from silver screen to phone screen. Thom Anderson’s 2003 documentary Los Angeles Plays Itself is the best record of this phenomenon: the fictional precedes the real. Griffith Observatory is Rebel Without a Cause. The Bradbury Building is Blade Runner. The movie ranches of the valley are the Old West. The buildings downtown are Chicago. The city fictionalizes itself as much as it fictionalizes everywhere else.