A Visit to the Hollywood Museum

Time for a little trip down memory lane!

As I mentioned briefly last month, I have a series of overdue photo posts I've been hoping to finally organize, and here's the first one!

Prior to the opening night of last year's Noir City Hollywood festival, my husband and I visited the Hollywood Museum in the Max Factor Building. It was my second time to visit the museum, which has a quirky layout, including narrow hallways and a maze of small rooms on the ground floor, but it's worth spending a couple hours checking out the displays.

On this visit I was especially excited to see the beautiful Irene gown seen above, which was worn by Lana Turner in MGM's MARRIAGE IS A PRIVATE AFFAIR (1944).

Here are some shots of Lana wearing the gown. I think she was at her absolute loveliest in this film, with an amazing wardrobe.

There was also a display featuring another MGM star, pianist Jose Iturbi:

The big draw for me on last year's trip was a large exhibit honoring Annette Funicello.

The exhibit was upstairs, where there are more spacious exhibit spaces than on the ground floor.

I remember reading Whitman published mysteries similar to these when I was in elementary school; I loved the bright, shiny covers. I don't recall reading any featuring Annette, but that's probably not surprising as from a look at Amazon, they were published about a decade before I would have been reading them.

There was also an extensive exhibit of memorabilia and costumes from the '60s TV series BATMAN:

Framed vintage magazine ads for Max Factor makeup are seen throughout the ground floor of the museum. Here's Martha O'Driscoll...

...and Loretta Young. There are many more to be seen at the museum; glare from the lighting makes it a challenge to photograph them!

There are more "memory lane" photo posts to come, including the Walt Disney Family Museum, along with looks at some interesting places I've visited this year!