Believe me when I tell you, it is an imaginary place, like Paradise. It is a total fantasy, though actual real estate moguls will denounce my words.
I went to school in Hollywood.
I did practice teaching at Hollywood High School.
One of my children was born in Hollywood.
But if you came to visit and wanted a tour, you'd be hard pressed to find that Hollywood is more of a concept than an actual place with definite parameters.
There is Hollywood conglomerate of studios around the area, but most studios are now in other locations, other neighborhoods.
When we were first married, I knew more people
connected to the movie/television industry than you find anywhere else.
Studios are small cities, walled and protected and with their own culture and lingo. The fun happens when the "shootings", the locations are outdoors, in neighborhoods. Then, entire city blocks become entrenched in the phenomenon of movie making, and neighbors whisper to each other during shooting times, park in unexpected places, drive around trying to get back to their homes. Yes, Hollywood moves in your neighborhood and you are now forever immortalized in that episode of Matlock. (Matlock habitually shot scenes in and around Warner Center, my neighborhood.)
Back then I was not a writer, not even a secret one.
Back then I made a living as a school principal. All that noise and bother, all that artificiality irritated me. Our neighbor worked for Johnny Carson then, and provided all the gossip I could stand. My best friend from college has a costume shop where pretend is the name of the game, and she has plenty of stories of strange people believing any day their luck will change, their discovery will take place.
I wonder how anyone could write in a place where everything and everyone is a figment of some one's imagination.
