There Goes Perino's
I had a chance to step inside the legendary Perino's (scroll down for image) restaurant a few years ago when Fox threw a party there, reviving the joint for the night.
One of the old Hollywood haunts, where entertainers like Frank Sinatra would hang, Perino's has sat empty on Wilshire Blvd. for years. The restaurant, closed since 1985, is ocassionally used for parties and TV/movie shoots, but is yet another ghost from Hollywood past.
It's still sort of sad to learn that developers plan to tear down Perino's to make room for a new apartment building.
The new complex will pay homage to Perino's by reflecting the restaurant's decor, and will even be named Perino's Apartments. But it's yet another piece of L.A. past that's about to be erased.
Whenever I pass by (which is about every day, on the drive home), I imagine giant flood lights outside and Hollywood starlets in mink shawls -- accompanied by a Rat Packer or two -- climbing out of their cars and strutting inside.
A romanticized image, I know. And I suppose a classy apartment building simply makes more sense on the site than an aging, empty shell of a restaurant.
But you can now add Perino's to the Brown Derby, Chasen's, and countless other restaurant structures that are now relegated to L.A. history books.
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