Hollywood Forever Cemetery – Los Angeles, CA

Located behind the Paramount Studios, it was founded in 1899 on 100 acres and called Hollywood Memorial Park Cemetery. Its history is as colorful as the movie heritage that surrounds it. Filled with show business luminaries, the formerly decaying bankrupted property was raised from the dead when Tyler Cassity purchased it in 1998 and turned it into Hollywood Forever. Restored and refurbished, it is the most unique modern cemetery in the world. It features "Life Story" tributes presented on a kiosk, a funeral chapel equipped with a Plasma-vision wide-screen, live worldwide webcasts of funeral services, plus a gift shop were you can purchase a map to find the famous.

The back wall which holds the baby area is filled with individual shrines.

Plays are held in the restored Masonic Lodge and in the summer people can picnic on the lawn while watching classic movies project on a mausoleum wall.

Left Side Wall Become Movie Screen

On their website you'll find a 'Calendar of Events' which will list the movies.

Hollywood Forever is listed on the National Register of Historic Sites. 

Oscar winner Hattie McDaniel wanted to be buried here but in 1952 this cemetery still had a 'whites only' policy; she is buried in Angelus-Rosedale Cemetery in the West Adams neighborhood. In 1999 Hollywood Forever contacted her family about having her re-interred here, but they declined. This cenotaph was then installed.

It's a lovely cemetery to visit.

When I visited in 2004, they were having a Day of the Dead celebration. The 2023 events calendar, lists a Dia y Noche de Los Muertos.

Here's Mel Blanc but you can also find Cecil B. DeMille, Jayne Mansfield, Rudolph Valentino and Douglas Fairbanks, to name a few.

These images were taken in 2004 and 2006.

To view more of my cemetery images: EnfocusGallery.com