HOLLYWOOD STUDIO CLUB

In the very beginning, the Hollywood Studio Club was the meeting place for the young women trying to push into the motion picture business. These women living in cheap hotels had no place to practice their art. So, they gathered in the basement of the Hollywood public library for the rehearsals. The librarian Mrs. Eleanor Jones worried too much about the women. With the donations of the city’s businessmen and the Hollywood studios, she rented an old house on Carlos Avenue. The club was called sorority house as it functioned for women only. One of the largest collections of Hollywood Studio Club photos is hollywoodphotographs.com.

In 1923 a fundraising campaign for the new building of the Hollywood Studio Club began. Hollywood cinema studios Metro Goldwyn Mayer, Warner Bros., and others donated thousands of dollars to the construction of the new building. A final donation was received in 1925 and the construction began on the new building on Lodi Pl.  The organizers hired a famous architect Julie Morgan. The open ceremony of the new Hollywood Studio Club was held in May, 1926. The club was decorated in a Mediterranean style. Everybody seeking a career in the motion picture business was admitted to the club. They also could attend class in various aspects of performing art. The studio was a great place for the young actress, singers, writers, script girls and etc. It provided the guests with two meals a day and also hair dryers, typewriters, sewing machines and other items. 

The Studio Club functioned 59 years. During this period it housed about 10 thousand women. Among them were famous Hollywood celebrities: Marilyn Monroe, Donna Reed, Ayn Rand, Rita Moreno, Kim Novak, Maureen O’Sullivan, Sharon Tate, Diana Dill and Barbara Eden. The club functioned on the donations of YWCA. By the time of 1960s the idea of sorority house was dated. It had no revenues but on the contrary losing money. That’s why the Studio was forced to begin working as a regular hotel but in vain it was still losing money. In 1975 the Hollywood Studio Club stopped working and closed its doors. In 1979 it was listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

All the Hollywood Studio Club photos on the hollywoodphotographs.com web site are available for purchase.