{"id":2186,"date":"2020-01-13T08:24:45","date_gmt":"2020-01-12T21:24:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/?post_type=articles&p=166230"},"modified":"2021-03-15T19:08:23","modified_gmt":"2021-03-15T19:08:23","slug":"travel-hollywood-like-a-movie-star","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/us\/articles\/travel-hollywood-like-a-movie-star\/","title":{"rendered":"Some Like It Hot \u2013 And Those People Holiday In Hollywood"},"content":{"rendered":"

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HOLLYWOOD, LOS ANGELES: \u201cStop!\u201d orders our rather eclectic Starline<\/a> tour guide to his obedient driver as we pull up at 815 North El Centro Avenue. In 1935, at just nine years old, a pretty little blonde girl named Norma Jean Baker was sent to an orphanage at this very address. She was the Hollygrove Home For Children\u2019s 3,463rd<\/sup> displaced little one after her mother was deemed mentally unstable.<\/p>\n

Today, a plain orange-brick building has been erected where the once palatial orphanage stood. Legend has it, when the 26 other girls in Baker\u2019s dorm went to sleep at night, the would-be star sat at her window as she cried for her mother and dreamed of the life she wanted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat window looked out upon the former RKO Studio water tower \u2013 which later became the Paramount Studio water tower \u2013 which you can see across the road,\u201d says our tour guide. To my left, down a decrepit alleyway and with a view repeatedly intercepted by so many power lines, the famous white steel giant stands tall. \u201cNorma Jean would stare out her window at this very water tower and said many years later, \u2018I used to think as I looked out on the Hollywood night, there must be thousands of girls sitting alone like me, dreaming of becoming a movie star. But I’m not going to worry about them. I’m dreaming the hardest.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

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The Paramount television network’s water tower directly opposite Norma Jean Baker’s childhood orphanage.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

To say that quote landed with me is an understatement. Just one month prior to Visit California<\/a> flying me to the Sunshine State, I had moved halfway across the world to New York City. I\u2019d look out the window of my Manhattan apartment often and dream up some big ticket opportunities. But can you really dream so hard that you manifest the exact life you want?<\/p>\n

Making perhaps one of the most convincing cases for Atkinson\u2019s law of attraction, Baker \u2013 as we now know \u2013 went on to become Marilyn Monroe, one of the world\u2019s biggest movie stars.<\/p>\n

BOOK A STARLINE TOUR OF HOLLYWOOD HERE<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n