As I've mentioned here, I'm a Magician member of the Magic Castle, the famous private club in Hollywood for folks who pester you to pick a card, any card. I joined in 1980 and have spent many wondrous hours dining there, watching magic there, studying magic there, etc. It's in a beautiful old mansion built in 1909 by Rollin Lane, a prominent lawyer, banker and real estate investor.
It became the Magic Castle in the early sixties. A TV writer named Milt Larsen, who was then working on the game show Truth or Consequences had an office with a great view of the old Rollin mansion. It had then fallen into disrepair, carved up into a building full of shabby apartments. Milt had the idea that it might be the realization of a dream his late father had talked about. William W. Larsen Sr. was a popular magician who thought it would be great if there was a fancy private clubhouse for magicians.
Milt and his brother, Bill Jr., leased the property, rallied the local magic community, and on January 2, 1963, the Magic Castle opened its doors. To visit, you must be a member or a guest of a member and it's a great place to dine and see the best practitioners of the art from around the world.
It's especially mobbed the week of Halloween. Each year, the Magic Castle is transformed. A crew of dedicated redressers install an overlay to change the architecture for ten days or so. They put up new walls, decorate, install special effects and in a way, the Castle puts on a costume for Halloween. Last year, they made it look like a spaceship overtaken by an alien invasion. This year, it's the "Cursed Temple," resembling a tomb in which Indiana Jones or someone like him might unlock secrets to find mystical treasures.
I went up to see it on Monday and took along my trusty aide, John Plunkett, and a scream queen, the lovely Brinke Stevens. It was an amazing creation…especially impressive to those of us who know what the Castle looks like when it isn't dressed like this. Here's a quick tour of the Cursed Temple…