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Michael Jackson‘”‘”‘s Thriller is, in my humble opinion, the best music video ever created. And ever since seeing the Thriller dance scene from 13 Going On 30 (which has to be one of my favorite movie scenes of all time) I have loved nothing more than to bust out the Thriller dance at parties! 🙂 I so want to someday do the Thriller Dance at my wedding, but unfortunately I know there is NO way in hell my boyfriend would agree to that! But since my dad did volunteer to play the Michael Jackson role if I do decide to “rock my reception”, there'”‘”‘s still hope. 🙂 I'”‘”‘m pretty sure he'”‘”‘d even wear the red jacket. 🙂
So when I found out that the movie theater used in Thriller is located in Downtown Los Angeles, I just had to drag my dad out to stalk it. The theatre is named the Palace and it was designed by G. Albert Landsburgh in 1911 for the Orpheum Vaudeville Circuit company. The theater was originally named “The Orpheum”, but when a new, and larger, Orpheum theater was built on the same street in 1926, the original Orpheum'”‘”‘s name was changed to the Palace. The Palace is the oldest remaining Orpheum theater still standing in the United States. Numerous celebrities have performed at the Palace in the past, including Harry Houdini, Bob Hope, the Marx Brothers, W.C. Fields, and Will Rogers. After the decline of Vaudeville, the Palace was turned into a regular movie theater showing first run features. Sadly, though, the theater closed down in the mid 1990′”‘”‘s and is currently only used for special events and as a filming location. Besides Thriller, the Palace Theater was also used in the movie Dreamgirls. And, in an interesting bit of trivia, while the Palace was used for all of the exterior theatre scenes in Thriller, the interior scenes were actually filmed at the Rialto Theatre in South Pasadena.
I could not have been more excited to see this location in person, especially during the Halloween season. And, of course, I just had to bust out a little bit of the Thriller dance while there (which my dad captured in one of the above photos). The people standing outside the theater thought I was absolutely crazy, but that'”‘”‘s just because they didn'”‘”‘t realize that they were in the midst of a landmark filming location! How great would it be to rent this place out for a huge Halloween party – or a wedding reception! 🙂 Maybe someday!
You can watch the entire Thriller video here.
Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂
Stalk It: The Palace Theatre is located at 630 S. Broadway in Downtown Los Angeles.
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