During the Depression this was known as Club Seville, a veritable smorgasbord of illegal gambling and drinking; high stakes addicts like David O. Selznick and Harry Cohn lost their shirts here before the vice squad crashed the party in 1938. It featured a unique glass dance floor laid over a pool filled with live carp, but women objected to having fish eyes peering up their skirts, and everyone wa
s afraid the floor would shatter. Within a year the Seville was out of business. The enterprising Billy Wilkerson took over the building, giving it a lavish makeover and a name that would soon be world famous: Ciro's. Ads announcing this latest addition to the club scene proclaimed, "Everybody that's ANYBODY wll be at Ciro's," and you can bet that everybody in Hollywood WAS there for the Grand Opening on January 30, 1940. A Wilkerson establishment spelled publicity with a capital P, and Ciro's was a virtual fishbowl for Tinseltown's finest during the war years. The club went on to even greater glory after it was acquired by a man named Herman Hover, who began spending megabucks to lure the hottest acts onto its stage. Among those who performed here were Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Marlene Dietrich, Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, Martin and Lewis, Edith Piaf, and Mae West with her musclemen. Some of the acts were TOO hot: stripper Lili St. Cyr's routine nearly caused a riot and was shut down for lewdness. Such incidents were par for the course at Ciro's; there was something about the place that just made people want to misbehave. One salacious story had a loaded Paulette Goddard crawling under a table to express her affection for director Anatole Litvak; then there was the time that Darryl Zanuck threw a party at Ciro's with a circus theme. After one belt too many, the aging Fox mogul stripped down to the waist and attempted to chin himself from a trapeze that was part of the stage show. Fights broke out here so often that Hover facetiously considered replacing the dance floor with a boxing ring, and he finally had to impose a three-brawl-per-customer limit. On a loftier note, this was where Sammy Davis, Jr. staged his comeback after his near-fatal 1954 auto accident. Producer George Schlatter described the scene: "After Sammy came back from his eye injury, the whole town came out to see his first gig. Cooper was there. Gable and Bogart were there. Frank and Dean were playing cards at the stageside." Confounding rumors that his career was finished, Davis danced and sang for two hours before grabbing -- and playing -- every instrument in the band for an encore. The star-studded audience gave him a half-hour standing ovation. Ciro's closed in 1957, but a semblance of glamor lives on in the building's present incarnation, The Comedy Store. Located here since 1970, this renowned comedy club showcses established comedians as well as unknowns waiting to be discovered; Richard Pryor, Robin Williams, David Letterman, Jim Carey, Sam Kinison, and Roseanne all performed here before hitting the big time. The Comedy Store has three separate rooms with varying cover charges; drop in for a few laughs in one of the area's most historic settings.
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Ciro's opened at the end of January, 1940, and, as was the case with his other enterprise, it was an instant hit. The stars, abandoning the recent trend of staying home, flocked to Hollywood"s newest-in-spot. What greeted them was a sophisticated exterior facade by George Vernon Russell and inside a Baroque confection by interior designer Tom Douglas. Under the supervision of Wilkerson, Mr. Douglas created the latest in Hollywood glamour, with walls draped in heavy, ribbed silk, dyed pale reseda green, and a ceiling painted American Beauty red. The stars sank themselves into wall sofas also of silk, dyed to match the ceiling. Bronze and urns served as lighting fixtures that flanked the bandstand. Everywhere, the endless attention of Wilkerson business was evident. Ads preceding the opening were a daily occurrence in the Hollywood Reporter, wherein readers were reminded that: "Everybody that's anybody, will be at Ciro's." And pretty much everybody in Hollywood turned up for the two openings on subsequent nights. Emil Coleman's orchestra initiated the bandstand, and it was reported that as a tip a bartender received five shares of Grand National stock. For weeks after the opening, the only place to be was Ciro's. Post premiere parties, benefits and birthday parties were all celebrated there. Certainly one of the oddest occasions in its early days was a fashion show by a local furrier who paraded models in his expensive pelts accompanied by a live animal with the same fur she wore. Beavers, leopards and minks go a firsthand view of Hollywood nightlife in the hallowed halls of Ciro's.
