The Homes of Curtis Harrington
Oh boy, we just can’t stop talking about Curtis Harrington. Curtis was an openly gay avant-garde director who absolutely loved film. He’s known for his horror thrillers (Night Tide, What Happened to Helen, Games, Whoever Slew Auntie Roo)- all of which have unhappy endings- did some Roger Corman films, dabbled in the occult pond (he made a short film celebrating his friend Marjorie Cameron and her art, and acts as the Somnabulist in Anger’s Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome) and had a knack for elevating new talent (Dennis Hopper’s first lead was in Harrington’s Night Tide) and coaxing older actresses back into the spotlight (Shelley Winters, Debbie Reynolds, Simone Signoret, Gloria Swanson, to name a few). Then, much to his dismay, he found success in television, particularly the Aaron Spelling heyday- “Charlie’s Angels,” “Dynasty.” In addition to his own work, he was such an avid admirer of Josef Von Sternberg that he wrote a book indexing Von Sternberg’s films, and James Whale’s old horror films were so influential that he was able to unearth old prints to restore (and advised on Gods and Monsters).
I wanted to collect all of his house stories in the area and combine them, and then slip in some little side morsels of interest.
Should everyone know who Curtis Harrington is? Yes. Do they? No, not even close. I like film, I use the word cinema, and I didn’t know who he was until a couple years ago, and then he started popping up everywhere in the hills. For a brief overview, I would suggest just glancing at his wiki or imdb credits. For a longer overview, read his wonderful memoir, Nice Guys Don’t Work in Hollywood.
Early Years
When Harrington was studying film at USC in the 40s, he had befriended Kenneth Anger and Forrest Ackerman (who went on to be a champion agent of sci-fi authors) through an artsy informal society of film enthusiasts that met at a Hollywood art gallery. Harrington felt misunderstood by his USC professors, and Anger approached him about an opportunity to show their films to a group of aesthetes at the Schindler house in West Hollywood. The Schindlers are often described as bohemian, and (depending on the source), their parties and salons were forward-thinking and risque. However, this was not the case for Anger and Harrington, and the films were not well received.
From Harrington’s memoir:
After a very long time, John Cage was delegated to speak to us. He took us out into the garden where we could be alone. “You must understand that these films are not art,” he said. “Art has to do with clouds and trees and beautiful things.” He repeated, “These films are not art.”
Nearly no one else present would speak to us, so we took our projector and films and went home. A few days later, Mrs. Schindler called Kenneth and told him coldly, “We just want you to know that we have discussed your films and have decided that you are two very sick boys.” (Harrington, Curtis. Nice Guys Don’t Work in Hollywood . Drag City Books.)
When Curtis graduated from USC, he lived in a boarding house at the base of Whitley Heights, which was replaced after the Lasky-DeMille barn was relocated there, now home to the Hollywood Heritage Museum.
Harrington discusses taking walks up through Whitley Heights and befriending a widow in one of the houses:
Another resident was Edith Breckenridge, a widow who also lived in one of the smaller villas. She was actually twice a widow; her second husband, Mr. Breckenridge, had been a pilot and a victim of the recent war. But her first husband was Samuel Hoffenstein, an American poet who had come to Hollywood to work as a screenwriter at the beginning of talkies. I was interested in him because he was credited with the screenplay of Sternberg’s Morocco. Edith told me fascinating stories about being on the set when Sternberg was working intensively with Dietrich to erase her German accent, teaching her how to pronounce her words phonetically. Perhaps this is why her dialogue in the film is delivered in such a slow and languorous way. Edith had marvelous social connections and seemed to be invited everywhere. Occasionally, she would let me be her escort. This inevitably led to my exposure to the gossip about her. She had impeccable social credentials but had lost her money and was now forced to live on canapés and hors d’oeuvres. Eventually, she had to sell her lovely Whitley Heights villa and move to an apartment in the no-man’s-land of East Hollywood. She took her elegant furnishings with her, but they lost their luster in the second-rate setting. (Harrington, Curtis. Nice Guys Don’t Work in Hollywood . Drag City Books.)
This house later became a rental, and housed both William Faulkner and Gloria Swanson at different times. In the 70s, coincidentally, Harrington made Killer Bees starring Gloria Swanson.
Filmmaking Houses
After a stint in Europe, Harrington returned to Los Angeles and rented a small apartment around the corner from Samson De Brier. De Brier is an interesting side character. He acted when he was younger (notably in the Oscar Wilde adaptation of Salome), and then bought this 1896 Victorian mansion in Hollywood in the early 40s, where he lived and rented rooms while living in the back house. De Brier is often described as a “celebrity warlock” and there are many anecdotes about his parties- the occult air to them, his overstuffed maximalist decor, and ever present tarot readings before they returned to fashion in the 60s. The purported list of guests who came through the house is impressive- Thelemites Jack Parsons and L Ron Hubbard (hey, we also saw these party boys up when we talked about Zorthian Ranch), Anais Nin, Dorothy Parker, Jack Nicholson, Igor Stravinsky, James Dean, Stanley Kubrick, Jane Fonda, Steve McQueen.
This is where Kenneth Anger filmed Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome in 1954, and the cast included De Brier, Harrington, Marjorie Cameron (Jack Parsons’ widow), Anais Nin and Anger himself.
Harrington didn’t stay in the apartment long, and moved on to working for Edward James, an eccentric British millionaire art collector. James had a significant collection of surrealist art (and was the subject of two Magritte paintings, he later went on to build Las Pozas in Mexico), and a number of homes. One of these was also in Whitley Heights, originally designed by early modernist designer KEM Weber for himself in 1926. KEM was the interior designer for posh Barker Brothers stores, and went on to design the buildings and furniture for the Disney Studios in Burbank. While working for James (typing out his poetry) this house was where Harrington filmed The Wormwood Star, a short film about his friend Marjorie Cameron, showcasing her esoteric paintings, in 1956.
Final Home
Harrington went on to get a studio job, and that led to making longer features, and then a career directing television. He purchased this home and lived here for several decades until his death in 2007, when he left the house to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences.
Harrington made one final film in 2002, Usher, based on Edgar Allen Poe’s Fall of the House of Usher. Independent filmmaking at its finest, Harrington raised the funds himself, filmed the interiors at his home here, and the exteriors at another friend’s home in Whitley Heights.
75 year old Curtis Harrington also starred as both Madeline and Roderick Usher in the film.
Harrington’s social life didn’t stop after he stopped working in 1987, host to many parties here, and every story about him is told with utter love and he is deeply missed by many.
One of the pervasive themes of Cahuenga Past is based on an anecdote a witch recounted to me when discussing the undercurrent of energy in this area: you either vibe with it, or you don’t. Simplistic and crude, but accurate. Harrington was certainly a character who did.
For more on Harrington (again, read his book, you can breeze through it in a night and it’s very casually dishy), here’s a short documentary on him with footage from Usher and many interiors of him at his final home, and let’s close with this quote from the documentary, in his own words: “Esoteric is the hidden meaning, the hidden thing behind- and that’s what I’m interested in. I’m interested in the unseen, the secret behind appearances.”
*One last footnote, and I’m loath to include it, but in one of the long nights of reading about Harrington homes, there’s a stubborn link connecting a film grip, Paul Alan Ott, to Harrington’s last house during the 90s. I can’t verify it, and informal queries of friends of Harrington don’t remember him having boarders, but it persists in Ott’s records as a former address. Ott later committed some truly ghoulish crimes, so, if you’re into that, feel free to search, but I’m not linking any of it here.