好莱坞的前世今生

Hollywood started as a small town in the California desert， and became the entertainment capital of the world. In the early 20th century， film industry pioneers drawn to the areas mild climate， sunshine， varied terrain and large labor market set up studios in Hollywood and began producing movies. Throughout the Great Depression1 and World War II， Hollywood movies provided Americans with entertainment， distraction and information. When television emerged as the next great media format， Hollywood soon also became the center of television show production. Today， the term “Hollywood” has become synonymous with the entertainment industry， and the once-independent town—now a part of Los Angeles—is a major tourist destination.

Hollywood is a district within the city of Los Angeles， California， U.S.， whose name is synonymous with the American film industry. Since the early 1900s， when moviemaking pioneers found in southern California an ideal place for moviemaking， the image of Hollywood as the fabricator of tinseled cinematic dreams has been etched worldwide.

When Spanish explorers first entered the area now known as Hollywood， Native Americans2 were living in the canyons of the Santa Monica Mountains. Before long， the Indians had been moved to missions3 and the land which Hollywood now occupies was divided in two by the Spanish Government.

By the 1870s an agricultural community flourished in the area and crops ranging from hay and grain to subtropical bananas and pineapples were thriving. The first house in Hollywood was an adobe building （1853） on a site near Los Angeles， then a small city in the new state of California. Hollywood was laid out as a real estate subdivision in 1887 by Harvey Wilcox， a prohibitionist from Kansas who envisioned a community based on his sober religious principles. This areas name “Hollywood” was christened by his wife. Within a few years， Wilcox had devised a grid plan4 for his new community， paved Prospect Avenue （now Hollywood Boulevard） for his main street and was selling large residential lots to wealthy Midwesterners looking to build homes so they could “winter in California.”

Real estate magnate H.J. Whitley， known as the“Father of Hollywood，” subsequently transformed Hollywood into a wealthy and popular residential area. At the turn of the 20th century5， Whitley was responsible for bringing telephone， electric， and gas lines into the new suburb. In 1910， because of an inadequate water supply， Hollywood residents voted to consolidate with Los Angeles.

In 1908 one of the first storytelling movies， The Count of Monte Cristo， was completed in Hollywood after its filming had begun in Chicago. In 1911 a site on Sunset Boulevard was turned into Hollywoods first studio， and soon about 20 companies were producing films in the area. In 1913 Cecil B. DeMille， Jesse Lasky， Arthur Freed， and Samuel Goldwyn formed Jesse Lasky Feature Play Company （later Paramount Pictures）. DeMille produced The Squaw Man in a barn one block from present-day Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street， and more box-office successes soon followed. Hollywood had become the center of the American film industry by 1915 as more independent filmmakers relocated there from the East Coast. For more than three decades， from early silent films through the advent of “talkies，” figures such as D.W. Griffith， Goldwyn， Adolph Zukor， William Fox， Louis B. Mayer， Darryl F. Zanuck， and Harry Cohn served as overlords of the great film studios—Twentieth Century-Fox， Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer， Paramount Pictures， Columbia Pictures， Warner Brothers， and others. Among the writers who were fascinated by Hollywood in its “golden age” were F. Scott Fitzgerald， Aldous Huxley， Evelyn Waugh， and Nathanael West.

After World War II， film studios began to move outside Hollywood， and the practice of filming “on location” emptied many of the famous lots and sound stages or turned them over to television show producers.6 With the growth of the television industry， Hollywood began to change， and by the early 1960s it had become the home of much of American network television entertainment.

The Hollywood Walk of Fame7 pays tribute to many celebrities of the entertainment industry. The most visible symbol of the district is the Hollywood sign that overlooks the area.

Hollywood has been anything but static， however， and after a few decades as the capital of film glamor， the neighborhood changed again. Although much of the studio work remained in Hollywood， many stars moved to Beverly Hills， and the elegant shops and restaurants left with them.

In the 1960s， music recording studios and offices began moving to Hollywoodan off shoot of the night clubs further west on Sunset Boulevard. Other businesses， however， continued to migrate to different parts of the city. Hollywood today is a diverse， vital， and active community striving to preserve the elegant buildings from its past. Much of the movie industry remains in the area， although the neighborhoods outward appearance has changed.

In 1985， the Hollywood Boulevard commercial and entertainment district was officially listed in the National Register of Historic Places protecting the neighborhoods important buildings and seeing to it that the significance of Hollywoods past would always be a part of its future.

好莱坞起初只是加利福尼亚州沙漠中的一个小镇，现在已经成为闻名世界的娱乐中心。在20世纪初，电影工业的先驱们看中了此地温和的气候、充足的阳光、起伏多变的地貌和雄厚的劳动力市场，便纷纷在这里建立工作室，开始电影制作。在经济大萧条和第二次世界大战时期，好莱坞电影给美国人带来了信息、娱乐和消遣。而当又一次媒体革命——电视出现时，好莱坞很快又成为电视节目制作的中心。今天，“好莱坞”这个词已经成为娱乐业的代名词。这个一度独立而现在隶属于洛杉矶市的小镇，已经成为了著名的旅游胜地。

现在的好莱坞，作为美国加利福尼亚州洛杉矶市的一个区，已经被认为是美国电影工业的代名词。自20世纪初以来，电影制作的先驱们发现加利福尼亚南部是电影制作的理想之地，好莱坞从而以华丽电影梦的温床形象得到了世界的关注。

当西班牙殖民者第一次踏上这块后来被称作好莱坞的土地时，当地的土著还生活在圣塔莫尼卡山的峡谷中。不久以后，印第安人被强迫搬进教区里，那块土地被西班牙政府一分为二。

到了19世纪70年代，这里的农业蓬勃发展，从粮食和干草到亚热带水果香蕉和菠萝，各种农作物被大量种植。好莱坞的第一间房子建于1853年，是居民房，靠近洛杉矶。而洛杉矶当时只是新成立的加利福尼亚州的一个小城市。1887年，哈维·威尔科克斯，一个来自堪萨斯州的禁酒主义提倡者，想建立一个满足他本人禁酒宗教原则的社区，因此将这里分割成一小块一小块土地进行售卖。这片地区由他的妻子命名为“好莱坞”。几年之内，威尔科克斯为他的新区设置了交通路线，铺设了一条“前景路”（现在的好莱坞大道）作为主街。他把面积较大的住宅区卖给那些想在加利福尼亚安家过冬的中西部有钱人。

随后，被称作“好莱坞之父”的不动产大亨H. J.惠特利将好莱坞转变为广受欢迎的富人住宅区。在20世纪前后，惠特利把电话、电力、煤气管线等引入了好莱坞这个新郊区。1910年，因为供水不足，好莱坞居民投票决定将其并入洛杉矶地区。

1908年，电影《基督山伯爵》在好莱坞杀青。这部电影在芝加哥开机，是最早的故事片之一。1911年，日落大道上诞生了好莱坞的第一个电影制片厂，这一片地区很快就成了约20个公司的电影制作场所。1913年，西塞尔·B.德米尔、杰西·拉斯基、阿瑟·弗里和塞缪尔·戈尔德温组建了杰西·拉斯基故事片公司，也就是之后的派拉蒙电影公司。德米尔在一个牲口棚里制作了《弱气男儿》，那儿距离现在的好莱坞大道和藤街只有一个街区。更多的票房大片也随之而来。到1915年，随着更多的独立电影制片人从东海岸搬到这里，好莱坞已经成为美国电影工业的中心。接下来的三十多年里，从早期的默片到有声电影的出现，涌现出一批电影界著名人物，诸如D. W.格里菲思、戈尔德温、阿道夫·朱克、威廉·福克斯、路易斯·B.迈耶、达里尔·F.柴纳克和亨利·科恩。他们领导着那些优秀的电影制作公司：二十世纪福克斯影片公司、美高梅电影公司、派拉蒙电影公司、哥伦比亚电影公司及华纳兄弟……而被好莱坞的黄金时代所吸引的作家则有 F. S. 菲兹杰拉德、奥尔德斯·赫胥黎、伊夫林·沃和纳撒内尔·韦斯特等人。

第二次世界大战后，出于外景拍摄的需要，电影制片厂开始陆续搬出好莱坞，许多著名的拍摄场地和摄影棚由此空了下来，或者被改去制作电视节目。好莱坞随着电视工业的发展也发生了变化。到了20世纪60年代初，它已经成为美国多家娱乐电视台的大本营。

好莱坞的星光大道上铭记了很多为娱乐业做出贡献的名人，而好莱坞最醒目的标志则是俯瞰着整个小镇的那个牌子——HOLLYWOOD。

可以用许多词来形容好莱坞，但其中绝不会有“一成不变”这个词。在成为电影魅力之都的几十年后，这里又一次改变了。尽管很多制片的工作依然在好莱坞完成，但是许多明星已经搬去了貝弗利希尔斯，随他们而去的是一批高档的店铺和餐馆。

20世纪60年代，音乐录制棚和相应的办公室开始搬入好莱坞日落大道西端夜总会群落的一角。其他的社团也陆续迁移到城市的各个部分。今天的好莱坞不仅保持了过去的华丽建筑，同时又是一个百花齐放、生机勃勃的地方。很多电影工业还留在这里，尽管社区的外观已然跟过去不同。

1985年，好萊坞大道商业娱乐区被正式列入美国国家历史遗迹名录。好莱坞的重要建筑得到了保护，而它过去的辉煌也将永远铭刻在它的未来中。

注释：

1. Great Depression： 大萧条，特指发生于1929—1933年之间全球性的经济大衰退。美国、英国、德国等国的经济受到的打击尤为强烈。在大萧条时期，文艺和娱乐业作为人们的安慰剂，得到了一定的重视和发展。

2. Native Americans： 美洲土著，指殖民者进入美洲大陆之前生活在那里的种族和部落，以印第安人为主。

3. mission： 教区，这里指的是西班牙于18世纪后半叶开始在加利福尼亚州建立的教区，大部分分布在圣地亚哥市至索诺马海岸之间的地带。

4. grid plan： 一种城市规划方式。街道之间互成直角，多以数字命名，比如，the 5th avene（第五大道）。

5. turn of the 20th century： 20世纪前后。turn of the n-th century指n世纪之前或之后某个不确定的时间，而没有具体数字的turn of the century一般指19到20世纪之交。这是一种非正式的表达法，一般不出现在措词严谨的文献中。

6. on location： 外景。电影拍摄上指摄影棚外的景物，包括自然环境、生活环境等；sound stages： 摄影棚。摄影棚内布置的景物又叫“内景”。

7. Walk of Fame： 星光大道，是一条沿着好莱坞大道和藤街伸展的人行道。路面上有数千颗镶有好莱坞名人名字的星形勋章，以此纪念他们对娱乐工业的贡献。

Did You Know？ 你知道吗？

The famous HOLLYWOOD sign overlooking the city was built in 1923 （a new sign was erected in 1978）. It originally said“HOLLYWOODLAND，” but the “LAND” section was removed in the 1940s when the sign was renovated.

那个著名的俯瞰着整座小镇的“HOLLYWOOD”标志牌建于1923年（1978年时又树立了一个新的牌子）。最早上面写的是“HOLLYWOODLAND”，只是在20世纪40年代翻修标志牌时，“LAND”这几个字母被去掉了。