'Life at the Marmont': 6 stories of Hollywood stars at the famous hotel

1.Workaholic Billy Wilder

During the 1930s, legendary director Billy Wilder stayed at the Marmont once he had secured a short-term contract with Columbia Pictures. On seeing the grand hotel, he thought he would never be able to afford a room. Manager Ann Little was eager to fill one of the hotel's tiniest rooms and described it to Wilder with a few exaggerations, calling it "our loveliest small suite." The room was actually "simply a furnished cubicle," Sarlot and Basten wrote. "Small, cramped, and dark. But to Billy Wilder, it was the answer to his prayers, a private sliver of heaven, where he could literally hole up close to the studios and write to his heart's content." Little remembered him working at all hours. "That young man was much too hard on himself," she said.

2.Wartime shelter

During World War II, the Marmont was chosen as the air-raid shelter for the surrounding residents. The exclusive doors were suddenly open to the public. "No sooner did the word get out than strangers began arriving in droves," Little remembered. "They would wander in and out at will, wondering where to go and how to get there 'just in case.' There was nothing we could do but try and be helpful, at times at the expense of our guests." However, Little said the paying guests were mostly very understanding. "Few of the guests complained," she said. "There was such a spirit of togetherness."

3.Nervous Grace Kelly

Kelly stayed at the Marmont while she was filming the 1952 movie "High Noon." She would go on to make many other movies, but according to Sarlot and Basten, the actress was nervous at first about her job. "There were times when she would return to the studio looking rather distraught," they wrote. "One day while passing through the lobby, she was overheard to say, 'I wonder if I'm going to be any good.'" Other guests remembered hearing her rehearse her lines loudly in her room.

4.Paul Newman's socks

Corinne Patten went to work at the Marmont in 1950 and filled various jobs over her time there, including working at the front desk. She kept a diary of happenings at the famous residence. "Paul Newman had his picture taken with Joanne Woodward at the desk," she wrote one day. "Then he jumped up on the counter and reached over my head to get the mail out of his box. I must remind him not to hang his socks out to dry on a string across his balcony."

5.Poolside phones

Everyone in the pool at the Marmont, wrote Sarlot and Basten, seemed to be waiting for an important phone call from a producer or director, and since there was only one phone near the pool itself, many brought their phones out as far as they could go from the houses surrounding it. When a phone would ring, it was often hard to tell which it was because there were so many. "Whoever was [in the water] would surface in a flash, wide-eyed in anticipation," Sarlot and Basten wrote of those who were underwater when a phone rang. "But no one hurtled out of the pool – and no one along the sidelines made the first move to answer the calls. Only after a suitable pause would some brave soul give in. Then there was a hush, as everyone waited for his or her name to be called... One of the regulars confessed... 'Who in Hollywood would dare appear so anxious, or insecure, as to ask, "Is it for me?"'"

6.Spooky elevator ride

Sherry Hackett stayed in the Marmont with her husband Buddy and remembered being startled one night when she went to the elevator. "I remembered that I had forgotten something in our suite, so I left Buddy at the car and went back upstairs," she said. "I was on my way to rejoin him, waiting for the elevator, when the doors slid open. Who was standing there alone inside – staring at me – but Boris Karloff! There I was, a young bride, and all I could think of was that ghoul I had seen in the movies. I got so scared I started shaking. He didn't calm me down any when he said, in that soft, sinister voice of his, 'Won't you come in?' I did, but I couldn't stop trembling.... I ran to [Buddy] and cried, 'I don't want to stay in this place anymore. They've got monsters living here!'"