Chinese Theatre Marks 90 Years As Hollywood Glamour Hotspot

[...] known as the TCL Chinese Theatre, the landmark movie palace first opened on May 18, 1927, and it's been hosting movies, stars and fans ever since. Sid Grauman's masterpiece movie house stands on a bustling corner of Hollywood Boulevard, next door to the Dolby Theatre where the Oscars are now presented and across the street from the historic Roosevelt Hotel, where the first Oscar ceremony was held in 1929. A showman and entrepreneur, Grauman started building the Chinese Theatre in 1926, the same year he and other Hollywood titans established the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. While the building and the forecourt are historic, the projection technology inside has been continually updated to stay on the cutting edge and keep attracting studio premieres, said Alwyn Hight Kushner, the theater's president and chief operating officer. The auditorium underwent the biggest renovation in its history in 2013 to make room for stadium seating and a state-of-the-art IMAX screen — the only one in the world with an old-fashioned curtain that opens just before the feature presentation, Tinker said. On a recent morning, Kushner stood in Grauman's old office upstairs, where the theater founder played poker with Pickford and Fairbanks and kept a stash of liquor behind a secret trap door during Prohibition. [...] for countless tourists and celebrities past and present, the Chinese Theatre will always be on Hollywood Boulevard, representing the golden age of cinema.