Chateau Marmont on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles is a fantastical folly in the land of make-believe. As Harry Cohn, the founder of Columbia Pictures, said in 1939, “If you must get in trouble, do it at the Chateau Marmont.” Several generations of actors, directors, writers and artists have heeded Cohn’s advice, from Dorothy Parker and F. Scott Fitzgerald to Hunter S. Thompson and Jim Morrison.
