UPDATE!!! The event has moved to in front of Grauman's Chinese Theater. Check Facebook for updated details.Coming on the heels of the announcement for Los Angeles' participation in World Pillow Fight Day scheduled for Saturday March 22 downtown, there's yet another spectacle of an event planned for the night before at Hollywood and Highland, sans bouncers and lines to wait in (h/t again to Bored-LA). According to the Facebook page, at 10:00 p.m. on Friday......

Today's holiday is a Federal one, so that means government offices, from city to county to state and beyond, are closed. Same goes for banks and public schools. No mail being delivered either. However, trash and public transportation in Los Angeles will be running as usual says the Daily News in their Presidents Day schedule. If you're one of the blessed and have the day off, there are many fun things to do. Here are......

'Santa Monica Subway: Alternative 4' is one of the 17 routes presented by Metro Last night, a packed room of community members at LACMA listened attentively to Metro present nineteen options to serve the Westside. This first in a series of three public input meetings (two more meetings next week) was exciting -- wheels are in motion to get Los Angeles moving, even if that reality be around ten years from now. One of......

The LA River in all its glory. DEBATE WATCHING Now with John Edwards out of the picture, Hillary and Barack only have eyes and one-liners for each other. Watch them duke it out during the Democratic candidates debate tonight with friends and bloggers in the comfort of CineSpace (because really, you don’t want to be anywhere near Hollywood and Highland). RSVP at RSVP@gatherinc.com. Doors open at 4:30 pm // CineSpace // 6356 Hollywood Blvd., Los......

What started off as some goofing off on the escalators at the Hollywood & Highland shopping complex turned deadly last night, when an unnamed man fell to his death. He had been trying to slide down the bannister of one of the upper escalators when he reportedly lost his balance and fell several stories onto another escalator below. The fall caused a severe head injury, and the man was pronounced dead at the hospital. It......

We comb through LA's listings so you don't have to. THEATRE: Feel like pondering human existence tonight? Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot -- a classic play about nothing (or maybe everything) plays in Glendale tonight. 8 pm // A Noise Within // 234 S Brand Blvd , Glendale // $28-$40. DANCE: The Debbie Allen Dance Academy presents Alex in Wonderland – a “re-imagining” of Alice’s version with a few other fairy tale characters mixed......

On November 27th, the striking members of the WGA held a rally on Hollywood Boulevard. As I walked towards the rally from my car, I could feel the sound of the helicopters beating down around me. It was one of those silver fall afternoons, the sky distant like winter, but it was still warm. Walking up a side street, all the different Hollywoods crowded up around me – each taking its turn in a......

There's a big ugly smelly fountain of blood in front of the Kodak Theatre on the sidewalk of the Hollywood & Highland strip mall. No, Elmo didn't finally get his, Showtime has figured out a way to get LAist off the couch and onto the Red Line. Even though our friends at Bostonist and Phillyist had pics, we saw that our pal Defamer didn't so we pushed aside the bong water pipe, dug around......

Holy jeebus my eyeballs are gonna fall out. There's about a 1/2 dozen series premieres and a 1/2 dozen season premieres tonight. Unfortnately the only new thing calling my name is the Bionic Woman (9:00pm NBC) but that's based on junior high school fantasies and not what I've seen so far of this show. Prime time offers such an overabundance of mediocrity I'm tempted to head off to TCM at 8:00pm and watch the......

The California Independent System Operator (CAISO), charged with managing the electricity grid in California, has issued a Flex Alert for both tomorrow and Thursday due to the current hot weather and demand for electricity, which is approaching capacity. Flex it by turning off unnecessary lights, turn ing AC up to 78 degrees or higher and not using major appliances until after 7:00 PM Free jazz tonight at Hollywood and Highland along with a wine......

Did you think $75 for Rock the Bells tickets was too steep? Fight the power, and head over to Hollywood and Highland to catch one of the headlining acts for free. Yeeeeah Boy! Public Enemy will be performing on Thursday night's episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live and Chuck D is inviting everyone to bum rush the show. Check out his new blog at ChuckD.tv for details to find out how you can see one of......

A hat tip to Quint over at AICN for alerting me to this little bit of coolness happening next week. Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz are two of my absolutely favorite movies from the past few years. Shaun has been in heavy rotation at home and Fuzz will surely follow now that it's out on DVD. Starting next Sunday night, you'll have the chance to see them both as God intended--back-to-back and......

It's hard to find a good Wookiee these days, so LAPD is looking for a naughty one. A Chewbacca impersonator allegedly sexually assaulted a Marilyn Monroe look-alike near Hollywood and Highland last month, though the crime was just reported yesterday. When authorities showed up to investigate, the suspect fled. Police are presumably looking for a man who is tall, dark, and hairy. There has been no comment from LA County Sheriff Lee Baca, who may......

Maybe we shouldn't be emphasizing this tip so we can keep our parking spots open in busy areas of the city. But we're feeling generous to those who read LAist on Sundays and we still seem to shock a new person everyday with this parking tip that the LACityNerd taught us so long ago. Yellow Loading Zones are only in effect from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday. So take advantage all......

Maybe it’s because of its residents' blogginess, but these days everyone seems to know that downtown LA is booming. However, flying way below the radar is Koreatown. Yes, you already know it’s the place to go for your late night barbecue and karaoke needs, but the boozin’, beef-eatin’ hood (best known to those outside LA as one of the places ravaged by the 1992 riots) has quietly been getting a $1 billion makeover that......

Dear LAist, On Sunday both Ellen DeGeneres and Vice President Gore said something along the lines of there being a billion people watching the Oscar broadcast. When the Neilson (sic) ratings came out it said that only 37 million Americans watched the program. Did 963 million foreigners really watch that show the other night? If they did, I now understand why they let that guy speak Italian for what seemed forever. - TF, Highland......

Last week all you had to do was stroll down to Hollywood & Highland or take the subway there, then stand in line for a short while and you'd get to hold a real Oscar trophy. Every day we kept forgetting to mention it and then kicked ourselves when it was over. And now The Hollywood Reporter's Risky Biz blog has posted video of regular people holding the award and mugging for the cameras.......

Thanks to the times that we live in everyone can be a reporter AND everyone can be a star. Tonight's Midnight Movie is by Lisa Nova who braved the freaks on Hollywood Blvd who dress up and hang out next to Hollywood & Highland. No, not the tourists, the superheroes. We wonder if she had to tip them each a buck once she was finished interviewing them? Who she didn't interview: the aw-shucks Superman......

We've kept mum about the supposed H&M coming to Pasadena because, well, we were too frightened to believe. What if we got our hopes up only to have them dashed by the evil retail god? But now we have reached acceptance. H&M is coming to Pasadena. And H&M is coming to Hollywood, too. H&M is the fashion retailer for the broke-ish hipster, the shopping-savvy, the people who don't care about being hip but don't......

Since summer is winding down, we figured now would be a good time to wind down our Ice Cream Summer endeavor. We took the well-intentioned suggestion to try Venice's Robin Rose, but soon realized they'd been out of business for two years. Then the mention elsewhere in internet-land of Gelato Paradiso's new 3 month-old location in Hollywood sent us scurrying over the hill and in their front door. Among all the other ice cream......

"Kinetic advertising" seems to be on a roll in Los Angeles over the past few years. Hollywood and Highland, Sunset Boulevard at Kings Road, and the Aroma Wilshire Center have adopted the advertising medium that makes us wonder if Blade Runner wasn’t entirely so far-fetched after all. Now it appears the Citadel in City of Commerce is the next site positioned to attract bored eyeballs that crave pumped up lights and action. This move......

We've heard all the griping about the trolley at the Grove, and we can't disagree with any of it. It barely runs one city block. It disrupts foot traffic. It's full of gleefully shrieking, digital picture-snapping tourists who look like, sound like and most likely are complete idiots. What's the point of a trolley whose functional value is pretty much zero? There may as well be a 400-foot-tall bellydancing octopus in the middle of......