The Brief

From behind the counter, in front of enormous, sizzling piles of lengua (beef tongue), chicharron (pork skin) and buche (hog maw) on a bustling Monday afternoon around lunchtime, Tomas Martinez recalls the first time he visited Grand Central Market in his 20s, back in 1972.

“Things were very different then,” says Martinez, who opened his always-busy restaurant Tacos Tumbras a Tomas in 1995. “Before you had many Hispanic people, many Latin products and fish, meat, all kinds of things for Mexican and Latin people.”

For nearly 30 years, Martinez has come to Grand Central Market at 4 or 5 a.m., six days a week, to open his restaurant, serving burritos, tortas and his most popular dish: carnitas tacos. (His tacos are so good they made The LAist Guide To Eating Your Way Through Grand Central Market.)

He's the Tomas of Tacos Tumbras A Tomas, a GCM food stall popular for its carnitas tacos.

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Among the clacks of giant woks, the hiss of Korean short ribs and carne asada and the chatter of hungry visitors, Martinez gestures toward the 44,000 square foot open-air structure that resembles a sort of Grand Bazaar. “Now, it’s a mix,” he says. “But it is still our home. It’s a very important place in this city.”

For more than 100 years, the Grand Central Market has been a centerpiece of downtown Los Angeles for both locals and tourists. Drawing in around 2 million visitors annually, they can choose from nearly 40 of Los Angeles’ best local eateries or shop for produce, spices and other specialty goods.

China Cafe is a favorite of many GCM patrons, who say the combination of the tasty food and the afforable prices can't be beat.

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Around the corner from Tacos Tumbras, Mike Kalustian sits on a red-leather bar stool at China Cafe, hunched over a steaming bowl of wonton soup — the same dish he’s been ordering here for more than 30 years, first as a downtown employee, now as a retiree who travels here from the valley at least a few times a month to enjoy his favorite meal.

“It’s the best $12 meal you can buy in the city,” he says. “It used to be $6 back in the day."

Over the years, Kalustian has also had a front-row seat to the market's transformation from a place for farmers to sell their produce to a more upscale food hall reflecting the wide variety of cuisines in the city.

“It was a little dingier back then,” he says, describing the run-down amenities, saw dust covering the floors and a much less “foodie” crowd than the hip, industrial feel the market has today. “But I loved it then, and I love it now. Things have got to evolve.”

Grand Central Market’s roots

This vintage photo, taken in 1966, shows a bustling Grand Central Market and its many food stalls. In some ways, not much has changed.

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The first, the oldest

While longtime patrons and vendors describe a trendier, more gentrified scene today than ever before, Grand Central Market has always been in a state of evolution.

When the market opened in 1917, the city's first food hall, it catered to a mostly wealthy class of Angelenos — specifically, those living up above Hill street in Victorian mansions Bunker Hill. They would ride the Angels Flight funicular — made famous most recently by its appearance in La La Land — down the hill directly to the market.

At that time, Grand Central Market was a true marketplace with more than 90 vendors: stalls of colorful produce and international spices, pastries, Jewish deli meats, as well as fishmongers and other specialty groceries.

Archival photos of this time — known as L.A.’s “golden age,” when Hollywood was just beginning to boom — show shoppers dressed in their finest suits, coats and hats and vendors sporting bowties behind glistening piles of produce and fine deli meats.

Evolving with the neighborhood

But as the demographic in downtown LA changed drastically post WWII — when wealthy Angelenos moved into the suburbs and the Victorians in Bunker Hill became working-class houses — so did Grand Central Market.

This vintage 1946 photo of a counter at Grand Central Market shows it's jam packed with customers — mainly men, nearly all wearing fedoras.

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The intricate displays of sparkling produce and specialty goods were replaced by vendors selling everyday, inexpensive grocery items, catering to the mostly working class Latino customers who would go to market to eat and shop during their lunch breaks or after their shifts.

“It was really just a place for the working class to save money and come together,” Kalustian recalls. “It wasn’t so much a place to go and be seen. It was truly just a great place to get a cheap meal.”

Though the market has transformed yet again since then, vestiges of this era can be seen today: at Valeria’s Chiles & Spices you’ll find rare, specialty Latin goods like dried chiles, spices, beans, dried shrimp and canned Latin foods that are nearly impossible to find anywhere else, as well as fresh homemade moles; La Huerta Candy sells American candies with a Mexican twist — like watermelon gummies sprinkled with Tajin — as well as specialty Mexican nuts and dried fruits.
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Now, a microcosm of L.A.

Today, with vendors selling goods ranging from a $4 taco, a $12 bowl of wonton soup, to trendier cold pressed green juice, artisanal breads and craft beers, is a sort of microcosm of Los Angeles’ evolution throughout the century since its opening.

“There’s something for everyone’s taste,” Martinez says. “One person can get a sandwich, one person a taco, you can’t go wrong here at the market.”

But for long-time, loyal customers like Katusian, Grand Central Market is more than just a convenient destination to satisfy anyone’s culinary palate or explore new restaurants. It’s a uniquely L.A. tradition that breeds a true sense of community — one that’s hard to find in a city so spread out and car-centric, Katusian says.

Recently, he introduced his teenage children to the wonton soup at China Café.

“They loved it. They get to experience the same joy I have for so many years,” he says.

“It’s different," he added of the ever-changing market, "but it still has that same magic."

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced several significant rule changes for the 99th Oscars, including AI protections for actors and writers as well as expanded eligibility for international films.

In a statement to NPR, the Academy on Saturday said the changes are in response to listening to the global filmmaking community and addressing barriers to entry in its eligibility process.

The Academy added that its rules and eligibility standards have always evolved alongside technologies such as sound, color, and CGI, and that AI is no different. Awards rules and guidelines are reviewed and refined each year.

A blow for Tilly Norwood 

Among the most noteworthy changes, the Academy now explicitly states that only roles, "demonstrably performed by humans with their consent" are eligible for Acting awards. In other words, AI creations like the much-hyped Tilly Norwood cannot hope to win a Best Actress Oscar anytime soon.

Particle6, the production company behind Norwood, did not immediately respond to NPR's request for comment on Saturday about its creations' ban from consideration. In March, Norwood commented, "Can't wait to go to the Oscars!" in an Instagram post announcing its newly released music video.

The Academy also requires screenplays to be "human-authored" and said it reserved the right to investigate the use of generative AI in any submission.

Meanwhile, qualifying flesh-and-blood human actors can now be nominated for multiple performances in the same category if those performances get enough votes to land in the top five. So, someone like Anne Hathaway, who has five major movies scheduled for release in 2026, could now theoretically sweep the nominations – though that outcome seems extremely unlikely.

"If an actor has an extremely prolific year, might we even see someone swallow up three of the five nominations?," wrote Deadline's awards columnist and chief film critic Pete Hammond about the changes. "Probably won't happen, but it's now possible."

Under previous rules, an actor could only receive one nomination per category. If they had two high-ranking performances in Best Actor, for example, only the one with the most votes would move forward.

International films prioritizes filmmakers over countries

While international films can still be the official selection of their countries, now they can qualify by winning the top prize at a major international festival such as the Palme d'Or at Cannes, the Golden Lion at Venice, or the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at Sundance.

Historically, countries "owned" the nomination, and only one film per country was allowed. The new rules allow multiple films from the same country to compete if they are critically acclaimed, and it shifts the honor from a geopolitical entity to the filmmakers themselves.

Largely positive response

The changes have prompted a largely positive reaction from the film community on social media, such as on the popular The Shade Room entertainment and celebrity-focused Instagram feed, where commenters widely praised the "human-only" move to protect creative jobs.

The Academy's Awards Committee oversees the rules in tandem with branch executive committees, the International Feature Film Executive Committee and the Scientific and Technical Awards Executive Committee.

The rules are scheduled to go into effect next year, covering films released in 2026.

Copyright 2026 NPR

Los Angeles changes fast, and oftentimes that means some of the architectural relics of our shared past get swept up and paved over in all the "progress." (RIP Garden of Allah.)

But there are still places where you can find ruins that tell a tale, like a long-forgotten speakeasy reputedly for old Hollywood near La Crescenta.

The ruins are still there 

On a recent afternoon, author and local historian Mike Lawler led me just beyond the boundary of Crescenta Valley Park. Joggers like me might have seen an old, towering stone arch shrouded by bushes there — and wondered what lies beyond.

Turns out there was once a place called the Verdugo Lodge back there and Lawler has spent years excavating its history.

A car speeds away from the lodge onto New York Avenue. The stone archway that still stands can be seen in the background.

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Kadletz Family Archives)

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“It was a very high-end speakeasy for a time,” Lawler, who also helps run the Historical Society of the Crescenta Valley, said. “An amazing thing. And all the ruins are still here, just like this arch.”

Lawler said we don’t know exactly when the lodge was built, but we do have some of the picture starting in the late 1920s. The place was set up kind of like a timeshare where people bought 10 x 10 foot ‘tent lots’ that gave them access to on-site amenities. There was a golf course, stables, trout stream, a swimming pool — and a lodge with gambling and alcohol.

“The Crescenta Valley in the teens and '20s was a hotbed of moonshine, prostitution, all that stuff," Lawler said. "It was a quiet little community. But in all these canyons up here, stuff was going on. Illegal stuff!”

We don’t have a full guest list, but Lawler said it’s likely at least a few Hollywood types had gone up to the lodge to circumvent Prohibition era laws.

In some ways, it was kind of like the original glamping. Lawler said patrons probably weren’t doing much sleeping, though.

“They might have been unconscious!” he said with a chuckle.

Lawler led me to a road that swooped around a meadow. We passed by a massive swimming pool nestled into the hillside.

Once known as the “Crystal Pool,” it’s now empty and fenced off, with pitch black locker rooms below.

The exterior of the locker rooms for the old Crystal Pool.

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We continued our journey up the hill and eventually arrived at a cascading stone stairway.

And at the top, the big show: overgrown with orange monkey flowers and goliath agaves lies the foundation of the old Verdugo Lodge, with lofty stone fireplaces the only guardians keeping the surrounding oak trees at bay.

Lawler takes out a floorplan that one of the former owners drew up for him.

“This is what it was laid out like on the inside. So a dancehall, and band stand on that side... And then upstairs was the gambling,” Lawler said.

Lawler had in hand a copy of a Los Angeles Times article from 1933 he found. The headline reads: “Revelers Flee in Lodge Raid.”

“The police that raided it were here at 3 o'clock in the morning. And there were still 500 people here. And they said it was the classiest joint they had ever raided... Anyway, people were diving out of windows and everything,” Lawler explained.

In a ruin like this, covered with moss and overgrowth, the imagination can run wild, too.

The archway that still stands outside of what's now known as Mountain Oaks.

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Lawler pointed out a questionable door jam below the old dancefloor that’s been cemented over.

“That is a door. So what is behind there? So there’s a room in there that got walled in for some reason,” he said.

What we do know is that, sometime after the raid, the tawdry Verdugo Lodge and the surrounding land were purchased and then renamed Mountain Oaks by the Kadletzes — an entrepreneurial family who had run everything from a Turkish bath to a mini golf course. Over the next few decades, the family would rent the place out to local groups for recreational retreats.

The future of Mountain Oaks 

After they sold it in the ‘60s, Lawler said Mountain Oaks faced a “nightmare” of development threats. Over the years, some of the subdivided "tent lots" had been combined and sold off, Lawler said. A dozen private homes now stand on these pieces of land, next to the ruins of the Verdugo Lodge.

A map showing the Mountain Oaks public property acquired by The Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA).

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Courtesy MRCA

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Last year, with help from the City of Glendale, a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development grant among other funding sources, the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA) put up $6.1 million to acquire 33-acres of the land — not including the private lots where the homes stand — so the public can continue to roam the meadow and ruins.

Paul Edelman, MRCA's director of natural resources and planning, said his group will continue to manage the land, doing things like brush clearance, trash pickup and sign maintenance. And he said there are no current plans to remove the ruins or make any major changes to the property.

“If somebody comes up with a grand idea where they can find some funding for us to do something to enhance it, we’re always open to it,” Edelman said.

The purchase was good news for local preservationist Joanna Linkchorst.

“I grew up directly up the hill. But I always saw the sign that said ‘private property’ and didn’t really think about it until several years ago when I finally asked Mike. And he said, ‘Oh yeah, we got a resort speakeasy down the street,’” Linkchorst said standing among the oaks and overgrowth.

Linkchorst, who founded the group Friends of Rockhaven to preserve another nearby historic site, said it’s been amazing to see all of the decaying structures that were still hiding out at Mountain Oaks.

“There’s almost like these little ghosts in your head as you imagine what it was like when there was a beautiful wood floor and there was a second floor that people came jumping out of,” Linkchorst said.

Now, let’s check in to the Overlook Hotel.

That’s the fictional place Stanley Kubrick brought to life in his 1980 film The Shining, loosely based on Stephen King’s novel of the same name.

A local architect who hails from South Pasadena meticulously crafted a 3D model of the iconic space so Shining fans everywhere never have to check out.

‘I just couldn’t stop’ 

At his day job, architect Anthony Chieh mainly works on residential and boutique commercial spaces. But over the course of five months, he spent his nights meticulously recreating a virtual replica of the Overlook Hotel from the film that first scared him when he was 12.

Of course he started with the deeply haunted Room 237. That’s where Jack Torrance, played by Jack Nicholson, has a terrifying encounter with a ghostly woman.

Chieh's 3D rendering of Room 237

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Anthony Chieh

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“But once I started, I just couldn’t stop,” Chieh told LAist.

“I ended up modeling the Colorado Lounge, and then after that I was thinking maybe I should make the lobby and then arriving to the Gold Room, and then Grady’s bathroom.”

“It’s like a rabbit hole,” he said.

Users who download Chieh’s free 3D model can fly through all of those spaces, immersed in atmospheric sounds and music from the film.

“It’s interesting to dive into these kind of fictional environments and try to make sense of it,” Chieh said. “And the hope is people will get a different perspective once they’re in there.”

Kubrick’s take on the Overlook was famously inspired by real hotels like the Timberline Lodge in Oregon and the Ahwahnee in Yosemite. But the interiors you see in the film were created on sound stages in England.

“Real architecture, physical buildings, are built for people to live. And for movies, these are more meant to express the emotional aspect of things. It’s a psychological construct,” Chieh said.

In a recently published video essay on YouTube, Chieh dives deep into those psychological constructs and how, as he puts it, “Kubrick designed the Overlook Hotel not as a backdrop, but as the film's true villain.”

How spaces scare 

Chieh said during the monthslong process he was reminded of the power of architecture and design in the real world too – whether it’s an uncomfortably repetitive carpet design or a claustrophobic hallway.

“A physical construct can affect your emotion,” Chieh said.

“You can use it in a way to make people feel comfortable and you can also use it in a way to create fear.”

Chieh's 3D rendering of the Torrance's apartment in 'The Shining'

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Anthony Chieh

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What’s next for this architect moonlighting as a 3D modeler?

Chieh says he’s thinking about giving the spaceship from “2001: A Space Odyssey" the virtual treatment next. Or maybe turning to a local non-fictional space, like the Stahl House.

That is, of course, if he can ever escape the Overlook.