Hollywood’s fading relevancy

A lobby where visitors can take selfies before touring the Paramount Studios lot in Los Angeles. With few films still shot on site, Hollywood backlots aren’t the wonderlands they once were, and the studio tours that used to leave people dazzled are now melancholy reminders of the past. — Ricardo Nagaoka/The New York Times

THEY had seen where Bob Hope once broke a dressing room window with a golf ball. Soon, they would drive by a beige building where artistes used to toil on Betty Boop.

But first, the seven people on a Paramount Pictures studio tour would have the chance to scrutinise a park bench.