“West Side Story” is an adaptation of the Jerome Robbins Broadway musical of the same name, which had run on Broadway for 2 years and over 700 performances. The play was adapted from Shakespeare's play, “Romeo and Juliet”, and set in modern day New York.

“West Side Story’s” Broadway Director, Jerome Robbins, initially refused to work on the film unless he could direct it. The Producer was nervous about handing the reins entirely over to Robbins, who had never made a film before, so he enlisted Robert Wise to direct the drama while Robbins would handle the singing and dancing sequences. Robbins rehearsed with the dancers for three months before shooting began, but once location shooting began he kept revising and revising his original choreography. The dancers all claimed that they had never worked so hard on a dance piece, and most of them at one point or another sustained injuries during shooting. Robbins' propensity for filming and re-filming scenes in his quest for perfection led to the movie going over budget and falling behind schedule. During the entire “West Side Story” production, the actors wore out 200 pairs of shoes, applied more than 100lbs of make-up, split 27 pairs of pants and performed in 30 different recording sessions. After long rehearsals, shooting, and grueling editing, the film took a total of 2 years of production before it hit the big screen. He was fired when shooting was about 60% finished and Wise completed the filming alone. Wise went on to win the Oscar for directing this film (which was shared with Robbins), winning a total of 4 out of his 7 Oscar nominations! Wise also won an Oscar for his work on the iconic musical, “The Sound of Music.

Casting “West Side Story” wasn’t an easy task. Elvis Presley was originally approached for the lead role of Tony. His manager, Colonel Parker, strongly believed the role to be wrong for Elvis and made him decline in favor of other movie musicals. When the movie became a hit and earned 10 Oscars, Elvis later regretted having given up the part. He was only one of many young stars that were in consideration for the role of Tony. Several Hollywood men auditioned for the part, including Warren Beatty, Tab Hunter, Anthony Perkins, Russ Tamblyn, Burt Reynolds, Troy Donahue, Bobby Darin, Richard Chamberlain, and Gary Lockwood. After countless auditions and offers were made, the producers settled on their so-called final five: Warren Beatty, Anthony Perkins, Russ Tamblyn, Troy Donahue, and Richard Beymer. Although Perkins was 28 before filming began, his boyish looks and Broadway resume seemed to make him a prime contender for the role. Wise originally chose Beatty for the role, figuring that youth was more important than experience. Ultimately, the former child actor Beymer (the most unlikely of the candidates) won the part of Tony. Having been invited for several callbacks, Tamblyn impressed the producers and was given the role of Riff. In regards to the female roles, the producers had not originally thought of Natalie Wood for the role of Maria. She was filming “Splendor in the Grass” with Warren Beatty and was romantically involved with him off-screen. When Beatty went to screen test for the role of Tony, Wood read opposite him as Maria as a favor because she had been practicing with him. The producers fell in love with the idea of Wood as Maria but did not cast Beatty.

Rita Moreno is one of the very few (and very first) performers to win an Emmy, a Tony, and a Grammy as well as the first Hispanic to win an Academy Award. Of the three people who won all five major entertainment awards (Oscar, Golden Globe, Emmy, Tony and Grammy), Moreno won all five awards in the shortest amount of time (within 16 years). She also won the Presidential Medal of Freedom presented by George W. Bush. Moreno however, wasn’t always so blessed. While filming her final scene in West Side Story in which her character "Anita" is harassed and nearly raped by New York street gang members, "the Jets", she was reduced to tears, as it brought flashbacks of similar real life childhood experiences. Nevertheless, Moreno has triumphed in her career also appearing in such classic pictures as “Singin' in the Rain” and “The King and I”. She was awarded the Joseph Jefferson Award for her role in Tennessee Williams' "The Rose Tattoo" at the Ivanhoe Theatre here in Chicago. Moreno was thrilled when her star was unveiled on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She fell on top of it, openly and uncontrollably weeping. She later commented, "I had been dreaming of this day since I was six!" She is a key spokesperson in raising the awareness of osteoporosis and in 2000, she was presented with an award from the National Osteoporosis Foundation for her outstanding work with the organization.

George Chakiris made his film debut at the age of 12 singing in the chorus of film “Song of Love”. Later he started his acting/dancing career appearing in musicals with Marilyn Monroe such as “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” and "Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend", the classic holiday film – “White Christmas”, “The Girl Rush”, “There's No Business Like Show Business”, “Brigadoon”, and “Meet Me in Las Vegas”. He traveled to New York hoping for his Broadway break. Hearing that Jerome Robbins was casting the London Company of "West Side Story", he auditioned and was awarded the co-starring role of “Riff”. He played the part for almost two years on the West End stage before acting, singing and dancing as Bernardo and earning him a Golden Globe and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Since then, he starred in a succession of films, including “Diamond Head” with Charlton Heston, “La ragazza di Bube” with Claudia Cardinale, “Les demoiselles de Rochefort” with Catherine Deneuve and Gene Kelly, and “The Big Cube” with Lana Turner. He is one of the most traveled stars in motion pictures, having been to such locations as Hawaii, Japan, Mexico, Italy, England, Spain, and France. George lives in Los Angeles and is also a very successful designer of hand crafted jewelry for his popular George Chakiris Collection.

Russ Tamblyn was groomed early for stardom. Discovered at age ten by actor Lloyd Bridges for the play "Stone Jungle", Tamblyn was soon performing on radio and in L.A.-based musical reviews. Billed as "Rusty Tamblyn", his first film role was “The Boy with Green Hair” starring another child actor, Dean Stockwell. Having taken up dancing and acrobatics from the age of 6, Tamblyn marked his abilities with his very first TV appearance on the "The Ed Sullivan Show." He was put under contract by an eager MGM who saw his potential as a juvenile actor. Featured in the popular original, “Father of the Bride”, and its sequel, “Father's Little Dividend”, before taking off in musical films, he demonstrated exceptional athleticism in one of MGM's best, “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers”. He served as a choreographer for Elvis Presley in 1957's “Jailhouse Rock”. He went on to starring roles in a series of films including “Cimarron” with Glenn Ford, “How the West was Won” with our recent guest Debbie Reynolds and “Peyton Place” for which he was 1st nominated for an Oscar. Of course in the character of “Riff” in “West Side Story” he was the knife-welding leader of the Jets "till his last dying day" where he received his 2nd Oscar nomination. He also won a Golden Globe Award in 1956 and has appeared in many television roles including Fame Quantum Leap, Nash Bridges, Babylon 5 and most notably as Dr. Lawrence Jacoby in the popular TV cult series, Twin Peaks. Recently Tamblyn toured throughout the world with folk star Neil Young and his critically acclaimed environmental rock-novel concert , Greendale, acting as the director, choreographer and a featured character. Tamblyn has also lately taken on choreographic and managing duties for his actress/daughter Amber Tamblyn and her "Joan of Arcadia" fame.

 

 

Our very popular series of celebrity events often includes a table in our lobby where you can briefly meet the stars of some of your favorite films, get their autograph or a posed photograph with them.

These events are very expensive to stage and most celebrities are paid for their personal appearances including all first class expenses.

These events are often heavily attended and we always suggest that you arrive early.  Celebrities are generally scheduled to arrive one hour prior to the first scheduled showing of their film.  They may or may not be available to the public after a screening so we always suggest that you purchase a souvenir and meet them prior to entering the auditorium.  Your early arrival also helps ensure that you can enjoy the widest selection of seats when you watch the film. You must have purchased an admission ticket to get in the line to meet our guests.

For some extraordinarily popular events we have to run select films in more than one auditorium, so our guests will appear in person in the largest auditorium and we will feed live video of their greeting into secondary auditoriums before we roll the film.  Seating is always on a first come first serve basis so you may or may not be in the same auditorium as our guest during an interview, although you will not miss anything when viewing it live on our big screen in an adjacent auditorium.  If space permits, there may be standing room during an interview.

Depending on the length of the line and scheduling, our guest may or may not entertain questions from the audience and introduce the film from the stage.  This is entirely discretionary and varies from event to event.  Some of our guests make an extraordinary effort to ensure a great experience and are very talkative, although this may back up the seating for later show times. Sometimes the lines to get autographs and pictures are so long that timing will not permit the actor to make an in-theater appearance at all.  We try to please as many people as possible and hate to turn away people from the line or the shows, although this will at times wreak havoc with the show schedule.

In most instances, there is a charge per autograph, whether it is a photograph or item from here at the table or something that you bring with you.  You must have purchased an autograph in order to get a posed photograph with our guest.  In some cases, we do have a professional photographer set up to take a picture with our guest, also at a nominal charge, and in those instances you may only get a posed photograph through this system.  We do take credit cards and there is also an ATM on premise.

You may always take a candid unposed photograph of our guest from elsewhere in the lobby at no additional charge.