“[This tour is] a poetic journey full of rare insight into the life of a man whoâ€s come to represent the ghettoized contingency of the City of Angels.” – Tanja M. Laden, Flavorpill

“Haunts of a Dirty Old Man: Charles Bukowskiâ€s LA” focuses on Bukowskiâ€s great passions: writing, screwing and Los Angeles. Weâ€ll take in the canonical locations of his life and myth: the Postal Annex Terminal where he gathered the material for “Post Office,” the De Longpre apartment where he briefly experimented with marriage and fatherhood, one of his favorite bars and liquor stores, and many other spots. Along the way, weâ€ll explore the people and ideas that made up the warp and weft of Bukâ€s rich inner life. This Esotouric bus adventure is hosted by Richard Schave and spans Bukowskiâ€s personal city, from Skid Row to once-genteel Crown Hill, to Bukowskiâ€s favorite East Hollywood liquor store, the Pink Elephant.

In honor of this tour and Bukowskiâ€s poem Bluebird, cartoonist Tony Millionaire has created The Bukbird, a pale blue version of his beloved alcoholic crow character. The Bukbird is available on T-shirts and fine art prints by plasticmuse.

To buy a ticket for this event click here. If you’d like to be contacted when another crime lab tour and lecture are scheduled, subscribe to LAVA’s occasional Crime Lab Newsletter.

Join us in the Cal State Los Angeles teaching crime lab for an afternoonâ€s inquiry into the history and practice of forensic science in Los Angeles, in support of new research coming out of the Criminalistics Department. 

Presentation #1: V is for Vice

Mike Fratantoni, an LASD Jailer who sits on the board of the Los Angeles County Sheriffâ€s Museum and is organizing the new exhibition space in the Hall of Justice, makes a return engagement with a fascinating presentation on the unwritten history of vice in West Hollywood and corruption in law enforcement.

In 1940, West Hollywood madam Lee Francis was arrested on a morals charge, her first. Media coverage of the subsequent trial exposed the thriving trade in sin along the Sunset Strip, and had southland husbands quaking in their socks. But the papers never printed the name of one prostitute arrested in the “House of Francis” raid: LaVonne Weaver, soon-to-be wife of gang kingpin Mickey Cohen. For decades, mob historians have chased down rumors that “dance instructor” Lavonne was actually a “working girl.” Wonder no more, as in a LAVA exclusive, LaVonne Weaverâ€s mugshot will be unveiled. Lee Francis had a reputation, but madam Brenda Allen was an underworld superstar, as famous for her wardrobe and high-powered social connections as she was for the services available at her hillside brothel. Her 1948 arrest and subsequent Grand Jury investigation revealed deep veins of corruption within the Los Angeles Police Department.

Presentation #2: Beverly Hills Confidential

Clark Fogg, the lead forensics investigator at the Beverly Hills Police Department, and investigative journalist Barbara Schroeder share the sensational crimes and scandals of the glamorous city of Beverly Hills, as chronicled in their book “Beverly Hills Confidential: A Century of Stars, Scandals and Murders.”

Featured topics include:

The cityâ€s first blockbuster scandal — the Doheny murder mystery at Greystone Mansion — New information on who really killed gangster Bugsy Siegel — The true story of the death of Lupe Velez, the movie star known as “The Mexican Spitfire” — The mysterious execution of publicist-to-the-stars Ronni Chasen

Copies of “Beverly Hills Confidential” will be available for purchase and signing during the event.

How did this East Coat sophisticate go from managing editor of “The New Yorker” to populist novelist accused of writing dirty books? Esotouric’s tour explores Cainâ€s L.A. from Hollywood to Glendale and along old Route 66, and includes illuminating visits to Forest Lawn Memorial Park (a Glendale institution and site of the funeral of Mildred Pierceâ€s “other” daughter, Ray), the Glendale Train Station where the “Double Indemnity” murder plot played out, and the punch line to a Billy Wilder joke so subtle, itâ€s taken 63 years for anyone to get. The tour will also cover the artisans who transformed Cainâ€s tales into film, including Billy Wilder, Raymond Chandler, Joan Crawford and Lana Turner, each an important contributor to the Film Noir canon.

This was Raymond Chandlerâ€s Los Angeles, which resonated under deft and melancholy fits from his writerâ€s bow.

Join Esotouric down the mean streets that shaped his fiction, and that in turn shaped his hard-boiled times, in a four hour tour of downtown, Hollywood and surrounding environs: The Los Angeles Athletic Club, the Larry Edmunds Bookshop, the Hotel Van Nuys, Paramount Studioâ€s gates, and much, much more, including a Chandler-themed gelato stop at East Hollywood cult favorite Scoops.

Through published work, private correspondence, screenplays and film adaptations, we trace Chandlerâ€s search for meaning and his anti-hero Philip Marloweâ€s struggle to not be pigeonholed or give anything less than all he has, which lead them both down the rabbit hole of isolation, depression, and drink.

Exclusive on this tour: the fascinating story of Raymond Chandlerâ€s lost comic operetta The Princess and the Pedlar, a bombshell in Chandler studies, discovered by our own Kim Cooper in 2014.

Tour passengers will have the opportunity to purchase an autographed copy of co-host Kim Cooperâ€s mystery novel The Kept Girl, inspired by this tour and starring the young Chandler and the real-life Philip Marlowe on the trail of a cult of murderous angel worshippers, as well as the new Raymond Chandler Map of Los Angeles.

Join Kim Cooper and David Smay, co-editors of the book Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth: The Dark History of Prepubescent Pop from the Banana Splits to Britney Spears, and contributors Becky Ebenkamp and Gene Sculatti, for an audio-visual celebration of the history and mythology of this under-appreciated musical genre, and the Saturday morning cartoons where many of the most memorable songs debuted.

After the presentation, copies of the book will be available for purchase and signing.

The event is free. Arrive on time to ensure you get a seat.  

“Haunts of a Dirty Old Man: Charles Bukowski’s LA” focuses on Bukowskiâ€s great passions: writing, screwing and Los Angeles. Weâ€ll take in the canonical locations of his life and myth: the Postal Annex Terminal where he gathered the material for “Post Office,” the De Longpre apartment where he briefly experimented with marriage and fatherhood, one of his favorite bars and liquor stores, and many other spots. Along the way, weâ€ll explore the people and ideas that made up the warp and weft of Bukâ€s rich inner life. This Esotouric bus adventure is hosted by Richard Schave.

The tour spans Bukowski’s personal city, from Skid Row to once-genteel Crown Hill, to Bukowski’s favorite East Hollywood liquor store, the Pink Elephant.

The Photography of Kristin Bedford: Race, History & the Divine

Los Angeles-based photographer Kristin Bedford will be presenting her series of photographs about the legacy of the African-American religious leader Father Divine. The body of work delves into issues of race, American religious history, and the mystery of enduring faith.

Father Divine, known to his followers as God, once had tens of thousands of devotees in 1930s Harlem. To the outside world Father Divine died in 1965, but for his followers he “lay his body down” and is still with them as he always has been. Now in their seventies, eighties, and nineties, eighteen of the remaining celibate followers live with Mother Divine at Fatherâ€s estate outside of Philadelphia. In 2013, Kristin Bedford spent five weeks living with and photographing this community.

The followers, who call themselves “The International Peace Mission Movement,” are living a way of life and performing rituals created over eighty years ago by their God. With the lack of new followers, their movement is likely in its final chapter. Bedford had the chance to experience and photograph their traditions before they fade away.

The Father Divine presentation will be followed by an exclusive sneak peek of Bedfordâ€s current photography project.

Biography

Kristin Bedford is a Los Angeles-based photographer who focuses on long-term visual studies of where we live – the streets we walk down, the places we worship in, the homes we create, and the spaces between them all. Her subjects have included religious movements, street culture in numerous urban centers, and the modern day legacy of historic African-American communities.

Kristinâ€s website

NY Times LENS Review

Calling all rain dogs, gin-soaked boys and Gun Street girls! Climb aboard as your hosts David Smay (author of the 33 1/3 series book on Swordfishtrombones) and Esotouric’s Kim Cooper (a Zoetrope Studios intern who’ll tell how she used teenage subterfuge to arrange a private concert by Tom) lead you on a scrupulously researched ride through Tom’s epic misdeeds and shenanigans, from the Trashing of the Troubadour to epic nights at the Tropicana.

And oh, there are such tales to tell, from food fights with L.A. Punks and smackdowns with L.A. Police. We’ll crawl through the Sewers of Paris, tattle on the Ivar Theater, and get the lowdown on Tom’s legendary performances at the Wiltern and elsewhere. Before departing for points rural, Tom left his mark all over L.A., from Francis Ford Coppola’s Zoetrope Studios to Sunset Sound to Skid Row. We’ll show you where Tom found his true love and collaborator, Kathleen Brennan, and how all the pieces came together to transform a drunken, desperate singer into the multi-faceted, multi-media artist he’d become.

Raised near San Diego, Tom Waits launched his musical career in L.A., signing with David Geffen’s Asylum Records in 1972, living at the raunchy Tropicana Hotel (where he sawed off the kitchen drain board so his piano would fit), and building a reputation as a songwriter willing to risk his own health and sanity to get inside the sad sack characters that peopled songs like “The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me),” “On The Nickel” and “Pasties And A G-string (At The Two O’clock Club).”

By 1980, Tom was 31 and starting to feel the effects of his hard living. While scoring the music to Francis Ford Coppola’s “One From The Heart,” he met Kathleen Brennan, whose influence would completely transform his life and his art. After a whirlwind courtship the pair married and began a 28-year creative and personal partnership, beginning with the revolutionary album “Swordfishtrombones,” the subject of tour host David Smay’s recent book.

“Crawling Down Cahuenga” spans Tom’s personal city, from The Nickel (aka Skid Row) to once-ratty West Hollywood, favorite strip clubs and midnight diners, recording studios, night clubs, record labels and film studios, before rolling back downtown via the filming location of Waits’ “In The Neighborhood” video.

ABOUT THE HOSTS: Longtime collaborators David Smay and Kim Cooper co-edited the books “Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth” (“quite simply the most fun music book I have ever read.” -Bucketfull of Brains) and “Lost in the Grooves: Scram’s Capricious Guide to the Music You Missed” (“the perfect book for the advanced record collector” -Ear Candy) before penning their solo 33 1/3 series books on Tom Waits and Neutral Milk Hotel. Kim gives Esotouric’s rock history and true crime tours. David Smay lives in San Francisco, where he is working on a history of the Beats.

This was Raymond Chandlerâ€s Los Angeles, which resonated under deft and melancholy fits from his writerâ€s bow.

Join us on an Esotouric bus adventure as we go down the mean streets that shaped his fiction, and that in turn shaped his hard-boiled times, in a four hour tour of downtown, Hollywood and surrounding environs: The Los Angeles Athletic Club, the Larry Edmunds Bookshop, the Hotel Van Nuys, Paramount Studioâ€s gates, and much, much more, including a Chandler-themed gelato stop at East Hollywood cult favorite Scoops.

Through published work, private correspondence, screenplays and film adaptations, we trace Chandlerâ€s search for meaning and his anti-hero Philip Marloweâ€s struggle to not be pigeonholed or give anything less than all he has, which lead them both down the rabbit hole of isolation, depression, and drink.

Exclusive on this tour: the fascinating story of Raymond Chandler’s lost comic operetta The Princess and the Pedlar, a bombshell in Chandler studies, discovered by our own Kim Cooper in 2014.

Tour passengers will have the opportunity to purchase an autographed copy of co-host Kim Cooper’s mystery novel The Kept Girl, inspired by this tour and starring the young Chandler and the real-life Philip Marlowe on the trail of a cult of murderous angel worshippers, as well as the newRaymond Chandler Map of Los Angeles.

“Haunts of a Dirty Old Man: Charles Bukowski’s LA” from Esotouric focuses on Bukowskiâ€s great passions: writing, screwing and Los Angeles. Weâ€ll take in the canonical locations of his life and myth: the Postal Annex Terminal where he gathered the material for “Post Office,” the De Longpre apartment where he briefly experimented with marriage and fatherhood, one of his favorite bars and liquor stores, and many other spots. Along the way, weâ€ll explore the people and ideas that made up the warp and weft of Bukâ€s rich inner life. This Esotouric bus adventure is hosted by Richard Schave.

The tour spans Bukowski’s personal city, from Skid Row to once-genteel Crown Hill, to Bukowski’s favorite East Hollywood liquor store, the Pink Elephant.

Esotouric has made its name with true crime bus tours (Black Dahlia, Pasadena Confidential) and explorations of literary LA (Raymond Chandler, John Fante, James M. Cain). Now they turn their creative attentions to Bukowski, the prolific poet, novelist and screenwriter whose rough-hewn tales of boozing, wild women and rotten jobs never obscure the deep vein of sweetness and hope that runs through all his work. In one of his finest poems, he described this as a bluebird he kept caged, and that bluebird is been represented in the Bukbird, a pale blue version of his beloved alcoholic crow character, represented by a logo created by cartoonist Tony Millionaire exclusively for this tour. The Bukbird is available on T-shirts, beer coasters and fine art prints by plasticmuse.

Press clips:

Silver Birch press gives our Bukowski bus a most auspicious rating.

LA Weekly interviews Charles Bukowski tour host Richard Schave to compile a list of L.A. sites that were important to the writer.

Slake wonders if the Charles Bukowski tour is “‘Fawlty Towers’ on wheels.”

Spike Magazine digs our literary tours.

Novelist Anna Stothard explores the hidden gems of Los Angeles for the London Guardian, including our Bukowski tour.

Annenberg News Radio covers our Charles Bukowski tour in a video/slideshow.

Marco Mannone on the Charles Bukowski bus:“Four hours after we departed, the tour drops us back off at Philippeâ€s. This is a terrible way to simplify the tour, filled with so much wit and insight into not only Bukowski, but lost parts of Los Angeles.&quot

Girls Gone Wild digs the Charles Bukowski tour.

For more info, see this short film on the landmarking of Bukowskiâ€s former bungalow on De Longpre.