In December Esotouric, the eclectic bus adventure company
whose tours reveal L.A.'s secret history, rolls out a quartet
of tours in honor of the city's great noir authors living and
dead: James Ellroy, Raymond Chandler and James M. Cain. The
days are getting shorter, and the nights colder, and it's the
perfect time to curl up with a classic LA book-or to get on
the toasty Crime Bus.
On 12/8, it's "Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles: In A
Lonely Place." The tour spans Chandler's L.A. from downtown
landmarks that appear in thinly disguised form in his fiction
to his favorite Hollywood haunts, and includes some
off-the-bus-adventures, including a stop in the Barclay Hotel
lobby to talk about the ice pick murder from "The Little
Sister" and a visit to Scoops for complementary
Chandler-themed gelato. From his pre-literary career as a
failed, fired oil executive in boomtown 1910s downtown to his
glory years penning pristine magazine pulp to the creative
conflicts that dogged his highly paid, miserable years as a
screenwriter and the boozy whirlwind that pulled him into the
grave, the tour is a complex portrait of a compelling,
brilliant and haunted soul.
On 12/15, it's "The Birth of Noir: James M. Cain's Southern
California Nightmare." (Seats are available 2-for-1 for
anyone who's ridden the Esotouric bus this year, or who also
buys a Chandler ticket.) In his best known novels (each one
also made into a classic film) "The Postman Always Rings
Twice," "Mildred Pierce" and "Double Indemnity," Cain painted
a jaundiced portrait of a Southern California that was in
stark contrast to the orange groves and mission bells sold by
the city's boosters. Cain's LA was full of loose women with
murder on their minds, lust-drenched cads who'd destroy their
lives for a dame, rotten kids, suckers and saps. The tour
explores Cain's life and work and how both were transformed
when he reached the Southland, as well as the artisans who
transformed Cain's tales into movies, including Billy Wilder,
Raymond Chandler, Joan Crawford and Lana Turner.
And on 12/22 and 12/29, James Ellroy hosts "James Ellroy Digs
LA," a new tour through the city that haunts his dreams and
inspires his art. Passengers will accompany the author in a
luxurious coach class bus on an uncensored time travel
journey to tony Hancock Park, where he stalked his teenage
classmates and later broke into houses. . . to the Hollywood
flats to explore some of the heinous 1950s murder cases that
fascinated him as a youth and continue to feed his
obsessions. . . and out to El Monte, where his mother Geneva
was murdered, the unsolved crime that runs through all his
work, from "The Black Dahlia" to "My Dark Places." (These
tours are sold out, but we hope they will be offered
again.)
It's a noir December in Los Angeles, and Esotouric is there
to provide the backdrop. Get on the bus this month to see the
unexpected and explore the city that we love.
yrs, Kim Esotouric http://www.esotouric.com
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