Glamorous Nights at Ciro’s

Since 1972, the building at 8433 Sunset Blvd. has been occupied by The Comedy Store, a club that gave many of the most legendary comics their start. While most of us know this location as the place to catch the hottest funnymen, this address has a long and glamorous history.

In January 1940 the club Ciro’s opened at 8433 Sunset, replacing a not-so-popular joint called Club Seville. The brains behind Ciro’s was William Wilkerson, publisher of The Hollywood Reporter who had previously had success with Cafe Trocadero at 8610 Sunset and La Rue in the Sunset Plaza. It wasn’t difficult to lure famous names to a nightclub owned by William Wilkerson since they were sure to see their photograph in The Hollywood Reporter the next day or in the columns of gossip queens Hedda Hopper or Louella Parsons. Wilkerson made sure that Ciro’s was equipped with amenities for the elite like phone jacks at every table, a cozy little dance floor made for getting close, and a hidden gambling parlor.

The 1940s was a time when the Sunset Strip was at its most glamorous with elegantly dressed movie stars, moguls, and mobsters gathering to dine, dance, and indulge in activities that never made the gossip columns. Notorious glamor queen Lana Turner called Ciro’s her favorite nightspot, probably because she met several of her husbands there.

Not every club regular enjoyed the press coverage as the notoriously media-phobic Frank Sinatra punched a Hearst gossip columnist outside Ciro’s in 1947. In 1952, debonair actor Franchot Tone, angered by the gossip columnist’s unflattering comments about his marriage to scandal-plagued starlet Barbara Payton, spat on Florabel Muir at a table at Ciro’s. The club had become so notorious for celebrity fistfights that Hover jokingly set a limit of three brawls per patron.

In its heyday, everyone who was anyone could be seen at Ciro’s, including celebrity couples Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, Dick Powell and June Allyson and George Burns and Gracie Allen. Sexy sirens like Marilyn Monroe, Ava Gardner, Mamie Van Doren, and Anita Ekberg turned heads in clinging gowns while handsome gents like Clark Gable, Cary Grant, and Peter Lawford looked dapper in tuxedos. These were truly the golden days of Hollywood glamor.

After getting Ciro’s off to a fast start, Wilkerson leased the club to his associate Herman Hover in 1942. Hover ran the club through its glory days before declaring bankruptcy in 1959. The building was sold at auction and would host several not-so-memorable nightspots over the next decade. 

In 1965, the club moved into the swinging sixties with the opening of Ciro’s Le Disc, which featured acts including the Byrds, Little Richard, and Ike and Tina Turner for two years until it became the Kaleidoscope and later It’s Boss and Patch 2. None of these incarnations of Ciro’s were able to compete with the Strip’s most successful hippie hangouts like the Whisky-a-go-go, leading to the building being vacant for several years.

In 1972, the location got its second life when The Comedy Store opened, giving the building a tenant that would still occupy the address more than 50 years later. The Comedy Store is worthy of its own story and will get one next week as we ask the question: Is the comedians’ favorite hang haunted?