Lights, cameras …. action! USS Angeles members explore cinematic history

By Commodore Dave Mason

LOS ANGELES — Jeremy Kranz and I found the Oscars.

We discovered the statues that the winners held. They were behind glass in a small gallery at the mammoth Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, a four-story building across the street from a site of previous USS Angeles away missions: the Petersen Automotive Museum on Los Angeles’ Miracle Mile. 

It was the USS Angeles’ first visit to the Academy Museum, which opened in 2021 in the former May Co. building. During our Feb. 1 mission there, Jeremy and I found countless treasures from Hollywood’s past and present. 

We discovered everything from Sam’s piano in “Casablanca” (1942) to the model used as a spherical moon shuttle from “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968). We also saw the models from other sci-fi movies such as the spaceships from “Interstellar” (2014).

The museum’s futuristic displays extended to its “Cyberpunk: Envisioning Possible Futures Through Cinema” exhibit, which focused on movies such as two classics from 1982, “Blade Runner” and “Tron.” A section on the “Terminator” movies featured sketches used in planning the look of Arnold Schwarzenegger as an android with some of his skin exposed.

The exhibit also explored later films such as  “Alita: Battle Angel” (2019). The title character of “Alita” was played by Rosa Salazar, who portrayed Capt. Lynne Lucero in the Tribble-inspired “Star Trek” short “The Trouble with Edward,” also from 2019.

Other exhibits explored the histories of animation, Los Angeles filmmaking, the use of color and, of course, the Oscars.

One large room was dedicated to a timeline for the Academy Awards, from their beginning on May 16, 1929 at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood to its current home at the Dolby Theater. Visitors walked around a giant table as they followed the history. One wall was devoted to videos of acceptance speeches.

Nearby exhibits were devoted to movies such as “Boyz N The Hood” (1991), which starred Cuba Gooding Jr., Ice Cube, Morris Chestnut (now starring as the title character of “Watson” on CBS) and Laurence Fishburne.

The animation exhibit, which takes up much of one floor, begins with a large room where families watch movies varying from the latest Disney movies to the 1914 animated black-and-white short “Gertie the Dinosaur.”

Another room in the exhibit shows models, such as one created for the robotic title character of Disney/Pixar’s “WALL-E” (2008). Animators use physical models as a guide to creating computer-generated images.

More details and photos from our trip to the Academy Museum will appear in the March edition of Angels Flight, our award-winning newsletter. It goes to members. To become one, click on ussangeles.org/join-us.

Jeremy Kranz stands in front of a scene of Marilyn Monroe in the 1956 blockbuster “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” on Feb. 1, 2025, at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. The image promoted the Los Angeles museum’s exhibit on the use of color in movies. (Photos by Dave Mason/USS Angeles/Angels Flight)

A model from”2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968) stands at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles. This model was filmed as one of the shuttles on the moon.

The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures stands in the renovated May Co. building at Fairfax Avenue and Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles.

Costumes from “Jodhaa Akbar” (India, 2008) grace the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures exhibit on the use of color in movies.