STARS IN MOTION (Thumbnail image)

Stars in Motion: At the left, Orson Welles escapes from the old Hall of Justice Building and bolts across Kearny Street to Portsmouth Square and the never changing Chinatown in the 1948 film, ‘The Lady From Shanghai’. Second from the left, Woody Allen running across upper Kearny in North Beach in the 1972 movie ‘Play It Again, Sam’. Woody plays a slimy fellow who betrays a friend because of his amorous adventures. Boy, how out of character is that! Second from the right, Barbara Lawrence in the center heading down the stairs at the Ferry Building in the 1949 film ‘Thieves Highway’. There’s a bit of history in this scene. The old ferry boats had two levels, and passengers on the top level off boarded into the second story of the Ferry Building, traveled down a corridor, and exited to the Embarcadero down these stairs! Wow, have they seen some traffic! At the right is the plaza beneath the Bank of America tower in the 1974 blockbuster, ‘The Towering Inferno’. That’s Fred Astaire dancing up the steps on the right, and “that’s entertainment!”