Emma Stone — Film Noir Blonde

Lighthouse Café’s jazz brunch brightens Sunday mornings

Femmes fatales are naturally nocturnal and enjoy night-time carousing almost as much as they love spending a hefty pile of cold, hard cash. But there are exceptions to that rule.

For example, the Sunday jazz brunch at the Lighthouse Café in Hermosa Beach provides plenty of reasons to be up early-ish on a weekend morning. The event, which runs from 10 am to 2 pm, features classic songs (think Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, George and Ira Gershwin) and attracts first-rate performers, such as vocalist Lia Booth and guitarist Miles Jensen.

Vocalist Lia Booth and guitarist Miles Jensen help the audience mellow out with excellent music.

Sporting Bettie Page bangs and retro specs, classically trained Booth makes each song her own with singular phrasing and Jensen gives a lithe grace to every chord he plays. Most of the songs are audience requests and patrons are encouraged to try to stump the versatile chanteuse.

While jotting down your requests, you can nosh on great brunch fare. Treat yourself to the irresistibly decadent fry up (eggs, hashbrowns, bacon, sausage and toast) or the more demure yogurt and fresh fruit. The raspberry daiquiri pairs remarkably well with both, or go for a savory note and sip a classic Bloody Mary.

If these walls could scat … jazz artists have played here since the place opened in 1949.

To be sure, performers Booth and Jensen follow in some mighty big footsteps. The Lighthouse Café celebrated its 75^th anniversary this summer and has long been known as a ballast of bebop and a hot spot for cool jazz, showcasing legendary musicians like Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and Chet Baker.

In the early days, bassist/band leader/club manager Howard Rumsey put together a house band called the Lighthouse All-Stars, frequently playing with guest musicians. Many artists recorded at the café as well.

Current owner Josh Royal recently told the Daily Breeze he aims to keep the old-school vibe and maintain the café as a live music venue. Besides the brunch, the café hosts a jazz jam session on Monday nights. Royal and his partners took over in 2021. Previously, Paul Hennessey had owned the place for about 40 years.

The neon sign is a nod to the 2016 movie, “La La Land” and its iconic scenes that were shot at the Lighthouse café.

And Musicians aren’t the only ones who are drawn to the historic café. The Lighthouse earned a cinematic claim to fame when it was selected as a location for “La La Land” (2016, Damien Chazelle), starring Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling (pictured below), which won the best Picture Oscar in 2017. Filming took place over four days in late summer, 2015. There is a neon sign that pays tribute to the popular flick; it reads: “Here’s to the fools who dream.”

Ryan Gosling won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in “La La Land.”

Both interior and exterior scenes in “La La Land” were filmed at the café.

Vocalist Lia Booth and guitarist Miles Jensen will play on Sunday, Sept. 15, from 10 am to 2 pm. The Lighthouse Café is located at 30 Pier Ave., Hermosa Beach, CA 90254. Ryan Gosling may or may not be in attendance.

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‘Gangster Squad’ goes for gorgeous gloss over true grit

Gangster Squad/2013/Warner Bros./113 min.

The much-hyped new neo-noir “Gangster Squad,” set in 1949 Los Angeles, falls prey to the same stereotypical failing that marks some Angelinos, then and now: It’s a wannabe. On the plus side, the movie is glossy looking and elegantly styled (many famous locations, from Slapsy Maxie’s to Clifton’s Cafeteria, are stunningly presented) with a star-studded cast.

Directed by Ruben Fleischer, there’s action aplenty, though it never feels like there’s much at stake. And its superficial, often cartoonish, virtues are undercut by a weak script, uneven performances and tepid emotion.

That’s too bad, given the long-standing allure of vintage LA and the fascinating source material for the film: Paul Lieberman’s crime saga, “Gangster Squad: Covert Cops, the Mob, and the Battle for Los Angeles,” which was based on the work of a secret LAPD unit that aimed to guard the city against gangsters. (The book began as a 2008 LA Times series.)

Their primary target: the ruthless and immensely powerful mob leader Mickey Cohen, portrayed in the film by Sean Penn. Josh Brolin plays ambitious good cop Sgt. John O’Mara (married and devoted to his wife); Ryan Gosling turns in another spare, cool performance as the wayward Sgt. Jerry Wooters who tangles with Cohen’s supposed mistress (Emma Stone). A growling, leonine Nick Nolte as police chief William H. Parker must muddle through lines like this one, addressed to O’Mara: “Los Angeles is a damsel in distress. And I need you to save her.”

Penn’s Cohen has similar clunkers. He tells us: “Back east, I was a gangster, out here I’m God.”

The strong cast does what it can, with Brolin, Gosling and Stone making the best of what they are given. But, thanks to Will Beall’s cliche-ridden script, Nolte starts to get mannered and Penn gives us a 2-D Cohen, unrelentingly brutal and ever-menacing. As talented as Penn is, he doesn’t seem to connect with this character and physically he’s an odd choice to play a brawny baby-faced former boxer. In 1949, Cohen was 36; Penn is 52. And if you know much of Cohen’s backstory (he avoided sex because of his OCD disorder), it’s hard to buy into the love-triangle element of this story, which is only very loosely based on fact.

“L.A. Confidential” this is not. But if you fancy gorging on some glitzy eye candy, this should do nicely.

“Gangster Squad” opens today nationwide. You can read author Tere Tereba’s piece Beyond the Gangster Squad: the Real Mickey Cohen here. Tere’s book on Cohen was selected by KCET as one of the best books of 2012.

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