Miracle Mile
It was August 2004, and I was with my family on our annual trip to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. Right at the beginning of the trip, I walked into a local CD shop and spent my daily vacation allowance on a copy of Notorious B.I.G.’s Ready to Die. (We’ll refer to him as Biggie from here on in.) It was during my nascent years as a hip hop fan, and after consulting a number of top ten lists I found on the internet, I told myself I was going to spend this trip getting my hands dirty. I brought it home and listened to it that night. I could feel my brain being rewritten.
Ready to Die is an incredible album in and of itself, but I was also in a unique time and place to be particularly blown away by it. Though a little album called The College Dropout was making a lot of noise, 2004 was still very much peak 50 Cent. Of course, 50 Cent brought a certain degree of authentic criminal expertise and charisma to his work, as part of the package was his origin story as a nearly murdered drug dealer in South Jamaica, Queens. But he also brought a certain degree of theatricality. He was, to put it simply, a wrestler. He wasn’t using his story or his music as a means of connection. He was using it to get you to root for him and to buy his albums. His is an underdog story for a larger-than-life character who crawled out of impossible circumstances, and despite all the hardship he endured and the violence he sowed, he finally “made it.” 50 Cent should’ve been dead, but here he is making millions with Vitamin Water.
I was in middle school in the Bush Administration. Naturally, I fell for it hook, line, and sinker.
Get Rich or Die Tryin’ is frequently violent and dark. But it’s all contextualized in a come-up story, and the tone is mostly positive, provided you’re willing to ignore some homophobia and misogyny. (Which, for the record, you shouldn’t. Also Get Rich or Die Tryin’ doesn’t hold up, but that’s for another time.) Ready to Die, on the other hand, is an hour and ten minutes of mostly uninterrupted suffering. Sure, you get “Juicy” and “Big Poppa.” But in 50 Cent’s world, crime is a means to a better life, and the reasons why it was necessary for him to turn to drug dealing in the first place go mostly unexplored. Biggie knows he’s trapped in a system that was designed to ensure his poverty and demise, and Ready to Die ends with him killing himself. The joys of “Juicy” and “Big Poppa” don’t last. (Also, in case you don’t like subtlety, the album cover features an image of a baby and is titled Ready to Die.)
I was twelve years old. I didn’t know music could get that dark, and once Ready to Die reached its conclusion, I didn’t quite know how to handle it. (My version did come with the bonus tracks, but they did little to lighten the mood.) Suddenly, Get Rich or Die Tryin’ didn’t do it for me as much. I still spent a few more embarrassing years as a G-Unit fan, but listening to Ready to Die exposed 50 for what he was, and my 50 fandom was never the same.
Biggie became a hero of mine. He was the rapper that showed me the way, so to speak. Other artists would do a more substantial job of finishing Biggie’s work of reshaping, in my head, what hip hop could be. (Just because Biggie wasn’t as theatrical as 50 doesn’t mean he didn’t have that side to him. Quite the contrary, as a matter of fact.) But Biggie put me on the right path. He showed me what hip hop, and all art for that matter, could be.
Many years later, I came to Los Angeles for my junior semester “abroad.” I went to attend a Boston University program to learn about the business of Hollywood. (I was one of two non-Boston University kids there.) For housing, the program stashed us in an apartment complex in an area of Los Angeles called Miracle Mile. That complex is called Park La Brea, and during that semester, I lived in two of the eighteen high-rises (they call them “towers”), one of which was located on 535 S. Curson Ave.
I was taken with the complex, or more specifically, its location and the convenience of having a more corporatized rental office. So in 2014, after graduating college, I spent two years renting one of the garden apartments in the southwest corner of the grounds.
The closest intersection to my garden apartment was 6th and Fairfax. One block south of that intersection is Wilshire and Fairfax, the intersection where Biggie was murdered on March 9, 1997.
Last year, I found Walter Chaw on Twitter bemoaning Marvel’s erasure of Lexi Alexander, the director behind Punisher: War Zone. “I like this guy.” I thought. So naturally, I did some digging and found some of the writing he’s done on Miracle Mile, a 1988 film written and directed by Steve De Jarnatt about a man scrambling to find the love of his life right as the bombs are about to fall on Miracle Mile. (I bought Walter Chaw’s book on the subject, but sadly, the shipping’s been delayed so I haven’t had a chance to read it.)
It’s a movie where I saw my literal old neighborhood descend into chaos. I had thoughts.
Miracle Mile is one of the few areas in Los Angeles that actually feels like a discernible location. A neighborhood where you can easily see yourself spending some time having fun or even living in if the rents weren’t astronomically high. For reasons I’m not qualified or patient enough to explain, so much of Los Angeles is endless homogenous sprawl, and Miracle Mile, or at least parts of Miracle Mile, feel like it has an actual identity.
Where exactly Miracle Mile begins and ends, much like any Los Angeles neighborhood, is a bit hard to pin down. You could look at the map, but that may not be too helpful, as most people in the area would call what Google Maps says is Miracle Mile inaccurate. (By their definition, the movie Miracle Mile does not take place in Miracle Mile. The point is that Google is wrong. Some hero even bothered to amend Miracle Mile’s Wikipedia page to say as such.)
Technicalities aside, when I talk about the identity of Miracle Mile, I’m really talking about the section north of Park La Brea. (For those of you who’ve seen the movie, Miracle Mile takes place mostly south of Park La Brea. Below is a map of how to get from 535 S Curson Ave to the diner where Harry gets the phone call.) Even more specifically, I’m talking about the stretch of Fairfax Ave that lasts roughly until Melrose Ave. (We’re talking a few blocks, basically.) Most people would call this northern area Fairfax, but Miracle Mile and Fairfax blend into each other so seamlessly that it hardly makes a difference. At least to me.
That big area that looks like two Pac-Mans eating a diamond is Park La Brea. The big block south of Park La Brea with the highlighted green path through it is LACMA, the Tar Pits, and, now, The Academy Museum. I was going to write something about living in Park La Brea, but there isn’t much to say. It’s an apartment complex. The only notable aspects are certain amenities, its size, and its location.
Get on Fairfax Ave and walk north. The first locations of note are a few LA institutions. The first is The Farmer’s Market and The Grove, which are connected at the hip to each other. The former is a large outdoor food court made up of tiny restaurants, butcher stands, and produce sections. (It’s less of a mall style food court and more of a European style outdoor market. It’s getting less and less cool by the year as the asshole owners have driven a lot of the charm out, but that’s a rant for another time.) The latter is one of the more well-known outdoor malls. Also, on the other corner of that intersection, 3rd and Fairfax, is the WGA headquarters. Support your local screenwriters.
Presumably, The Grove is famous because of what’s just north of it, which is CBS Television City, a giant TV studio complex. (CBS actually sold it a few years ago, so I believe it’s just Television City now. But for most people, it will always be CBS Television City.) In the past, this is where they shot The Carol Burnett Show, The Jeffersons, and countless soap operas, talk shows, game shows, and anything in between. Currently, it’s where they shoot The Price is Right, The Late Late Show, and a few others.
When you walk past that, you get to the interesting part, as north of here is a bizarre combination of ingredients. The first is a heavy amount of Jewish influence. There’s a synagogue, The National Council of Jewish Women run a large thrift store and donation center across the street, and Canter’s, one of the most famous Jewish delis in Los Angeles. The second is a number of hip hop oriented clothing boutiques and flagship stores for streetware brands. Supreme (pretty much the largest of these kinds of brands) has a store there, as well as a HUF, DOPE, RIPNDIP, and man many others. (Another notable inclusion: GOLF WANG, the flagship store of Tyler, the Creator’s clothing line.) Most of the stores also feed into the skateboard culture of the area, as this neighborhood is also home to Diamond Supply Co., Brooklyn Projects, DDK, and more. (Note: I was not able to confirm if all these stores are still there, but they were when I was living in the area.)
I’m a huge hip hop fan, but I was never invested in the fashion brands. I was never a skater, but a part of me always wishes I was. (I’m a big Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater fan, at least.) I come from a Jewish lineage, but nobody in my family practices, or really even believes for that matter. I am at semi-arm’s length from all the elements of this neighborhood, yet when I used to walk these blocks, I loved soaking it all in. Supreme might not be my style, but at least there’s style to be found. The whole area feels alive in a way that most of Los Angeles simply doesn’t.
Even the areas south of Park La Brea aren’t immune from this feeling, the area we can refer to more properly as Miracle Mile, where the movie takes place. Let’s look at Fairfax and Wilshire as it is now, the intersection where Biggie was murdered and the location of Johnie’s Coffee Shop, the diner where Harry picks up the phone.
Let’s start with Johnie’s Coffee Shop, the diner located on the northwest corner of the intersection. That diner is no longer a diner, and as far as I can tell, hasn’t functioned as one for a long time. Johnie’s was declared a historical landmark in 2013. (I couldn’t find/access a pertinent LA Times article, but presumably, it has something to do with the building’s Googie style. It’s on some LA space-age architecture shit, essentially.) During the 2016 presidential election, the building was rented out by the Bernie Sanders campaign, and the building remains adorned in Sanders memorabilia. A rather depressing site now.
I never went into the building. In fact, for the record, I’ve never been inside any of the buildings in this intersection. But it certainly left an impression. I walked by this building during my junior year tenure in Los Angeles, and there was a sign on the building saying it was regularly available as a filming location. I’m used to seeing film crews all the time now, but I was there to study the industry and I’m still very much trying to break in. It was hard not to be swept up in it. That corny feeling that you’re a part of it, or at least very close by.
Across the street, in the northeast corner, is the Academy Museum, the movie museum ran by the organization that runs the Oscars. This museum only recently opened, so I haven’t visited it yet. But I’d like to, even if there’s an unmistakable feeling that the only reason the museum exists is to raise funds for the Academy. It’s also worth noting that the Academy Museum is located right next to LACMA (the Los Angeles County Museum of Art), which is itself located right next to the Tar Pits. (The locations in Miracle Mile are very close together, and I saw very little location trickery in the movie.)
In the southwest corner is a skyscraper belonging to National City Bank. Though that particular branch of the bank seems to closed, a notable inhabitant of that building is the Consulate General of Chile. You’d never know it from looking at the building. I didn’t even know it until I started doing research for this article. But it’s there.
Then, of course, in the southeast corner, is the Petersen Automotive Museum. It was here, at around 1:00 a.m. in the morning, that Biggie Smalls was shot to death in an SUV leaving the after-party of the 11th Soul Train Awards. He was 24 years old.
Miracle Mile, again, seems idyllic. When a family or a friend from out of town came to visit, we’d frequently start our day getting an egg and cheese boreka at Moishe’s Village in The Farmer’s Market, go look at the fossils in the museum at the Tar Pits, take in some art at LACMA, then get dinner in one of the restaurants in The Grove before catching a movie. Or maybe we’d go to Canter’s before checking out some of the stores in Fairfax. Or maybe if we really wanted feel like shit, we’d go to The Counter (located across the street from the Tar Pits) and customize ourselves some truly ridiculous burgers.
In fact, there’s plenty I didn’t cover here. There’s the El Rey Theatre, a concert venue I’ve been to once or twice. There’s SAG-AFTRA HQ, there’s Pan Pacific Park, there’s the ACE Gallery, and so much more. If the weather is perfect, which it frequently is in Los Angeles, and you take well to city life, then there are few better places to spend your day.
But this is also the place where one of my heroes was slain.
I see the potential of Miracle Mile. The sheer value, culturally speaking, of having all these elements so close to one another. If it was actually affordable to live there, it would be an urban paradise. But knowing what I know, I can’t help but also feel a certain level of unease whenever I’m there. A certain tension. A barely hidden well of madness and despair beneath all the pricy real estate and institutions of learning. We know what happened to Biggie on Fairfax and Wilshire. But if you go down the mental rabbit hole, you realize that this can’t be the only tragedy to have happened here. What trauma was inflicted on which actresses in Television City? What businesses were driven out so The Grove can stand? What horrors had to happen to make all this real estate so valuable in the first place?
The cheesy way to put it is that Miracle Mile feels haunted to me. Of course, the sad truth is that I could say something similar about many neighborhoods in many cities. (You can toss in the whole country too while we’re here.) But the ghost that haunts me personally belongs to Christopher Wallace, Notorious B.I.G., the man who played a huge hand in the revelation that I give a shit about art. He was gunned down a block south of where I used to live. He was just a kid.
Then I watched this very intersection get nuked in Miracle Mile. There’s even a shot that I’ve tastefully called the “Biggie’s Death Angle” shot.
Biggie was murdered to the left of this shot. The traffic light pole Harry and Julie are standing behind is the one that stopped Biggie’s car, allowing his murderers to catch up to him.
I’m a millennial. 30, to be precise. Thus the dot I’m probably supposed to connect here is between the violent paranoiac chaos of the last act of Miracle Mile and the sense of all-encompassing doom hanging over my entire generation’s head. I describe the shedding of societal trappings in the scenes where my former stomping grounds descend into brutality, then I compare that to the knot I get in my stomach every time I look at the news and feel the reminder of how fucked I am and how nothing I do will probably get to matter. The demons lurking in this movie’s subconscious and all that good stuff.
I did feel all of those things. How could I not?
On top of that, besides the probably forever prescience of the story, Miracle Mile is just a good ass movie! The script is lean and effective, the way it’s shot and assembled makes the desperation feel unrelenting, and despite not having a particularly high budget, I can’t help but feel a certain sense of scope to it. It is, to put it mildly, a very unnerving experience.
Yet, despite the obvious subtext, I didn’t think about the sword hanging over my head while I watched it.
Instead, I felt oddly seen. There are thousands of movies I can relate to about characters I can empathize with doing or saying things that make me feel things. But I don’t think there’s ever been a movie that’s felt like it’s infiltrated my brain as much as Miracle Mile. It looks at Wilshire and Fairfax and sees what I see. Not the wealthy institutions or the whiff of Hollywood, but the ugliness of humanity that swallows art. Of course, Biggie was murdered almost a decade after the movie came out. But it’s all I thought about while I watched Miracle Mile. One phrase kept crossing my mind. “It understands.”
It’s a strange movie to be comforted by, and I doubt I’ll have the same reaction to it should I watch it again. But it’s nice to know that you’re not alone.
