2166 Alcyona Drive 

2266 Alcyona Drive (originally 2264 Alcyona), built in 1925, by architect Harry McAfee, this 4-bedroom, 3-bathroom Spanish/Mediterranean villa retains its original 1920s grandeur while having been modernly updated.  A lofty foyer leads into a grand living room with a wood-burning fireplace and three sets of French doors opening to the hills.  The property sits on a double-sized lot (over 10,000 sq. ft.) featuring manicured grounds with orange, lemon, and avocado trees.It includes a formal dining room with a balcony and multiple stone patios with fountains for al fresco dining. The home is currently known as Casa Escalera, serving as a luxury vacation rental and high-end event space, highlighting its preserved "Old Hollywood" charm and scenic courtyard views. Casa Escalera" is Spanish for "Staircase House" or "House of the Stairs."

In 1929, after marrying actress Mary Astor, director Kenneth Hawks and she rented this house after they married at Moorcrest on Temple Hill Drive, the house of her parents.  They had purchased a home on Lookout Mountain before the end of the year.  Hawks was the younger brother of director Howard Hawks and rarely began his film career in 1926.  In January 2, 1930, he was filming "Such Men Are Dangerous" and was in one of two airplanes filming a scene off the coast of Redondo Beach near Rocky Point with some other crew members, when the two planes crashed into one another killing all 10 people that were in the planes.  He was one of the five bodies recovered in the ocean.  Astor was so upset, she did not return to 8803 Appian Way to retrieve any of her belongings and had the house sold immediately.

Paramount art director Travis Banton rented this house after the Hawks moved out in 1930.  Banton is best known for his long working relationships with director Josef von Sternberg and actress Marlene Dietrich and is considered one of the well known costume designers of the Golden Age.  After designing Mary Pickford's wedding dress when she married Douglas Fairbanks in 1924, Paramount put him under contract in Hollywood, designing gowns for Norma Talmade, Pola Negri, Clara Bow, Kay Francis, Lilyan Tashman, Mae West, and Claudette Colbert.  However, the gowns he designed for Carole Lombard are the memorable ones.  Below: Fairbanks & Pickford, Banton with Lombard, and Banton with actresses Adrienne Ames and Lilyan Tashman at a fashion home at his Notthingham Avenue home in 1933. 

Actor Robert Armstrong rented this house in 1934.  Armstrong is best known for his starring role in the original movie of "King Kong" in 1933 in which he played opposite Fay Wray and Bruce Cabot.  Beginning in the 1920s, Armstrong appeared in hundreds of character roles for Warner Brothers before making guest appearances in tv during the 1950s and 1960s.

Between 1938 and 1936, screenwriter Arthur Caesar resided here with his wife, Dora.  Romanian born Caesar started working in Hollywood in 1924 and won the academy award for Best Original Story for "Manhattan Melodrama" in 1934 starring Clark Gable, William Powell and Myrna Loy for MGM Studios.  However, this movie may be famous today because on July 22, 1934, gangster John Dillinger had just seen this film at the Biograph Theater in Chicago, when he was gunned down by Federal special agents.   In July 1937, Caesar was jailed for an intoxication charge after coming out of a nightclub near Hollywood Blvd. and Las Palmas Avenue.