That Time I Went “Back to the Future”
Hello friend! Welcome back! (The the future. Har har) I’m happy you’re here!
So about a year ago I got to attend a Back to the Future themed birthday party. Sounds pretty fun, right? Want to make it even more fun? Try having your party in the same gymnasium in which the school dance was filmed! That’s exactly where we ended up going. Turns out the gymnasium is inside of Hollywood United Methodist Church just outside of the Hollywood strip. My friend was not a member of their church, but she did some basic research and found that they still celebrate the fact that a major part of Back to the Future was filmed there and rent out their gym for parties.
Not sure when this photo was taken, but it looks old and traffic is way too clear.
Now, parking isn’t very nice. The corner that the church sits on is a weird traffic intersection and if you miss your turn, you will have a difficult time getting back around the block to pass the church again. I don’t think it’s possible to turn left into their parking lot without getting into a traffic accident, so turning in from the right is likely the only way. (For my international friends, this might not make much sense of your standard is driving on the left whereas in this location, everyone drives on the right side side of the road.) And they closed down their parking lot on this night because parking near the strip is a nightmare and people will leave their cars for DAYS in parking lots like the church’s essentially making it impossible for the church’s community to park for services. So, street parking was what we had to do and of course, almost nothing was available. We circled the block a few times before something opened up. It ended up being several blocks away in a residential area.
Walking up to the church there are multiple doors and gates, so if you are hosting, make sure that you inform your guests which entrance to use and instruct them on how to get to the gym. Once inside we found ourselves in a lovely courtyard with few indications of where their gym space would be and ended up having to ask someone to point us the right way.
It’s pretty small but they probably needed fewer background actors because of it.
Upon entering the gym we found that it was a lot smaller than what it seemed like in the film. But it was beautifully decorated for the party. I found out that my friend didn’t have all that much to decorate with and that the church had all kinds of stuff for her to use. They even had “Enchantment Under the Sea” decorations to borrow that matched as closely as possible to the original set.
Around the walls were enlarged photos from the film. On stage they had a band set with props and costumes used for decoration and guests were encouraged to wander back stage and check out all the different corridors that scenes were shot in. We took photos with the phone and bloody rag that Marvin (played by wonderful Harry Walters, Jr.) wrapped his injured hand with during his phone call to his cousin regarding the “new sound” they were looking for.
This place is a delightful surprise hiding inside a church sitting in the middle of Los Angeles. I shouldn’t be surprised given that it’s Hollywood and there are fun film surprises everywhere in this city but often for films I don’t recognize straight away or need a deeper knowledge of silver screen classics. Back to the Future is an 80’s classic that I knew well and even had to study in college for one of my introductory film classes back in Michigan. So this party was a big treat for me.
If you are looking to have your own Back to the Future themed party and need an affordable venue, I would give Hollywood United Methodist Church a call. I looked over their website and I didn’t see anything pertaining to event hosting listed, and as I recall, my friend had to just call them directly and ask. Their website can be found here: https://hollywoodumc.org/
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I wish you well the week and I hope your Halloween season is going wonderfully this year! See you next week!
