Newport’s Hollywood ties

As Hollywood’s “It” girls and guys tread the famed red carpet at the 78th annual Academy Awards tonight in Los Angeles, there’s no need for Newport Beach to feel left out.

This seaside enclave, some 50 miles from the epicenter of the movie biz, has a star-studded past worth boasting about.

For some of Hollywood’s most legendary names, Newport Beach was an old stomping ground, and for a few stars, Newport was a place to grow roots.

Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall kept a boat in Newport Harbor. Jane Russell and Gloria Swanson hung out at the Balboa Bay Club. Joey Bishop, the last surviving member of the Rat Pack, still lives on Lido Isle. And, of course, Orange County’s favorite cowboy, John Wayne, called Newport Beach home for 15 years.

After World War II, the newly-dredged Newport Harbor was alluring to the nautically inclined Hollywood set. People came here to make use of the boating facilities, said Dan Marcheano, owner of the Arches, the Newport Beach restaurant notoriously frequented by the Tinsel Town elite.

Authors Bert Minshall and Clark Sharon wrote about John Wayne’s love affair with his boat in their 1992 “On Board With the Duke.”

Wayne kept his ex-Navy boat, Wild Goose, berthed at the Lido Yacht Anchorage. Wild Goose was known as one of the biggest boats in Newport Harbor, according to the book.

Wayne’s ties to Newport go back to the 1920s, when he body-boarded off Balboa Peninsula while he was a student at USC. He also went to dances at the historic Balboa Pavilion, according to the book.

Wayne and his family bought a home on Bayshore Drive, and while it was being remodeled, they lived at the Newporter Inn, according to the book. Wayne lived here for 15 years; his wife, Pilar Wayne, and several of his children still call Newport Beach home.

Wayne wasn’t the only one who liked Newport enough to stick around. Funnyman and talk show host Joey Bishop has lived in Newport Beach since 1971.

He arrived here by chance. Returning to the Los Angeles area from a boat trip to San Diego, a storm forced him and his wife Sylvia to stay over in Newport Harbor.

The morning after the storm, Sylvia Bishop spotted several lots being developed on nearby Lido Isle and went to check it out. She returned and announced to her husband that she had purchased a lot.

They built a home on Lido Isle, and Joey Bishop, now 88, has lived there for 35 years. He also kept his boats, Son of a Gun I and Son of a Gun II, in the harbor.

“It was a very nice place to be,” Bishop said Thursday by phone. “I loved the water in front of the house.”

If Newport Beach wasn’t a home base for the Hollywood set, it was certainly a hangout. Bogey used to sit at the end of the bar at the Arches restaurant; nobody really bothered him, Marcheano said.

Inside the Arches, a piece of artwork depicts the restaurant’s celebrity clientele. John Wayne, Howard Hughes, Humphrey Bogart, Bob Hope and Marilyn Monroe are just a few of the restaurant’s famous patrons, Marcheano said.

“The whole Rat Pack has been in here,” Marcheano said. Over the years, he’s heard the celebrity stories from many customers. “The old timers knew them all.”

Back when the Arches was a cafe, Hughes used to come in all the time.

“If everything went well and he was in a good mood, he left a penny tip,” Marcheano said of the finicky aerospace entrepreneur.

For movie producers, Newport Beach provided a natural film set that looked like the tropics without the need to leave the states. In the early 1900s, Balboa Peninsula and Corona del Mar were used as a backdrop for Buster Keaton movies, said Newport Beach historian Gay Wassall-Kelly.

Crystal Cove’s historic cottages were virtually born out of interest from the film industry, said Crystal Cove Alliance founder Laura Davick. Grasping the opportunity to recreate Polynesia in Southern California, moviemakers filmed black-and-white pictures at Crystal Cove in the early 1900s.

“That’s really what brought the first people down to Crystal Cove,” Davick said.

The isolated and remote nature of the Cove created an exotic feeling, Davick said. Some of the cottages were even built as film sets.

The most famous Crystal Cove connection to Hollywood is the Beaches cottage ? so named after the Bette Midler movie that was filmed there in 1988.

Davick, who spent her childhood in a Crystal Cove cottage, doesn’t remember many celebrities living there. She does, however, recall John Wayne visiting often. Being a little girl, Davick was less interested in the Duke than her mother was, she said.

As Hollywood changed and the areas around it began to burgeon with development, most of the stars abandoned Newport for communities like Santa Monica, Newport Beach resident Wassall-Kelly said.

“Even with the freeways, it became too long to get back home or to the studios,” Wassall-Kelly said.

Newport’s celebrity appeal isn’t reserved for the old Hollywood greats ? at least one star just bought a house here and others are rumored to be looking. Actor Nicolas Cage bought the home next door to the old John Wayne house three months ago.

In February, rumors flew around town that actor and director George Clooney might have bought on place on the harbor. The rumor wasn’t confirmed. dpt.05-sunday-1-CPhotoInfoCA1OKEUN20060305ivl8rjknDON LEACH / DAILY PILOT(LA)Two women enjoy the booth under a popular painting at the Arches. It depicts Hollywood stars John Wayne, Bob Hope, Marilyn Monroe and others. dpt.05-sunday-2-CPhotoInfoCA1OKEUQ20060305ivl8rwknMARK DUSTIN / DAILY PILOT(LA)John Wayne’s grave is in Pacific View Memorial Park in Corona del Mar.