Westwood Memorial Park
If you had to choose only one Hollywood cemetery to visit, Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park would be your best bet. It is a small, intimate park, where the stars' graves are fairly easily located (unlike the massive Forest Lawns), yet there are numerous major celebrities buried here.
It is also noted as the final resting place of many of Hollywood's young actresses who died tragically before their time.
Popular with the show biz crowd (especially since Marilyn was buried here), Pierce Brothers is tucked away on the south side of Wilshire Boulevard in Westwood, and its almost impossible to find without specific directions. It can't be reached from either the north, south or east sides - the only entrance is on the west side, from Glendon Avenue.
Ironically, this final resting place for Hollywood stars is located just a few steps away from the popular Avco movie theatre complex on Wilshire Boulevard. Movie-goers at the Avco wait patiently in long lines to see the newest summer blockbusters on the silver screen, most unaware that they are only a few yards away from some of the most famous stars in the history of Hollywood.
The Westwood Village Memorial Park is a very small, quiet, well-kept cemetery, with a single circular road which allows visitors to drive directly into the park. This road circles a grassy oval lawn where most of the stars are buried. To the south side of this grassy oval are offices; the northern and eastern borders of the park are lined by walls of outdoor crypts. (Refer to the map for exact locations.)
Since it's a small park, it's much easier to find a grave here than in a larger cemetery such as one of the Forest Lawns. But even so, you'd be surprised just how long you can wander around trying to locate a particular name if you don't know where to look.
Look around you here on any given day, and you'll see people doing just that - wandering about, heads down, trying to spot that one particular star's marker. Fortunately, you've come to the right website. I've put in the long hours needed to track down the stars for you. Here, you'll find a map of the park I've drawn up for you, as well as detailed directions to most of the stars' graves.
The grave of one of the most famous people buried at Westwood is also probably the easiest grave to find here: that of actress Natalie Wood (1938-1981). It is located just a bit northwest of the center of the main lawn, three or four rows south of a large tree. You can spot it easily enough, since several sizable flower pots and planters rest on and around the grave. People also tend to leave coins on her marker.
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