Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was the last major animation studio to dip its corporate toe into the iswimming pool of
the restaurant industry. Studio founders Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising had been reluctant to make the plunge, despite
the fact that they’d enjoyed success in the grocery business with their 24-store “Bosko’s Superette” chain.
roducer Fred Quimby, however, was another story entirely. Quimby, a man legendary throughout the industry for
his utter lack of interest in animation, was intrigued by the possibilities of the restaurant field; he envisioned
a dining establishment that would display the same high quality and plush feel that MGM’s movies were famous for.
His enthusiasm proved infectious, and soon the whole cartoon studio’s staff joined in. Bill Hanna planned the menu
while Joe Barbera fussed over linen patterns and stemware choices; Tex Avery, who had just come over from Warner’s,
arrived with his enviable recipe file and extensive contacts with Southern California butchers and produce wholesalers.
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“Zesty, Aren‘t They?”
Famed animator Tex “Fred” Avery offers a heaping platter of his
latest club sandwich creations to MGM starlets (from left) Yvonne D’Irigible, Rita Hayworth lookalike Lizbeth Lesterbridge,
and Lolly Madison. The notoriously close-mouthed Avery took the secret of his mayonnaise dressing’s extra zing
to his grave. |
Opening in early 1943 on Rodeo Drive, the studio’s restaurant was simply called MGM. (Word around town variously
had it that the acronym stood for Mostly Good Meatloaf or Many Gelatin Molds.) Quimby had outdone himself: MGM
was perhaps the swankiest bistro of its time. Diners sat at thrones produced by the same company that built them
for the Royal Family of Great Britain, and just about everything from the cutlery to the toothpicks to the towering
statues of Tom and Jerry was made of 18K gold. The shag carpets in the restrooms were so deep that children and
midgets weren’t allowed to enter without an accompanying tall person. To circumvent wartime meat shortages, Quimby
bred cattle aboard an airplane that slowly circled the restaurant, parachuting them down as needed.
It was all terribly impressive, but there was just one problem — nobody was there to be impressed by it. The market
for animation-themed restaurants was saturated. Jack Benny, Charles Lindbergh, and Greta Garbo, for instance, were
already habitués of Walt’s, while Bette Davis, Mickey Rooney, and Father Coughlin favored Berrie Medleys.
Major Bowes and Gene Autry were regulars at the Woodpecker Ranch, and several lesser-known stars were oft-seen
at Van Beuren’s Snackville (a restaurant not discussed in this article because nothing is known about it). Similarly,
east-coast celebrities such as Eddie Cantor and the Lunts tended to dine at Popeye’s Burger Palace (formerly Fleischer’s
Famous Foods) or the Terry-Mat. Non-celebrity eaters quite naturally gravitated to where their favorite stars ate.
As a result, MGM was deserted for weeks, with a distraught Quimby weeping piteously at a table, surrounding by
rotting food, while employees ranging from Scott Bradley to Irv Spence attempted, in vain, to console the morose
animation baron.
Eventually, someone — reports differ as to whether it was Preston Blair or Michael Lah — came up with an ingenious
solution to the dilemma. MGM became perhaps the first restaurant in history that paid people to eat there. The
menu remained the same, but the prices indicated were what the restaurant paid you — fees ranged from fifteen cents
for downing a bowl of split pea soup to five dollars and twenty cents if you consumed the 72-ounce sirloin. Naturally,
all this was done circumspectly, without Quimby’s knowledge.
It worked. The restaurant’s business picked up rapidly, especially with MGM contract players, whom the studio bussed
out in droves from its production facilities. A much-relieved Fred Quimby came out of his funk, and all was well.
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