1.21 Gigawatt Fire Destroys Movie History
Monday, 2nd June 2008 by James Turnbull
Yesterday a large fire tore through the Universal Studios backlot, injuring 3 people and destroying numerous sets.
Thankfully no-one was seriously injured, but the fire did destroy a key piece of movie history: Courthouse Square.
Courthouse Square has been used in numerous films and TV shows, including Gremlins, Bruce Almighty, Knight Rider and, most recognisably, Back to the Future.
As you can see from the aerial shot, the square looks just like it did in the 1985 film, including the clock tower to the East of the square. Initial reports of the fire starting when the famous clock tower was struck by lightning have been denied.
"It looked like a disaster film" said Los Angeles City Councilman Tom LaBonge, which isn't surprising as most of Universal studios looks like a disaster film; scroll South a bit and there's the wreckage of a plane crash as featured in War of the Worlds.
More on the story from the BBC or explore more Back to the Future filming locations.
On Virgin Airlines they used to show War of the Worlds on the back of the seat entertainment system, but they had a disclaimer saying that it contained scenes of plane crashes which may distress some viewers… Made me laugh at the time.
Actually, this is not the original courthouse square. It was originally built for “To Kill a Mockingbird”, and the original was used for back to the future. However, the whole of courthouse square, except the courthouse, plus new york street and the sets from Ben Hur were completely destroyed in a fire in 1990 (set by a disgruntled security guard). The northern side of courthouse square was destroyed again in another fire in 1997. The unofficial Universal studio tour website has a nice summary of all the fires at the studios over the years.
http://www.thestudiotour.com/ush/backlot/fires.shtml
Don’t you mean 1.21 Jigawatt?
Some news reports made it seem as if the structures destroyed in the fire were actual buildings. They were nothing of the sort.
“…the square looks just like it did in the 1985 film….” – that’s what you call Back to the Past
I was a little distressed when I saw this post (in a “oh no, we lost a piece of hollywood history” way) , but seeing as they’ve rebuilt it before, I’m optimistic that they’ll rebuild again.
wasn’t there a fire there in the 90s sometime?
There was a fire that damaged Courthouse Square back on November 7,1990. I’m pretty sure that after that fire, the courthouse remained standing because it really was brick.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0CE6DE1F3CF93AA35752C1A966958260
@ Neill & Peter, thanks for the links, these facades look like they are very prone to fires!
@Paul, Yes I do mean “Jigawatts“!
I’m afraid I find it pretty hard to care – firstly because Hollywood churns out so much crap, but mainly because the “history” is widely available on DVD. What does it matter if the sets are destroyed? They were nowt but things of wood…