"I like seeing movies at the ArcLight because there's such a big selection, but I prefer the big older theaters because they're almost gone in New York."

"I'm not really interested in the latest hotspot. Ny friends can drag me to a club like Hyde because I do have to go out--I'm single--but I prefer dinner at a place like Dan Tana's. I'm a sucker for old Hollywood.

"I love places like Laguna Beach and Topanga Canyon where the hippies hung out. This place has a wonderful patio and a hippie/health-food vibe, but it's also very elegant."

Hollywood Billiards is a glorious name brand in the dank religion of L.A. pool. Film mogul Louis B. Mayer opened the place on the corner of Hollywood and Western in 1916 and, the old-timers say, it was glorious in its bleak austerity.

It was in reality nothing more than a dark basement choked with cigarette smoke and chalk dust, but it was also a way station for every pool pro who mattered for decades. Then the earth moved.

In January 1994, the Northridge earthquake brought the roof down and the grand old pit of a place was shuttered. The franchise was moved to a new location.

Now it's a huge purple building -- a shade usually reserved for strip clubs or singing dinosaurs -- and it's across from a Pier One. The menu has a nice Cobb salad and crème brûlée, and there is valet service and a digital jukebox.

None of this is to slight the place. The service was very good, the tables (32 tournament-sized, spread over two floors, with table rates from $12 to $17 per hour depending on day and time) are gorgeous, and the manager I spoke to, a pleasant fellow named John Fisher, was candid about the jump shot between past and present.

"People like to say the original was seedy and that the greats all came to play there, and they say it was amazing," Fisher said. "Obviously, we're catering more to today's crowd." Apparently most of today's crowd wants the NFL on big television screens while they play, as well as blaring classic rock.

The place still gets plenty of solo players working on their craft, and I chatted with one who would offer only his first name, Peter, and say that he was a 56-year-old Detroit native who made some good cash with the stick.

He waxed about the place's original venue ("Everybody," he said, "was comfortable; it was nothing fancy but it was special. It was like walking into a different world") and then gave a sideways stare when asked about the mystique of the game.

"The game is simple. It's a matter of discipline; you have to hold your technique in place. It's all about your game; sometimes the other guy doesn't matter."