A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
Hollywood Forever Cemetery is running out of room, so it's expanding - not out, but up. Next month, they're formally opening a high-rise mausoleum. It'll provide space for thousands more interments. Steve Futterman took a visit.
KARIE BIBLE: Welcome to Hollywood Forever. My name is Karie. I'm the official in-house tour guide here.
STEVE FUTTERMAN: This graveyard sits in the middle of Hollywood, bordered by Paramount Studios in Santa Monica Boulevard. It looks much like a park, with green lawns, a few small lakes, and peacocks roaming among the monuments, memorials and grave sites. It's the final resting home for many legendary Hollywood figures. Karie Bible has been conducting weekend tours here for 20 years.
BIBLE: This is the grave of Hollywood legend Cecil B. DeMille, one of the great directors in Hollywood's golden age.
FUTTERMAN: Judy Garland's final resting spot is also here, along with silent-screen legend Rudolph Valentino, Chris Cornell of Soundgarden, and rock star Johnny Ramone. His grave site has a statue of Ramone playing his guitar. But several years ago, it became clear that Hollywood Forever was facing a very serious problem. It was running out of room.
TYLER CASSIDY: Just like any other city, this city of the dead has to build up to maximize space.
FUTTERMAN: That's co-owner Tyler Cassidy. His solution to the space problem is a five-story mausoleum.
This was necessary, right?
CASSIDY: This was necessary. We're in the middle of a giant metropolis.
FUTTERMAN: And Cassidy says without the money from the new burials, they wouldn't be able to maintain the rest of the historic cemetery. The vertical mausoleum is made of concrete, quartzite and marble with a brutalist design. And the architects built it to take advantage of its iconic location.
MICHAEL LEHRER: It's profoundly of Hollywood and Los Angeles.
FUTTERMAN: Michael Lehrer is one of the designers.
LEHRER: You've got 360 views - Hollywood sign, downtown. Today, I was up there. You can see the ocean.
FUTTERMAN: Ricardo Pentreath (ph) has already purchased his spot in the high-rise. His mother is buried in this cemetery. He wanted to be close to her. We visited his future resting place on the first floor.
RICARDO PENTREATH: Let's hope there is another 40, 50 years from now. I understand that this marble is from Brazil, and I love Brazil. It's very appealing. And, well, it's going to be easier to - when it's my time, to put me in.
FUTTERMAN: The problem Hollywood Forever has been facing with space isn't unique.
CARLTON BASMAJIAN: In particular major cities, where some of the historic cemeteries - they're essentially running out of room, and there's no chance to expand outward.
FUTTERMAN: Carlton Basmajian is a professor of urban planning at Iowa State University. He says that even though many people are now choosing less traditional alternatives like non-burial cremation...
BASMAJIAN: There's enough deaths and enough demand for these spaces that I think - starting to see this across the country at some level.
FUTTERMAN: Tyler Cassidy, the co-owner of Hollywood Forever, says he's been contacted by operators of other cemeteries who are looking at this high-rise as a possible solution they can use as well.
For NPR News, I'm Steve Futterman in Hollywood.
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