Episode 24: Life, Death, Ego and Eternity

The original Forest Lawn Memorial Park, in the hills above Glendale, may be best known outside California for inspiring the sledgehammer satire of the 1965 cult comedy “The Loved One.” For tourists and curiosity-seekers, it’s the gonzo life’s work of Hubert Eaton, who memorialized himself as The Builder in the park’s every corner. For the families of the people interred there, though, it’s something more, and harder to joke away: A place of their own, green and quiet, and eternity-adjacent.

Take a video tour of Forest Lawn.

MUSIC:

The Builder

Thanks to Adam Papagan, Adrian Glick Kudler (whose excellent story “Los Angeles Is Killing Us” is here) and Elizabeth Harper.