Haunted Mansion, Banksy and Butt Cams

Haunted, or just cursed? Popular with satanists, criminal gangs and squatters for years, a mansion in the northwest corner of Runyon Canyon has become big news recently. Two weeks after Curbed LA profiled the then-$12.5 million dollar home, then the The New York Times has a story. The house was built 16 years ago, but "legal squabbles" have kept it from being sold and officially occupied since, making it rumor fodder for hikers who like to speculate that it's been long haunted.

Banksy watch: As anticipated, it appears the anonymous, Academy Award-nominated street artist has returned to Los Angeles ahead of the Oscar ceremony. Over the last week four or more walls or billboards have been artfully defaced in a style familar to Banksy. Some examples:

• A stenciled Crayola-machine gun toting kid in the alley behind Westwood's Urban Outfitters. Here's bad boy British chef Jamie Oliver posing next to it.
• Another stencil, this one of a girl with a sledgehammer, in front of Golden Apple Comic on Melrose near LaBrea.
• A peeing dog near the Beverly Hills Community Recreation Center.
• A pyromaniac Charlie Brown on Sunset across from Pink Dot (*UPDATE: the one put up for sale on eBay is considered a fake by Melrose & Fairfax).
• A Mickey and Minnie style hijacking of a Sunset Strip billboard (since removed over the objections of the advertiser, who wanted to keep it up).

All of these links go to the blog Melrose and Fairfax, which has been on top of Banksy's L.A. art spree from day one.

(Note: photographer Ted Soqui incorrectly identifies a popular piece on Broadway in Downtown L.A. as new. This one has been in place for at least the last two years.)

And the medical findings goes to: In other Academy Awards news, the UCLA Stroke Center unveiled a report on "the frequency and impact of stroke among best actor and best actress Oscar nominees from 1927 through 2009." Among the findings: 7.3 percent suffered strokes, and 9.5 percent suffered heart attacks; the average age of nominees at their first stroke was 67; and 60 percent of the victims were women. Among the nominees and winners it included are Elizabeth Taylor, Kirk Douglas and Sharon Stone. [Kansas City Infozine]

Dinner at P-p-p-pickford: Kings Speech fans take note: Bizarre L.A. dredged up some old breaking news that Prince George dropped in for a nice dinner with Charlie Chaplin, Greta Garbo and Gloria Swanson, hosted by Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford. The year was 1928. 

Gothic and Gorey: Start strapping on your corsets, ironing out your velvet jackets, and, for the future-retro nerds, building your steampunk contraptions. The Edwardian Ball comes to the Music Box Theatre on March 5. 

Butt choo lookin' at? Over on YouTube, New Zealand transplants Jessie and Reanin equipped spycams on their bottoms and wandered Los Angeles, including Hollywood & Highland, to catch assorted male and female butt watchers in the act.

Don't call me Shirley: Blogger Alan Plavik at Just Above Sunset complains that if you're from or live in Hollywood, people don't take you seriously.

CD 4 tidbits: The Daily News endorses Stephen Box for City Council, though it warns he's going to need to become a more polished speaker if he wants a chance to win. Tom LaBonge, the sitting councilman running for a third term, is the clear front-runner in The City Maven's online poll asking, "Who Is the Most Passionately In Love With Los Angeles?" Tomas O'Grady, a third candidate, hasn't updated his campaign blog in more than a week.