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That Time I Almost Got Arrested for Touching Kubrick’s Typewriter
“I came for Kubrick. I stayed for the typewriter. I left before being cuffed. A love letter to a forbidden moment at the Stanley Kubrick Exhibit in LA.”
The Shining Twins Costumes - Kubrick Exhibit at LACMA
Stanley, Forgive Me
Los Angeles has a funny way of reminding you that you’re nobody.
You’ll be standing at a crosswalk beside a man with twelve million followers who only eats blueberries on camera.
Or you’ll stop for a coffee and realize the barista used to be on Riverdale.
Me? I was just riding down Wilshire, hot, over-caffeinated, and trying to remember if I’d paid my phone bill—when I saw it:
THE STANLEY KUBRICK EXHIBITION.
My hands turned the handlebars before my brain caught up.
Now, I don’t know what it says about me that I walked into a shrine to one of the greatest visual tacticians of the 20th century wearing dusty jeans and a helmet under my arm like I was delivering Postmates—but there I was, pretending to be calm, pretending I didn’t want to touch everything.
And then—there it was.
The typewriter.
That typewriter.
No plexiglass. No ropes. Just sitting there.
Like it had been waiting for me.
I didn’t even mean to touch it.
My fingers just… drifted.
Like they were trying to finish a sentence he never wrote.
Adler Typewriter from The Shining - Kubrick Prop Exhibit
All Work and No Play Prop Page - The Shining Exhibit
And that’s when the guard appeared.
Not running. Not yelling.
Just standing two feet away, suddenly very aware of how real this object was.
“Sir, you cannot touch the artifacts.”
The phrase “the artifacts” hit me like a religious slur. I backed away with the shame of a teenager who’d just been caught sniffing their crush’s hoodie.
I didn’t get kicked out.
But I did spend the rest of the exhibit with my hands in my pockets like I was visiting an ex’s parents.
And yet… something about that moment felt right.
Because Kubrick’s whole deal was control.
He lit a single candle for three hours to get the shadow right in Barry Lyndon.
He reshot a hallway scene 127 times.
And here I was—some dusty, unplanned, imperfect visitor—leaving fingerprints where I shouldn’t have.
I think he would’ve hated it.
Which is exactly why I loved it.
Ballroom Photo from The Shining - Kubrick Exhibit Piece
Clockwork Orange Costume Display - Kubrick LACMA 2013
Clockwork Orange Sculpture Props - Kubrick Exhibit
Kubrick's Mitchell BNC 35mm Camera - LACMA Exhibit 2013
Stanley Kubrick A Cam - Mitchell BNC Focus Detail
Born to Kill Helmet - Full Metal Jacket Exhibit
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