THE LOVE NEST: The Beverly Hills Hotel, California

THE PLAYERS: Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy

THE DISH: Hollywood's most legendary love affair took place on the palm-studded grounds of the Beverly Hills Hotel. The hotel, of course, served as a clubhouse for the elite during Hollywood's Golden Age, hosting everyone from Howard Hughes to Greta Garbo to W. C. Fields. Megastars Hepburn and Tracy, who met on the set of Woman of the Year and appeared in nine movies together, spent much of the 1940s and 1950s living like a married couple in Tracy's bungalow—despite the annoying fact that he was still legally married to his wife, who lived on their ranch in the Valley (and whom he never divorced). It was often tumultuous, as a biography of Hepburn by A. Scott Berg recalls: Tracy once struck the actress in front of other guests, and Hepburn slept in the hallway outside the bedroom after Tracy kicked her out. But generally life at the hotel seemed sunny: Hepburn took a tennis lesson at the hotel at 6 am nearly every day, and she famously jumped into the pool with her clothes on after one morning class. Tracy spent afternoons playing polo with friends at Will Rogers's nearby ranch before retiring for cocktails in what became known, on account of such activities, as the hotel's Polo Lounge. And you thought Lindsay and Britney's louche lives were unique.

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