In 1982 Broadway's

once-elegant Los Angeles Theater sat in disrepair, its walls graffiti'd and its Baroque-style murals painted-over. Mayor Tom Bradley then asked

downtown real estate investor Ezat Delijani to do the city a slight

favor — buy the white elephant before its rendezvous with a wrecking ball.

Delijani, a fairly recent Iranian emigre, agreed, and five years later began restoring to its former glory what Gebard and Winter called “probably the finest theater building in Los Angeles.”  In time, Delijani's son, Michael, would go on to purchase the State, Palace and Tower theaters on Broadway, along with the Pacific Stock Exchange. (For a detailed profile of the family's holdings — including not-so-flattering past criticism by preservationists of the Delijanis' pace of restoration work — see Kathryn Maese's 2007 Downtown News piece.)

Today the elder Delijani, a civic leader and philanthropist, will receive a special honor as the city names the intersection of Seventh Street and Broadway, Ezat Delijani Square. City Councilman Jose Huizar will lead the ceremonies, which kick off at 2:30 p.m.

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