Second Act for the Temple of the Stars

Monica Almeida/The New York Times

The Byzantine dome of the Wilshire Boulevard Temple, built on the eve of the Depression, has been restored as part of a renovation and expansion project.

LOS ANGELES — It was known as the Temple of the Stars: a soaring sanctuary capped by a 100-foot-wide Byzantine dome, built by Hollywood moguls on the eve of the Depression and splashed with the kind of pizazz one might expect at a movie palace rather than a synagogue.

Monica Almeida/The New York Times

Rabbi Steven Z. Leder and Brenda Levin, the architect overseeing the project. "It's very much Hollywood," she said. "Every aspect of this room is theatrical."

But over the last 80 years, the Wilshire Boulevard Temple has become a monument to neglect, its handsome murals cracked, the gold-painted dome blackened by soot, the sanctuary dark and grim. A foot-long chunk of plaster crashed to the ground one night.

The congregation, too, has faded; while still vibrant and active, it has grown older, showing no signs of growth. This once proud symbol of religious life in Los Angeles seemed on the brink of becoming a victim of the steady ethnic churn of the city, as its neighborhood grew increasingly Korean and Hispanic and Jews moved to the west side.

But faced with the threat of extinction that has forced synagogues in other parts of the country to close or merge, Wilshire has responded with force: a $150 million program to restore the synagogue to its former grandeur and, in fact, make it even grander — extending the campus to fill a whole block and building a school and a social services center for the community. In the process, the synagogue is looking to reclaim its prominence in the civic order here.

It is by any measure a costly gamble — Jewish leaders said the $150 million is among the highest amounts ever spent on a synagogue renovation. And the renovation is in some ways jarring, coming at a moment when cuts in education and social services have rocked this state and taking place in a community that has at times been criticized for being short on philanthropy.

But the leaders of this synagogue, racing to open their new temple before the High Holy Days in September, said they had no other choice.

"I'm not going to sell this place," Steven Z. Leder, the senior rabbi, said as he led his almost daily show-off ritual of taking visitors to admire results slowly being revealed with the dismantling of scaffolding. "I'm not going to be the rabbi that turns this place into a church."

Risky or not, the renovation of such an admired building is heartening to Jewish leaders who have watched as other synagogues have faltered.

"I'm thrilled with what's going on at Wilshire," said Ron Wolfson, a professor at the American Jewish University here. "That's a spectacular building. They could have very easily moved west, they could have abandoned that building and sold it for who knows how many millions of dollars to some church. They didn't. I have to respect that."

To a considerable extent, the decision to invest on the future of this synagogue is an insight into the demographic rhythms of Los Angeles. For a long time, many of this city's Jews concentrated on the west side, in places like Westwood, Beverlywood, Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. But these days, many younger Jews are settling on the east side, in hip and handsome — and less expensive — neighborhoods like Los Feliz and Silver Lake.

Rabbi Leder, in recounting the demographic studies and debate that went into the decision, noted that two subway stops, part of this city's rapidly growing transit system, are within walking distance of the synagogue, raising the prospect that people would take a train to services.

Yet there are considerable obstacles. Jews might be moving back to the east side, but the Wilshire Boulevard Temple is in the heart of Koreatown, a good 15-minute drive from, say, Los Feliz. The sidewalks surrounding the temple are filled with Latinos and Koreans, a contrast with the many neighborhoods across Los Angeles where the streets on Friday night are filled with Jewish families headed for services.

Many synagogues across the nation are also struggling with declining attendance and membership. On a recent Saturday morning at Hollywood Temple Beth El, the very few people in attendance broke out in an anguished discussion about whether they would need to hire a choir for the approaching holidays because there were not enough congregants.

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