The Florida Pool: MGM's Aquatic Stage
Near Lakeland, Florida
The shimmering pool you see here was not built for swimmers. It was built for Hollywood. In nineteen fifty-three, Cypress Gardens built this pool, shaped like the state of Florida, as a film set for the Esther Williams aquatic musical "Easy to Love."
Williams, the swimming sensation who anchored a string of MGM spectaculars through the late nineteen forties and fifties, filmed elaborate water-ballet sequences here at what is now Cypress Gardens. The pool weaves a slice of Polk County into the golden age of Hollywood musicals. Today the grounds survive as part of LEGOLAND Florida, but this pool remains, a quiet remnant of the era when the Silver Screen came to Central Florida before any theme park ever did.
