I know they are its just for a start i've never been to ripleys in Orlando and i've always wanted too and the malls are a must seeing astho the $-£ is SOOOO good !!
I think those of us who have seen what Hollywood and the urban areas around the Los Angeles core are like are just trying to gently persuade you to find other options. The real business of "Hollywood" is done in sprawling studio complexes that are no longer in the city limits of Hollywood. Hollywood has been trying very hard to undergo urban renewal and clean up its dirty streets, but they've been doing that with false starts for 25 years now and while there are nice new gems available to visit, overall it's still not a very pleasant environment.
I would hate to have a foreign tourist come all the way to America to see glamorous Hollywood, check in to a hotel on Hollywood Boulevard, and then look out the window and say
"This place is dirty and gross and nothing like the movies!". 
We're just trying to steer you towards the stuff that won't disapoint you.
That said, I think a tourist who has never been to SoCal should see Hollywood at least once, and there are sights that even a local like myself enjoys seeing every once in awhile. Your desire to at least visit Hollywood has merit. When I drive on the Hollywood Freeway once or twice a year I do strain my neck to get a glimpse of the Capitol Records Building, only because its such a fun and famous building. But I think you could "see" all of these things in one afternoon. You stand on the sidewalk, look at the Capitol Records Building, smile and say how happy you are to see it, take a picture, tell the street bum staggering by that you don't have any change, and then walk quickly two blocks down to do the same thing at Grauman's Chinese Theater. The basic Hollywood sightseeing tour can be done in one afternoon.
As for actual working movie studios, there is of course Universal Studios. It's a real working studio with a very legit tram tour which started in its present form in 1964. The tram tour is the big highlight of the Universal Studios tour. It takes about an hour and goes past real sound stages and exterior sets. Try to visit on a weekday when there is more activity going on around the lot than on a weekend. There is also all of the attached theme park type stuff which is also fun. But unlike the Orlando version of Universal, the Hollywood version is really a working studio with legitimate work taking place all around you. It's very fun.
If real working movie studios are your interest, you might also want to look into the
Warner Brothers VIP Tour. There's no theme park rides involved, and it's a much smaller scale tour on a little electric golf cart carrying 10 people instead of a massive tram carrying 250 people. But it really gets you into the working insides of a real "Hollywood" movie studio.
http://www2.warnerbros.com/vipstudiotour/ It's not in Hollywood though, it's in Burbank where all of the major studios now are. Warner Brothers is located smack dab between Universal Studios and the Walt Disney Studios. You may be in Burbank, but you are really in the middle of 21st century "Hollywood", and that can be exciting just to be there.
As for shopping.... so it's more an issue of taking advantage of the favorable exchange rates than seeing a mid-sized mall like the Beverly Center?
Have you thought of visiting the largest mall in Southern California, and one of the most noted malls in America, that just happens to be a 15 minute drive from Disneyland? It's massive with 280 stores and it's called
South Coast Plaza. It has every expensive store you can imagine, many of which are the biggest SoCal Flagship stores for their companies;
Chanel, Hugo Boss, Versace, Armani, Burberry, Dolce & Gabbana, Donna Karen, Fendi, Gucci, Hermes, Louis Vuitton, Cavalli, Ferragamo, St. John, Valentino, Ted Baker, Yves St. Laurent etc., etc. all have their own stylish stores at South Coast Plaza. Plus you have all the usual upscale American offerings and big department stores like
Saks, Nordstrom, and a massive new
Bloomingdales. The
Tiffany & Co. location there is more lavish than the stores in Los Angeles, and there was just a story in the newspaper about how the huge Tiffany's at
South Coast now outsells the smaller Tiffany's stores in Los Angeles, Bevery Hills or San Francisco.
There is a second part to the mall across the street, connected by a sky bridge, that has a home mall with home furnishing stores; a giant
Crate & Barrel, Macy's Home Store, etc. There are people from Japan and China that visit only South Coast Plaza for a few days just to shop, and the website has all sorts of information for visitors coming to the mall from overseas. Obviously there are lots of fancy restaurants, entertainment, and other amenities in and around the mall area besides all of the shopping. If you or your group wants a classic American steak, there is a great
Morton's of Chicago at South Coast that I highly recommend. There are two separate
H&M stores, the trendy Swedish fashion stores, at South Coast Plaza. One
H&M is a big version of their normal stores, and the second
H&M near Bloomingdales only carries their couture and very limited clothing releases that only appear in their stores in New York, London, Stockholm..... and
South Coast Plaza.
http://www.southcoastplaza.com
That could be your one stop shopping location to take advantage of the great exchange rates. Plus, you can't get more Southern Californian and more American than a giant trendy mall in the suburbs of upscale Orange County. You'll know you aren't in Yorkshire anymore, that's for sure.
