Last week I did something that I am almost too ashamed to admit to on this forum. I, Lindsay Blake of iamnotastalker.com, actually spent about two hours searching for a filming location that I – are you sitting down for this – HAD ALREADY FOUND! LOL LOL LOL I’m not kidding!!!! I guess I truly am a blonde! Ever since fellow stalker Owen tracked down the Griswold house from fave movie National Lampoon’s Vacation, I have wanted to find the mansion which stood in for Clark’s boss, Frank Shirley’s, house in the movie’s 1989 sequel Christmas Vacation. So, last week, I sat down at my computer on a mission to do just that. But unbeknownst to me, it seems I already had!
My first stalking step was to pop in my Christmas Vacation DVD and skip forward to the scene when Cousin Eddie shows up with his RV at Frank Shirley’s Chicago area manison on Christmas Eve night and kidnaps him – an idea he gets after hearing Clark’s HILARIOUS “last minute gift ideas” rant. LOL LOL LOL
As soon as the mansion came into view on my computer screen I realized that it looked extremely familiar. My first thought was that it might be located in the Pasadena area and that the reason it looked familiar was because I had driven by it regulary on my way to and from home. The more I watched the scene, the more I kept thinking to myself, “Man, I KNOW that house!” I spent the next couple of hours on Google Map’s Street View, looking up and down all the streets I frequent on a regular basis. I also spent quite a bit of time researching behind-the-scenes information on the movie. Then, just as I was about to go completely crazy, it hit me! Not only had I stalked the Christmas Vacation mansion before, but I had even BLOGGED ABOUT IT! LOL LOL LOL What an airhead I am!
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It turns out that the Christmas Vacation house is actually the Mansion Bel Aire which I stalked last May while on the hunt for the Fresh Prince of Bel Air house. The Mansion Bel Aire was built in 1922 by prominent Glendale area businessman Mattison Boyd Jones and was also used in the Aaron Spelling TV series Flamingo Road. According to Zillow, the house sits on over one and a half acres and measures a whopping 5,698 square feet! The mansion is truly amazing to see in person and I highly recommend stalking it – preferably during the month of October, as the owners apparently really do the place up for Halloween. Mansion Bel Aire has been nominated for a City of Glendale Halloween Spirit Award for several years in a row now. You can bet I am going to be dragging my fiance out to stalk it once again come October! 🙂 Personally I think they should do the place up for Christmas, too! Bring in fake snow ala how it looked in Christmas Vacation! Can you imagine how cool that would have been to see being filmed?!?!
Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂
Stalk It: The Christmas Vacation mansion, aka Mansion Bel Aire, is located at 727 West Kenneth Road in Glendale.
I thought it was Graceland at first!
I think this house was also used for exterior shots for Graceland in Elvis And Me.
I am so excited to read these replies. Mary Rogers owned this home in the very early 60s as well as the Feldman family it was that early time when I was in third grade when our home on Virginia Avenue down the street was being remodeled, and Mary Rogers invited our family to live there for a few months while she was in Europe. Mary Rogers was a wealthy woman and my father James Taylor was her financial advisor.The Feldman family who owned a local Glendale appliance business through a huge turn of the century party back in the day where all the women arrived in huge hoop skirts and all the men decked out and everyone arrived in carriages it was amazing! I know every single inch of that house top and bottom like the back of my hand and I still have dreams about that home that I shall never forget! I give anything to go back and go inside and relive everything. I don’t know if it’s been remodeled or not but square foot per inch I can remember every single bit of that house inside and out.
What a joy to relive this! I welcome anyone to contact me, what a blast!
Aloha from Hawaii, Robin Taylor Lang.
I love that I came across this website! This home was actually built by my great-great grandfather/grandmother. My grandmother spent her summers here and resided there during her college years. While I have never seen this house, I plan to before this year is over! This is an amazing part of my family history and so enjoy that it is still relevant today!
How wonderful to read this! I am in all of this home and history and where I grew up in Glendale California. I hope it’s a happy family there now as well
I actually lived in this house for about 6 years. I was living here during the time of the filming of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, the fake snow was awesome and my mom let my sister and I skip school the next day and “play in the snow.” It was fun when I was little living in such a big house, with all of the different shows being filmed there. The best part was getting to raid the catering truck in the back and mingling with all of the actors and actresses. Do you remeber the show Rags to Riches? They filmed that there too…it was a good show! Just wanted to share! Happy Stalking!
I lived there too!!!!! Way back in the very early 60s when I was in third grade! The front yard used to have two rows of cascading very tall eucalyptus trees lining up to the front door, it was spectacular!
Hi Lindsay, I thought you might like to know (if you did not already) that this house was also on the night time soap Emeral Point, N.A.S. with Sela Ward as one of the main characters. I have loved the house ever since the days it was featured on Flamingo Road. However, my all time MUST SEE is Filoli in Redwood City/Woodside, CA better known as the Carrington Mansion from Dynasty. Happy stalking!!
Darien