Katherine Heigl’s Apartment Building from “The Ugly Truth”

A few months back I received an email from a woman named Marilyn (love it!) who wanted to know if I could track down the apartment building where Katherine Heigl lived in the 2009 romantic comedy The Ugly Truth.  But because I am not a big Katherine Heigl fan – I just think the girl has entirely too much to say about . . . well, everything – I had yet to see the movie and didn’t really plan on doing so.  So, I enlisted the help of fellow stalker Owen in tracking this location down and, even though he had yet to see the movie either, he found the place in record time!  Thank you, Owen!  🙂  But then a funny thing happened.  Once Owen gave me the address and I started looking at aerial views of the building via Google maps, I became more and more intrigued by it until I finally broke down and rented The Ugly Truth.  And you know what? I absolutely LOVED it!  In fact, I watched it twice!!  🙂  The Ugly Truth is cute and funny and both Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler are fabulous in it!  Although, truth be told, I’m not sure if I liked the flick because it was actually a good movie or because my expectations were so incredibly low that I couldn’t help but be pleasantly surprised while watching.  Either way, I truly enjoyed The Ugly Truth and my opinion of its leading lady couldn’t help but be improved after watching it.  🙂  So, once I had seen the movie, I, of course, just had to drag my fiancé out to stalk the building where Katherine Heigl’s character lived.

In The Ugly Truth, Katherine Heigl’s character “Abby” supposedly lives in the Sacramento area.  But in real life, her Mediterranean-style complex, which is named “El Mirador”, is located a good 380 miles south of the state capital in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles.  El Mirador, which is not to be confused with the famous El Mirador apartment building in West Hollywood, was built in 1936 and consists of several privately owned townhomes.  The complex is truly charming in person and I absolutely fell in love with the place.  Although I must say I am rather surprised that it was chosen to masquerade as a Sacramento area residence in The Ugly Truth, as, to me, the place just screams Southern California.  The Ugly Truth complex is actually very reminiscent of both Le Borghese Apartments from the movie Mulholland Drive and the El Cabrillo Apartments from ‘Til There Was You and the television series Chuck.  In fact, El Mirador is such a typical L.A. area courtyard building that I can’t imagine it existing anywhere else.  But, then again, being that I haven’t spent all that much time in Sacramento, maybe there are similar style buildings located there, as well. 

Sadly, not much of El Mirador can be seen from the street thanks to a large grove of trees planted along the perimeter of the property.  But thankfully there is a little window in the complex’s front gate, through which I was able to take the pictures you see in the this post.  🙂

After I sent Marilyn the address of The Ugly Truth building, she sent me back the images pictured above from a Craig’s List posting she had stumbled upon advertising the rental of one of the El Mirador Townhomes.  As you can see in the photos, while the interior of Katherine’s apartment in the flick was actually just a set built on a studio soundstage, it was, in fact, modeled after the real life interiors of the El Mirador.  🙂  So darn cool! 

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Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location and to Marilyn for sending me the Craig’s List images!  🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  🙂

Stalk It: Katherine Heigl’s apartment building from The Ugly Truth is located at 1930 Rodney Drive in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles.