The John Ferraro Building

I was recently interviewed for an exciting new project (more details to come) and in my talks with producers beforehand was asked if I had any ideas about where the interview could take place.  They were hoping to meet up at a filming location that I felt best represented the spirt of L.A.  I didn’t hesitate in my answer – the John Ferraro Building.  The strikingly gorgeous structure is not only an onscreen stalwart and an icon of Los Angeles architecture, but it uniquely serves as both a notable part of the city skyline and one of the best places to view it.  I have covered the place countless times on my site – in a 2010 post, on My Must-Stalk List, in the “See” section of my 2015 Guide to L.A., to name a few – as well as for other entities, including my article on the Top 10 Science Fiction Locations for Discover Los Angeles and a blurb about must-see locales for the September 2018 issue of Los Angeles magazine.  My love for the John Ferraro Building is prolific.  While walking the perimeter of the property prior to my interview last week, I realized that in all my chronicling of it, I had yet to do a deep dive into its vast filming history, so I thought it only appropriate to amend that.

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Designed in 1965 by A.C. Martin & Associates, the Modernist/Corporate International-style structure was “green” before being green was even a thing.  Built to house the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP), the architecture firm innovatively incorporated both elements into the design in the most unique way.

The building, which features concrete slabs cantilevered between towering glass walls, boasts specially-built ceilings on each of its 17 floors that absorb heat from the lighting system, helping to keep the property warm during cooler temperatures (yes, L.A. does get some of those) and at night.

As for water, the dramatic structure sits atop a 625 x 350-foot moat-like reflecting pool containing 2-million gallons of the stuff, portions of which are pumped through the HVAC system to cool the interior, essentially carrying 1/3 of the entire air conditioning load.

The pool and its eight fountains also make for some incredible views, the likes of which can’t be found anywhere else in the city.

I mean, come on!

I challenge you to find a prettier spot in all of L.A.

Last one, I promise.

Originally known as the DWP’s General Office Building (GOB), the property was renamed the John Ferraro Building in 2000 in honor of L.A.’s longest-serving city councilman.

The distinctive 287-foot-tall site is Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #1022.

Most of my photos in this post come from past visits to the LADWP.  While we were there last week, the site was undergoing some sort of maintenance and the typically stunning reflecting pool was dry and the plentiful fountains shut off, as you can see below.

Despite this fact, the building was still dazzling to look at.

Considering LADWP’s beauty, it is no surprise that the place is a frequent film star.  What is surprising is all of the misinformation about its various cameos floating around online.  But more on that in a bit.

Robert Neville (Charlton Heston) jogs around the building in the 1971 Sci-Fi classic The Omega Man.

Jerry Landers (John Denver) gets interviewed by God (George Burns) at the LADWP, which is said to be located at 1600 Hope Street, in the 1977 comedy Oh, God!, though not much of the building is shown in the scene.

The property portrays a courthouse, where the two young winners of a traffic safety essay contest are interviewed – and mistakenly kidnapped – in the Season 3 episode of CHiPs titled “Kidnap,” which aired in 1980.

Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) explains to Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) what a Terminator is in the building’s parking garage in 1984’s The Terminator.  It is the rear side of the parking lot, on 1st Street, that Reese drives in and out of in the scene.

In the Season 7 episode of The X-Files titled “All Things,” which aired in 2000, the John Ferraro Building masks as the exterior of Washington National Hospital, where Dana Scully’s (Gillian Anderson) former professor is being treated.

John Hancock (Will Smith) holds a news conference at the LADWP to announce that he is heading to prison in the 2008 action flick Hancock.

The site appeared regularly as FBI Headquarters on the short-lived television series FlashForward, which debuted in 2009.

During the first season of Pretty Little Liars, which started airing in 2010, Hannah Marin (Ashley Benson) gets a job at her ex-boyfriend’s mother’s dental office, shown in establishing shots to be located at the LADWP, in order to work off the damage she caused by crashing his car.

That same year, the site popped up very briefly as the exterior of a CIA building in the Season 3 episode of Chuck titled “Chuck Versus the Subway.”

Also in 2010, the LADWP served as a dream world in Inception.  It is in the building’s reflecting pool that Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his wife, Mal (Marion Cotillard), conceived reconstructions of homes from their past, which were, of course, just CGI creations.

The interior of the property also appears briefly in the film.  As Cobb leads Ariadne (Ellen Page) inside, he says, “We both wanted to live in a house, but we loved this type of building.  In the real world, we’d have to choose, but not here.”  He then takes her upstairs to his “residence,” which is supposedly located a short elevator ride away, but can actually be found about ten miles north at 215 South Grand Avenue in Pasadena.

Emma (Natalie Portman) and Adam (Ashton Kutcher) randomly run in to each other at a farmers’ market taking place at the LADWP in the 2011 romcom No Strings Attached.

In 2012, Detective Lydia Adams (Regina King) told Terrell (Michael Jace) that she was expecting his baby at the John Ferraro Building in the Season 4 episode of Southland titled “Thursday.”

The locale pops up briefly in some establishing imagery of what is supposedly the Department of Justice in 2016’s The Nice Guys.

Melinda’s (Punam Patel) “fountain unveiling” in the Season 2 episode of Adam Ruins Everything titled “Adam Ruins the Future,” which aired in 2017, takes place at the LADWP.

In The Rookie, which began airing in 2018, the LADWP portrays the Los Angeles Police Department’s Mid-Wilshire Station.

Now that we’ve covered a plethora of the productions that LADWP has been in, let’s debunk some of that erroneous info I mentioned earlier.  There is so much of it swirling around the internet that writing this post felt more like a disproving of the false reporting of the building’s film history than a chronicling of its many appearances.

   Though several websites claim that the LADWP masked as Washington, D.C.’s Bureau of Internal Revenue at the beginning of 1964’s What a Way to Go!, that is incorrect.  Filming actually took place at the Gateway West Building, once located at 1801 Avenue of the Stars in Century City.  The structure was demolished in 2015 as part of the Westfield Century City expansion, but you can see what it formerly looked like here.

LADWP wasn’t a courthouse in the Season 6 episode of Adam-12 titled “Clinic on 18th Street,” which aired in 1974, either.  That building is actually the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center located just a few blocks away at 210 West Temple Street.

Nor did it portray the 14th Street Precinct in the 1980s television series Cagney & Lacey as has been reported.  The confusion on this one is semi-understandable, though, being that filming took place at another downtown L.A. DWP site – the Central District Facility located at 1350 South Wall Street.  Sadly, the exact building utilized has since been torn down, though.

It has also been reported that the John Ferraro Building played the Tacoma Police Department in the 1989 comedy Three Fugitives.  That location, though, is actually the very same former Central District Facility building from Cagney & Lacey.

 

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Until next time, Happy Stalking! 

Stalk It: The John Ferraro Building, aka the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, is located at 111 North Hope Street in downtown L.A.  The facility’s lobby is open to the pubic each weekday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.