Just up the street from the Just Married mansion which I blogged about yesterday is the residence which stood in for Wayne Manor, aka Batman’s abode, in the 1966 television series and movie of the same name. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, the Batman mansion and the Just Married mansion are quite often mistaken for each other due to a myriad of reasons. So, to set the record straight – and since we already were in the area a couple of weeks ago doing some Just Married stalking- I decided to drag my fiancé a few hundreds yards up the road to also stalk Bruce Wayne’s pad. Sadly, though, not very much of it is visible from the street.
According to Zillow, the residence, which was built in 1928, boasts ten bedrooms, six bathrooms, a whopping 16,599 square feet of living space, and sits on over five acres of land! And if you look at the above photographs, it is very easy to see why the property is often confused with the Just Married mansion that burned down in October of 2005. Not only are both houses gargantuan, set far back from the road, and Tudor/Gothic Revival in style, but both were constructed almost entirely out of brick by the very same architect, Paul Revere Williams, and bear a striking resemblance to each other. Further adding to the confusion between the properties is the fact that they are located within blocks of each other on the very same street, San Rafael Avenue, in Pasadena and have both been featured in countless productions over the years.
Because the location rumors about the two mansions have been running rampant for so very long, this weekend I decided to try to get my hands on as many of the productions filmed on the premises as I could to try to set the record straight once and for all. And I didn’t do too bad – the only movies I wasn’t able to track down were Topper, Three Men and a Little Lady, Executive Action, The Gumball Rally, The Bells of St. Mary’s, Sweet Bird of Youth, and True Confessions. If anyone has those movies or has seen them in the past, can you let me know which, if either, of the San Rafael mansions was featured in them?
As I mentioned above, the mansion’s most famous appearance was as Wayne Manor in the 1966 television series Batman and the subsequent movie of the same name that was made that very same year. But its resume hardly ends there.
The residence was also used as both the St. Audrey’s Home for Boys where Grace (aka Emma Thompson) was taken in by a nun . . .
. . . and as Roman Strauss’ (aka Kenneth Branagh’s) home in 1991’s Dead Again.
In the first Rush Hour movie, the mansion stood in for Los Angeles’ Chinese Consulate.
As you can see in the above photograph and screen capture, though, the exterior gate which appears in that movie is not the home’s real life gate.
In 1999’s Bowfinger, the mansion was used as the residence of action star Kit Ramsey (aka Eddie Murphy).
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And in that flick the home’s real life gate does actually appear and was the site of one of the movie’s funniest scenes.
In Scary Movie 2, the mansion stood in for Hell House/Kane Manor where most of the film’s action takes place.
In X-Files: Fight The Future, it was used as the Somerset, England home of the Well-Manicured Man (aka John Neville).
According to some reports that I found online, the mansion was also featured in 1986’s Stand By Me, which seemed a bit odd being that I had always heard that Stand By Me was filmed almost in its entirety in the state of Oregon. After re-watching the flick earlier today, though, I believe that the mansion did appear once at the very end of the movie as the residence of “The Writer” (aka Richard Dreyfuss). As you can see in the above screen captures, the front driveway area does match that of the Batman mansion. Why would they come all the way to Pasadena to film this one brief scene, though, when the rest of the movie was filmed hundreds of miles away in Oregon, you ask? Well, according to IMDB’s Stand By Me trivia page, an actor named David Dukes was originally cast in the role of “The Writer”. After his scenes were shot, though, and filming had wrapped, they re-cast the role with actor Richard Dreyfuss and re-shot all of his character’s scenes. So, since the Richard Dreyfuss scenes were filmed at a later date – I am guessing after principal photography in Oregon had already wrapped – it makes sense that they would have been shot somewhere in the L.A. area, closer to where the film was being edited.
And if you’ll notice in the above screen captures, which were taken from the movie Dead Again, the mansion’s front window and the view from it does sort of match that which appeared in Stand By Me, which makes me think that the property was actually used in the movie, although I don’t have any concrete proof to back that up.
Fellow stalker Ivan just sent me the above screen captures from the television series Land of Giants, in which Wayne Manor stood in for the residence belonging to Uncle Trojar in the episode entitled “Collector’s Item”. And, yes, the mansion was blown up t the end of that episode. Thank you, Ivan! 🙂
According to fave website OnLocationVacations, the mansion was also the site of some filming from the upcoming Dinner For Schmucks movie starring Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, and Zach Galifianikis. Besides being a filming location, the mansion was also the Pasadena Showcase House of Design in 1997. So, I hope that at least partially puts to rest some of the locations rumors about the two landmark San Rafael Avenue mansions. If I come across any further information, I will post it here! And please let me know, dear readers, if you come across any information yourselves!
Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂
Stalk It: Wayne Manor from the Batman television series is located at 380 South San Rafael Avenue in Pasadena. Unfortunately, the residence is not very visible from the street. To see the best views of the home, drive just a bit north of where the main gates are located.
This house was also used in an episode of Banacek, “The Missing Chalice”.
i ari would like too buy this house if i ever win the lotto.
This is the same mansion that was used at the end of Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion. They showed it briefly as the house that an old Michele and her husband lived in.
I grew up right down the street. Us neighborhood kids use to play in the mansion in the early 80s. It was vacant for awhile.
I believe the atkins mansion is also featured in “the rat pack” with ray liotta as the home of joe kennedy, and more recently in the film “brides maids” (where they had the bridal shower).
Painful to watch but Wayne Manor (exterior and interior) is shown throughout this movie (Legacy of Blood) from 1971 http://youtu.be/FkcU1NkIMNw
The interior and back of the home are seen in this clip from Bowfinger (1999) http://youtu.be/Yrx2bv_LoG0
From 1998 http://tinyurl.com/84lv2uu
Wayne Manor also appeared on at least two Mission Impossible shows
http://tinyurl.com/c743hdm
http://tinyurl.com/cousnn2 (at beginning and at 37:45)
Wayne Manor was also in Lucky Chances from 1990. http://tinyurl.com/bqgbl3m A bit of the home’s interior, including an impressive mahogany staircase, can be seen as well.
FYI, Wayne Manor is not the mansion in the 1937 Topper film with Cary Grant. This home was http://tinyurl.com/7lp2ou9 The Topper mansion is located just up the block from Wayne Manor and unfortunately burned down several years ago. Both homes are of the same Tudor Revival style, which adds to the confusion, and were built within one year of each other (1928 vs. 1929).
To make another minor correction, Wayne Manor was not designed by Paul Williams (architect for the Topper/Just Married mansion). The architect for Wayne Manor was Stiles Clements, another well-known LA architect whose firm designed many local landmarks [Mayan Theater, El Capitan Theater, the Uniroyal Factory in Commerce (now the Citadel Factory Outlets)].
I loved your tour and the information which this article gives. I loved the look and the grandeur of the whole mansion. Being a fan of Batman from the time I was a kid, I remember sitting in front of the t.v glued to my seat and sipping on a can of soda. I remember having dreams of someday going and visiting this wonderful place, sadly what I understand that on the news, the mansion had been destroyed in a fire. Though I am not sure if it had been rebuilt in its splendor, but I do hope that the owners did restore it.
Great article, and I am hoping that you will be adding more great articles to your blog.
The house was also featured prominently in the TV Series The Event, in an episode called “Cut off the Head.” You can see it on Hulu (with about a million commercials thrown in.) House shots start around 11:45. For some reason, producers just love setting fire to this house!
–> http://www.hulu.com/watch/233352/the-event-cut-off-the-head
Nice! Thanks for letting me know. I will add the info to the site. 🙂
Happy to help. Thank YOU for the awesome site!
🙂 Aw, you’re more than welcome!
That place was cool. I went there with my parents in the early 1980’s for a party there on New Year’s day after watching the Rose Parade. My mom was friends with the family. Totally awesome place as I recall. The food spread was ridiculous…
This is so cool! I did a google on the Batman Mansion and got your page. This is amazing. Thanks for taking the time to do this!
-Matt
That mansion was also seen in “dirty sexy money” (in the first episode of season 2 for instance).
The mansion that was wayne manor burned down a few years ago the gate is still there. If you drive over the bridge away from pasadena and look to the left of the cliff edge you can see where it once stood. There was talk of rebuilding but so far nothing. My son goes to school in pasadena so we drive the bridge everyday and saw the before and after of it……sad
oops well I am glad I talked with the know it all spouse it was not the wayne manor that was burnt down that house was down the street a bit. The house that burnt was used in some things but not batman. Now I have to tell my son I’m a liar……….lol
I used to live in the house and I can tell you that it is still there.
You do an amazing job on your thorough research. Please keep up the good work!! Well Done
You’re right about Dinner for Schmucks! I just watched the trailer & you see the house at the 1:47 mark!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZ4i_woBTF8
Reading your blog so much is totally making me location-aware! 😉
OMG just watched – that is SO cool! Thanks for letting me know!
That is awesome that you are so location-aware now. 🙂 My fiance always says that I have ruined movies for him cause now he spends far more time looking in the background of what is onscreen rather than watching the actual movie! LOL
I’m with the others. I love this! Your research is just great, thank you so much.
Great post! Thanks for the detailed research! 😀
Great Post! I can remember watching batman as a kid..loved that show POW! Also, Stand By Me and Rush Hour (or anything with Chris Tucker) are favs!
According to my late father, the Mansion was the boyhood home of his best friend Theodore Clark. “Uncle Ted” was the greatgrandson of Elbert Henry Gary. One of the founders of U.S. Steel and the namesake of Gary, Indiana,the home of the largest steel mill in the U.S. My father said he was allowed to be friends with Ted because his mother, who was “Judge” Gary’s granddaughter, thought my father was well mannered, and he knew the proper use of all the silverware and the finger bowl!