Chateau Bradbury Estate from “The Craft”

I am devastated that the month of October is almost over!  It seemed to come and go so fast this year!  But I do have to say that I am really excited for Halloween (T minus two days and counting!), even though the end of October is always bittersweet for me.  Especially since I have so many Haunted Hollywood locales left over in my stalking backlog.  I always tend to overdo things when it comes to those particular posts.  I currently have a “stalkpile” of over fifty (!) spooky locations and only two days left to blog about them.  Yet I know that won’t stop me from over-stalking Haunted Hollywood locales again next year.  It’s a habit I can’t shake.  One spot that I stalked last October, but never got around to blogging about is a massive residence known as the Chateau Bradbury Estate that has appeared in countless productions over the years, many of them of the horror variety.  Last week, while watching The Craft prior to writing my post about the El Adobe Studio Building, I was shocked to see the Chateau make an appearance.  So I knew I couldn’t postpone covering it any longer.

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The Chateau Bradbury Estate was originally designed in 1912 by architect Robert David Farquhar for Minerva Polk.  Minerva was the daughter of Colonel Lewis Leonard Bradbury, who established what is now the city of Bradbury when he acquired 2,750 acres of the Rancho Azusa de Duarte land grant in 1881.  I had actually never heard of Bradbury, which sits nestled between Monrovia and Duarte, prior to researching this post.  That shouldn’t come as a surprise, though.  While the municipality is continually ranked one of the wealthiest in the entire nation, it is also one of the tiniest.  The city (and yes, it is a city – it was incorporated in 1957) boasts only 900 residents and measures a scant two square miles.  And while it does have a city hall, it lacks a post office, library, school, gas station and coffee shop.  (No Starbucks?  Egads!)  Ironically enough (and I am guessing due to some sort of subdivision or annexation of land that occurred at some point), the Chateau Bradbury Estate is not actually situated in Bradbury, but in its neighbor to the south, Duarte.

According to Zillow, the French Normandy-style manse boasts 4 bedrooms, 3 baths, 5,625 square feet of living space, and a 2.06-acre plot of land.

The Chateau Bradbury Estate has gone through several owners over the years and for a time grew dilapidated and run-down.  According to this website, local kids used to refer to the place as a haunted house.  Love it!  The property was purchased by a new owner in the ‘90s, who rehabilitated it and leased it out regularly as a wedding venue/special events location.  Today, the site is some sort of religious space known as the Hon Los Temple.  Unfortunately, virtually none of it can be seen from the street.

Not even through the front gate.

In The Craft, which premiered in 1996, Chateau Bradbury was where Nancy Downs (Fairuza Balk) got revenge on Chris Hooker (Skeet Ulrich) by hurling him out of a window while at a party.

The home’s interior was also used in the filming.  You can check out some photographs of that interior here.  It is pretty spectacular.

I first found out about the Chateau Bradbury Estate thanks to The Location Scout website, on which the residence’s many horror movie appearances are chronicled.  Much of the filming information below I learned from The Location Scout, so a big thank you goes out to them!  In the Season 1 episode of Tales from the Crypt titled “Lover Come Hack to Me,” which aired in 1989, the manse stood in for the abandoned house where Peggy (Amanda Plummer) and Charles (Stephen Shellen) took shelter after being stranded in the rain on their honeymoon.

The interior of the manse also appeared in the episode, though all of the scenes were rather darkly lit.

In the 1994 made-for-television movie Confessions of Sorority Girls, Chateau Bradbury was the home of Mrs. Masterson (Natalija Nogulich).

The property masked as Hochstatter Mental Hospital that same year in the straight-to-video Ghoulies IV.

The residence’s interior was also utilized in the flick.

In 1997’s Grosse Pointe Blank, the Chateau Bradbury Estate served as the home of Debi Newberry (Minnie  Driver).  It is featured several times throughout the movie, most notably in the ending scene in which Martin Q. Blank (John Cusack) saves Debi’s father’s life.

The property’s interior was also utilized in the film.

In the 2000 thriller The Stray, the mansion belonged to Kate Grayson (Angie Everhart).

The interior was used in that movie, as well.

In the Season 3 episode of Bones titled “Death in the Saddle,” which aired in 2007, the mansion stood in for the Ambassadora, a country inn in Virginia that caters to people interested in “pony play fantasy.”  Oddly enough, while the exterior was used in the filming . . .

. . . the establishing shot shown was of a different residence.  That property, which was where Reed Standish (Christopher McDonald) lived in Dutch, can be found at 20181 Northridge Road in Chatsworth.

The interior of the Chateau Bradbury Estate also appeared in “Death in the Saddle.”

The residence masked as Cherrymount Academy for Girls in 2003’s Scream Bloody Murder.

In the 2005 television series South of Nowhere, Ashley Davies (Mandy Musgrave) lived at Chateau Bradbury.

The pad appeared as two different locations in the Season 7 episode of 24 titled “Day 7: 9:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m.”  The front exterior . . .

. . . and the interior first popped up as the home belonging to Senator Blaine Mayer (Kurtwood Smith).

And the back of the property later appeared as a café in the episode.

For more stalking fun, follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Los Angeles magazine and Discover Los Angeles.

Big THANK YOU to The Location Scout website for much of the filming information that appears in this post! 

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 

Stalk It: Chateau Bradbury Estate, aka the party house from The Craft, is located at 2232 California Avenue in Duarte.