Mayfield Senior School from “All About Steve”

Stalkings can come about from the most random of situations.  Many, many moons ago, I joined a grief group (long story) where I met a woman who worked at Mayfield Senior School in Pasadena.  During one of our sessions, she happened to mention that filming took place on the campus regularly and my ears immediately perked up.  After the meeting, I, of course, approached her to pick her brain about the school’s cinematic history and she wound up inviting me for a tour.  Though I never took her up on her offer, I did pop by for an impromptu visit one Saturday afternoon several years later.  My friend happened to be on site at the time and welcomed me to poke around.  Because it was the weekend, all of the buildings were locked up, but I did get to see the exteriors – and they were fabulous!  The place somehow went straight to the back of my mind afterwards, though, and stayed there until earlier this summer when I spotted it while scanning through All About Steve making screen captures for this post.  Thrilled over the discovery, I dug up my old photos of the school and decided to finally sit down and write about it.

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Mayfield School, as it was initially known, was founded in 1931 by the Society of the Holy Child Jesus on a small campus located at 405 South Euclid Avenue in Pasadena.  It was the city’s first private Catholic learning institution, serving students in grades Pre-K through 12 (though boys were only accepted at the primary levels).

By 1950, Mayfield’s enrollment had grown such that more space was needed and it was decided that the facility would split into an upper school and a lower school.  The lower, comprising grades K-8, would remain at the Euclid site.  For the upper levels, 9-12, a new location was secured thanks to Dr. Charles and Vera Strub who gifted the Society of the Holy Child Jesus with a 1917 mansion situated about two miles away.

Originally known as the Marshall-Eagle House, the striking Italianate Beaux Arts estate was designed by Frederick L. Roehrig (who also gave us the Stimson House from House II: The Second Story, the Andrew McNally House from Kingdom Come,  the Lincoln Clark House from Little Black Book, and the Rindge House from The Brasher Doubloon) for oil tycoon E.J. Marshall.  Today, it goes by the moniker “Strub Hall” in honor of its generous benefactors.  Though transformed from private residence into a campus building, much of the original detailing miraculously remains intact, with the ground floor living spaces repurposed into a chapel, conference room and student activities area.  You can check out some photos of the interior here.

The sprawling eight-acre campus boasts five additional buildings, including a gym and a music studio, as well as a courtyard, a meditation garden and a grotto.

It is not at all hard to see how the gorgeous site wound up onscreen.

In All About Steve, Mayfield poses as the supposed Sacramento-area The Youngstrum School, where Mary Horowitz (Sandra Bullock) attends a career day event and speaks about her job as a cruciverbalist.  The exterior of Strub Hall . . .

. . . as well as the interior of the school’s auditorium appeared in the movie.

All About Steve is hardly the only production to feature Mayfield.  In fact, the property is one of Pasadena’s most popular filming locations – and that’s saying a lot considering the city’s prominence onscreen.  There are far too many cameos to chronicle fully here, but what follows are some of the highlights.

Mayfield portrays Valley View Sanitorium, where Dr. David Banner (Bill Bixby) becomes an unwitting patient, in the Season 2 episode of The Incredible Hulk titled “The Quiet Room,” which aired in 1979.

In one brief scene from the 1992 favorite The Cutting Edge, Strub Hall stands in for the Albertville, France chateau where Kate Moseley (Moira Kelly) and Doug Dorsey (DB Sweeney) stay while in town for the Olympics.  It is in the foyer of the building that Kate tells Doug she is retiring from skating.  From what I’ve gleaned, virtually all of the movie was shot in Toronto, so I am unsure how this short bit came to be lensed in Pasadena.  I am guessing it must have been a pick-up shot captured after principal photography wrapped.

Bishop (Robert Redford) tracks down Liz (Mary McDonnell) teaching music at Strub Hall in 1992’s Sneakers.

Mayfield pops up as the T. Carter Foundation, where Easy Rawlins (Denzel Washington) goes “all the way to the top” by visiting the richest man in town, Todd Carter (Terry Kinney), in the 1995 drama Devil in a Blue Dress.

In the 1996 comedy The Nutty Professor, Strub Hall serves as the office of Dean Richmond (Larry Miller).

That same year, it portrayed the hospital where Matilda (Mara Wilson) was born in Matilda.

John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) lives there in the 1997 action flick The Lost World: Jurassic Park.

Strub Hall was used for interior scenes involving the Potsdam Conference in the 2006 drama The Good German.

It plays Paris’ Chateau Parc des Chanteraines, where Jenny Shepard (Lauren Holly) attends an Interpol anti-terrorist seminar, in the Season 4 episode of NCIS titled “Trojan Horse” which aired in 2007.

Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck) is summoned there to discuss his affair in the 2008 thriller State of Play.

On the series Switched at Birth, which started airing in 2011, Mayfield masquerades as the supposed Kansas City-area Buckner Hall, where Bay Kennish (Vanessa Marano) attends school.

Mayfield pops up as Bridget Donovan’s (Kerris Dorsey) high school during the third season of Ray Donovan, which kicked off in 2015.

And currently, Mayfield stands in for Atlas Academy on Marvel’s Runaways.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking! 

Stalk It: Mayfield Senior School, from All About Steve, is located at 500 Bellefontaine Street in Pasadena.  Please remember that it is a working school and not open to the public.