Month: October 2019

Woodsboro Police Station from “Scream”

Happy, happy Halloween! I can’t believe it is already time to wind down my Haunted Hollywood posts, but here we are. Another October in the books! The season definitely turned into a full-blown Scream-fest on the blog (as predicted a couple of weeks ago) and I am a-OK with it! Amazingly, there are still quite a few locales from the 1996 horror flick that I have yet to write about, so I figured I’d finish things off this year with Oakville Grocery Co., the former Healdsburg City Hall which masked as Woodsboro Police Station onscreen. Like all the other Scream sites I’ve blogged about recently, I stalked this one back in 2016 while in Northern California for a brief visit.

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The southeast corner of Matheson and Center Streets in downtown Healdsburg was home to the area’s City Hall for 110 years. The original building, a towering three-story brick and stone Romanesque Revival structure which you can see here and here, was erected in 1886. Comprised of city offices, a library, a post office, and a gym for a nearby school, it was razed in 1960. The building that replaced it was a vast departure from its predecessor with a decidedly mid-century modern feel. Designed by A.C. Steele, the new Healdsburg City Hall was dedicated on July 4th, 1961. Built at a cost of just over $175,000, the one-story, 7,544-square-foot site housed both city offices and the police station and featured a beamed overhang, a front patio, pebble rock siding, and globe lighting. You can check out a photo of it here. It is that building that appeared in Scream.

In the hopes of making downtown Healdsburg more tourist-oriented, City Hall was moved to a new, larger building a couple of blocks northwest at 401 Grove Street and the police station re-located next door to 238 Center Street in 1996, shortly after Scream was lensed. The former city hall site was subsequently given a massive overhaul and transformed into the Oakville Marketplace, home to a winery, a jewelry store, a spa, a clothing boutique, and an upscale deli/market named Oakville Grocery Co. Boasting a Mediterranean façade, the 9,000-square-foot retail complex is hardly recognizable from its days as City Hall, though structurally it remains the same.

Though I abhor the fact that a Scream location has been gutted, Oakville Grocery Co., which takes up a third of the former City Hall space, has long been our favorite spot to eat when in town. With a large front patio complete with a fireplace, a wide selection of specialty grocery items, and excellent deli sandwiches, Oakville just can’t be beat!

Healdsburg City Hall pops up as Woodsboro PD twice in Scream, first in the scene in which Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) is brought in by Deputy Dewey (David Arquette) to make a report following the attack by Ghostface. As you can see below, the exterior is recognizable from its 1996 cameo in shape only, unfortunately.

I first saw Scream in December 1997 with some friends who had rented it on DVD over Christmas break. I remember being shocked when the end credits rolled and I spotted a nod to the City of Healdsburg in the “Filmmakers Wish to Thank” section, suggesting filming had taken place there. The charming Northern California town was only about an hour away from where I then resided and a stone’s throw from where my aunt lived (and still lives). I begged my mom to take me up there pronto and a few days later she obliged. At the time I was not entirely sure what portions of the movie had been filmed in the area – this was long before location websites that could point me in the right direction existed – so when we arrived, my mom suggested I pop into the local police station to inquire, which I distinctly remember garnering an eye roll and a “Seriously, mom?!?” from me. I did as she recommended, though, and just about fell over when the detective I spoke with informed me that filming had actually taken place at the former police station! By then, the remodel had already occurred and Oakville Grocery Co. was in full swing, but he walked us over to explain where the station used to be and which areas of it had appeared onscreen – proving further that mothers always know best! As he told us, the actual interior of City Hall was utilized as Woodsboro PD in the movie.

An interview that fellow stalker Ashley of The Drewseum recently emailed me a scan of leads me to believe that it was the City Hall portion of the building, not the actual police station, utilized in Scream. In the blurb, production designer Bruce Alan Miller says, “There’s a City Hall on the corner of the square that we turned into our police station. We just changed some signs and put a few things in the windows. We couldn’t use a real police station, because we would have been at their mercy, and we couldn’t be disrupting their police activity.” Though I was unable to unearth any photos of the interior areas featured in Scream, I did find 1961-era pictures of Healdsburg City Hall’s lobby, courthouse, and city council chambers. (Here’s another of the lobby for good measure.)

Perhaps even more famous to Scream fans than Woodsboro Police Station is the alley that runs alongside it, where Dewey escorts Sidney and Tatum (Rose McGowan) after Sidney gives her statement. Said alley can be reached via Center Street, just south of Oakville Grocery, but it, too, has largely been remodeled. The door that the girls walk out of in the scene, unfortunately, fell casualty to the 1996 renovation, though the pipe visible just beyond it still stands.

The door’s former location is pretty much where the middle glass block window is currently situated, as denoted with an orange rectangle below.

The rain gutter and window due east of the door’s former location are also still intact, which was thrilling to see! Along with the aforementioned pipe, they are pretty much the only elements that remain from the time Scream was filmed.

The dumpster enclosure and chain link fencing situated at the rear of the alley also largely remain the same.

It is in the alley that Sidney famously gives Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox) a fist to the face.

Had to do it!

During my ‘97 visit, my officer friend informed me that the people standing across the street in the punching scene were not background actors hired to be there, but interested locals hoping to catch a glimpse of the filming. Taking advantage of the situation, Wes Craven installed barricades to give the illusion that the crowd was made up of lookie-loos waiting outside the station for news about the murders of Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore) and Steve Orth (Kevin Patrick Walls). In his commentary on the Scream Collector’s Series DVD, Craven calls them “free extras.”

Woodsboro Police Station also shows up in a later scene in which Dewey drops the girls off to go grocery shopping while he checks in with his boss, Sherriff Burke (Joseph Whipp).

That segment gives us a better look at City Hall’s former exterior. It truly was a piece of mid-century perfection!

Today, the entrance to Woodsboro PD serves as the exterior of the Virginia Carol clothing boutique (the shop with the yellow awning below).

Man, what I wouldn’t give to have seen the old City Hall building still intact!

The happiest of Halloweens to all of my fellow stalkers!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Oakville Grocery Co., aka Woodsboro Police Station from Scream, is located at 124 Matheson Street in Healdsburg. Healdsburg Town Plaza, which portrayed downtown Woodsboro in the movie, is right across the road at the intersection of Healdsburg Avenue & Matheson Street.

October 31, 2019
Healdsburg Town Plaza from “Scream”

I was saddened to wake up to the news of yet another fire tearing through Sonoma County last Thursday morning, this one threatening Healdsburg, one of my favorite places in the entire world. Not only is the city idyllic, pastoral and ridiculously charming, but it is a filming location to boot, the main square having stood in for downtown Woodsboro in Scream. Healdsburg Town Plaza was, in fact, the site of one of my very first stalking adventures back in late 1997. I have visited it often in the years since, most notably during my epic October 2016 Scream stalking trek in which I hit up every.single.location. featured in the 1996 flick, down to the warehouse where the production’s few sets were built to the hotel where the cast and crew stayed during the 55-day shoot (the latter was, sadly, lost to the Tubbs Fire in October 2017). Though Healdsburg remains safe from the Kincade Fire for the time being, the city was evacuated and per a Los Angeles Times article is currently a “ghost town,” a situation eerily reminiscent of Scream’s curfew scene which rendered downtown Woodsboro deserted. I pray that the blaze is controlled soon and my thoughts go out to everyone affected, including my aunt and uncle who were recently evacuated from their home in the area. For now, I thought a post on Healdsburg Town Plaza was in order.

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The city of Healdsburg was originally envisioned by businessman Harmon Heald. After failing to strike it rich mining gold, the native Ohioan built a small home in 1851 on what was then a portion of the Rancho Sotoyome land grant. Figuring the site was perfectly situated between San Francisco and the mining areas north of it and would, therefore, be passed through often, he constructed a general store with a post office soon after. A community surrounding the shop quickly developed and in 1857 Harmon commissioned a surveyor to layout a design for a town square and surrounding streets and, thus, Healdsburg and its central plaza were born. The city was incorporated ten years later.

Today, the bucolic one-acre Town Plaza boasts a gazebo, a central fountain, pathways, Canary Island date palms, and redwood trees, all surrounded by a sprinkling of charming shops, cafés, and restaurants. It is small town U.S.A. at its finest!

The fountain at its center, known as Sandborn Memorial Fountain, was donated by Elmer Sandborn in remembrance of his family in 1961. In the square’s early days, though, a bandstand stood as its focal point. The structure not only drew musical acts, but audiences with alcohol in hand, to the consternation of many locals. The Ladies’ Improvement Club got to work on curtailing the drinking and eventually won permission to raze the bandstand in the early 1900s, with a 13-foot marble fountain installed in its place. The revelers couldn’t be curtailed, though – according to The Healdsburg Tribune, a new bandstand was simply built next to the fountain the following day! Healdsburg Town Plaza also saw raucous times in the 1970s, when the Hells Angels made it their regular hangout. Today, the park is, thankfully, much more low-key.

On any given afternoon, you’ll find families picnicking, couples strolling, and visitors relaxing on the many benches that dot the site.

The space is so idyllic that Travel and Leisure deemed it one of “America’s Most Beautiful Town Squares” in 2013.

The surrounding town isn’t too shabby, either!

The last time I visited, in early December 2018, the city was really flaunting its fall colors.

We just don’t get this kind of Autumn vibrancy in Palm Springs.

Show off!

Healdsburg Town Plaza pops up a couple of times in Scream, most notably as the spot where Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) and her friends eat lunch in an early scene. In the segment, during which Stuart Macher (Matthew Lillard) utters his famous “Liver alone!” line, the group is sitting on Sandborn Memorial Fountain’s north side with their backs to Matheson Street.

Sadly, the fountain has been renovated a bit in the years since filming took place, with its rock siding removed and built-in planters added to its corners.

Even sadder, the park’s quaint white wooden gazebo, visible in the scene, has since been completely replaced. According to a Press Democrat article, the original structure was a “casualty of dry rot and changing taste.” This photo of its demolition, which took place on March 14th, 2007, absolutely breaks my heart.

The gazebo is also where Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), wearing her infamous neon green suit, reports on the murders plaguing Woodsboro in a news clip that Sidney catches on TV in a later scene.

Fortunately, the original gazebo and fountain were both still in place during my early stalks of the square.

Healdsburg Town Plaza is also seen in an establishing segment in which the sun rises on Woodsboro the morning after Sidney is attacked. That bit was filmed on the corner of Center and Plaza Streets.

Per the sheriff I spoke with during my first Healdsburg stalk, the shot was actually lensed early evening as the sun was setting. Apparently, Wes Craven intended to capture it the morning of the last day of the Healdsburg portion of the shoot, but ran out of time, so he instead grabbed it later that day at dusk, knowing that audiences would be none the wiser.

Finally, the plaza serves as a backdrop for the scene in which Woodsboro townspeople lock up and head home before the newly-imposed curfew. Several shops lining the square are featured in the segment including 104 Matheson Street;

312 Center Street, which was the site of Healdsburg Coffee Company at the time of the filming, but today houses The Nectary juice bar;

and the grassy section of the park directly across from 105 Plaza Street . . .

. . . and 111 Plaza Street.

Thanks to the Dear Old Hollywood blog, I learned that Healdsburg Town Plaza also appears a few times as Hartfield, Iowa in the 1943 drama Happy Land.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Healdsburg Town Plaza, aka downtown Woodsboro from Scream, is located at the intersection of Healdsburg Avenue & Matheson Street in Healdsburg.

October 29, 2019
Broadlind Hotel from “Over Her Dead Body”

Over Her Dead Body is hardly a horror flick. In fact, the only thing scary about it is the reviews, with one critic going so far as to opine, “A deceased bride, a depressed groom and a caterer who doubles as a psychic. Yes, it’s an unlikely love triangle, and it’s even more unlikely that you’ll like this film.” Ouch. The 2008 “ghostcom,” as Roger Ebert called it, centers around would-be-newlywed Kate (Eva Longoria), who, after getting killed in a freak accident on her wedding day, decides to spend the afterlife haunting Ashley (Lake Bell), a psychic who starts to show interest in her former fiancé, Henry (Paul Rudd). (I’m not gonna lie, that would be so be me!) I initially learned of the movie many moons ago when fellow stalker Virginie emailed me a couple of its locations including Long Beach’s Broadlind Hotel, which doubled as the apartment building where Ashley lived and was haunted by Kate. I finally sat down to give Over Her Dead Body a watch this week and was shocked to find it cute, sweet and funny – and though not of the horror genre, considering its subject matter, fully fitting of a Haunted Hollywood post.

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Built in 1928 as a boutique lodging by the Piper & Kahrs architecture team, the Italian Renaissance-style Broadlind Hotel featured 20 rooms as well as a manager’s unit at its inception.

The property’s name was derived from its location on the corner of East Broadway and Linden Avenue in Long Beach’s East Village Arts District.

Featuring handsome brickwork, terra cotta detailing, two-story arches dotting the lower levels, and carved wooden doors, the structure, dubbed “the biggest little hotel in Long Beach,” was mainly patronized by naval officers temporarily stationed at the now-defunct Long Beach Naval Complex in its early days. Amenities included a tiled bath and shower in every room and a barbershop, beauty parlor, and restaurant on the ground floor.

The basement level, now home to the Blind Donkey whiskey lounge, served as a gambling hall and watering hole during the Prohibition years.

The Broadlind eventually transitioned into an apartment facility before falling into disrepair and sitting vacant for many years. Then in 2005, it was picked up by a new owner who made plans to restore it to its original use as a boutique lodging. Those plans finally came to fruition in 2017. Today, the 20-room property, a Long Beach Historical Landmark, is marketed as a European-style “ApartHotel,” meaning it is part apartment/part hotel. Each of the units features many of the comforts of home, including a kitchenette with an oven, refrigerator and microwave, cookware, utensils, a flat-screen television with digital channels, and Wi-Fi. Laundry facilities are also on the premises, as well as a lobby balcony for guests to enjoy their morning coffee. In a unique twist, there is no front desk or on-site reception – vacationers are instead granted access to their rooms via keyless entry codes.

The Broadlind even has a penthouse suite in the tower situated at its northeast corner.

The hotel’s ground floor is currently home to a Thai restaurant and a juice bar. And don’t forget about the Blind Donkey in the basement!

Though the place looks absolutely adorable both from the outside and in its website photographs, sadly the reviews are less than stellar. Yelpers really don’t mince words about the property, with one referring to it as “whipped cream on dog sh*t” and another deeming it the “Fyre Festival of hotels.” Yikes!

It is the penthouse area that Ashley calls home in Over Her Dead Body. Oddly, we only get one establishing shot of it throughout the entire movie.

Though I didn’t take a matching photograph, that’s the penthouse in my images below.

Broadlind’s front entrance also makes a brief appearance in the film . . .

. . . as does its interior stairwell . . .

. . . and its north side, where Thai District restaurant is now located.

The interior of Ashley’s apartment only existed in a studio soundstage, though. You can see what the actual penthouse looks like here. The sole element of it that matches its onscreen counterpart is the perimeter of arched, paned windows.

The hallway leading up to Ashley’s apartment was also just a set. Production designer Cory Lorenzen incorporated elements of the Broadlind’s actual exterior, including arches, tile work and wooden doors, into the design of both, though.

The Blind Donkey has also famously cameoed onscreen. The basement lounge masked as the interior of Seb’s, the jazz club owned by Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), at the end of La La Land.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Virginie for telling me about this location!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Broadlind Hotel, aka Ashley’s apartment building from Over Her Dead Body, is located at 149 Linden Avenue in Long Beach. You can visit the property’s official website here.

October 25, 2019
Susan Berman’s Former House

One location that has confused me for years is the cottage where writer Susan Berman was murdered in 2000 – so much so that despite stalking it back in August 2015, I have put off blogging about it until now. I first learned of the locale from the hit HBO docuseries The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, which chronicles the sordid, twisted, extremely weird tale of multimillionaire Durst and the deaths of three people connected to him, including Berman, his longtime BFF. On the show, much was made about Susan living at 1527 Benedict Canyon Drive in Beverly Hills. When I headed out to stalk the home located there, though, I was shocked to see that it looked nothing like the pad showcased onscreen. Figuring I might have jotted down the wrong address (hey, it happens to the best of us!), I took photos regardless and started delving into the matter further as soon as I got home. Sure enough, what was shown in The Jinx, specifically the third episode titled “The Gangster’s Daughter,” did not match the house at 1527 Benedict Canyon. I eventually pushed the matter to the back of my mind where it remained until a couple of days ago when I decided to rehash it. Thankfully, this time around I was able to figure things out.

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In The Jinx, we are only shown one full shot of Susan’s former residence. It’s below.

Several close-up images taken the night of the murder are also featured on the series, though the dark-shingled façade pictured in them looks considerably different than the white-washed exterior from the wide shot. Since both consist of wood shake, though, I figured they were one and the same and that Susan likely had the place painted at some point during her tenure. But, as it turns out, the photos are actually of two different properties. The cottage above is a Brentwood residence Susan owned for a time long before she was murdered, while the pad below is her Benedict Canyon rental, where she lived during two different periods of her life, including her final years. Because the latter was remodeled extensively in 2006 and the wood siding removed, it is not very recognizable today, which only added to my confusion.

It was not until coming across the photos here and here that I was able to piece things together. As you can see, though the shiplap has been removed, making the home appear more ranch-like than its former Cape Cod style, it is the same place.

Hedges now obscure much of the dwelling from view, but toggling back to January 2011 on Google Street View provides better imagery. Per the building permits I dug up, besides the wood shake removal, during the 2006 remodel a portion of the patio was also enclosed in order to expand the kitchen and both bathrooms were gutted.

It was in the quaint abode that Berman met her untimely end on December 22nd, 2001 – authorities say at the hand of her dearest friend, Robert Durst. Susan and “Bobby,” as she called him, originally met while attending UCLA in the 1960s and became fast, yet unlikely companions – she a vibrant, talkative extrovert, he an odd reclusive scion of a prominent New York family. They say a picture speaks a thousand words and the image of Susan and Bob below speaks volumes regarding their strikingly different personalities. Regardless, the two were thick as thieves up until Susan’s death. But to understand her killing, we have to go back to 1982, when Robert’s first wife, Kathleen McCormack, went missing. As I explained earlier, it’s a very twisted tale.

Kathleen and Bob’s relationship was by all accounts tumultuous. Married in 1973, Kathie was seeking a divorce by early 1982. On January 31st of that year, after spending the weekend together at their South Salem lakeside cottage, Durst claims he dropped his wife off at the Katonah rail stop, where she caught a train to New York. A doorman reportedly saw her enter the couple’s pied-à-terre at 37 Riverside Drive later that night. The following morning, Kathie called the associate dean of Albert Einstein College of Medicine, where she was set to begin a clerkship, to say she was ill and would not be coming in. She has not been seen or heard from since. Because Kathie disappeared from Manhattan and Robert never left South Salem that night, he was never regarded as a suspect. At least not officially, though most who followed the case had their suspicions. The investigation quickly went cold and it was not until years later, November 1999 to be exact, that authorities decided to reopen it based upon a tip from a suspect in a different matter. Though said tip turned out to be bogus, it set off a chain of events almost too bizarre to be believed.

Detectives were able to keep the reopening of the case under wraps for a full year before the media caught wind of things. When reports finally started rolling out in November 2000, it sent Robert into a tailspin. He promptly relocated to Galveston, Texas where he rented a small apartment and began posing as an elderly mute woman to avoid detection. Just a couple of weeks later, on December 24th, Susan was found dead at her Benedict Canyon rental. According to a March 2001 New York magazine article, Berman had initially leased the 1935 cottage for a few years upon relocating from NYC to L.A. in 1981. Though small, with 2 bedrooms and 2 baths, at the time it was a “lovely, cheerful place.” As you can see below, the 2006 remodel did the exterior of the place no favors. It looked so much better with the wood siding!

After marrying her one and only husband in 1984, Susan moved out of the Benedict Canyon property and into a home she purchased at 12030 Coyne Street in Brentwood. It was that house that was showcased on The Jinx.

An interview was even conducted outside of the Brentwood pad for the series and, in a very confusing twist, it was made to appear as if it was the Benedict Canyon residence! It’s no wonder I was confounded by the location for so long!

Berman’s marriage didn’t last and by 1987, she had a new love, aspiring screenwriter Paul Kaufman. The two eventually attempted to develop a Broadway musical together, using Susan’s finances to do so, but the venture bankrupted her, put an end to the relationship, and the Brentwood house was foreclosed on. Broke and single, she relocated to a condo at 1131 Alta Loma Road in West Hollywood, which was owned by a friend who let her live there rent-free for the next five years. In 1997, as she started to get back on her feet, she moved back into her old Benedict Canyon rental. But by late 2000, she found herself in dire financial straights yet again and reached out to Durst to borrow money. He sent her two checks totaling $50,000. He claims that around the same time she told him that she had been contacted by detectives regarding the re-opening of Kathie’s case and that she planned on speaking with them. It turns out that was not true – something Robert did not find out until much, much later. As recounted in a fabulous Los Angeles magazine article about Berman, Durst was shocked when L.A. Deputy District Attorney John Lewin informed him during a 2015 jailhouse interview, “They had not contacted her. I think that Susan was trying to subtly squeeze you for money.”

By all accounts, Susan never would have squealed on Bobby, though he had good reason to be nervous. Berman, who had casually mentioned to several friends over the years that Durst had something to do with Kathie’s disappearance, had not only provided an alibi for him the night McCormack went missing, but she also acted as his media liaison in the months that followed. And much of what she spewed wasn’t true. As it turns out, no doorman ever saw Kathie the night of January 31st – that was a story fed to the press by Berman. It is also now largely believed that it was Susan, posing as Kathie, who called the Albert Einstein College of Medicine dean the morning after the disappearance. Susan knew where the bodies were buried (quite possibly literally) and police contend that Robert killed her for it.

Authorities believe that Robert flew from New York to San Francisco on December 19th, 2000. He then took another flight to Eureka and, the following morning, drove to Los Angeles. He headed to Susan’s house late on the evening of the 22nd or early the morning of the 23rd and shot her once in the back of the head, execution-style. Police, responding to a call from a neighbor who reported that Berman’s dogs were running loose and barking up a storm, arrived at her residence at 1 p.m. on Christmas Eve where they found the the rear door open and Susan dead on the floor of the guest bedroom. She was 55 years old. A horrific scenario all around, no doubt, but Kathie’s sister Mary Hughes did have this to say in the Los Angeles magazine article about Susan, “Obviously it’s horrible that Berman was murdered by Durst. But we’ll always be mindful that she was Durst’s coconspirator in covering up Durst’s murder of our sister.”

As evidenced in the crime scene photos from The Jinx (the top one I blacked out a portion of as Susan’s body was visible) as compared to the MLS images above and below, the house looks quite different today than it did in 2000. The interior was said to be in shambles toward the end of Susan’s life and the pictures featured on the series certainly attest to that. Apparently, the heat had even been turned off and some of the rooms lacked flooring – there was only cement where the carpeting had once been. The place is in much better shape since the 2006 remodel, during which doors were closed off and relocated and the kitchen opened up, as you can see.

The bizarre story doesn’t end there. On the 23rd of December, a note was sent to the Beverly Hills Police Department that read “1527 Benedict Canyon Cadaver.” Susan’s body had already been found by the time detectives received it, but it did provide them with a clue. Whoever killed Berman must have cared for her in some way and didn’t want her body to go undiscovered.

The murders don’t end there, either. On September 28th, 2001, Durst shot his Galveston neighbor, a cantankerous elderly gentleman named Morris Black, who had discovered his true identity and had been pressuring him financially. Robert then dismembered his body, wrapped the parts in newspaper, put them in garbage bags and dumped them in Galveston Bay. The bags wound up floating though and were discovered by a teen fishing in the area the following day. An address on one of the newspapers led police straight to Durst and he was arrested. He promptly posted bail and then skipped town, successfully avoiding authorities until he was detained in Pennsylvania about six weeks later for attempting to steal a sandwich and a band-aid from a grocery store. You can’t make this stuff up! Robert claimed self-defense at his subsequent trial for Black’s murder and was inexplicably acquitted despite having dismembered the body, though he did serve some time for bond jumping and evidence tampering. He was eventually paroled in 2005, was rearrested for violating said parole, and served another few months.

In 2010, filmmaker Andrew Jarecki’s movie All Good Things, based on Durst’s life, premiered. Apparently happy with his onscreen portrayal, Robert contacted Jarecki and, against the advice of his lawyers and pretty much anyone else with half a brain, asked to be interviewed by him. Over the next few years, Jarecki compiled more than twenty hours of footage of Durst, which is how The Jinx came to be. The series debuted to much fanfare on February 8th, 2015. Building on evidence uncovered by Jarecki and his producing partner, Marc Smerling, police began closing in on Durst, ultimately deciding to arrest him on March 14th, 2015, the day before the final episode hit HBO. That finale featured a chilling segment in which Robert was confronted with a letter he wrote to Susan in 1993, years prior to her death, which bore not only the exact same block handwriting as the “cadaver” note, but the exact same misspelling of the word “Beverly.” In a stunning turn, he then walked into the bathroom of the hotel room where the interview was taking place, still miked, and uttered to himself, “What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.” His trial for Susan’s murder is set to begin in January and something tells me this time an acquittal is not in the cards.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Susan Berman’s former house is located at 1527 Benedict Canyon Drive in Beverly Hills.

October 23, 2019
Nuart Theatre from “Foul Play”

I was hesitant to include today’s locale in with my Haunted Hollywood postings being that the Nuart Theatre is neither haunted nor a horror movie location, per se. But the small arthouse venue did cameo in one of my favorite thrillers/comedies – 1978’s Foul Play – as the site of a murder, no less, so I figured it was fair game. Especially considering I had stalked the place years ago while writing a 2015 article for Discover L.A. about the city’s best places to beat the rain but had somehow never dedicated a post to it. So here goes!

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Commissioned by Forrest W. McManus and boasting terrazzo flooring, 660 seats and a single screen, the Nuart Theatre opened on August 21st, 1930 with a star-studded gala.

Nine years later, the site was remodeled and the neon Art Deco marquee that now stands above the entrance installed.

The Nuart went through several ownership changes over the ensuing decades, first falling under the Fox West Coast Theatres umbrella from 1941 to 1954, then running independently for several years before finally getting snapped up by Landmark Theatres in 1974.

The space underwent a major renovation in 2006 during which the seating was downsized to 303 chaises to allow for roomier accommodations. With beer and wine also served on the premises, today the Nuart easily holds up against L.A.’s many luxury theatres.

Such an arthouse fave amongst Angelinos, in fact, the Nuart consistently ranks as one of the area’s best theatres and has been lauded by such entities as LAist, the Los Angeles Times and Curbed LA. Los Angeles magazine even recognized the place for its “Top-Rated Popcorn” in 2009. The Nuart is also famous for its regular showings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show (which have been taking place since the ‘80s), as well as its many celebrity Q&As with the likes of such luminaries as Harry Dean Stanton, Halle Berry, Burt Lancaster, Ridley Scott, Mel Blanc, John Waters and Mark Hamill. And, of course, it’s also a filming location!

In Foul Play, Gloria Mundy (Goldie Hawn) heads to the Nuart, said to be on San Francisco’s Union Street, one dark and stormy night (because, of course) to meet Bob ‘Scotty’ Scott (Bruce Solomon) for a film noir double feature. During the retrospective, Gloria discovers that Scott has been stabbed to death in his seat. By the time she reports the killing to the theatre manager, though, his body has gone missing (dun dun dun!), setting her off on a path to find the guilty party. Quite a lot of the venue is shown in the movie, including the exterior;

the ticket booth area and front entrance;

and the lobby.

From the way the segment was shot and because various message boards I’ve come across concerning the Nuart mention that its interior was decidedly red in color before the 2006 remodel, I am fairly certain that the inside of the theatre itself also appeared in Foul Play.

Oddly though, in 1976, two years prior to Foul Play, the Nuart was featured in the Season 1 episode of Starsky & Hutch titled “Silence” . . .

. . . but the theatre interior shown did not match what was seen in Foul Play in the slightest, which has me thoroughly confused. I am guessing that Starsky & Hutch must have only utilized the exterior of the Nuart and then shot interiors in a screening room located back at 20th Century Fox Studios where the series was lensed, but that is just a hunch.

The Nuart has appeared in a couple of other productions, as well. Thanks to fellow stalker MM, I was reminded that the theatre popped up briefly each week in the opening credits of the television series Moonlighting, which aired from 1985 through 1989.

Guy Franklin (Alexander Tovar) runs into Heather (Megan Rosati) at the Nuart at the end of the 2016 film Show Business.

And Maddie Kendall (Jennifer Love Hewitt) and Howie “Chimney” Han (Kenneth Choi) head to the Nuart for a date in the Season 2 episode of 9-1-1 titled “Buck, Actually,” which aired in 2018.

Though the Nuart is said to be the spot where Leonard Hofstadter (Johnny Galecki), Howard Wolowitz (Simon Helberg) and Raj Koothrappali (Kunal Nayyar) attend a Planet of the Apes marathon in the Season 1 episode of The Big Bang Theory titled “The Pancake Batter Anomaly,” no filming actually took place there. The episode was instead shot in front of a live audience on a soundstage-built set at Warner Bros. Studio in Burbank, where the show was lensed.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Landmark’s Nuart Theatre, from Foul Play, is located at 11272 Santa Monica Boulevard in Sawtelle. You can visit the venue’s official website here.

October 21, 2019
Cole’s House from “The Sixth Sense”

Locations stick with me. They just do. Obviously. One that stuck with me above the realm of normalcy, though, is the handsome brick townhouse where Cole Sear (Haley Joel Osment) lived in The Sixth Sense.

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Even though I’ve only actually seen the 1999 thriller once, the image of Bruce Willis as child psychologist Malcolm Crowe sitting on a bench while waiting for Cole in the film’s opening sequence is forever seared in my mind. So when we headed to Philadelphia, where the movie was lensed, in September 2016, visiting Cole’s house was a no-brainer. (My photo below is of the wrong bench, unfortunately – I accidentally snapped the one situated directly outside of Cole’s home, thinking that is where Bruce sat, instead of the one across from it.)

The correct bench is pictured below.

Though named the “Garden Court Apartments” in The Sixth Sense, the row of picturesque brick townhomes where Cole lives is actually known as the “Garden Block.”

Centered around a foliage-filled median, the small stretch of road, closed to cars, is pretty darn idyllic.

While the vegetation is much more mature and full than it was when The Sixth Sense was filmed twenty years ago, the block is instantly recognizable from its big-screen cameo – even to those for whom locations don’t stick, like the Grim Cheaper who identified the place immediately.

Unfortunately, the abundance of greenery made it impossible to get a photo matching the screen capture below. The pictured image is the best I could do.

As you can see in this unobstructed view, though, aside from the front door and window trims now exhibiting a bright purple hue . . .

. . . the property looks much as it did onscreen.

The inside of the home is another story entirely. For interior scenes involving Cole’s apartment, a studio set was built, one that, interestingly, looked nothing like its real-life counterpart. Though taken from opposing angles, in the MLS image as compared to the screen capture below, you can see that the real entry does not resemble its silver-screen self in the slightest. The actual entrance to the home is comprised of a narrow hallway that leads directly to a staircase, while the movie version is wide and open and pours into the living room.

To accommodate that wide entry, you’ll notice that filmmakers cheated things a bit with the townhouse’s exterior by making it appear to have a central front door flanked by two windows. In actuality, only the window to the west of the door (denoted with an orange arrow below) belongs to the property.

The window to the east is part of the neighboring townhouse (the front door of which is situated around the corner facing South 23rd Street), something that is quite obvious in person thanks to the differing trim colors.

The real kitchen is also much different from its big-screen counterpart, with lower ceilings, fewer, more modern cabinets, and a narrower footprint. I much prefer the homey, charming look of the set to that of the actual house, which is somewhat bland and cold. But I guess that’s why production designers get paid the big bucks!

You can check out some more images of the townhome’s interior here. The washer/dryer situation leaves quite a bit to be desired, but I digress.

Per an old real estate listing, the 1915 pad is comprised of 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, 2,052 square feet, an eat-in kitchen, a small backyard, and a full basement. There’s no mention of unwanted visitors of the spirit variety, so whether or not the house actually has any remains to be, ahem, seen.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Cole’s apartment from The Sixth Sense is located at 2302 St. Alban’s Place in Philadelphia.

October 18, 2019
Ontario Airport Inn from “Poltergeist”

In “I must be living under a rock” news, I had no idea that a Poltergeist remake had debuted in 2015 – in 3D, no less! Considering the so-called curse that plagued the OG trilogy, I’d have to think long and hard before signing up to be a part of any sort of reboot! That cast and crew were seriously brave – yet it turns out the only thing plaguing the recent flick was bad reviews. The rumored curse has never stopped me from stalking locales from the franchise, though, including the motel where the Freeling family stayed at the end of the 1982 original. The location was actually a mystery for years, with several sources claiming that filming took place at Hotel Silver Lake in Westlake, and I am not entirely sure who finally pinpointed the correct spot. Whoever did discover that the hotel utilized in the production was the Holiday Inn at 1801 East G Street in Ontario (now the Ontario Airport Inn), I thank you! Since the lodging is situated right off the 10 Freeway between L.A. and Palm Springs, I figured it would be the perfect place for a pit stop on the way home from my last visit to the City of Angels, as wells as a perfect Haunted Hollywood posting.

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The property currently known as the Ontario Airport Inn was originally built as a Holiday Inn in the mid-1960s.

At the time, nothing was surrounding it but vacant land as you can see in the 1980 image from Historic Aerials below.

Aerial views look quite different today, though amazingly the hotel hasn’t changed a bit, structurally at least.

Per ads I came across on newspapers.com, by 1996 the lodging had become the Good Nite Inn which it remained through at least 2000. Today, the Ontario Airport Inn, situated less than a mile from Ontario International Airport, boasts a huge pool, a courtyard with a BBQ, a laundry room, free coffee and fruit available 24 hours a day, a business center, park-and-fly services, rooms with Tempur-Pedic memory foam beds, and a complimentary continental breakfast and airport shuttle. Not bad for rates that start at $69.95!

Before snapping any photographs, the Grim Cheaper and I popped into the lobby to ask permission from the powers that be. A front desk clerk welcomed us and I explained that I was hoping to see the area of the hotel featured in Poltergeist. She retreated to ask the manager if it was alright and when she returned she told me it was perfectly fine and then produced a map of the property, pointed to a building on the southern side and informed me that filming had taken place in front of Room 209. Shocked that she knew the precise spot and figuring her awareness had to be due to the countless requests from stalkers like myself, I said, “Oh, do a lot of people come by asking to take photos because of Poltergeist?”, to which she deadpanned, “Nope, not really.” And here I thought maybe I was in good company! The GC and I could not stop laughing as we headed out the door toward Building 4, where we had been pointed (that’s it below).

Said to be “the Holiday Inn on I-74,” the weary Freelings venture to the hotel after leaving Midwestern suburbia, where their possessed home has just been sucked into a paranormal vortex, at the end of Poltergeist. (That scene was achieved using a 6-foot by 4-foot model of the Simi Valley property that stood in for the family’s residence, the debris of which were, at least for a time, displayed in Steven Spielberg’s office.)

Room 209, where the Freelings check in, can be found on the second floor of Building 4.

I was shocked to discover upon walking up to the Freelings’ door that Ontario Airport Inn not only boasts the same coloring it did onscreen in 1982, with red doors and yellow walls, but that the number placards also remain entirely unchanged!

It is incredible that so little of the hotel has been altered since the filming, especially considering two changes in ownership and the passage of 37 years! Aside from the addition of some hedges and the removal of the Holiday Inn signage, though, the place is frozen in time.

In an interesting twist, the locale is not included in the shooting schedule featured on Poltergeist: The Fan Site which covers all sixty days of principal photography, as well as one day of second-unit photography. That coupled with the fact that Ontario is a somewhat out-of-the-way spot to film, especially considering the rest of the thriller was lensed in Simi Valley, Agoura Hills, Irvine, and Culver City, makes me wonder if the hotel segment was a re-shoot or perhaps a scene added after initial filming wrapped.

Figuring one of the Poltergeist DVD iterations had to feature a commentary of some sort which might provide clarity on the issue, I got to Googling and was shocked to discover via DVD Exotica that is not actually the case. Amazingly, the only home release of the film with any sort of extras about the movie itself (and not paranormal activity in general) is the 1982 LaserDisc which boasts a stills gallery, the original trailer, and a 7-minute making-of featurette (that you can watch here). Sadly, none of the three provide any info on the hotel. An Upland resident named Don J. did inform the Daily Bulletin in 2017 that producers landed on the locale thanks to its classic neon signage, which few Holiday Inns in the area still had at the time. Whether that information is true or not is anybody’s guess.

The Ontario Airport Inn has another claim to fame! The many musicians hired to perform at the California Jam music festival in 1974 were put up there and shuttled back and forth to the venue, the Ontario Motor Speedway, via helicopter. During their stay, the motel’s marquee read “Welcome Western States Police Officers Assn.,” a rather humorous attempt to mislead any fans heading to the property hoping to catch glimpses of the various acts, which included such bands as Earth, Wind & Fire and the Eagles.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Ontario Airport Inn, aka the Holiday Inn from Poltergeist, is located at 1801 East G Street in Ontario. Filming took place in front of Room 209 on the second floor of Building 4. Please keep in mind that the hotel is private property and you need permission to be on the premises. You can visit the lodging’s official website here.

October 16, 2019
Homer’s House from “The Day of the Locust”

Today’s locale is an oldie but goodie. Way back in October 2010, while in Eagle Rock stalking with Mike, from MovieShotsLA, we passed by a residence at 4911 College View Avenue and Mike informed me that it was featured in The Day of the Locust. At the time I had never heard of the 1975 surrealistic thriller, which was based upon the 1939 Nathanael West book of the same name. I snapped a few photos regardless, but somehow the pad went straight to the back of my mind pretty much as soon as I got the images uploaded to my computer. It wasn’t until organizing my location spreadsheet a few months ago that I was reminded of it. Figuring the home would make for a good Haunted Hollywood post, I finally sat down to watch the movie. Though the name sounds straight out of a horror film, as it turns out it is neither horror nor slasher – nor are there any locusts to be found! The Day of the Locust is instead about several show business hopefuls in 1930s-era Hollywood. Because it is easily one of the oddest, most disturbing flicks I have ever seen, I decided it was still fitting for an October posting.

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In a 1975 review, Roger Ebert explains The Day of the Locust’s odd titling as such, “The locusts are the little people, faceless and sad, who accumulate on the benches of Los Angeles, waiting for a bus that will never come. They’re surrounded by the artificial glitter of Hollywood, which provides dreams that certainly are happier and sometimes seem more real than the America of the 1930s. But one day, the dreams will end and the locusts will swarm and the whole fragile society will come crashing down.” Said “crashing down” occurs in an almost zombie-ish scene at the end of the film in which a bloody riot breaks out in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre during a big Hollywood premiere. Living amongst the locusts in the film are three archetypal Tinseltown characters – talented aspiring art director Tod Hackett (William Atherton), opportunistic blonde starlet Faye Greener (Karen Black – who, in real life, became something of a horror movie queen later in her career), and wealthy, lonely, older recluse Homer Simpson (Donald Sutherland) who gets taken advantage of by her. It is the latter’s house that Mike took me to stalk that warm October day nine years ago. (And yep, you read that right – Sutherland appeared as a live-action big-screen “Homer Simpson” twelve years before the infamous animated patriarch made his television debut and quickly became a household name.)

Miraculously, the 1928 pad looks very much as it did onscreen when The Day of the Locust premiered over four decades ago – though there have been a few alterations.

Most notably, the front door is in a different spot. Odd, I know! But in the movie, the home’s main entrance was situated at the southern end of the front porch, facing West Fair Park Avenue which runs perpendicular to College View Ave.

Though it is hard to see in my photos due to a hedge standing in the way, when I stalked the house the front door was situated in the middle of the porch, facing College View Avenue, as the below Google Street View image from May 2009 shows.

In an incredible twist, since my 2010 visit the front door has been relocated again! (In all my years of stalking, this is the first time I’ve come across a house with a front door that has been moved twice!) Per current Google Street View imagery, the door is now situated in the same spot it was during the filming of The Day of the Locust, as you can see in the extreme side view of the property below.

In place of the former front entrance is now a paned window.

The detached garage which once stood at the rear of the property and which was intact when I stalked the place has also since been torn down. In its place is what is referred to in the building permits I dug up as a 528-square foot “recreation room” with a 2-car garage below it. Apparently, in 2012 plans were submitted to the city to subdivide the 0.44-acre plot of land the residence stands on in order to build a secondary home on the northern parcel, but they look to have been denied. I am guessing the “recreation room” was constructed as an alternative.

Per aerial views, the pad also has some sort of guest house/second garage located in the backyard and I am fairly certain that the measurement information supplied by Zillow includes that of the main property as well as the guest cottage and the “recreation room” being that the home itself appears far too small to comprise the reported 6 bedrooms, 5 baths and 3,022 square feet.

I am fairly certain that the residence’s actual backyard was featured in The Day of the Locust . . .

. . . as was its original garage.

The interior of Homer’s house, though, was, I believe, just a set. While the camera angles certainly made it look as if the actual inside of 4911 College View was utilized, because so many scenes took place there, it seems a lot more feasible that a set was constructed on a soundstage for the production.

Said set was seriously (and appropriately) eerie – and reminds me quite a bit of the Canfield-Moreno Estate in Silver Lake – another great Haunted Hollywood locale that I blogged about in 2012.

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

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for showing me this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Homer’s house from The Day of the Locust is located at 4911 College View Avenue in Eagle Rock.

October 14, 2019
Ron Levin’s Former Home

As a Los Angeles aficionado who has long been obsessed with true crime, it is rather shocking that I had no knowledge of the infamous Billionaire Boys Club murders of 1984. Sure, I’d heard of the 1987 The Billionaire Boys Club miniseries, but figuring it a tale of financial woe, dismissed it as not something that would interest me. It was not until earlier this year when the Grim Cheaper suggested we watch the 2018 film of the same name that I learned about the case – and became appropriately transfixed. I spent the next few days fastidiously reading anything I could get my hands on concerning the killings. Of course the tidbit I was most interested in finding out was the real-life location of murder victim Ron Levin’s house. As it turns out, the movie played a bit fast and loose with its locales. While Ron is shown living in a massive Beverly Hills mansion onscreen, he actually called a modest duplex at 144 South Peck Drive, just steps from Rodeo Drive, home. What follows is the story of what occurred there, per newspaper articles, court documents and witness testimony (because the movie played a bit fast and loose with the facts, as well – as least as far as to what I think happened).

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The Billionaire Boys Club was established in 1983 by Joe Hunt, who was born Joseph Gamsky (on Halloween, incidentally) to a lower-middle-class family in Chicago. At some point, Hunt’s family relocated to Los Angeles, where he secured a scholarship to the prestigious Harvard-Westlake School. Following graduation, Joe enrolled at USC for a brief time before dropping out and moving to the Windy City, where he began trading stock. Not licensed to run an investment group, he did so anyway and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange booted him for it. He promptly changed his last name, headed back to L.A. and formed another investment group – the BBC, named in honor of the Bombay Bicycle Club, one of his favorite Chicago restaurants. He enlisted his wealthy former classmates from high school to provide capital for his new venture, which was essentially a Ponzi scheme involving commodities that I can’t properly explain here because I don’t entirely understand it myself (where’s Margot Robbie in a bathtub when you need her?). It was not long before people began referring to the group as the “Billionaire Boys Club” thanks to is members who were all very young and very rich. (That’s Hunt pictured below in a still from the Season 1 episode of Dominick Dunne’s Power, Privilege, and Justice titled “Billionaire Boys Club,” which aired in 2002.)

Though Joe was initially successful in his trades, the group started spending money like water, buying fancy cars and clothes and leasing high-end office space, and it wasn’t long before more was going out than was coming in. Once initial investors began seeing zero ROI, the high-end investments stopped pouring in, as well, and the BBC found itself in dire financial straits, only a year after being established. That was when Ron Levin entered the picture. (That’s him below, again in a still from Dominick Dunne’s Power, Privilege, and Justice.) Joe thought the wealthy Beverly Hills businessman, who wanted to invest $5 million in the BBC, would be the club’s ticket out of debt. In truth, Ron was nothing more than a flimflam man, though. Not only did he not have $5 million, but he was setting Hunt up as part of an even bigger scam. When Joe discovered that he had been played – and that his financial circumstances were more dire than ever as a result – he set out to murder Ron. But not before getting some cash out of him first.

On the evening of June 6th, 1984, Joe and his bodyguard, Jim Pittman, entered Levin’s Beverly Hills duplex (pictured below). Still believing him to be a wealthy man, they forced him to write a $1.5 million check to the BBC and then shot him in the back of the head. (In actuality, Ron hardly had two nickels to rub together – a reality Joe learned shortly after the killing when his check bounced. I guess Ron ultimately got the last laugh!) Pittman and Joe then wrapped Ron in a comforter, put his body in the trunk of Joe’s car, drove out to Soledad Canyon and buried him. (At least, that is what has been testified to and confessed by Pittman. Joe has denied all of it and Levin’s body has never been found.)

Ron had been scheduled to head to New York the following morning with Dean Factor (Shannen Doherty’s ex) of all people, as well as two other friends. When the trio arrived at the duplex to pick him up, though, he was nowhere to be found and the men noticed that a few things in his bedroom seemed to be out of place. Despite these anomalies, police initially assumed Ron had skipped town, largely due to his long history as a conman.

When Levin’s check didn’t provide the funding Hunt had anticipated, BBC member Reza Eslaminia suggested the group kidnap his father, an exiled former Iranian dignitary named Hedayat Eslaminia supposedly worth a whopping $30 million. (That’s him below, once again in a still from Dominick Dunne’s Power, Privilege, and Justice.) Reza figured the boys could get Hedayat to sign over his vast fortune to them via some good old fashioned torture. Knowing he wouldn’t give up his money easily, the group rented a house in Beverly Glen with which to hold him until he turned, after which they’d kill him. Bernice Rappaport, the realtor who leased the boys the residence, told Dominick Dunne’s Power, Privilege, and Justice that during the tour they were only interested in seeing the basement. Way to be inconspicuous, guys! A van was then rented, a steamer trunk procured, and Hunt, his closest friend Dean Karny, and a few other BBC members headed to Belmont in Northern California where Eslaminia lived (and very near to where I grew up, which makes it all the more strange that I knew nothing of the case!). On July 30th, they entered his apartment, beat him, put him in the trunk, stuck the trunk in the van, and began driving back to L.A. Somewhere along the way, though, he died due to lack of air. Hunt still tried to acquire his assets, but once again the joke was on him. As he quickly learned and as was the case with Levin, Eslaminia was worth far less than originally thought. Per a 1998 SF Gate article, following his death his estate was valued at around $200,000.

By this time, many members of the BBC had grown fed up with Hunt’s continual failure to dispense dividends. Two in particular, brothers Tom and Dave May (heirs to the May Co. department store fortune) were especially frustrated and went to the police to report both that Joe was swindling people out of millions and that he had murdered Levin. Detectives immediately got a warrant to search Ron’s duplex and made a startling discovery. Sitting half-hidden behind a trash can in the office was a veritable murder checklist, pinpointing items like “tape mouth” and “hand cuff.” Running seven pages long and hand-written by Joe himself, the list was titled “At Levin’s TO DO.” Joe was arrested soon after.

As the police closed in on other BBC members, Joe’s BFF Dean (pictured below) quickly turned state’s evidence, agreeing to testify about Ron’s murder in exchange for immunity. He also told police that Hunt was responsible for Eslaminia’s killing and led them to his body. Joe was eventually convicted of Ron’s slaying in 1987 and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He later went on trial for Eslaminia’s death, during which he inexplicably represented himself! I guess he did an OK job, too, because jurors wound up deadlocked, a mistrial was declared, and prosecutors declined to pursue the case further. Hunt’s bodyguard, Pittman, was also tried for Ron’s murder – twice actually and both resulted in a hung jury. He eventually pled guilty in November 1987 to being an accessory after the fact, though when he tried to lead police to the body, none was found. (Dun dun dun!) Dean was put in witness protection immediately following the trials, where he has remained ever since.

Despite the violence that took place there, Levin’s former home truly is an idyllic little duplex, each unit boasting 3 bedrooms, 3 baths, about 2,900 square feet, a den, formal living and dining rooms, a fireplace, crown moldings, walk-in closets, plenty of built-ins, a courtyard, and parking for 3 cars. You can see interior images of both apartments here.

I am fairly certain that Ron’s unit, addressed #144, is on the bottom floor of the two-story French Traditional building, which was originally constructed in 1936.

Interestingly, per court testimony given by a friend of Levin’s, in the early ‘70s Ron lived at 148 South Peck Drive, right next door to the building he would eventually be murdered in.

You can see the neighboring structures and their proximity to each other below.

Levin moved to 144 South Peck in the mid-70s and never left – or if you believe Joe Hunt and his defense team, perhaps he did leave one summer night in 1984 and is now living the good life somewhere, completely off the grid.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Ron Levin’s former duplex, from which he disappeared on June 6th, 1984, is located at 144 South Peck Drive in Beverly Hills. Prior to that, he lived next door at 148 South Peck.

October 11, 2019
Stu’s House from "Scream"

At the risk of my October postings turning into a full-fledged Scream-fest (and there ain’t nothing wrong with that, honestly!), I’m coming at ya again with another locale from the 1996 horror flick – the Tomales-area farmhouse where Stuart Macher (Matthew Lillard) lived. Situated up a long, winding driveway and barely visible from the road, the pad is typically off-limits to passersby. But I had the amazing good fortune of seeing it up-close-and-personal during my 2016 visit to Sonoma County. As fate would have it, I happened to drop by on a Saturday morning, at which time a wedding was being set up on the premises. While I was posing for the above photo, one of the party planners pulled up, took pity on me and asked if I wanted to come onto the property for a better look. I just about died right on the spot, stuttered out a “YES!” and promptly hopped in my car and followed her up the driveway, practically hyperventilating the entire way! It was definitely a day for the record books!

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In real life, Stu’s house boasts 5,500 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 4 baths (3 with clawfoot tubs and marble counters procured from a hotel in San Francisco), a formal dining room, a library, 4 fireplaces (though one is covered over), 2 wood stoves, fir wood detailing throughout, a gourmet kitchen with a walk-in pantry, a grand staircase, rear and front foyers, a 3-car garage with a bonus room upstairs, 298 acres of land, creek frontage, 2 barns, 2 guest cottages, and a span of eucalyptus groves.

I was a little uncertain about the home’s provenance when I originally published this post. Thankfully, a fellow stalker named Mandy went on a deep dive into the nitty-gritty of the property’s history as well as that of its original owners and has filled in all the blanks! Honestly can’t thank you enough, Mandy! A real estate listing I came across early on in my research stated that the dwelling was built in 1991 by a Mr. and Mrs. McPhail, who were in their 70s, and was designed to match to the Victorian where Mr. McPhail’s grew up – a factoid that just about made me, ahem, scream! A replica of Stu’s house existing somewhere in Marin County? I couldn’t think of anything cooler! As Mandy discovered, though, virtually none of the listing’s reporting was correct. The property was actually commissioned by John (aka “Jack”) and Carolyn MacPhail, not McPhail, who were in their late 50s, not 70s. A photo of a plaque displayed on the front of Stu’s house that was posted to Instagram by a guy named Ben who attended the Scream Comes Home event in 2018 further confirms Mandy’s information. It also shows that the pad was completed in 1990, not 1991.

But the erroneous reporting doesn’t end there. Mandy further uncovered that John’s childhood home is located at 7 Marin Street in San Rafael. That’s it below. As you can see – and as I was sorely disappointed to discover – it looks absolutely nothing like Stu’s. It’s not even a Victorian!

Now, the house next door at 11 Marin Street, where John’s father was born and raised and where a cousin of the family lived during his childhood, does bear some resemblance to the Macher residence. Some. While it is Victorian and has bay windows and a porch overhang similar to the Scream home, that’s certainly not enough to claim it is a replica of it – or even that it was inspired by it. So yeah, the whole story about the Tomales property being built to match John’s childhood home appears to be just that, a story – probably intended to make the history of the place more interesting and therefore more attractive to buyers.

Per their obituaries, the MacPhails both passed away in their Tomales home in 1991 at the age of 59 – John from a “brief illness” on March 6th and Carolyn “after being in ill health for several years” on November 12. Matthew Lillard discusses the deaths in an on-set interview that is included in the Behind the ‘Scream’ documentary featured in The Ultimate Scream Collection DVD box set. He says, “It’s kind of, like, an eerie house. Actually, two people have died in this house. Literally – two people have died in the house. So coming up the hill and you’re doing a Wes Craven film and somebody tells you, ‘Oh, by the way, two people have died in the house,’ it brings on an entirely new thing.” Though both John and Carolyn passed away from natural causes, Matthew is right – it’s certainly eerie!

The MacPhails left the sprawling property to their children and it sat vacant in the years following, which I’m sure is a big part of how it came to be used in Scream. A huge, deserted and unoccupied Victorian situated up a lonely dark road? There’s no better spot to shoot the final sequence of a horror movie! Of the find, Wes Craven said in a 1996 interview that my friend Ashley of The Drewseum was kind enough to email me a scan of, “We wanted Stu’s home to have elements of a dark and haunted Gothic house and it needed to be very isolated. We looked a long time for some place that had all of those elements. The house we found was actually brand new. It had not quite been completed when both of the owners died, and the family of younger kids didn’t quite know what to do with it. When we found it and offered to use it, they were very happy to let us. The art department went in there and did an enormous number on the house. We put in all sorts of beams, and stained-glass windows, darkened all the colors, and brought in all the set dressings. It was done in a sort of farmhouse style, and we changed it into a Gothic farmhouse.”

Production designer Bruce Miller furthers in the same article, “It just doesn’t make sense that in a normal American home, murders could be happening in the upstairs bedrooms, and people watching television downstairs wouldn’t know about it. So the house had to be big enough, and the rooms had to be separated by enough distance, to convince the audience that these things could really be happening, without the other people knowing about it. This particular house was perfect for that, because it was very convoluted, and kind of Victorian on the inside. It was actually a little scary to some extent, and then we added big paintings and a chandelier. Because the house was so Victorian on the inside, we didn’t want to fight that, but we didn’t want to over-stress it either. We even put a volleyball net in the front yard, because it had to be believable that a normal teenager lives there with his parents, who just happened to be away for the weekend.”

The production team must have really, ahem (again), screamed with excitement when they saw that the home’s garage is situated on the rear side of the property, not at all visible from the front, making Tatum Riley’s (Rose McGowan) death scene (which was a part of the original script) – as well as the fact that her body is never seen by any of the partygoers – all the more feasible.

Stu’s house was put up for sale in November 2011 for $2,795,000, but there were no takers. It was eventually removed from the market, then returned and finally sold in June 2014 for $2,820,000. Today, it is known as “Spring Hill Estate” and, as I mentioned, serves as a wedding venue. Despite being remote, isolated, situated on a lonely hill and the site of one of filmdom’s most famous horror movie sequences, it is nothing short of peaceful and pastoral, not to mention stunningly beautiful. I can think of no better place to host a wedding in Northern California. The nuptials we saw being set up, situated in one of the property’s barns, looked like something out of a magazine! Rustic, inviting and lit with hundreds upon hundreds of twinkle lights, it was all I could do not to try to secure myself an invite!

Scream’s epically bloody finale, which counts for a whopping 42 minutes of screen time, was comprised of one scene, Scene #118. Broken up into more than 20 different parts, the sequence, titled “People live, people die,” makes up the entire third act of the film. And all of it takes place at Stu’s house! Pretty much every single area of the residence is featured, including the front exterior.

The pad looks exactly the same in person as it did onscreen, minus the large stained glass window situated over the front door which was a prop added for filming, I am guessing to give it even more of that Gothic Victorian farmhouse feel.

For the shoot, the home’s real life dining room was transformed into the Macher family’s TV room, where audiences were gifted with Randy Meeks’ (Jamie Kennedy) legendary break-down of “the rules” of horror movies. As you can see in the MLS image below from the property’s 2014 sale, even without Stu’s red floral curtains and rust-colored couch, the room is very recognizable from its cameo.

And the kitchen is even more so! Looking at MLS images of it makes my heart beat a little faster! The room is absolutely frozen in time from its big screen appearance!

The only thing missing is a set of ceiling-mounted cabinets that ran along the edge of the space in Scream. I am not sure if said cabinets were a real element of the house since removed or just set dressing, but I am guessing the former.

The 2014 listing mentions that the home boasts “a kitchen desk and planning center” which cracked me up as that is the spot where Stu sits while speaking on the phone with Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell). It is there that he utters his famous line, “My mom and dad are gonna be so mad at me!”

The residence’s breakfast nook also makes an appearance in Scream;

as does the foyer;

one of the bedrooms;

the attic (of which, Wes Craven says, “The attic wasn’t very creepy, so we darkened it down, and filled it up with all sorts of strange stuff.”);

and, of course, the garage!

Had to do it!

As I mentioned earlier, the garage is situated on the back side of the house . . .

. . . completely hidden from view from the front.

It is in the middle garage door that Tatum meets her untimely end and from the dormer above it and to the left that Sidney jumps out of the attic and first sees her body.

The finale sequence, which took a whopping 21 nights to shoot, was so grueling that cast and crew started referring to it as “the scene from hell” and “the longest night in horror history.” It was not long before “I survived Scene 118” became a running joke and t-shirts bearing the phrase were made for everyone involved, as seen in the still from ’Scream’: The Inside Story below.

All I could think while making screen captures for this post was how in the heck did they ever get the house clean again following filming?

Fun fact – Dewey Riley (David Arquette) was originally set to die at the end of Scream, but Wes Craven had a last-minute change of heart and shot the bit with the deputy being taken out of Stu’s house on a stretcher and loaded into an ambulance on the final night of filming, as he had a feeling audiences were going to fall in love with him. And he was right! I can’t imagine the sequels without Dewey!

Per the Spring Hill Estate website, Stu’s house is quite a hotbed for filming, with more than 15 productions lensed on the premises. I was only able to identify 2, though.

The interior is utilized briefly as the home where Sara Gold (Allison Paige) lives with her parents in the 2016 drama The Dog Lover.

And Stu’s house also serves as the residence of Stella Davis (Dorian Brown Pham) in 2017’s Running Wild.

Coincidentally, shortly after I began penning this article, the Grim Cheaper texted me a link about a Halloween party taking place at Stu’s house on October 31st, hosted by the same guys who put on Scream Comes Home. Apparently, the homeowners have recently decided to move onto the premises and though the place will still be available periodically as a special event venue, this will be the last time it is opened up to Scream fans. You can get your tickets here! And if you are interested in checking out more interior shots of Stu’s house, the Real to Reel website has some fabulous ones from the Scream Comes Home event.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Mandy for unearthing so much of this home’s history and to my friend Ashley, of The Drewseum, for sharing several articles about the property with me!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Spring Hill Estate, aka Stu’s house from Scream, is located at 3871 Tomales Petaluma Road in Tomales. The home currently serves as a special event venue. You can visit its official website here. The residence is situated up a long private drive and only the back of it (which did not appear in the movie) is visible from the street. (Pictured below is the view of it from the road.) You can catch an up-close glimpse of it, though, by attending the Halloween party being held there on October 31st. More information can be found here.

October 9, 2019