Author: Lindsay

The El Palacio Apartments

Situated at the corner of La Cienega Boulevard and Fountain Avenue in West Hollywood is an idyllic complex named The El Palacio Apartments. The gorgeous Spanish Baroque architecture is hiding some dark secrets, though. The building has been the site of two infamous deaths, the most notorious of which was the overdoes of actress Dorothy Dandridge in 1965. I have always been fascinated by the El Palacio’s lesser-known tie to the macabre, however. It was at the tenement that a young oil heiress named Georgette Bauerdorf was found murdered, face down in a bathtub, in 1944 – a mystery that remains unsolved to this day.

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The El Palacio Apartments were designed by architect William Hauptman in 1931. The 18-unit courtyard complex features a stuccoed exterior, subterranean parking, mahogany doors, cast stone ornamentation, balconets, a tiled gable roof and gardens fashioned by Seymour Thomas.

Georgette Bauerdorf was born into a life of privilege in New York City on May 6, 1924. After her mother passed away in 1935, she migrated to Los Angeles with her father and sister. Georgette graduated from the Westlake School for Girls in 1941 and spent the next few years travelling. In the summer of 1944, she moved into the family’s multi-level, two-story apartment at the El Palacio along with her sister and father. When they decided to return to Manhattan in August, Georgette remained behind. She spent her days working for the Los Angeles Times Women’s Service Bureau and also volunteered each Wednesday night as a junior hostess at the Hollywood Canteen, a nightclub for servicemen formerly located at 1451 Cahuenga Boulevard in Hollywood.

On the night of October 11th, 1944, Georgette left the Hollywood Canteen at 11:30 p.m. and arrived home about a half an hour later. She ate a can of string beans and some cantaloupe and then changed into pajamas. The following morning she was found by the cleaning staff, face down in her bathtub with a nine-inch by nine-inch piece of cloth lodged in her throat. It is said that the bath water had been left running, though I am not sure how or why the tub did not overflow. The police were immediately called and it was determined that Georgette had been raped and strangled. Nothing in the apartment was found to be amiss, save for a lone drop of blood on the floor of the bedroom, and Georgette’s expensive jewelry had been left undisturbed on her dresser. Investigators later discovered that her front porch light had been unscrewed slightly, rendering it unusable, possibly so that the intruder could leave the premises undetected.

A few suspects were later questioned, but the crime was never solved. It is believed, though, that a man, most likely someone Georgette knew, broke into her apartment while she was at the Hollywood Canteen and then proceeded to hide out until after she returned home, at which time he raped and killed her. You can read a more detailed account of the case here.

Twenty years later, Dorothy Dandridge, the first African American woman to be nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award, moved into unit D2 of the El Palacio. Her tenure there was not long. She was in fairly dire straits at the time, victim to both a drug addiction and a Ponzi scheme that had depleted her finances. On September 8th, 1965, just a year after she had moved in, she was found dead of a prescription pill overdose in the bathroom of her apartment. She reportedly had $2.14 in her bank account. You can read more about her death here.

According to Curbed LA, my girl Miss Marilyn Monroe also lived at the El Palacio Apartments, in the spare bedroom of actor John Carroll and his wife, Lucille Ryman, for five months in 1947.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The El Palacio Apartments, where the murder of Georgette Bauerdorf took place, are located at 8491-8499 Fountain Avenue in West Hollywood.

October 13, 2014
Dorothy Stratten’s Former House

True crime has always fascinated me. One case that I had never followed, though (probably because I was barely three years old at the time the events took place), was the murder of Playboy Playmate Dorothy Stratten in 1980. When my friends Lavonna, Kim, Katie and Kaylee came to L.A. for a visit this past June, Lavonna insisted we stalk the house where the killing took place so that I could write a blog post on it come October. Here goes.

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Dorothy Stratten grew up in Vancouver and, while working at a Dairy Queen at the age of 17, met and hooked up with a club promoter/get-rich-quick schemer/pimp nine years her senior named Paul Snider. Thinking the naïve and beautiful young blonde could be his potential meal ticket and his “in” to show business, Paul had professional nude photographs taken of her shortly after they met and sent them off to Playboy. Hugh Hefner liked what he saw and quickly flew Stratten out to L.A. It was not long before Paul followed, intent on riding on his girlfriend’s coattails. To seal the deal, he convinced Dorothy to marry him and the couple tied the knot in a quickie Vegas ceremony on June 1st, 1979. She was 19. Along with a roommate named Dr. Stephen Cushner, the newlyweds moved into a two-bedroom, two-bath, 1,424-square-foot home located at 10881 West Clarkson Road in Rancho Park.

Cushner lived in the residence’s upstairs bedroom . . .

. . . while Dorothy and Paul stayed in the bottom level room located at the back of the house. There was to be no honeymoon period, though. Dorothy’s star was on the rise and as she grew more successful, Paul grew more possessive and controlling.

Dorothy was named Playmate of the Month in August 1979 and then Playmate of the Year in 1980. Predictably, it was not long before Hollywood came a-callin’. She landed roles in episodes of Fantasy Island and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century and in the movies Americathon, Skatetown, U.S.A., Autumn Born and Galaxina. The starlet caught director Peter Bogdanovich’s eye one afternoon at the Playboy mansion and he cast her in his film They All Laughed shortly thereafter. Dorothy had to relocate to New York for the shoot and, while there, she and Bogdanovich fell in love. Upon returning home once filming wrapped in early August 1980, Dorothy separated from Paul, asked for a divorce and moved into Peter’s Bel Air mansion located at 212 Copa De Oro Road in Bel Air.

Around noon on August 14th, Dorothy agreed to meet Paul at the house the two once shared to discuss the divorce. She brought along $1,000 cash to placate him and keep things amicable. The events that followed were anything but. Paul ended up shooting Dorothy and then killing himself. Their bodies were found at approximately 11 p.m. that evening by Cushner. The details of the murder/suicide are not pretty. If interested, you can read more about them on Findadeath and in this 1980 article from The Village Voice. In an odd twist, Bogdanovich, who still considers Dorothy the love of his life, wound up marrying her much-younger sister, Louise, in 1988. They divorced 13 years later.

In 1983, famed dancer Bob Fosse directed a movie about Dorothy’s life and untimely death named Star 80. Model Mariel Hemingway played Dorothy, while Eric Roberts played Paul. Oddly enough, part of the filming took place at the couple’s real life former home.

Supposedly, several areas of the real life interior of the dwelling appeared in the movie, as well, including the garage;

Paul and Dorothy’s bedroom, where the murder took place;

the downstairs bathroom;

the downstairs hallway;

and the downstairs living room/office. Without having seen images of the home’s actual interior, though, I cannot say with certainty whether or not that was the case. And because the layout of the windows shown in Star 80 does not match the window layout of the actual residence, I am guessing that the interior was just a set.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Lavonna for taking me to this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Dorothy Stratten’s former house is located at 10881 West Clarkson Road in Rancho Park.

October 10, 2014
New “L.A.” Mag Post – About Phil’s Halloween Open House from “Modern Family”

Be sure to read today’s Scene It Before post for Los Angeles magazine – about Phil’s Halloween open house from Modern Family. My columns typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours.

October 9, 2014
The Chandler Estate from “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”

The Chandlers are widely considered to be one of L.A.’s “first families.” Patriarch Harry not only served as publisher of the Los Angeles Times for 27 years, but was largely responsible for developing the San Fernando Valley, the Hollywood Hills and Dana Point in the O.C., as well. He was also instrumental in the construction of some of the city’s most famous structures including the Biltmore Hotel, the Hollywood Bowl, the California Institute of Technology and the Los Angeles Coliseum. So when I found out that his Los Feliz estate had been used in the 1956 science fiction thriller Invasion of the Body Snatchers, I ran right out to stalk the place.

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The 8,891-square-foot, red-brick, Georgian-style manse was built from 1914 to 1916 and boasts 24 rooms, including eight bedrooms and four baths, a two-story entrance hall, a library, a solarium, a butler’s pantry, a pool, a detached four-car garage, and a one-bedroom guesthouse. Sadly, outside of a long tree-lined driveway, little else of the place is visible to the public. The views from the street out front are pretty darn spectacular, though.

An aerial view of the Chandler estate is pictured below. As you can see, it is quite impressive. You can also check out some close-up and interior photographs of the pad here.

After Harry Chandler passed away in 1944, his wife Marian continued to live at the mansion until her own death in 1952. The Chandler family held onto the property for quite some time and in 1972 leased it at a rate of $1,000 a month to the Source Family (the cult that operated The Source Restaurant on Sunset Boulevard, which I blogged about here). During their time there, the Source Family dubbed the estate “Mother House.” The Chandler’s opted not to renew the group’s lease after the first year, so in 1973 the Family moved elsewhere. In September 2008, the mansion was put on the market for $6,799,000. There were no takers, though, and in January of the following year the price was dropped to $5.499 million. The residence finally sold in October 2009 for $3,696,000.

It is well-documented online that the Chandler estate served as the home of Jack Belicec (King Donovan) and his wife, Theodora (Carolyn Jones), in Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Having scanned through the flick in preparation for this post, though, I cannot say with certainty that the reports are correct. So little of the house can been seen in the movie that it is virtually impossible to confirm or deny the location.

It has also been reported on several Invasion of the Body Snatchers websites and message boards that the Chandler estate was demolished sometime after filming took place. I think what led to that assumption is the fact that most sites list the address of the residence as 2330 Hillhurst Avenue. There is no such address is Los Feliz. The Chandler estate is actually located at 2411 Inverness Avenue. But as you can see below, both addresses point to the same spot, which leads me to believe that the home was originally numbered 2330 Hillhurst. In its early days, the Chandler estate boasted five acres. The majority of the land was sold off over the years, though, and the residence currently sits on 0.83 acres. I am guessing that the address was changed to 2411 Inverness at some point due to that division of land, leading Invasion fans to believe that the residence was no longer. Thankfully though, it is still standing in its original state.

The interior of the Belicec home was also shown in two Invasion of the Body Snatchers scenes, but I am uncertain if the the Chandler estate’s actual interior (if filming did, in fact, take place there) was used or a set. I am leaning toward the latter, though.

In 1985, the estate was used in a few Season 4 episodes of Falcoln Crest as the home of Gustav Riebmann (Paul Fremann), although very little of it could be seen in the episodes.

The Chandler estate was also where Matthew Winfield (a very young George Clooney) hid out in the Season 3 episode of Hunter titled “Double Exposure,” which aired in 1987. Both the exterior . . .

. . . and the interior of the property appeared in the episode.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The Chandler estate, from Invasion of the Body Snatchers, is located at 2411 Inverness Avenue in Los Feliz.

October 8, 2014
Harbor Steps Apartments from “The Ring”

I am reaching deep into my stalking vault for today’s location. I visited the Harbor Steps Apartments from The Ring during a trip to Seattle well over four years ago – shortly after being caught in a torrential downpour, which explains my hat in the above photograph – but somehow failed to blog about them. Since the building’s appearance in the 2002 thriller was decidedly macabre, I figured what better time to write about it than during my annual Haunted Hollywood postings. So here goes!

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The 734-unit Harbor Steps Apartments, which are situated overlooking downtown Seattle and Puget Sound, were completed in 2000.

The upscale complex, which consists of four high-rise buildings, features three fitness centers, a basketball court, a volleyball court, three Jacuzzis, a sauna, a climbing wall, an indoor pool, a business center, a media room/theatre, stunningly gorgeous views, and (my personal favorite) 24-hour concierge service.

The Harbor Steps Apartments sit directly across from the Seattle Art Museum and one of Jonathan Borofsky’s Hammering Man sculptures. (There are several others situated throughout the world.) The 48-foot-tall instillation was constructed in 1991 out of hollow-fabricated steel and, according to the City of Seattle’s official website, “celebrates the worker’s contribution to society.”

Thanks to an electric motor, the sculpture’s arm makes a hammering motion every 15 seconds, 24 hours a day, every single day of the year. Well, except each Labor Day, that is, when Hammering Man is programmed to take a rest – a fact which I thought was so incredibly cool.

In The Ring, the Harbor Steps Apartments were where Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts) lived with her son, Aidan (David Dorfman). According to the movie’s production notes, director Gore Verbinski chose to shoot the flick in Washington because, “The Pacific Northwest winter provided a seemingly perpetual overcast and cold, gloomy weather that only added to the story’s atmosphere of dread. The lack of sun also lent itself perfectly to the soft light and lack of shadows that Verbinski and cinematographer Bojan Bazelli were employing to complement the story’s surrealistic moments.” Production designer Tom Duffield based the film’s coloring on the paintings of Andrew Wyeth. He says, “In Wyeth’s work, the trees are always dormant, and the colors are muted earth tones. It’s greys, it’s browns, it’s somber colors; it’s ripped fabrics in the windows. His work has a haunting flavor that I felt would add to the mystique of this movie, so I latched on to it. “

He did a fabulous job, too, because, as you can see below, even moments after a downpour, the building is much more vibrant in person than Duffield made it appear to be in The Ring.

Rachel supposedly lived in Unit 601 in the movie.

But I am fairly certain that the interior of her apartment was a set. You can check out a few interior photographs of some real life Harbor Steps Apartments here and here.

The interior of Rachel’s unit seemed to be much larger and more open than those of the actual complex.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The Harbor Steps Apartments from The Ring are located at 1221 First Avenue in Seattle, Washington. You can visit the complex’s official website here.

October 7, 2014
Anoakia Mansion from “Doppelganger”

There’s no denying that Doppelganger is a pretty horrible movie. But part of the fun of the Halloween season is watching ridiculously terrible horror flicks from years past – and stalking their locations, of course. I had long been on the hunt for the psychiatric institution from the 1993 thriller and was given a tip a couple of years ago that a historic, since-demolished mansion named Anoakia in Arcadia was the right spot. (For the life of me, I cannot remember who gave me the information. To whomever it was, I apologize.) Even though the place is long gone, I figured that it still proved blog-worthy being that several people have asked me about its location over the years.

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Anoakia was originally constructed in 1913 for Anita Baldwin, the daughter of Elias Jackson “Lucky” Baldwin, the founder of Arcadia. The 50-room estate was designed in the Italian Renaissance style and boasted 17,000 square feet of space, a bowling alley, a gym, wood-paneled rooms, etched glass doors, a pool, an aviary, a bee yard, tennis courts and murals painted by artist Maynard Dixon. The 20-acre grounds featured ponds, gardens, stables, a bathhouse and a chapel. Upon Anita’s death in 1939, the property was turned into a boarding school for girls. In 1944, it was purchased by Lowry McCaslin, a former manager of the Baldwin estate. He continued to operate a school on the premises for several decades. Unfortunately, after the Whittier earthquake in 1987, McCaslin was forced to make costly upgrades to the mansion to keep it up to code. Maintaining the site was no longer feasible for the 82-year-old, so he had the school moved and made plans to develop Anoakia’s grounds, keeping the mansion intact.

City officials rejected all of McCaslin’s proposals and Anoakia sat vacant for the next decade and began to dilapidate. In 1999, a developer from Orange County purchased the site from Lowry’s estate (McCaslin passed away in 1995) and came up with a plan to build a gated community of 31 homes on the land. To do this, the Anoakia would need to be demolished. While the developer met with some opposition from preservationists, the city eventually approved of his plans and the historic mansion was leveled in 2000. You can see some pictures of how it looked in its last days here.

Today, the upscale community is known as Anoakia Estates.

The only part of the original property to remain intact are the perimeter wall and a guard house located in the southeast corner of the grounds (circled in the two aerial views below).

I did not know about the guard house at the time that I stalked the location so I did not take any photographs of it, but you can see what it looks like it via the Google Street View image below.

In Doppelganger, Anoakia stood in for Our Lady of Mercy Psychiatric Institute, where Holly’s (Drew Barrymore) brother, Fred, was institutionalized.

True to life, the institute was said to be located in Arcadia in the movie.

Anoakia showed up a couple of times in Doppelganger.

The real life interior of the mansion was used in the movie, as well.

From what was shown in Doppelganger, it is obvious that Anoakia was an absolutely idyllic estate. What a shame that it is no longer standing!

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Anoakia Mansion, aka Our Lady of Mercy Psychiatric Institute from Doppelganger, was formerly located at around 1200 North Baldwin Avenue in Arcadia.

October 6, 2014
The American Cement Building from “Scream 3”

While I am admittedly not a fan of MacArthur Park, there is a property situated on the border of it that I would absolutely LOVE to live in – The American Cement Building. Mike from, MovieShotsLA, pointed out the dramatically stunning structure many moons ago during one of our very first stalks together and I have been obsessed with it ever since. And while Mike also informed me that the edifice had appeared in the 2000 horror flick Scream 3, for some reason I never thought to blog about the place during my Haunted Hollywood postings. That changes today!

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The American Cement Building was constructed in 1964 and originally served as the American Cement Company’s headquarters. The Daniel, Mann, Johnson and Mendenhall (DMJM) architecture firm designed the 13-story structure, which was, fittingly, manufactured out of reinforced concrete.

The north and south sides of the building are covered in latticework comprised of 450 X-shaped pieces of precast concrete. While the design adds beauty to the structure’s façade and is striking to look at, it serves a functional objective, as well. According to the Los Angeles Conservancy website, “The primary purpose of the latticework is to provide external support for the structural system so the building’s interior can be free of columns.”

The American Cement Building underwent a multi-million dollar renovation in 2002 during which time the office spaces were transformed into 71 live/work lofts. You can check out some great interior photographs of the property here. The units – and their views – are breathtaking!

In Scream 3, The American Cement Building housed the office of horror movie producer John Milton (Lance Henriksen).

At the time of the filming, the interior of the building was far less modern than it is today.

I absolutely LOVE the fact that Milton had a diving board attached to his window in the flick. Anyone care for a swim?

The American Cement Building also appeared in Pharrell Williams’ music video “Come Get It Bae,” which featured Miley Cyrus.

The building’s parking garage was where The Bride (Uma Thurman) learned how to wiggle her toe again in Kill Bill: Vol. 1.

The Entourage movie also apparently did some filming at the building in March of this year.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The American Cement Building, from Scream 3, is located at 2404 Wilshire Boulevard in Westlake. You can visit the building’s official website here.

October 3, 2014
Latest “L.A.” Mag Post – About Buster’s Coffee from “Revenge”

Don’t forget to head over to LAMag.com to read today’s Scene It Before post – about Buster’s Coffee from my new favorite show Revenge. My columns typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours. And you can check out a bonus post I did about filming locations from Gone Girl, which comes out tomorrow, here.

October 2, 2014
Whitey Bulger’s Former Apartment

It is finally that time of year again – October 1st, the start of my Haunted Hollywood postings. And I could not be more excited, so let’s get to it! The October 2013 issue of Los Angeles magazine featured an absolutely enthralling article about the arrest of the infamous Boston mobster James “Whitey” Bulger. I read the column, titled “The Old Man Next Door,” in one short sitting and was elated that author Steven Mikulan had included the address of Bulger’s former Santa Monica apartment building. I finally made it out to stalk the place in January of this year, but held off on blogging about it until now as I figured the locale would make for a perfect Haunted Hollywood posting.

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James Bulger was born in 1929 in Boston’s North End. He was given the nickname “Whitey” thanks to his bright blonde hair and reportedly hated the moniker as much as fellow mobster Benjamin Siegel hated being called “Bugsy.” Whitey moved to a South Boston housing project with his family at a young age and his life of crime began shortly thereafter. By the age of fourteen, he had been arrested for larceny and was eventually sentenced to a juvenile facility. By 30, he was serving time at Alcatraz for a bank robbery conviction. After his release, it was not long before he was running South Boston’s infamous Winter Hill Gang. (Jack Nicholson’s Frank Costello character in The Departed was based on Bulger.) In 1993, a task force was implemented to catch and arrest Whitey for numerous crimes, including 19 murders. The task force was ready to take Bulger in the following year, but he was tipped off and immediately fled Boston. Oddly enough, he originally went on the lam with a longtime girlfriend named Teresa Stanley. She tired of life on the run fairly quickly and, upon her return to Massachusetts, Whitey asked a different longtime girlfriend, Catherine Greig, to flee with him. Apparently, Greig didn’t mind playing second fiddle.

Upon arriving in Santa Monica in 1996, James and Catherine took up residence at the Princess Eugenia apartment building located at 1012 Third Street. They lived for the next 15 years under the aliases of Charlie and Carol Gasko. Their life at the Princess Eugenia was a fairly quiet one, though Whitey could often be seen on his balcony looking through a pair of binoculars. The couple went on daily walks, were friendly with neighbors and took care of a couple of local stray cats. Their two-bedroom, two-bath apartment hid a more sinister existence, though. Holes in the walls concealed a stash of $822,198 in cash and a collection of thirty guns.

The Gasko’s lurid past caught up with them on June 22, 2011. The previous day, a former Icelandic native named Anna Bjornsdottir had randomly watched an FBI video about Bulger and Greig on TV and recognized the couple immediately. Anna had lived at the Embassy Hotel Apartments (now named Palihouse) across the street from the Princess Eugenia many years prior and had become friendly with Catherine thanks to a stray neighborhood cat that both women cared for. She called the FBI and less than 24 hours later they had infiltrated Whitey’s building. Shortly thereafter and thanks to some help from Josh Bond, the Princess Eugenia’s manager, Bulger and Greig were arrested without incident in the building’s garage.

Greig wound up pleading guilty to identity fraud and conspiring to harbor a fugitive and was sentenced to 8 years in prison. She is currently serving her time at the Wyatt Detention Center in Central Falls, Rhode Island. Whitey’s trial lasted two months and he was convicted of 31 counts, including murder involvement, drug trafficking, racketeering, money laundering, and extortion. He was given two life sentences plus five years and is currently serving that time at the United States Penitentiary in Tucson, Arizona.

During their stint at the Princess Eugenia, Whitey and Catherine lived in Apartment 303, a corner unit located on the western side of the building’s third floor. Their unit is denoted with an orange arrow below. You can check out some photographs of the interior of the apartment from the time that the couple lived there here. To say the place was odd would be an understatement. Why there was a bed in the living room is beyond me. You can also see some interior photographs of what the space currently looks like here.

In an eerie twist, while writing this post I learned that Whitey’s former apartment unit is blurred out on Google Street View, as you can see below. I looked up Google’s privacy policy and apparently anyone can request to have their residence blurred from view. Whether this request was made by Whitey himself (a distinct possibility considering he had plastic sheets, duct tape, and black curtains covering all of his windows when he lived at the Eugenia) or the new tenants is anyone’s guess, but I was pretty spooked when I came across it. Freaaaaaaky!

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Princess Eugenia, aka Whitey Bulger’s former apartment building, is located at 1012 Third Street in Santa Monica.

October 1, 2014
Callahan’s Diner from “Zodiac”

In the early years of our relationship the Grim Cheaper lived in Santa Monica, just a few blocks from a local staple named Callahan’s Diner. Even though I knew the eatery was a filming location and supposedly served up some fabulous grub, for whatever reason we never ventured in for a meal. I am kicking myself now, too, because the restaurant, which has been in operation since 1948, is set to close at the end of the year. So when I found myself in the area a couple of weeks ago, I seized the opportunity to snaps some pics of the place.

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It was late afternoon when I stopped by Callahan’s, just a few minutes before I had to pick the GC up from a meeting, so, unfortunately, I did not have time to grab a bite to eat. But the owner, Abraham Vazquez, was nice enough to spend some time chatting with me and invited me to snap all of the photographs of the place that I wanted.

The Streamline Moderne-style building that houses Callahan’s – and the neighboring Vienna Pastry – was constructed by restaurateur Art Groves in 1946 for his eponymous Groves Restaurant and Bakery. In 1948, he leased out the restaurant portion of the property to Melvin Callahan and Callahan’s Diner was born. The café proved successful for four decades. In 1988, Melvin sold the site to Abraham, who thankfully kept Callahan’s name, décor and menu intact. While Abraham also enjoyed a long, successful run, he recently announced that Callahan’s will be shutting its doors on December 31st. A new company, LGO Hospitality, purchased the building not long ago and made plans to raise Vazquez’s rent when his lease is up at the end of the year. He, sadly, cannot afford the price hike. The good news is that LGO has a long history of preserving historical locations and announced in a press release that while the Callahan’s menu will be transformed, the floor plan and décor will remain largely the same.

Callahan’s has appeared onscreen a few times over the years, most notably in the 2007 thriller Zodiac. The eatery was featured in three scenes from the movie – well, sort of. It first popped up as the supposed San Francisco-area diner where Inspectors David Toschi (Mark Ruffalo) and William Armstrong (Anthony Edwards) discussed some handwriting samples over a BLT sandwich.

Towards the middle of the film, it was used in the scene in which Robert Graysmith (Jake Gyllenhaal) bought David lunch and informed him that books on cyphers had been stolen from both the Presidio Library and the Oakland Army Terminal Library.

Now here’s where things get weird. The third scene to take place at Callahan’s involved Robert sharing with David the various evidence he had compiled on suspect Arthur Leigh Allen (John Carroll Lynch). Prior to stalking the restaurant, I had come across a piece of Zodiac trivia on IMDB that stated, “Though Callahan’s Diner was a set built for the film, the Callahan’s Diner logo and window script is identical to that used by Callahan’s Diner at 1213 Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica, California.” I assumed the trivia was bupkis, especially once Abraham had confirmed for me that filming had actually taken place on the premises. But while watching the third scene that was supposedly shot at the eatery, I noticed that some portions of the interior did not match up to what was shown in the earlier scenes or to the real Callahan’s interior.

What first tipped me off to the inconsistencies was when David was shown leaving Callahan’s through a door located on the restaurant’s western side – a door that does not exist in the real life space. A partition separating the entryway from the booths was also visible in that segment of the scene. There is no such partition at Callahan’s, though, as you can see below.

There was no such door or partition in that area in the earlier scene in which David and William discussed handwriting samples, either.

What was shown in the handwriting sample scene does match perfectly to the real restaurant, though, as you can see below.

A wide shot of the restaurant was also featured in the evidence scene and, again, it does not match the real life interior of Callahan’s.

Nor does it match what was shown in the earlier lunch scene.

The interior shown in the lunch scene does match the actual Callahan’s interior, though. All of this leads me to believe that, as implausible as it may sound, while the lunch scene and handwriting sample scene were filmed on location at Callahan’s, the evidence scene was shot on a set modeled to look like it. The reason this was done is anyone’s guess.

Abraham also informed me that Callahan’s Diner had been used in music videos for both Snoop Dogg and Lionel Richie, but I am unsure of which videos. If any of my fellow stalkers are aware, please let me know.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Callahan’s Diner, from Zodiac, is located at 1213 Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica. You can visit the eatery’s official Facebook page here.

September 29, 2014