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Officer Rhodes’ House from “Bridesmaids”

As I mentioned in last Thursday’s post about the apartment building where Lillian (Maya Rudolph) lived in Bridesmaids, I recently became just a wee-bit obsessed with tracking down all of the locales featured in the 2011 hit. One of the sites I was most interested in finding, of course, was the small blue ranch-style house belonging to Officer Rhodes (Chris O’Dowd). I bugged Mike, from MovieShotsLA, relentlessly to help me out with the search and he finally managed to track the place down last Wednesday morning. Needless to say, I was absolutely ecstatic and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to stalk it just a few days later – despite the fact that it was raining at the time. As I have mentioned before, this stalker absolutely HATES rain (thank goodness I am moving to the desert) and there are very few locations that I would actually venture out to stalk during a downpour. But Officer Rhodes’ house was one of ‘em!

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Finding this location took quite a bit of work, actually, so Mike definitely deserves a HUGE pat on the back! While scanning through Bridesmaids looking for clues as to the house’s location, I noticed an address number of 8410 behind Rhodes in the scene in which Annie (Kristen Wiig) leaves a cake on his doorstep. Mike and I both had an inkling that the number was a fake, though.

That inkling was solidified when I spotted a five-digit address number on the residence pictured behind Annie’s car in the same scene. And while I was unable to make out the number with any sort of certainty, I told Mike that I thought it read 23430. As luck would have it, I was right! I had read in the Bridesmaids production notes that towns surrounding Los Angeles had been used to stand in for Milwaukee and Chicago in the flick, so Mike and I decided to begin our hunt in the 23400 blocks of small towns surrounding L.A. proper. And, sure enough, although it took a while, Mike worked his magic and found the pad – in Santa Clarita of all places. Yay!

Officer Rhodes’ house shows up a few times in Bridesmaids and, as you can see below, has not been altered much from its silver screen appearance.

In real life, the tiny cottage, which was originally built in 1948, boasts 1 bedroom, 1 bath, 605 square feet of living space (that’s smaller than my apartment!), and a small 0.085-acre parcel of land.

As you can see below, the place is absolutely adorable in person – and does not seem like an L.A.-area house at all.

I was most excited to see the front porch area where the raccoons devoured Annie’s cake in the movie. LOL LOVE IT!

And while I am not certain, I have a hunch that the interior (LOVE the beamed roof and French doors, by the way!) of Rhodes’ house was just a set.

Tomorrow, I will be blogging about the residence where Annie’s mom, Judy (Jill Clayburgh), lived in Bridesmaids – which just so happens to be located directly across the street from Rhodes’ house! I was going to blog both properties together, but ran out of time today. So until tomorrow . . .

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Officer Rhodes’ house from Bridesmaids is located at 23425 8th Street in Santa Clarita. Note – the property cannot be reached via Calgrove Boulevard, as that street is blocked just east of Creekside Drive. To gain access to the site, you can take either Apple or Valley Street south off of Lyons Avenue to 8th Street.

December 4, 2012
Lillian and Sam’s House from “People Like Us”

After I tracked down Frankie (Elizabeth Banks) and Josh’s (Michael Hall D’Addario’s) house from 2012’s People Like Us (which I blogged about on Friday), the next item on my To-Search-For list was the gorgeous Craftsman-style abode where Lillian Harper (Michelle Pfeiffer) and her son, Sam Harper (Chris Pine), lived in the flick. Thankfully, this locale proved to be an easy find, despite the fact that very little of the exterior was ever shown.

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Towards the end of People Like Us, there is a scene in which a phone book listing of Lillian and Sam’s address is shown. And while the residence is said to be located at 2523 Wonderland Avenue in the Laurel Canyon area, I knew from this June 2012 Los Angeles Times article that the place could actually be found in L.A.’s West Adams District. Because the real life address of Frankie’s home had been used in the movie, I had an inkling that the address number of Lillian’s house was most likely real, as well. So I started looking at aerial views of all residences numbered 2523 in the West Adams area and, sure enough, found the place after just a few minutes. Whoo hoo! And I, of course, dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out there to stalk it just a few days later.

As luck would have it, the SUPER-nice owner of the People Like Us house happened to come outside while we were stalking the place and filled us in on all sorts of filming information about the neighborhood. Ironically enough, the Eppes family’s home from the 2005 television series Numb3rs (pictured below), which I stalked and blogged about way back in March of 2008, is located right next door.

The owner answered all of my silly little questions about the filming of People Like Us and even said that if she was not running to appointment at the time, she would have invited us inside to see the interior of the house, which was used extensively in the film! OMG! That would have been amazing! Sigh! She also told me that I was welcome to go up onto the front porch to pose for a pic in the spot where Josh knocked on the door in the movie. Yay!

Lillian and Sam’s house popped up numerous times in People Like Us, although, as I mentioned above, not much of the exterior was shown.

The 6-bedroom, 5-bath, 4,030-square-foot abode, which was originally built in 1922 and sits on 0.16 acres, is quite spectacular in real life, as you can see below. Despite its large size, it does very much look like a Laurel Canyon-area home. I am guessing that the reason producers opted not to use an actual LC residence is that the streets there are extremely narrow and twisty and not very conducive to the transportation and parking needs of large production trucks.

As I mentioned above, the to-die-for interior of the home was used extensively in the flick. Of the fact that actual places and not sets were used in People Like Us, producer Bobby Cohen said, “There is something special about shooting in real locations. There is a texture to them that you can’t rebuild. It makes a difference.” I definitely agree. While some sets are absolutely spectacular (the bar from Burlesque comes to mind), I much prefer the look of real life locations. And the look of the interior of the People Like Us home is pretty darn spectacular. It would have been pretty foolish to use a set when an interior like that was available.

The home’s real life garage, which you can barely see in the background of the photograph below, was also used in the movie.

As was the majestic backyard. What I wouldn’t give to see that backyard in person!

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Lillian’s house from People Like Us is located at 2523 4th Avenue in Los Angeles’ West Adams District. The Numb3rs house is located right next door at 2515 4th Avenue. The Fisher & Sons Funeral Home from Six Feet Under (which I blogged about here) is located around the corner at 2302 West 25th Street.

December 3, 2012
Frankie’s House from “People Like Us”

As I mentioned in early November in my post about Henry’s Tacos, I did not especially love the 2012 movie People Like Us as I found it to be a bit too depressing. What I did love, though, was the fact that the flick was filmed in its entirety in L.A. So after watching, I, of course, set about tracking down as many of its locales as I could – all by myself! Lately I feel like I do not get to spend much time searching for locations as I am usually too busy writing about them. While I love the hunt, blogging each day and physically stalking sites each weekend does not leave much time for actually tracking them down. So while I typically hand over the task of searching to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, with People Like Us, I decided that I was going to do all of the heavy lifting myself. And I loved every minute of it! The locale I was most interested in finding, of course, was the house that Frankie (Elizabeth Banks) moved into towards the very end of the movie. And I am embarrassed to admit that while finding it should have been a slam dunk, it took me more than a few hours to do so.

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In People Like Us, an address number of 809 was visible on the side of Frankie’s front door. For whatever reason, though, I was absolutely convinced that the number was a fake, so I initially did not pay much attention to it.

And while the filming locations map on the People Like Us Facebook page states that Frankie’s house is located on Laurel Canyon Boulevard in Los Angeles, because the residence was shown to be on a flat, straight street in the movie and because Laurel Canyon is an extremely twisty and hilly road, I knew that information had to be incorrect. (I somehow did not even notice the word Burbank written next to the drawing of Frankie’s home on the map until making a screen capture of it for this post – yes, I am that blonde!) My gut was telling me that the abode was most likely located in the Valley somewhere, so I began searching for it in Van Nuys, Reseda, Valley Village and North Hollywood, but, unfortunately, came up completely empty-handed.

It was not until a few hours into the hunt that I recalled a scene in which Frankie’s son, Josh (Michael Hall D’Addario), wrote a note to Sam (Chris Pine) giving him their new address. And while I did not in a million years imagine that the home’s actual address would have been used in the note, I thought the address given might provide some sort of clue as to the pad’s real life location. So I scanned to that portion of the flick and saw that Josh wrote down 809 Fairview. On a whim, I punched 809 Fairview and Los Angeles into Google and it kicked back a map of 809 North Fairview Street in Burbank. One quick Google Street View glance and I saw that it was the right place. As you can imagine, I felt like a complete and total dolt after that! All those hours searching and it turns out that the home’s location had been spelled right out for me the entire time! D’oh!

Frankie’s house shows up only twice in People Like Us – first in the scene in which she is shown moving into the abode.

And next in the scene in which Sam shows up at Frankie’s house unexpectedly, hoping for a reconciliation. Sadly, as you can see in the photographs and screen captures both above and below, the house has changed quite a bit since the filming of People Like Us. Gone is Frankie’s landscaping and front lawn, the exterior trim is now painted red instead of white, the brick front porch steps have been swapped out for Spanish-style ones, a railing has been added, and the front porch overhang altered. Boo! At least the shutters flanking both front windows still look the same despite a change in paint color.

Thankfully though, the abode pretty closely resembles its onscreen self on Google Street View, as you can see below, so I guess there’s that.

I much prefer the look of the house in the movie to its real life appearance. I am just not all that into drought-resistant landscaping, I guess. According to Zillow, the 2-bedroom, 1-bath, 1,148-square-foot abode was originally built in 1936 and sits on 0.16 acres of land.

I am fairly certain that the real life interior of the home was also used in People Like Us, although very briefly.

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Frankie’s house from People Like Us is located at 809 North Fairview Street in Burbank.

November 30, 2012
Lillian’s Apartment from “Bridesmaids”

This past Monday, the Grim Cheaper and I both had some business to attend to on L.A.’s West Side, so we decided to drive out that way together. Because his meetings were going to run a lot longer than mine, I figured I would do some stalking in the area while I waited. And I really have to give myself a major pat on the back here as I managed to get quite a bit of stalking done using the GC’s car, which does not have a GPS. I am seriously directionally-challenged and typically cannot find my way out of a paper bag, but the direction gods were definitely smiling down upon me on Monday because I managed to get to several locales with no problems whatsoever . . . in Venice, mind you – an area I am not particularly fond of due to the crowds, the sketchiness, and the lack of parking places and public restrooms. So needless to say I am very proud of myself! I feel like I can conquer the world now! Anyway, one of the locations that I managed to successfully find my way to was the supposed Milwaukee-area apartment building where Lillian (Maya Rudolph) lived in the 2011 hit Bridesmaids.

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I should mention here that I did not particularly enjoy Bridesmaids the first time I saw it – perhaps because I was home alone at the time and had no one to laugh with. But when the GC and I randomly caught the last half of it on TV while vacationing in La Quinta last August, I was practically rolling on the floor in hysterics. Then when my good friends, fellow stalkers Lavonna and Kim, came for a visit in November they quoted the movie constantly, so I re-watched it during their stay and became just a wee bit obsessed – the airplane scene (which you can watch by clicking below – caution, it is NSFW) is SO me, I cannot even tell you! Anyway, I spent the past few weeks bugging Mike, from MovieShotsLA, to help me track down all of the locations from the flick, the final two of which he did yesterday, after which he sent me a text that said, “Can we move on from this now?” LOL (I have to say that I was seriously disappointed to learn that Joni’s Restaurant, where Lillian and Annie Walker (Kristen Wiig) had coffee at the beginning of the flick, was just a set built on the Paramount Studios backlot. But I digress.)

Lillian’s apartment was kind of a random find, actually. While the majority of the Bridesmaids establishing shots were taken in the Milwaukee area, all actual filming was done right here in Southern California. At one point in the movie, Officer Rhodes (Chris O’Dowd) mentioned that Lillian’s building was located on the corner of Craner and Rose. And while I was not aware of any L.A. street named Craner, I was, of course, aware of Venice Beach’s famous Rose Avenue and decided to begin my search there. Sure enough, I found Lillian’s apartment just a bit east of Rose Avenue, on the corner of San Juan and Cabrillo. Woot woot!

Amazingly enough, despite the fact that the building is quite beautiful and looks to be somewhat historic, I could find absolutely no information whatsoever about it online, outside of the fact that it was originally built in 1922 (thank you, Property Shark!). According to a Panoramio poster named “gregmaz”, the domicile was designed and constructed by Abbot Kinney, the father of Venice himself, but I could not find any other references which support that claim. And being that Kinney passed away in 1920, two full years before Property Shark states that the place was built, I am fairly certain that he had nothing to do with its creation.

The building shows up twice in Bridesmaids – first in a brief establishing shot before the scene in which Lillian tells Annie that she has just gotten engaged.

And next towards the very end of the movie, in the scene in which Annie and Helen (Rose Byrne) track Lillian to her apartment on the morning of her wedding.

The interior of Lillian’s apartment was just a set, though. You can check out the real life interior of two of the building’s actual units here and here.

The very same building was also featured very briefly (blink and you’ll miss it, in fact) in the 1990 movie A Girl to Kill For, in the scene in which Chuck (Sasha Jenson) and Sue (Karen Medak) are being chased by the police. (Please pardon the craptastic screen captures below.)

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Lillian’s apartment building from Bridesmaids is located at 300 San Juan Avenue in Venice.

November 29, 2012
Merv Griffin’s Former House – and Some Big News!

The Grim Cheaper and I had a fabulous time in Palm Springs last week celebrating Thanksgiving with my parents – so much so that we have decided to move there permanently! We have been seriously considering a move to the Desert for a few months now, but finally decided to pull the trigger while driving back to Pasadena last Saturday afternoon and called up our landlord to officially give our 60 days notice. While I will miss my beloved L.A. more than words can express, I think our being in the desert will do wonders for my dad’s health (not to mention my poor mom’s sanity). The fact that our new apartment (which we LOVE) is half the price of our current apartment – and twice the size! – AND features a HUGE walk-in closet only sweetens the deal. (My current closet situation is absolutely pitiful, but I digress.) And not to worry, my fellow stalkers, my blog is not going anywhere. We own a condo in Santa Monica that is only rented out part time and we will be staying in it whenever it is free so that I will be able to stalk. IAMNOTASTALKER is most-definitely here to stay, I promise. And now, on with the post!

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A couple of months ago, my mom mentioned that she had seen a real estate listing for Merv Griffin’s former 39-acre estate in La Quinta. The listing did not cite an address, though, and my mom was desperate for me to track the place down because she could not imagine where an almost forty-acre property could possibly be located in the LQ. Thankfully, I was able to find the abode fairly quickly via a Google search and, as it turns out, the pad is pretty darn close to my parents’ house. So I dragged the GC right on out to stalk the place Thanksgiving morning.

Merv, who had been a frequent Desert visitor in the past, purchased the land for his La Quinta estate while in town for a tennis tournament sometime during the 1980s. According to a 2006 Palm Springs Life article, he said, “I looked around and thought this would be a great place to bring my horses. I bought the first and only 80-acre parcel I saw. It was a disaster — nothing but sand, cactus, a little old motel, and a small lake. My son asked me, ‘What are you going to do with this?’ And I said, ‘See if I can make Kentucky out of it.’” Griffin bought up several adjacent plots of land in the following years, eventually amassing a whopping 240-acre compound. He built a private home for himself on the site in 1986 and the surrounding acreage was transformed into Griffin Ranch, an exclusive equestrian-themed gated community that formally opened in 2007. And while the Ranch was originally expected to feature 393 custom estates, according to Brad Schmett’s La Quinta real estate website, new construction was halted in 2009 and the fate of future development there is currently unknown.

Griffin’s ginormous Moroccan-style residence was inspired in part by clothing designer Yves Saint Laurent’s home in Marrakech, which Merv claims to have once snuck into while on a visit to Morocco (a man after my own heart, I swear ). He commissioned famed interior decorator Waldo Fernandez (who is/was the go-to designer for such stars as Elizabeth Taylor, Sean Connery, and Jennifer Aniston and who handled the 1980s remodel of the Beverly Hills Hotel, which was also owned by Griffin at the time) to style the interior. Sadly, Merv’s home was gutted in an electrical fire in 1987, not long after it was first constructed, and had to be completely rebuilt.

Griffin’s former estate, not much of which is visible from the road, is nothing short of spectacular, as you can see in the aerial views below. In fact, when I first saw the below images I thought I was looking at a resort! The estate boasts a 5,483-square-foot main house with a 2000-square-foot living room, retractable dome skylight, 20-foot ceilings, and two master suites with Moroccan-style steam showers. The property also features four detached circular-shaped casitas, a 1,712-square-foot guest house (with three bedrooms and two baths!), separate staff quarters, an equestrian center with a 16-stall stable, a barn, a regulation-sized racetrack (apparently the only one in the entire Coachella Valley), an infinity pool, and a 2.5-acre(!) pond complete with a swan paddle boat.

Upon Griffin’s passing in 2007, the home became a vacation rental and was then put up for sale this past March for a whopping $14.5 million. It was relisted in June for $9.5 million and appears to still be on the market today.

Thanks to fave website The Real Estalker, I learned that Griffin’s former house is also a filming location! The dwelling was where Slade Smiley and Gretchen Rossi vacationed with Gretchen’s parents, Brenda and Scott, in the Season 5 episode of The Real Housewives of Orange County titled “Let’s Bow Our Heads and Pray”.

Um, can you say “product placement”?

The interior of the home was also shown in the episode.

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Merv Griffin’s former house is located at 81345 Avenue 54 in La Quinta.

November 28, 2012
Another Few Days Off

Sorry to leave y’all hanging, but I will also be taking Monday and Tuesday of this week off. I will be back on Wednesday, though, with a whole new stalking location! I hope all of my fellow stalkers had a fabulous Thanksgiving!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

November 26, 2012
Happy Thanksgiving!

I will be taking the next five days off in order to spend Thanksgiving week with my family. But I will be back with a whole new location on Monday, November 26th. In the meantime, I’ll leave you with this favorite Thanksgiving moment from Friends, in which Rachel Green (Jennifer Aniston) accidentally adds beef to a not-so-traditional English trifle. No one in the group likes the dessert except for Joey Tribbiani (Matt LeBlanc), who says one of my favorite lines of the entire series – “What’s not to like? Custard? Good! Jam? Good! Meat? Goooooooood!” You can watch the scene by clicking here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

November 19, 2012
The “Boy Meets World” House

Last Friday, a fellow stalker named Breanne contacted me to see if I could track down the supposed Philadelphia-area residence where the Matthews family – brothers Cory (Ben Savage), Eric (Will Friedle) and Joshua (Daniel Jacobs), sister Morgan (who was played by both Lily Nicksay and Lindsay Ridgeway), and parents Amy (Betsy Randle) and Alan (William Russ) – lived in the 1993 television sitcom Boy Meets World. Breanne is a huge fan of the series and informed me that on one of the DVD commentaries it was mentioned that the Matthews’ house was located near The Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, where the series was lensed. So I immediately enlisted the help of Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and the two of us spent a few hours scouring the streets near Disney. As we worked our way outward, though, both coming up empty-handed, I had an inkling that we were on the wrong track. So I asked Breanne to listen to the commentary once again and to let me know exactly what was said.

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Breanne wrote back immediately with this, “So I found the part that I had told you about on the commentary. Rider Strong says, ‘Now that house is right next to where we ended up filming, not at this point, but later.’ Then the executive producer says ‘It’s in Sherman Oaks.’ Then Danielle Fishel corrects him and says, ‘Studio City, actually.’ Then it sounds like in the background that Rider Strong then says, “Right across from CBS.’” I was shocked that the cast-members knew in such detail where a house that was only ever used in establishing shots was located, but I took their word for it and Mike and I resumed our hunt, this time in the Studio City area. And, sure enough, I found the place right where Rider said it would be – directly across the street from CBS. Yay! (Come to find out, Boy Meets World was originally filmed at The Walt Disney Studios and then later moved production to CBS Studio Center, which is what Rider was talking about when he said the house was near where they ended up filming. Ironically enough, when Breanne had originally sent me a screen capture of the home, my first thought was that it was located in Studio City. Like they say, one should ALWAYS go with their gut! ) So I ran right out to stalk the place yesterday morning – in the midst of having my car break down . . . TWICE. Not kidding! Thank God for AAA!

In real life, the Matthews’ house, which was originally built in 1940, boasts two bedrooms, two baths, 2,108 square feet of living space, and a 0.27-acre plot of land. And, as you can see below, it is absolutely adorable in person and does have a very East Coast feel to it. It is no surprise at all that producers chose to use it in Boy Meets World. In fact, I am quite surprised that the dwelling has not appeared onscreen more often, except for the fact that it is located on a very busy street, which filmmakers tend to shy away from.

According to the Celebrity Black Book 2008, the dwelling belongs (or at one time belonged) to soap opera star Joseph Campanella.

When I first arrived at the house, I was absolutely amazed – and thrilled! – to discover that it looks pretty much EXACTLY the same today as it did back in 1993 when Boy Meets World started filming (minus the set of shutters that used to flank the front door). LOVE IT! The homeowners should be commended!

Only the exterior of the residence was used in the filming of Boy Meets World. The interior of the Matthews’ house was, of course, just a set that only ever existed on a soundstage.

The Matthews’ backyard and Mr. Feeny’s (William Daniels’) backyard were also just sets.

On a stalking side-note – Earlier this week, Mike re-launched the new and improved MovieShotsLA and I have to say that it is pretty darn amazing. No one takes photographs like him! You can check it out here. As you can see below, MovieShotsLA’s new motto is “A brand you can trust.” I absolutely LOVE that being that Mike is as meticulous about being correct in his reporting as I am. I just started reading fellow stalker E.J.’s (from the Movieland Directory) 2000 book Hollywood Death and Scandal Sites (it’s fabulous, by the way!) in which he writes the following, “That’s how this book came about. There are countless tour guides, maps, and tapes showing where stars lived, worked, or played. Some show where they’re buried. Most are redundant and almost none are very well-researched. A good number are downright fiction. Until now no guide has presented the tour highlights – or lowlights – showing where all this mayhem actually happened.” A man after my own heart, I swear! That paragraph goes for so many of the filming location blogs and websites currently out there, as well – most are redundant, almost none are very well-researched and a good number are downright fiction. But I am very happy to say that MovieShotsLA, The Movieland Directory, and IAMNOTASTALKER are all brands that you can trust!

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Breanne for asking me to track down this location and to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for helping me do so!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The Boy Meets World house is located at 4196 Colfax Avenue in Studio City.

November 16, 2012
Temple Israel of Hollywood from “Will & Grace”

Earlier this year, fellow stalker Lavonna informed me that she had just tracked down the temple where Grace Adler (Debra Messing) married Leo Markus (Harry Connick Jr.) in the Season 5 episode of Will & Grace titled “Marry Me a Little, Marry Me a Little More”. As it turns out, while the wedding supposedly took place on the island of Manhattan, in reality Leo and Grace tied the knot right here in Los Angeles – at Temple Israel of Hollywood. Because Lavonna has long been obsessed with the series (it is pretty much her Beverly Hills, 90210), she put in a special request for me to stalk the place. So I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out there one (very cold) day in March. Sadly though, the temple was closed when we showed up, so we only got to catch a glimpse of its exterior . . .

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Flash forward to this past October when Lavonna and her good friend Kim came out to L.A. for a visit from Ohio. Lavonna was absolutely dying to see the interior of Temple Israel of Hollywood (natch!) and called up the main office to ask for a tour. Amazingly enough, they told us to come right on over! So we headed out there immediately after our Dearly Departed tour (which I will be blogging about soon) had ended. And I am very happy to report that the place did not disappoint!

Temple Israel of Hollywood was originally founded in 1926 by a small group of individuals, most of whom were involved in the entertainment industry. In fact, the place had such major Hollywood connections that it was quickly given the nickname “Filmland’s House of Worship”. Um, LOVE it! For its early meetings, members rented a now-defunct castle-like mansion that, at the time, belonged to Japanese actor Sessue Hayakawa and stood on the corner of Franklin Avenue and Ivar Street. In 1930, the growing congregation purchased the former First Methodist Church on Hollywood Boulevard and proceeded to hold services there until 1948, when it was decided that a new and even bigger temple – the one that stands today – would be constructed about a mile west. The new synagogue was designed by architects S. Charles Lee (who also designed the Max Factor Building, the Los Angeles Theatre, and the Hollywood & Western Building) and Samuel Lunden.

Today, the Temple Israel of Hollywood congregation consists of over 950 families – and is still a major draw for the entertainment industry. Just a few of the celebrities who have attended services there at some point in time include Eddie Fisher, Tony Curtis, Marlon Brando, Bob Dylan, Al Jolson, Sammy Davis Jr., Eddie Cantor, Leonard Nimoy, Mike Todd, David O. Selznick, Lea Thompson, Amanda Peet, and Ben Stein. In 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. gave a speech on the premises and, on March 27th, 1959, Elizabeth Taylor converted to Judaism there, taking the Hebrew name Elisheba Rachel. The place definitely deserves its “Filmland’s House of Worship” nickname! In fact, I think I may need to convert and start attending services there!

In the two-part “Marry Me a Little, Marry Me a Little More” episode of Will & Grace, Grace and Leo decide to get married in a temple, after learning that their first wedding, in which they tied the knot on a whim while on The Today Show, was not valid. Only the interior of Temple Israel of Hollywood was featured in the episode, though. For the exterior of their wedding venue, Temple Emanu-El, located at One East 65th Street in New York, was used.

Grace and Leo’s wedding took place in Temple Israel of Hollywood’s Sanctuary area.

Visible in the episode is the temple’s real life Ark, which was constructed out of silver and white Italian marble and is flanked by two large lions representing strength, courage and majesty. The Ark was a bit covered over by a chuppah in the scene, though, as you can see below.

In a perplexing twist, while the real life altar area matches up to what appeared in the episode, the back half of the temple does not. Although it is not readily apparent in my photograph below, the temple’s actual ceiling is much shorter than what was depicted onscreen, due to the existence of a large mezzanine.

And while both the green rug underneath the aisle runner and the velvet and wooden seats match up perfectly to what was shown in the episode, the real life doors of the temple are completely different. I had Mike, from MovieShotsLA, call the temple’s main office for me (for some reason I am petrified of making phone calls to strangers – in person, I LOVE talking to random people, but on the phone I’m a total wuss) to ask if the Sanctuary had been remodeled in recent years and, as it turns out, there was a renovation done in 2009. But, while doing further research, I came across a black and white photograph (from an undetermined year) on the Paradise Leased blog which shows the Sanctuary in the exact same state that it is today. So a few different scenarios are possible here – the Paradise Leased photo may very well be a recent one that just happened to have been taken in black and white, making it possible that the back portion of the Sanctuary was drastically changed during the 2009 remodel OR Grace and Leo’s wedding ceremony was filmed partially on a set and partially in the actual temple. Hey, stranger things have been known to happen in Hollywood.

While I am unsure of the Sanctuary situation, I am almost positive that both the anteroom . . .

. . . and bride’s dressing room that appeared in the episode were sets built at CBS Studio Center, where Will & Grace was lensed.

And I, of course, just had to pose for a pic next to the chair where Will Truman (Eric McCormack) sat after he gave Grace away.

On a Will & Grace side-note – I absolutely LOVE the shearling coat that Grace wore in the “Marry Me a Little, Marry Me a Little More” episode. I want, I want, I want! Oh, GC – are you listening?

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Lavonna for finding this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Temple Israel of Hollywood, where Grace and Leo got married in the “Marry Me a Little, Marry Me a Little More” episode of Will & Grace, is located at 7300 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood. Their wedding took place in the Sanctuary. You can visit the temple’s official website here.

November 15, 2012
Another Breather!

Sorry to do this again, but I ran around all day yesterday and did not have time to write a new post. I will be back tomorrow, though, with a whole new stalking location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

November 14, 2012