80s movies – IAMNOTASTALKER

April 22, 2020April 22, 2020

Arden Villa from “National Lampoon’s Vacation”

In an email exchange with my friend/fellow stalker Owen in late January, I casually made mention of National Lampoon’s Vacation’s original ending, in which, after finding Walley World closed, Clark W. Griswold (Chevy Chase) heads to Roy Walley’s (Eddie Bracken) mansion, pulls a gun and forces the theme park mogul to entertain his family. The segment didn’t work with test audiences, so it was scrapped and the bit at Magic Mountain shot to replace it. Years later, that original ending was reworked into the segment involving the kidnapping of Clark’s boss for the movie’s 1989 sequel, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Owen was unaware of all of this, though. As he replied, “I had no idea about an alternate Vacation ending. I’d love to see footage of Clark going to Roy Walley’s house. And if that footage exists and we can view it, we then need to find that house!“ Sadly, the footage has never seen the light of day, but Owen’s response took the words right out of my mouth! As I typed my initial email to him, I couldn’t help but wonder where the Walley mansion was located. Amazingly, through a series of fortunate events, Owen was able to ID it! Turns out, it’s a place I am very familiar with.

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The only imagery of the original ending I was able to dig up is below. Virtually nothing outside of the edge of a pool and a tall wall can be seen in it. In the hands of a lesser stalker that might have been a problem, but not Owen!

Amazingly, Owen managed to get his hands on the Vacation call sheets years ago. They were packed away in storage, though, and he wasn’t sure when he’d make it out to his unit to look through them. But, just a few days after our email exchange, there was a bit of a mix-up at the storage facility that had Owen driving out to check on his things not once, but twice! On his second visit, as he was taking inventory of the items inside, he remembered our Vacation query and dug out the call sheets. Sure enough, Roy Walley’s mansion was noted in the pages! As Owen discovered, filming took place at one of Pasadena’s most well-known and oft-filmed estates, Arden Villa! Though I had stalked the place before, only its front gate is visible from the street, so I never blogged about it. Armed with this scintillating new info, though, I decided it was definitely time for a post! So I ran right out there to re-stalk it just a few days later.

Arden Villa was originally built in 1913 for railroad tycoon William Kennon Jewett. Designed in the Italianate/Palladian style, the estate was the work of the Marston and Van Pelt architecture firm. Per the Knight Industries website, the home was initially rust brown in color, but was repainted to the canary yellow it is today in the mid-80s. The screen captures that appear later in this post attest to that.

Boasting 5 bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, a whopping 10,290 square feet, 7 fireplaces, a wine cellar, an elevator, a game room, a finished basement and attic, a huge pool, lily ponds, a tennis court, and a 2,340-square-foot guest house complete with its own pool, the massive manse originally sat on 9 acres, but all but 2.5 were sold off. Sadly, the only part of it visible from the street is the front gate and a portion of the 100-yard driveway just beyond it. You can check out some interior photos of the place here, though.

Arden Villa most recently hit the market in 2017 for $28 million, but did not sell until September 2019. Avengers director Anthony Russo was the lucky buyer, snapping it up for a cool $15,579,500.

Because so little can be seen in that one image of National Lampoon’s Vacation’s original ending, I wasn’t ready to sign off completely on Arden Villa being Roy Walley’s mansion, even with the call sheet documentation.

Especially since aerial views and MLS photos show that the wall running alongside the property’s pool looks nothing like the one visible behind Clark. As evidenced in the imagery below as well as in this pic, though there is a wall in the same general vicinity at Arden Villa, it is almost two-stories high, boasts a built-in outdoor fireplace, is largely covered with hedges, and has a columned edge, none of which jibe with what appeared in Vacation. So I was left thinking that filming either took place elsewhere or the wall had been knocked down and rebuilt (or at the very least remodeled) since the 1983 shoot.

Luckily, I got clarity thanks to a 1984 episode of Scarecrow and Mrs. King! In Season 1’s “Weekend,” Lee Stetson (Bruce Boxleitner) and Amanda King (Kate Jackson) work a case at Arden Villa, which is posing as The Cumberland hotel.

In a scene taking place by the pool, a wall is visible behind Lee and its rust coloring, white lip and vertical perforations all match what was seen in Vacation! Eureka!

I got further confirmation thanks to Knight Rider! On the iconic series, Arden Villa regularly portrayed F.L.A.G. headquarters, including in the Season 2 episode titled “Brother’s Keeper” (pictured below), which aired in 1983.

In a scene from the episode, the wall is briefly visible as April Curtis (Rebecca Holden) and Devon Miles (Edward Mulhare) walk near the pool, giving us an almost identical angle to that of the Vacation still. As you can see below, there’s no question the walls are one and the same!

Season 2’s “A Knight in Shining Armor” also provides a similarly-angled view of the wall and, again, it’s a direct match to what appeared in Vacation. Suffice it to say, Arden Villa did, in fact, mask as Roy Walley’s mansion and the pool wall was then remodeled after the fact! You can check out the script pages for the movie’s original ending here. It’s actually pretty funny. Though some internet sources claim the segment involves The Girl in the Ferrari (Christie Brinkley) turning up as Roy’s daughter and Clark eventually taking a plane hostage (both of which sound idiotic), that does not appear to be the case. While I love what ultimately made its way to the screen, the ending as originally shot would have been a pretty fitting closure to the Griswold family’s tumultuous trip. Here’s hoping the footage will be aired someday!

Arden Villa has appeared in countless productions over the years, far too many to chronicle here. But what follows are some of the highlights . . .

Way back in 1933, before the property had a pool, it was the site of an elegant tea party in the Marx Brothers comedy Duck Soup.

Det. Ken Hutchinson (David Soul) and Det. Dave Starsky (Paul Michael Glaser) investigate a murder there in the Season 4 episode of Starsky & Hutch titled “Photo Finish,” which aired in 1978.

Arden Villa plays the home of Avery Williams (Robert Goulet) in the Season 4 episode of Fantasy Island titled “The Proxy Billionaire/The Experiment,” which aired in 1981.

Des Spellacy (Robert De Niro) attends a wedding at the property in the 1981 drama True Confessions.

In what is perhaps its most famous cameo, Arden Villa is the site of the epic lily pond catfight between Alexis Carrington Colby (Joan Collins) and Krystle Carrington (Linda Evans) in the Season 3 episode of Dynasty titled “The Threat”, which aired in 1983. You can watch the scuffle here. The backside of the estate was actually used regularly throughout the series as the rear of the Carrington mansion. Front and aerial shots were lensed about 360 miles away at Filoli in Woodside, though.

Arden Villa serves as the home of Fred Fusco (Lorne Greene) in the Season 4 episode of Highway to Heaven titled “The Smile in the Third Row,” which aired in 1985.

It’s the residence of Zeke Bridges (Noble Willingham) in the 1992 comedy The Distinguished Gentleman.

Arden Villa pops up as the Bel Air home of Stuart “He Gives Good Woo” Carson (David Gail) in the Season 3 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 titled “Moving Targets,” which aired in 1993.

In 1996, Oasis filmed the music video for their song “Don’t Look Back in Anger” on the premises.

James Whale (Ian McKellen) and Clayton Boone (Brendan Fraser) attend a party there in the 1998 drama Gods and Monsters.

Portions of the pad appear as the interior of the Cleary mansion in the 2005 comedy Wedding Crashers.

Rose (Toni Collette) attends a wedding there in the 2005 drama In Her Shoes.

The villa is also the residence of Jason Normandy (Jonathan Banks) in the Season 2 episode of Shark titled “Partners in Crime,” which aired in 2008.

Though some articles state that Billy Madison did some filming at the estate, I don’t believe that to be true. From what I’ve read, the 1995 comedy was lensed in its entirety in Canada. And while I thought that a reshoot might possibly have taken place at Arden Villa, I scanned through the flick and did not see anything resembling the mansion. The same goes for Terms of Endearment, which is also said to have shot scenes on the premises – I’m pretty sure that information is incorrect.

Big THANK YOU to my friend/fellow stalker Owen for finding this location’s Vacation connection!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Arden Villa, aka Roy Walley’s mansion from the original ending of National Lampoon’s Vacation, is located at 1145 Arden Road in Pasadena.

August 28, 2019August 27, 2019

The Sharper Image from “When Harry Met Sally”

Movies don’t typically surprise me, as far as locations go. But When Harry Met Sally has me absolutely shocked as of late! Ever since first seeing the romcom when it debuted back in 1989, I had been under the impression that it was lensed entirely in New York. The city is so woven into the fabric of the film – it is practically a character in the story! – that I couldn’t imagine even one frame of it being shot elsewhere. That all changed in 2016, though, when I contacted a crew member regarding a locale from a different production – the crab restaurant from A Few Good Men. As I chronicled in this post, said crew member not only informed me that the eatery I was looking for was in the San Pedro area, but that it had also appeared in When Harry Met Sally! Gobsmacked, I immediately started researching the matter further and discovered several more WHMS sites in Los Angeles, one of which being The Sharper Image where Sally Albright (Meg Ryan) karaoked with Harry Burns (Billy Crystal). Sadly, it’s no longer in business, but I figured it was still blog-worthy nonetheless.

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As has long been documented online, the exterior of The Sharper Image store at 4 West 57th Street in New York (which today houses an Ermenegildo Zegna boutique) was shown in an establishing shot at the top of the When Harry Met Sally karaoke scene. I had always assumed interior footage had been shot there, as well.

During my deep dive into the film’s L.A. locations, though, I was stopped in my tracks by a comment from a man named Colin Stone on the On the Set of New York’s When Harry Met Sally page who stated, “The interior scene of The Sharper Image was actually filmed at the Los Angeles (Wilshire and Grand) store.” A quick Google search for further information on the shop yielded absolutely nothing, which told me it was long since out of business. So I hopped over to Newspapers.com in the hopes of pinpointing its exact former address and found several ads (like the one below from 1986) noting its location as 601 Wilshire Boulevard, right on the corner of Wilshire and Grand, as Colin had said. (Also noted? The fact that it was a non-smoking store! Were people honestly allowed to smoke in retail shops back then??? I certainly don’t remember that as a kid!)

I ran out to stalk it shortly thereafter. At the time (July 2018), the site housed a print shop named LA Grafix.

Per Google Street View, it sits vacant today.

But back in the ‘80s, it was home to the mecca of all-things-yuppie, The Sharper Image. It was there that Harry and Sally headed to find a housewarming gift for their respective BFFs, Jess (Bruno Kirby) and Marie (Carrie Fisher). While shopping, the two test out a “singing machine” with a duet of “The Surrey with the Fringe on Top” and, in the process, run into Harry’s ex-wife, Helen Hillson (Harley Jane Kozak), and her new boyfriend, Ira Stone (Kevin Rooney), thereby setting Harry on a downward spiral. Quite a lot of the interior is shown in the scene (which you can watch here). Sadly though, other than the store seeming quite large (which goes against it being located in New York City), there really aren’t any identifying factors like doors or windows visible which would have helped me verify its use in the film. So I, of course, went straight to the source and tracked down Colin! As it turns out, he couldn’t have been nicer or more informative! Currently, he is a professional relaxation therapist and composer, but during The Sharper Image’s early days, he worked in the DTLA store creating health and fitness products, which is how he knew of its big-screen cameo.

I am absolutely kicking myself now for not having ventured inside LA Grafix during my stalk. I (wrongly) assumed that due to the passage of thirty years and the change in occupancy, the space would no longer look anything like it did onscreen. But as Colin wrote in his email, “I popped over to the location maybe 4 years ago and saw that it was a printing place (it was a Saturday and it was closed, but still in business then) and I was totally surprised and amazed to look in the windows and see they still had all the grey and burgundy fixtures, counters, displays, slatwall, everything, still intact from the TSI days!” Talk about a fail on my part!

I did manage to dig up some interior images of the place from a past real estate listing which corroborate Colin’s observations. As you can see, some of The Sharper Image’s grey slatwall, visible in When Harry Met Sally, was held over when the store closed.

There’s some more of it pictured below, though it is no longer grey.

The Sharper Image’s decorative triangular ceiling lining was retained by LA Grafix, as well.

You can also make some of it out here.

The Wilshire & Grand Sharper Image, which was the fifth of the company’s brick and mortar stores, opened its doors on November 12th, 1984. Founder Richard Thalheimer chose the location in a rather unconventional way. As he told the Los Angeles Times, “I just stand on street corners and count the number of people who walk by wearing suits and ties.” Though he looked at spots in Westwood, Beverly Hills and Century City, the corner of Wilshire and Grand fit the bill for his SoCal venture. As the article states, “There among the skyscrapers, he figured, were throngs of young professionals with a potential soft spot for gold-plated dumbbells, sculptured pillows designed to look like Porsche and BMW cars, guns that fire pulses of infrared light and even tummy exercisers, among other things.” Colin said the methodology was backed by the “San Franciscan logic that people shop where they work,” which turned out not to be the case in L.A. At least, not at the time. Today, DTLA is a bustling live/work community, but in the ‘80s, ‘90s, and even the early 2000s, the city virtually cleared out as soon as offices closed. And on weekends, it was practically a ghost town. Not exactly a fertile environment for retail. The downtown Sharper Image was apparently the lowest-performing in the entire chain. Per Colin’s recollection, the store closed in late 1992/early 1993, though the other outposts in Sherman Oaks and Beverly Hills remained open for a time. The company filed for bankruptcy in February 2008 and by the end of that same year, all of its retail stores had, sadly, closed, truly marking the end of an era.

Huge THANK YOU to Colin Stone for identifying this location and providing so much of the intel that appears in this post.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Sharper Image from When Harry Met Sally was formerly located at 601 Wilshire Boulevard in downtown Los Angeles. The space is currently vacant, but was home to the print shop LA Grafix when I stalked it last year.

August 2, 2019July 31, 2019

Mawby’s Bar from “Flashdance” – An Update

Typically, when a vacant space is built out for a production, it is dismantled as soon as filming wraps – though sometimes stranger things, ahem, do happen. Take Gwinnett Place, for instance. A wing of the largely deserted Duluth, Georgia shopping center was transformed (with breathtaking attention to detail, I might add) into Hawkins, Indiana’s Starcourt Mall for the third season of Stranger Things. It is one of my favorite locations ever to be brought to life onscreen and, incredibly, was left completely dressed in its destroyed ‘80s state up until earlier this month – almost a year after filming took place! Atypical as that is, the same scenario appears to be true for Mawby’s Bar from Flashdance! As I chronicled in an August 2017 post, the supposed Pittsburgh nightclub was not a real place, but a set created especially for the 1983 movie at a vacant warehouse located at 229 Boyd Street in downtown L.A. While I assumed said set was disassembled following the shoot, fellow stalker Dave (you may remember his amazing research from this post) recently informed me that it popped up again two years later as Coyle’s Club & Cuff in Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment! Why producers (not to mention the building owner) chose to leave the bar space intact is beyond me, but I am so grateful they did! Due to the many changes the warehouse incurred in the three-plus decades since Flashdance was shot, it is not at all recognizable, so prior to writing my 2017 post I attempted to dig up additional footage of it from other productions lensed around the same time to further verify its use in the movie. I was unsuccessful, but, thankfully, Dave has now done the legwork for me! So I figure an update is in order!

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It is at Coyle’s Club & Cuff that the officers of the 16th Precinct regularly hang out in Police Academy 2. As Dave explained to me, the small octagonal windows flanking the bar’s front door, the larger one situated on the wall beside it, and the glass block framing perfectly match Mawby’s exterior from Flashdance, giving away its location as 229 Boyd Street, despite looking completely different today.

Dave went on to explain that in one scene, Tackleberry (David Graf) is shown walking inside Coyle’s and, as he enters, it becomes obvious from the octagonal window visible behind him (denoted with a blue arrow below) as well as the glass block framing above the doorway (denoted with a pink arrow) that the warehouse was used for both interiors and exteriors.

Those exact same elements are also apparent in Flashdance, which cements the fact that the inside of the building was utilized in that film, as well – something I hypothesized about in my 2017 post, but could not prove at the time.

As Dave scrutinized the two movies further, he discovered even more matching details! He called my attention to the two shots below, taken from practically the same angle, noting that although framing was built atop the bar for Police Academy 2 changing the look of it, the countertop was left untouched as were the doorway and hatch visible beyond it!

Seeing that doorway and hatch (denoted with pink and blue arrows below) gave me goosebumps! I could hardly believe my eyes, but, sure enough, right before me was proof that the Mawby’s set was left intact long after Flashdance wrapped.

A clearer view of the octagonal hatch is pictured below. (To quote Jake Peralta, “Literal goosebumps!”)

Thrilled at the new development, I excitedly began dissecting Flashdance and Police Academy 2 myself and dug up a few additional elements visible in both, including a vestibule with decorative wood paneling (shown from opposing angles below) situated just inside the front door of the two spaces.

A partition with seating that runs the length of the interiors is also apparent in both flicks.

The counter attached to said partition (shown from opposite angles below) boasts red siding in both productions, as well.

The lip of the bar and the tan and red paneling below it are also direct matches. Oh, how I wish that interior was still intact today!

During his research, Dave unearthed an even more unusual twist! Toward the middle of Police Academy 2, the outside of 229 Boyd appears in an undressed state in the scene in which Doug Fackler (Bruce Mahler) heads to a gas station looking for a public restroom. As Dave wrote to me, “So at some point during production, either before or after Fackler drives past the building, the set designers will have given it quite a makeover!” Though definitely odd, the segment provides a fabulous full view of what the property looked like in 1985 – which is pretty darn close to how it appeared in Flashdance (minus the Mawby’s accoutrements, of course)! Dave notes, “Even the HOTEL lettering is still intact!” Sadly, the location in its current state does not resemble its ‘80s self in the slightest.

As chronicled in my 2017 post, the warehouse pops up in a few other productions, as well, including 1984’s Night of the Comet. In the screen captures below, the Mawby’s site, located just beyond the stop sign, is denoted with a yellow arrow.

Harry Washello (Anthony Edwards) and Wilson (Mykelti Williamson) drive by the building in 1988’s Miracle Mile.

And a reused shot of it from Flashdance appeared as an establishing shot in the 1990 made-for-television movie Perry Mason: The Case of the Poisoned Pen, though no actual filming took place there.

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

HUGE thank you to fellow stalker Dave for figuring out this location’s Police Academy 2 connection.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The building that portrayed both Mawby’s Bar in Flashdance and Coyle’s Club and Cuff in Police Academy 2 can be found at 229 Boyd Street in downtown Los Angeles. The neighborhood where it is located is not the greatest, so please exercise caution when visiting.

April 26, 2019April 25, 2019

Third Edition from “St. Elmo’s Fire”

A couple of weeks ago, Rob Lowe posted an Instagram selfie taken in Georgetown with the caption “Return to the scene of the crime. #StElmosFire,” and I was instantly reminded that I had stalked some locations from the seminal 1985 drama while back east in April 2016. I learned about the locales thanks to my buddy Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, who emailed me a virtual catalog of D.C.-area filming sites prior to my trip. One of the spots listed was Georgetown’s former Third Edition restaurant (now El Centro D.F.) at 1218 Wisconsin Avenue Northwest, the exterior of which he noted had appeared in the flick. I had yet to see St. Elmo’s Fire at the time, but was familiar enough with it to know that much of the action takes place at a bar. I assumed that bar was Third Edition – and many online sources backed up that notion. When I finally sat down to view the film last week, though, I was shocked to see that Third Edition was only briefly featured and that St. Elmo’s Bar, where Billy Hicks (Lowe) and his fellow Brat Packers regularly hung out, was nothing more than a backlot façade. Reports of which backlot in particular varied and I figured, since there was so much confusion surrounding the subject, it was high time to step in and settle the matter of the St. Elmo’s Fire bar once and for all.

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Just to be clear – Owen never stated that Third Edition was the main bar from the movie – that assumption fell on me and was then verified – incorrectly – by a few sources online. The list Owen sent me prior to my trip contained numerous addresses of sites and corresponding descriptions of their onscreen roles, and his notation about Third Edition was entirely correct – while not the gang’s main hangout, its exterior did appear in St. Elmo’s Fire. Twice, in fact. The restaurant first pops up in the film’s opening montage in which shots of Georgetown are splashed across the screen. That’s it on the very left of the still below. (My corresponding photo is a bit off from the angle shown in the movie.)

Third Edition is then featured again in a later segment in which Jules (Demi Moore) picks up Billy and Alec Newbary (Judd Nelson) to go for a ride in her Jeep with the rest of the gang.

I find it amazing that despite the fact that the brick is now painted over and there has been a change of occupant, the place is still recognizable from its cameo 35 years ago! Even the menu display case, albeit a different one, is still affixed to the exterior of the restaurant in the exact same spot!

Third Edition was a Georgetown staple for more than four decades, running from 1969 through 2013. You can see what it looked like when it was still in operation here.

The three-story casual eatery/bar served comfort food and libations and was popular among locals and tourists alike. Much like St. Elmo’s Bar in the movie, it was also a haven for college students and featured multiple drink stations, a dance floor, DJs spinning music nightly, and an outdoor tiki lounge. As one Yelper reported, “It reminded me of a college fraternity party with random girls dancing on top of a platform and guys trying to dance with them,” which might as well be a description of Billy and Jules’ regular hangout.

When Third Edition moved out in January 2013, Mexican restaurant El Centro D.F. (the D.F. stands for “Distrito Federal,” meaning “federal district”) moved in. It remains in operation today.

St. Elmo’s Bar, on the other hand, was entirely movie magic. Both the interior and exterior were nothing more than studio-built sets – the former constructed inside of a soundstage at (I believe) Warner Bros. Studio, which was then The Burbank Studios, in Burbank . . .

. . . and the latter, as I came to discover, on the backlot of Universal Studios Hollywood.

An entire half-block section of Universal’s New York Street area, in fact, was made over to resemble Georgetown for the shoot and, when production wrapped, was left intact for future filmings, becoming known as “Georgetown Avenue.”

The St. Elmo’s Bar façade, as well as the rest of the block, popped up several times throughout the movie . . .

. . . and was also featured on the poster.

Image result for st. elmo's fire poster

Sadly, Georgetown Avenue was severely damaged in the fire that ravaged Universal’s backlot in November 1990. Though it was subsequently restored, it was again destroyed in the studio’s 2008 blaze and was not rebuilt. You can check out a map of where it used to be situated, in the upper left portion of New York Street, here. Because it no longer exists, and hasn’t existed in its St. Elmo’s Fire-state since the 1990 fire, figuring out if filming took place there, as several online sources claimed, proved difficult. Thanks to The Studio Tour website and its catalog of historic photos of the lot, though, as well as a 1989 episode of Quantum Leap that filmed near Georgetown Avenue, I was able to do so by pinpointing a few identifiers. As you can see in the still from the movie below, St. Elmo’s Bar sat on a small street that dead-ended at the façade of a large brick townhome. I found that same very façade pictured in this 1984 aerial of New York Street featured on The Studio Tour! Visible in the mid/lower left section of the aerial, the structure boasts three stories, a porticoed front door, and sculpted lips in between levels – all of which match what appeared in St. Elmo’s Fire. The window layout is also identical.

Next to the façade in the 1984 aerial is a stretch of brownstones. Such was the case with the movie façade, as well. You can see those brownstones and a portion of the brick townhome (it’s on the extreme left) in this 1984 photograph, also featured on The Studio Tour.

I was thrilled to discover that the brick townhouse is also partially visible in the Season 1 episode of Quantum Leap titled “Double Identity,” which was filmed at Universal in 1989.

Though shown from the opposite angle and dressed quite differently, the corner store situated across from the brownstones in St. Elmo’s Fire can be seen in Quantum Leap, as well.

When Georgetown Avenue was rebuilt after the 1990 fire, it looked significantly different, as you can see in this image which matches the angle of the screen capture below. Though the townhouse façade was re-created as well as the brownstones next to it, numerous changes were made.

Here’s another shot showing the rebuilt Georgetown Avenue along with a corresponding screen capture below. Why the street was not once again re-created after the 2008 fire, I am unsure, but I am guessing it is because not many productions are set in Georgetown. The studio likely figured it could get a lot more mileage out of a New York scape and, as such, did away with the D.C. set.

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

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, for telling me about this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: El Centro D.F., aka Third Edition from St. Elmo’s Fire, is located at 1218 Wisconsin Avenue Northwest in Georgetown. St. Elmo’s Bar from the movie was a façade that once stood on Georgetown Avenue in the New York Street portion of the Universal Studios Hollywood backlot at 100 Universal City Plaza in Universal City. Unfortunately, that area of the lot was damaged in both the 1990 and 2008 fires and no longer stands.

August 16, 2017July 30, 2019

Mawby’s Bar from “Flashdance”

While I am definitely a child of the ‘80s, there are some classic films from that era that I have never been a fan of. Pretty in Pink, Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Flashdance come to mind. Being that there’s pretty much nothing I love more than movies with musical and dance montages, the latter should be right up my alley, but, for whatever reason, it never struck a chord. There is one spot from it that I have been asked about regularly over the years, though – Mawby’s Bar, the club where welder-by-day/exotic-dancer-by-night Alex Owens (Jennifer Beals) worked in the 1983 flick. Filming websites had long documented that the Mawby’s exterior could be found in downtown L.A., though it’s exact address was never specified. Then in September 2014, The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations published some more detailed information. According to a tip from location manager Charles Newirth, Mawby’s was a mocked-up vacant warehouse at the corner of Boyd and Wall Streets that had been demolished at some point since filming took place. Because the building was said to be gone, I did not put any further thought into it. So imagine my surprise when this past December, fellow stalker Chas, of It’s Filmed There, posted a page about Flashdance locales, along with the address of the still-intact Mawby’s warehouse!

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I immediately headed over to Google Street View to check out the building, which, as Chas explained, looks considerably different in reality. Not only was the structure, located at 229 Boyd Street, heavily dressed for the filming of Flashdance (with a neon, glass brick and black metal façade added to the exterior, as well as letters spelling out “hotel” written across the second level), but it was also altered in the years following the shoot. Most noticeably, the five rounded second story windows were filled in at some point.

Amazingly though, the outlines of those windows are still discernible today, which I was absolutely floored to see!

I was also floored to see that the utility access cover visible in the sidewalk directly outside of Mawby’s front door is still there today! (I know, I know – it doesn’t take much to excite me.)

Mawby’s, which was loosely based upon a real Toronto-area strip club named Gimlets, was featured numerous times throughout Flashdance.

Though I cannot say for certain, from the way the film was shot and a few blurbs I have read online, it seems that the actual interior of the warehouse was also utilized in the filming. Ron Karabatsos, who played Mawby’s Bar owner Jake Mawby in the movie, even wrote in to the Fast Rewind website explaining that the club was built from scratch in an empty storefront in downtown Los Angeles. (Though he states that said storefront was on 5th and Los Angeles Streets, that intersection is only a hop, skip and a jump away from the Boyd warehouse, so I believe he was just a bit off in his recollection. It is also possible that a different vacant site was utilized for interior shots of Mawby’s, but I do not think that was the case.)

I was really hoping to find some additional onscreen appearances of the warehouse from the same time period so that I could further verify the location (you know me – I don’t like to leave any stone unturned when it comes to this stuff). While I did come across a couple, neither provided a great view of the building. We catch a very brief glimpse of the side of it in the 1984 Sci-Fi horror flick Night of the Comet. In the screen captures below, the Mawby’s warehouse, located just beyond the stop sign, is denoted with a yellow arrow.

A much better view of the warehouse is shown in 1988’s Miracle Mile, in the scene in which Harry Washello (Anthony Edwards) and Wilson (Mykelti Williamson) attempt to get gas at a downtown gas station. Unfortunately, I did not take any photographs of that side of the structure while I was stalking the place, so please bear with the Google Street View images pictured below.

Oddly, the second floor windows that I was so excited to see the outlines of appear to have been replaced by long rectangular windows by the time Miracle Mile was shot, which makes no sense whatsoever. If the rounded windows were actually swapped out, how are vestiges of them still apparent today?

Miracle Mile also provides a quick glimpse of the parking lot that was formerly situated across the street from the warehouse and was visible in Flashdance. Today, a one-story building stands on that site.

Thanks to a commenter named Sam I learned that an establishing shot of Mawby’s from Flashdance was re-used in the 1990 made-for-television movie Perry Mason: The Case of the Poisoned Pen. No actual filming took place at 229 Boyd Street, though.

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

Big THANK YOU to The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations and Chas, from the It’s Filmed There website, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The warehouse that masked as Mawby’s Bar in Flashdance can be found at 229 Boyd Street in downtown Los Angeles. The neighborhood where it is located is not the greatest, so please exercise caution when visiting.

July 6, 2016July 1, 2016

Terry’s Apartment from “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”

I’ve made no secret over the years of my love for Jumpin’ Jack Flash. (You can read the posts I’ve done on the 1986 comedy’s locations here, here, here, and here.) Whoopi Goldberg is literally perfection in her role as zany New York bank employee Terry Dolittle and I pretty much go around quoting her and the other characters on a regular basis (“Get Larry, the heavy-set guard! Get Larry, the heavy-set guard!”). So when a fellow stalker named Mick emailed me in July 2013 to ask for some assistance in tracking down a few of the movie’s locations, I was eager to help. Somehow I got distracted, though, and never did any investigating. Then Mick contacted me again the following February and this time I got to work.

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One of the locales Mick was hoping to find was the apartment where Terry lived. So I popped in my DVD and was thrilled to see that there was a restaurant located on the ground floor of Terry’s building and that its name, La Tablita, was clearly visible on its awning.

An internet search for “La Tablita” and “New York” led me to an ad in a 1985 issue of New York magazine that listed the eatery’s location as 65 West 73rd Street. I headed right on over to Google Street View, popped in that address and, sure enough, it was the right spot!

The exterior of Terry’s apartment building was only shown a couple of times in Jumpin’ Jack Flash, but it was extremely memorable to me due to the unique glass block pop-out located next to the front door.

I was floored to see that virtually none of the property had been changed since filming took place there three decades ago. (I honestly cannot believe the movie will be turning 30 in October!)

Today, the La Tablita space serves as home to a hardware store. Other than a change in tenant, though, it, too, still looks very much the same as it did onscreen.

Terry’s apartment building is part of a set of neighboring row houses that were designed by Henry J. Hardenbergh, the same architect who gave us The Plaza Hotel, the Dakota, and the original Waldorf-Astoria, which was demolished in 1929 in order to make way for the Empire State Building. Construction on the homes began on July 20th, 1882. Terry’s building was completed on January 21st, 1885.

Of the 28 properties originally constructed by Hardenbergh, only 18 remain. They can be found from 15A through 19 West 73rd Street and 41 through 65 West 73rd Street. Sadly, the ten homes that once stood in between those two groups were demolished during the Great Depression in order to make room for a 16-story apartment building.

The row houses that do remain standing have been left largely untouched from their original design.

Terry’s building is one of the few that has been modified. The large glass block pop-out that was so memorable to me from Jumpin’ Jack Flash is obviously a later addition and not an original 1885 detail. Other than that, Hardenbergh’s design remains intact, though. You can read more about the history of the 73rd Street row homes here.

Only the exterior of the property was used in Jumpin’ Jack Flash. Terry’s apartment interior was a set built on a soundstage at 20th Century Fox Studios in Century City where portions of the movie were lensed. You can check out what a unit in the building actually looks like here. Apparently, the images are from the penthouse, which cracked me up as the place is teeny tiny. I mean, come on! That kitchen looks like it should be on a ship and the second bedroom is more like a closet. Sex and the City really led me astray when it comes to apartment sizing in New York. So did Friends and pretty much every other movie/TV show set in the Big Apple for that matter (outside of Wanderlust), including Jumpin’ Jack Flash! As you can see below, Terry’s apartment was huge compared to the building’s actual units.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Terry’s apartment from Jumpin’ Jack Flash is located at 65 West 73rd Street on New York’s Upper West Side.

June 10, 2016June 10, 2016

The Los Angeles Filming Locations of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”

Be sure to check out my latest Discover Los Angeles article about the L.A. locations featured in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. I am especially excited about this post as – thanks to a lot of help from Michael Amundson, who worked on the movie, and my friend Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog – a few of the film’s previously unknown locales were discovered. For me, personally, the trampoline location was mind-blowing!

February 8, 2016February 11, 2016

Falken’s Cabin from "WarGames"

So I realize I am like one of maybe ten holdouts left in the world, but I still have an AOL account. I know, I know – 1995 called, it wants its email address back. I think I’m finally ready to give it up, though, because the search function straight. up. SUCKS. Formerly, it was great – I could type in a key word I knew had been written in a particular correspondence and up would pop the exact email I was looking for. I used to utilize it regularly when writing my posts. I can’t always remember the exact process behind every location search (how I came to start looking for a place, how I figured out a certain detail, etc.), so in the past I would look back through old emails sent to various sources (like Mike, from MovieShotsLA, or Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog) to refresh my memory. And AOL always came through! Now that is no longer the case. Upon waking up last Sunday, the Grim Cheaper announced that he wanted to go to Big Bear Lake for a couple of days to play in the snow. So we literally tossed a few items of clothing into a bag and headed right up the mountain. It was such a last minute trip that I didn’t even remember to bring my good camera – or my stalking notebook. It wasn’t until we checked into our hotel that I remembered WarGames had been filmed in the area. Early last year, Owen and I tracked down the cabin where Falken (John Wood) lived in the 1983 movie, but unfortunately I did not have my notes on hand to check the address. Countless emails had gone back and forth between us during our search, though, so I promptly logged into AOL and started looking for those messages. I never found a one! By hour two of the fruitless hunt, I was ready to throw the GC’s laptop right out the window. Fortunately, Owen had his notes handy and texted me the location so that I could stalk the place while I was in town. Big thanks to you, buddy, for saving the day!

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Falken’s cabin was only featured briefly towards the end of WarGames, in the scene in which teenage hacker David (Matthew Broderick) and his friend Jennifer (Ally Sheedy) met with the reclusive scientist to ask for help in stopping a dangerous computer simulation that David unwittingly started.

I got the itch to track down the cabin last March while writing my Top 10 Totally Awesome 80s Movie Locations in Los Angeles article for Discover L.A., in which I wrote about the Hancock Park residence that stood in for David’s home in the flick. In WarGames, Falken is said to live on an island in Oregon, but it has long been common knowledge amongst stalkers that the scenes involving his wood-shingled house were lensed at Big Bear Lake, a mountain town located about one hundred miles east of L.A. Outside of that, though, information on the locale was pretty scant. I decided to do some digging and stumbled upon this 2005 message board thread in which a commenter named “jb4lcm” stated that the cabin could be found in the Pleasure Point neighborhood. So I started searching the area via aerial views and eventually came across a spot that I was 99% certain was the right place. Upon further scouring, I dug up this image titled “WarGames Cabin Big Bear,” as well as this one, this one and this one, which showed different angles of the home. In comparing them to the aerial view, I became 100% certain I had found the right spot.

When I switched to Google Street View, though, the imagery of that area showed an empty plot of land – and my stomach sank. Could it be that the WarGames cabin had been torn down? Oh, say it ain’t so! I started digging further and found a message board from 2009 in which commenter “Around the Lake” stated that he had heard there were plans to demolish the home, which had originally been built in 1924, in order to make way for a new, massive 17,000-square-foot residence. As you can see in the aerial view below, there is a large house situated next door to the WarGames cabin. According to Zillow, that residence was built in 2009 and boasts 6 bedrooms, 6 baths and 5,107 square feet of living space. Not quite 17,000 square feet, but I believe it is the place that Around the Lake was referring to.

The timing of the tear down strikes me as odd. Per Historic Aerials, the WarGames cabin was not demolished until 2010, after the 2009 property had been completed. Yet, according to eppraisal.com, the cabin and its land were last sold in April 2007, well before the larger house was built. The two residences also do not appear to be situated on the same plot, so why the cabin had to be razed is unclear. My best guess is that the owners of the 2009 property purchased two adjoining plots of land and originally planned on keeping the cabin intact, but when construction on the new house was completed, it was decided that the cabin sat too close to it, so they eventually tore it down. That is just wild speculation on my part, though.

The 2009 house is pictured below. You can also check out some interior photographs of it on Zillow. The dwelling is inarguably pretty, but if you ask me, I’d take the WarGames cabin over it any day. That property was just simply the quintessential mountain cabin. As Owen said to me recently, “It was like something out of central casting.” It is a shame it is gone.

According to eppraisal.com, when it stood, the WarGames cabin boasted 3 bedrooms, 1 bath, 1,992 square feet of living space, and a 1.63-acre plot of land. Today, all that remains is a tree-dotted expanse of terrain.

Oh, how I wish I could have seen it in person!

The WarGames cabin also boasted a large garage situated next to the road, which is still visible on Google Street View if you toggle back to the imagery from November 2007.

Street View imagery of that same spot circa April 2014 is pictured below.

And here’s a matching photo that I took of that same area last week. Again, what a shame!

Unfortunately, the Google Street View imagery from November 2007 does not provide very good views of the actual cabin.

According to the WarGames DVD commentary with director John Badham and screenwriters Lawrence Lasker and Walter F. Parkes, no filming took place inside of the Big Bear cabin. The interior of Falken’s home was a set built at M-G-M Studios (now Sony Pictures Studios) – one that utilized props and set pieces from the television series Little House on the Prairie.

UPDATE – Fellow stalker David, of The Location Scout website, recently alerted me to several other movies in which Falken’s cabin made an appearance. In the 1998 comedy The Opposite of Sex, it masked as the Canadian lodge where Dede Truitt (Christina Ricci) hid out with Matt Mateo (Ivan Sergei) and Jason Bock (Johnny Galecki).

I believe the real life interior of the cabin was also used in The Opposite of Sex, but that is just a guess, so don’t quote me on that.

In the 1999 movie Rites of Passage, it portrayed the cabin belonging to the Farraday family. Please pardon the craptastic screen grabs, but I could not find the movie available for streaming anywhere online and had to make captures from a preview on YouTube.

The lodge was also featured prominently in the movie American Weapon, which, per this Big Bear Grizzly article, was filmed in 2009, but, for whatever reason, was not released until 2014. Now having seen all of the filming that took place at the home, I am even more shocked that it was torn down! If nothing else, the dwelling was a great income property and it is surprising that its owners wouldn’t have left it standing for that reason alone. As I said above, what a shame!

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

Big THANK YOU to my friend Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for not only helping me to find this location, but for coming to my rescue by texting me the address while I was in Big Bear! And a big THANK YOU to fellow stalker David, of The Location Scout website, for informing me of the home’s many other onscreen appearances.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Falken’s cabin from WarGames was formerly located at 39224 Waterview Drive in Big Bear Lake, just southwest of the home at 39248 Waterview Drive. It has since been torn down and the site is currently vacant land.

December 11, 2015December 11, 2015

Diane’s House from “Say Anything . . . “

I have been on a major Say Anything . . . kick lately thanks to a soon-to-be published post I recently wrote for Discover Los Angeles. While doing research for the article, I became a bit fixated on tracking down an unknown location from the 1989 romcom (one that I still have yet to find, darn it!) and in the process watched countless behind-the-scenes vignettes. Thanks to those viewings, not only did I learn an interesting fact about the movie, but I also wound up finally finding the house where Diane Court (Ione Skye) lived with her dad, James Court (John Mahoney), in the flick.

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Oddly, while Diane’s home was featured several times in Say Anything . . ., a full exterior view of it was never shown – nor were any background clues that could help aid in locating it. No street signs, no address numbers, no nothing.

But thanks to the steps leading up from the street to the front doors of the neighboring homes and the extensive amount of trees, I had a hunch that the residence was most likely located in or around the Hancock Park/Windsor Square area. Other than that small inkling, though, with this one I was at a loss. Until a couple of weeks ago, that is.

The most famous scene from Say Anything . . . is easily the iconic boom box scene in which lovelorn Lloyd Dobler (John Cusack) stands outside of Diane’s window with a large boom box playing Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes” held high atop his head. Oddly, the segment was not lensed near Diane’s house, or any house at all, but on a tree-lined stretch of North Hollywood Park, which I blogged about back in August 2012. I had never heard any sort of explanation for the weird location choice until watching “An Iconic Film Revisited: Say Anything . . . 20 Years Later,” a special feature included on the Say Anything . . . (20th Anniversary Edition) Blu-ray DVD. In it, director Cameron Crowe mentions that the boom box segment had actually been shot several different ways in the street in front of Diane’s house, but that none of the takes had really worked for him. Then, on the last day of filming, while shooting the movie’s other iconic scene, in which Lloyd brushes glass out of Diane’s path at a 7-Eleven, cinematographer László Kovács noticed that there was a park across the street that might be perfect for the boom box segment. With only a few minutes of daylight remaining, cast and crew rushed over to the spot that Kovács had selected and re-shot the scene. Cameron loved the way it turned out and that was the footage that made it into the final cut. So there you have it – the reasoning behind the boom box scene’s unconventional locale.

While Crowe was talking about the scene in “An Iconic Film Revisited,” some footage of the original takes were shown.

I was absolutely floored when I noticed that a “135” address number was visible on the curb in front of the house located across the street from Diane’s in the footage. So with that address number in hand, I began searching all of the 100 blocks of Hancock Park using Google Street View and, sure enough, found the place almost immediately.

In real life, the residence, which was built in 1913, features 5 bedrooms, 4 baths, 2,867 square feet of living space, 3 fire places, leaded glass windows, countless built-ins, a separate in-law unit, and 0.23 acres of land.

Though said to be located in Seattle, Washington in Say Anything . . . , in actuality the home can be found right where I thought it would be, on a tree-lined street in Windsor Square.

The residence’s front walkway is the only real portion of the exterior that made it onto the screen in Say Anything . . .

The walkway was featured in the beginning of the movie, in the scene in which Lloyd drops Diane off after attending the graduation party together.

The home’s front porch was originally intended to appear in a scene, as well, but it wound up on the cutting room floor. In the scene, which is included along with several other deleted/alternate/extended scenes on the Say Anything . . . (20th Anniversary Edition) Blu-ray DVD, Lloyd goes outside to smoke while at a dinner party at Diane’s house.

While doing research for this post, I came across a real estate listing for the home and was floored to see that the real life interior of it was also used in Say Anything . . .

Though there have been some changes (which is to be expected, being that filming took place 26 years ago), much of the abode still looks the same today as it did onscreen! As you can see below, the dining room is a direct match to what was shown in Say Anything . . .

As is the kitchen . . .

. . . living room . . .

. . . and stairs.

I absolutely love that little details, like the ceiling trim, have also remained unchanged.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Diane’s house from Say Anything . . . is located at 140 South Norton Avenue in Windsor Square.

April 2, 2015March 26, 2015

Latest L.A. Mag Post – About My Filming Location Holy Grail

Don’t forget to read today’s Los Angeles magazine post – about the the Girls Just Want to Have Fun apartment building. My articles typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours.