Bruce Almighty – IAMNOTASTALKER

January 10, 2018April 15, 2020

The “She’s Out of Control” House – Part 2

One of my favorite parts of writing my blog each day is uncovering the various productions a particular locale has appeared in. Some spots are so prevalent on the big and small screen that I inevitably miss a role or two, though. Such was the case with the South Pasadena pad that portrayed the home of the Simpson family in the 1989 coming-of-age comedy She’s Out of Control, one of my very favorite flicks of the era. A couple of months after publishing my post on the property in 2011, I spotted it in Bruce Almighty (as I mentioned here). Then this past December, fellow stalker David, from The Location Scout, published a comment on my site alerting me to the fact that the dwelling had also been featured in Star Kid. When Mike, from MovieShotsLA, texted me not more than two days later to inform me that he had also noticed the place pop up in Little Fockers, I just about fell over and decided it was definitely time for a redux! So here goes!

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Considering the home’s vast Anywhere, U.S.A.-aesthetic and obvious curb appeal, it is not hard to see why location managers have flocked to it like moths to a flame.

Per Zillow, the 2-story 1908 pad boasts 4 bedrooms, 1 bath, 2,800 square feet of living space, and a 0.17-acre lot.

The picturesque property last sold in 1979 for $140,000 and today is worth an estimated $1.6 million, according to Redfin. Not a bad ROI, especially considering all the film income the place has generated over the years!

In She’s Out of Control, the residence is where newly-made-over teen Katie Simpson (Ami Dolenz) lives with her long-suffering father, Doug (Tony Danza), and smart aleck younger sister, Bonnie (Laura Mooney).

Amazingly, the property still looks exactly the same today as it did when the movie was filmed almost thirty years ago. Talk about being frozen in time! I mean, the trees don’t even appear to have grown in the past three decades!

Only the exterior of the residence was utilized in She’s Out of Control. The interior of the Simpson home was nothing more than a studio-built set.

I cannot even express what a shame it is that Katie’s famous staircase doesn’t exist in real life. If it did and I lived in that house, I’d so have Frankie Avalon’s “Venus” playing on loop! The dwelling’s actual staircase is much less impressive than its onscreen counterpart, sadly, and leads both upstairs and into the kitchen, oddly enough. Regardless, the residence is quite charming inside. You can check out some photographs of it here.

The backyard area also appears briefly in She’s Out of Control.

In the 1997 family flick Star Kid, the abode portrays the Griffith family residence, where Spencer (Joseph Mazzello) lives with his father, Roland (Richard Gilliland), and sister, Stacey (Ashlee Levitch).

Though interiors were filmed on a set, said set very closely resembled the actual inside of the house.

The pad also masquerades as the supposed Buffalo, New York-area home belonging to Debbie (Lisa Ann Walter), Grace Connelly’s (Jennifer Aniston) sister, in the 2003 comedy Bruce Almighty.

I absolutely love this candid shot of Jennifer Aniston and director Tom Shadyac taken out in front of the house during the shoot.

As I mentioned in my original 2011 post, the property serves as the Doyle residence, where Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton) babysits Tommy Doyle (Skyler Gisondo), in Rob Zombie’s 2007 horror flick Halloween.

In the 2010 comedy Little Fockers, the dwelling masks as the Chicago-area “American foursquare” (“also known as a prairie box”) that Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) and his wife, Pam (Teri Polo), are renovating.

The backyard area, which is undergoing a massive pool installation in the film, also makes an appearance.

And Izzy Richardson (Megan Stott) and April Jarvis (Isabel Gravitt) attend a party at the house in the recently-aired episode of Little Fires Everywhere titled “Picture Perfect,” though the exterior is only seen briefly.

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

Big THANK YOU to David, from The Location Scout website, for telling me about the home’s appearance in Star Kid and to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for alerting me to its role in Little Fockers.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The Simpson house from She’s Out of Control is located at 1960 La France Avenue in South Pasadena.

February 22, 2012February 21, 2012

The Interior of the “Bruce Almighty” Party House

In honor of my girl Jen Aniston receiving the 2,642^nd star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame today (a ceremony that I will actually not be attending because, after the debacle that was the Horrible Bosses premiere this past summer, I have a severe aversion to any event that has the potential of being too crowded or too chaotic), I thought that I would blog about a location from her 2003 romantic comedy Bruce Almighty. As I mentioned this past July in my post about the Stern House in Pasadena, which stood in for the exterior of the supposed Buffalo, New York-area Vanderbilt Estate where the Channel 7 news team threw a party in honor of Bruce Nolan (Jim Carrey) in the flick, I was fairly certain that a different property had been used for the interior. And for the past seven months or so, I had been just a wee-bit obsessed with tracking down that interior. Unfortunately though, while I searched through countless real estate listings and location websites during my hunt, I had come up completely empty-handed.

The most memorable aspect of the interior of the Bruce Almighty party house was the two-story front entrance foyer and its dual curving staircases.

Back in July, while researching the Stern House, I had come across a picture of Jen sitting at the foot of one of those staircases on IMDB’s Bruce Almighty photo page and, it will come as no surprise, that it soon became embedded in my memory.

So when I spotted that very same staircase pop up in the mansion belonging to wealthy steel businessman Henry Rearden (Grant Bowler) in the 2011 movie Atlas Shrugged: Part I a couple of weeks ago, I just about died! I, of course, immediately started doing research on Atlas Shrugged filming locations (in fact, I did not even finish watching the film, I became so obsessed!) and fairly quickly found an article in which a commenter had stated that Frank’s residence was located in La Canada Flintridge, across the street from the 2011 Pasadena Showcase House of Design. And while it would seem that it would be fairly easy to track down the 2011 Showcase House, for whatever maddening reason, I could not find it anywhere! Fortunately, after spending countless hours searching by myself, I decided to enlist the help of fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, who texted me back a few minutes later with an address. THANK YOU, Mike! So, this past Monday afternoon, while the two of us were out doing some stalking in the San Gabriel Valley, we ran right over there to take some pics.

In real life, the estate, which was originally built in 1993 by architect Wayne Siggard, boasts 5 bedrooms, 7 baths, a whopping 11,700 square feet of living space!!!, and an almost 2-acre plot of land. The mansion, which, as you can see above, is pretty darn spectacular, is currently listed on MLS for a cool $7,950,000, although it does look like a sale might be pending. You can visit the home’s real estate website here. Oh, what I would not give to see the inside of that place in person!

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In Bruce Almighty, the interior of the mansion was used extensively during the party scene and the master bedroom area was where Grace Connelly (Jennifer Aniston) caught Bruce in a passionate embrace with his “Spanish-accented” co-anchor, Susan Ortega (Catherine Bell).

The estate was also used extensively in Atlas Shrugged: Part I. Both the exterior . . .

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

And the very same bedroom where Bruce and Susan kissed in Bruce Almighty was also featured as the bedroom of Henry and his wife, Lillian Rearden (Rebecca Wisocky), in Atlas Shrugged.

Photographs of the magnificent stairwell that I spent over seven months searching for are pictured above. Sigh! What I wouldn’t give to sit on them to pose for a photograph like Jen did!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The interior of the Bruce Almighty party house, aka Henry Rearden’s mansion from Atlas Shrugged: Part I, is located at 4158 Commonwealth Avenue in La Canada Flintridge.

July 14, 2011July 13, 2011

The “Bruce Almighty” Party House

Last week while going through the glove compartment of my car, I came across the Scott’s L.A. Audio Tour of Pasadena CD that I had purchased about seven years prior. For those who have never heard of Scott’s L.A., the family-owned company produces a series of audio driving tours of the Southern California area, all of which feature numerous famous locations, including quite a few that have appeared in movies and on television. Since I had not listened to the CD in years, I decided to spend a couple of hours re-taking the tour. And I am so glad that I did because there were a few locales mentioned on it that I had completely forgotten about, the most important of which was the party house from the 2003 movie Bruce Almighty. And even though I was not at all a fan of Bruce Almighty, because my girl Jen had filmed a scene at the house, I figured it was most-definitely stalk- and blog-worthy.

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In real life, the Bruce Almighty party mansion is known as the Stern House and it was originally built in 1938 by architects Garrett Van Pelt and Robert E. Alexander. The Mediterranean-style property, which sits on 0.83 acres of land, boasts 7 bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, and 7,146 square feet of living space. And even though the residence has a name and seems to be historic in some way, surprisingly I could not find any other information about it online.

In Bruce Almighty, the Channel 7 news team throws Bruce Nolan (aka Jim Carrey) a party at the supposed Vanderbilt Estate in New York in honor of his recent promotion. When Bruce’s girlfriend Grace Connelly (aka Jennifer Aniston) shows up at the party, she catches him kissing his co-anchor Susan Ortega (aka Catherine Bell) and a fight ensues out in front of the mansion.

And while I could not find any photographs of the inside of the property to verify this, I am fairly certain that a different residence was used to film the interior party scenes.

Ironically enough, while scanning through Bruce Almighty yesterday to make screen captures for this post, I noticed that the house belonging to Debbie (aka Lisa Ann Walter) in the flick is the very same property where the Simpson family lived in fave movie She’s Out of Control, which I stalked this past May.

I also came across this super-cute photograph on IMDB of my girl Jen and Bruce Almighty director Tom Shadyac which was taken out in front of the She’s Out of Control house. Love it!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Bruce Almighty party house is located at 1395 Ridge Way in Pasadena. You can visit the Scott’s L.A. website and purchase the company’s various tour CDs here.