Entertainment – Page 11 – IAMNOTASTALKER

April 5, 2013April 4, 2013

Shannen Doherty’s Former Mulholland Drive Rental

Another locale that I found thanks to Hollywood Death and Scandal Sites, the fabulous book written by my buddy E.J. of The Movieland Directory, was the house at 13459 Mulholland Drive that was once rented by my girl Shannen Doherty and that was also the location of her ill-fated 1993 nuptials to Ashley Hamilton, son of actor George Hamilton. Well, believe you me, as soon as I read the words “Shannen Doherty”, I immediately added the address to my To-Stalk list and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over there a couple of weekends ago while visiting L.A.

[ad]

Sadly, not much of the abode, which was originally built in 1949 and boasts three bedrooms, four baths, 3,734 square feet, and a 0.50-acre plot of land, is visible from the street.

You can see a very small bit of the property, which, according to Zillow, last sold in August 1997 for $942,500, if you head a few hundred feet east on Mulholland Drive.

I was excited to see the home’s front gate, though, as a photograph of it had been featured in the October 11th, 1993 issue of People Magazine in an article about Shannen and Ashley’s “secret” wedding.

That photograph is pictured below. In a disappointing twist, the gate has since been remodeled and now looks completely different than it did in 1993, so much so that I thought E.J. might have gotten Shannen’s former address wrong. (I know, I know – blasphemy! ) As you can see, though, the number “13459” is clearly visible in the People Magazine image, and the article, which you can read here, goes on to state that the star’s home was located on Mulholland Drive. Why, oh why, would the owners remodel the gate? Ugh! (On a fairly amazing side-note – People failed to recognize actress Meredith Salenger in the photograph below, calling her an “unidentified guest”. Nice reporting and research skills, People. Meredith was a pretty big star at the time, so how the magazine failed to identify her is beyond me.)

I’ve recognized her twice while out in public! Maybe I should go work for People.

Shannen moved into the Mulholland home at some point after being evicted from her Doheny Drive rental (which I blogged about here) in March 1993. And it was there that, on September 24th, the star married Ashley, who at the time was six days short of turning 19. The wedding took place on a Friday evening and, according to People, Shannen reported to the set of Beverly Hills, 90210 that morning as if it was a normal day. During a break, she asked someone from the art department to come over to her house that afternoon to help her decorate her backyard for her wedding. When the crew member expressed shock at the spontaneousness of the nuptials, Shannen said, “Yeah, I just found out this morning.” The bride wore a silk bathrobe and no shoes during the ceremony, which was decorated with sunflowers and tiki torches and was attended by only a few close friends. Not surprisingly, the marriage did not last. The couple was separated by February 1994 and in April Shannen filed for divorce. The two had only known each other for two weeks at the time of their nuptials and Ashley had just been released from a drug rehabilitation program shortly beforehand. Not the best of circumstances for the start of a successful marriage, but you live and you learn, right? In a November 1994 TV Guide article, Shannen said, “It was me jumping into something very, very fast before I knew someone. I think it was more of – I needed to feel love. And I loved him, because I think his heart was very, very good. However, there were things about him that I didn’t find out until we were married. Things I couldn’t overlook. And it was one of the most unhealthy relationships I’ve ever been in.”

I am fairly certain that Shannen did not live in the Mulholland rental for more than a year. In an August 1995 Sky Magazine article, in which she was dubbed a “compulsive house-mover”, she talks about her new Spanish-style abode in the Hollywood Hills (one that I have yet to track down!) and says, “I have a problem with staying in one place too long.”

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 E.J., of The Movieland Directory website, for finding this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Shannen Doherty’s former rental is located at 13459 Mulholland Drive in Beverly Hills.

April 3, 2013April 2, 2013

Brandi Glanville’s Former House

After watching the latest season of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, I can say that Brandi Glanville is, without a doubt, my favorite cast member. I absolutely ADORE her. (I also love Lisa Vanderpump and Yolanda Foster. As for the rest of the Housewives? Well, to borrow one of my grandma’s catch-phrases, they can go take a long walk off a short pier for all I care. ) So I was practically chomping at the bit to get my hands on a copy of her new autobiography, Drinking & Tweeting: and Other Brandi Blunders, which I finally did two weeks ago. I then promptly devoured the thing in two sittings. My favorite part of the book was the chapter dealing with the pitfalls of social media, in which Brandi says, “Just ask yourself how many times you have interrupted a wonderful night with friends and family to post on Facebook or Twitter that you’re having a wonderful night. How many times have you stopped midsentence to ask a waiter to take a photo and then spent the next five minutes f*cking with filters to post it on Instagram?” #sotrue Besides being a good read, Drinking & Tweeting also, of course, provided a few stalking locations, which I was over the moon about. And while the residence that Brandi referred to most often throughout the tome is, unfortunately, unstalkable due to the fact that it located inside of the gated Mountain View Estates community in Calabasas, I did manage to track down (via fellow stalker E.J. of The Movieland Directory website) and stalk the Encino residence where the reality star lived with her philandering husband, Eddie Cibrian, just prior to that.

[ad]

Eddie and Brandi purchased the 8,560-square-foot abode pictured below in May 2002, a year after their wedding, for $2,020,000. The dwelling, which was originally built in 1992 and was renovated at some point during the couple’s tenure there, boasts a 0.48-acre plot of land, six en-suite bedrooms, including two master suites (one with two walk-in closets and dual showers), eight bathrooms, a chef’s kitchen, a banquet-sized formal dining room, a professional theatre with bi-level seating for 15 people, a rooftop sundeck, four fireplaces, a pool, a library, travertine and hardwood flooring throughout, a porte-cochere, and a three-car garage.

The then happy couple put the property, which was dubbed “Rancho Estate”, on the market in 2007 for a whopping $4,395,000. You can check out the real estate listing from that time here.

Your Mama, from the Real Estalker website, ripped the home apart in a November 2007 post, saying, “Oh dear. Somebody please get Your Mama a silver spike that we can drive through the heart of the decorating demon who is responsible for this Encino mess that luscious looking actor Eddie Cibrian and his model wifey Brandi (with an “i,” of course) call home. Dear Jeezis in heaven, Your Mama just prefers not to know that there are people in the world who actually want to live in houses with porte-cocheres meant to make the house look elegant and grandiose but really just make it look like a damn Ramada Inn.” And while Your Mama is absolutely right about the porte-cochere, I have to say that I rather like the interior of the residence, especially the open entryway, the curving staircase, and the wood-beamed ceilings.

Brandi and Eddie wound up selling the home to comedian Carlos Mencia in January 2008 for $4.3 million – well over two times what they had paid for it just five and a half years prior.

That same month they purchased their Mountain View Estates residence for $2.5 million. That home, which was originally built in 1994, features six bedrooms, seven baths (including his-and-her baths in the master bedroom), 6,610 square feet of living space, a 0.83-acre plot of land, custom-built closets (yes, please!), covered patios, and a pool with a slide and multiple waterfalls. Two years later, in early 2010, Brandi and Eddie put the home on the market for $2,349,000 as part of their divorce proceedings and eventually sold it in June for $2.2 million. The photographs below are from the real estate listing during that time.

And yes, that is a stripper pole in the master bedroom (classy!), of which the Real Estalker’s Your Mama said in a February 2010 post, “Listen babies, we’re all for folks getting down, dirty and fuh-reeky in the bedroom, but let Your Mama offer all you married ladeez a word to the wise: Iffin your man wants to install a stripper pole in your marital bedroom, you can be pretty damn sure he’s going to want to see scantily clad beehawtchas who are not you working that thing. Don’t believe Your Mama? Install a damn stripper pole and let us know what happens.” True dat! Notice that the pole was removed (either digitally or physically) for some of the real estate photos.

It was as Brandi was driving up to the “ostentatious neighborhood gates” of the Mountain View Estates community that she learned, via a text message from a friend, of her husband’s affair with LeAnn Rimes. So while I knew that I could not stalk her actual former home there, I dragged the Grim Cheaper out to Calabasas to do a little drive-by of those gates. I was so hoping to see an “open house” sign displayed out front, but, alas, that was not to be.

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 my buddy E.J., from The Movieland Directory, for finding these locations.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Brandi Glanville’s former home is located at 4743 White Oak Avenue in Encino. Her other former house is located at 5497 Amber Circle, inside of the gated Mountain View Estates community, in Calabasas.

April 2, 2013April 2, 2013

The “Burning Love” Mansion

This past February, thanks to Reality Steve and the E! Channel, I was introduced to the brilliance that is the Ben Stiller-produced parody of The Bachelor titled Burning Love. The Hose Ceremonies along with the catchphrase “Will you accept my hose?” are pure comic genius! The last time I found myself laughing so much over a television series was when I first started watching The Office. Anyone who is at all a fan of The Bachelor will LOVE Burning Love. As of yet, I have only seen the Season 1 episodes that have aired on E! (the show started as a web series and was later picked up by the cable channel), but am already eagerly awaiting Season 2 – although I cannot imagine a better lead character than Mark Orlando (Ken Marino – who also directs the series and whose wife, Erica Oyama, is the head writer). So when I saw that fellow stalker Geoff, from the 90210Locations website, had tracked down the mansion where the contestants live on the show, I just about passed out from excitement and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to stalk it while we were in L.A. this past weekend.

[ad]

Back in June 2012, Geoff came across this Yahoo TV article about the series in which Ken Marino stated that the Burning Love mansion was located in Calabasas, in the same area as the ranch from The Biggest Loser (which I blogged about here). I so love that Ken knew that, by the way! Most people in the industry could care less about filming locations, but I digress. Anyway, Geoff started looking for the ginormous Tuscan-style estate in the Calabasas hills, but the hunt proved to be a bit of a tough one. Because the property was recently constructed in 2008, most angles of Google and Bing Maps show its location as a vacant plot of land. It was not until Geoff randomly switched the map view to a different direction at one point during his search that the abode appeared and he realized it was the place he had been looking for.

In real life, the massive manse boasts seven en-suite bedrooms, eight baths, 9,684 square feet of living space, a 7.29-acre plot of land, a media room, a play room, an office/library, five fireplaces (!), a 1,500-bottle wine cellar, hand-crafted ceilings, 360-degree views of the Santa Monica Mountains, a sauna, a pool, a spa, and a built-in BBQ. The property last sold in April 2011 for $2,600,000 and is currently for sale for $3,950,000. You can check out the home’s real estate listing here.

Before arriving at the residence, I was nervous that it would not be visible from the street, so I was completely floored to discover that it was, for the most part, in open view!

Burning Love, which is so spot-on in its parody of The Bachelor that I constantly have to remind myself that the show is not actually a reality series, centers around several woman, most of whom are dental hygienists, hoping to find love with Mark, the boneheaded fireman who in the premiere episode announced that his soul mate was “someone who can make me laugh, but isn’t afraid of robots.” LOL The mansion was used extensively in the filming, which according to this Yahoo TV article, took only eight days to complete. The areas of the estate that appeared on the show include the front exterior;

the entryway;

the kitchen [and yes, contestant Haley (Chelsea Lately’s Natasha Leggero), who is pictured below, does not wear pants on the series, causing Mark to say in one scene, “I can definitely see us starting a family together, maybe in a town where they accept people who don’t wear pants.” LOL];

the living room;

the family room, where the Hose Ceremonies take place;

the master bedroom (check out the old school back pillow sitting on the floor – again LOL) . . .

. . . where Mark gazes at himself longingly in the mirror;

and the pool, where Mark throws a pool party because “I thought it would be a great chance to see the girls let loose . . . uh, also to see a lot of top and side-boob and, if we’re lucky, a little butt cleavage.” As Dan Casey said in his post about the show on Nerdist, “From the needlessly confusing rules, the preposterous theme dates and the plucked-from-Guess Who contestants, Burning Love hits the nail on its vapid, empty head.” That it does, Dan. And I couldn’t love it more. If you are at all a fan of The Bachelor (or just simply love to hate it), Burning Love is a must-watch!

You can watch the first episode of Burning Love, which features a cameo appearance by Jennifer Aniston, as well as a handful of other stars, by clicking 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.

Big THANK YOU to Geoff, from the 90210Locations website, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Burning Love mansion is located at 2760 Country Ridge Road, just off of Stokes Canyon Road, in Calabasas. King Gillette Ranch, aka The Biggest Loser ranch, is located just down the street at 26800 Mulholland Highway.

March 27, 2013May 22, 2013

The O’Neill House from "Beverly Hills, 90210"

While perusing the article “The Ultimate Guide to Hidden L.A.” in the February 2013 issue of Los Angeles Magazine, I came across a blurb about the O’Neill House in Beverly Hills – one of Southern California’s most unique residences – and recognized the place immediately. I had seen the property featured in a production a year or so prior, became mesmerized by its whimsical architecture and immediately set about tracking it down, which I did fairly quickly. For the life of me, though, I now cannot remember what production it was. I am only 35 – aren’t I a little young for my memory to be failing? Winking smile My gut is saying that the house popped up in an episode of Californication because I distinctly remember first searching for it in the Venice area – Californication is filmed almost entirely in and around Venice Beach – but I scanned through the Grim Cheaper’s DVDs of the series yesterday and did not spot the abode anywhere. I also contacted fellow stalker Geoff, who chronicles Californication filming locales on his 90210Locations website, but he did not recognize the home at all. I am now starting to doubt that Californication is the correct show. At this point, who knows? I decided to stalk the O’Neill House, anyway, while visiting L.A. a few weeks back in the hopes that I would eventually remember what production had been filmed there, but I still have yet to do so. Randomly enough, though, while scanning through early episodes of Beverly Hills, 90210 to make screen captures for yesterday’s post on The Peach Pit, I spotted the property in a very brief scene and just about had a heart attack. It always comes back to 90210 for this stalker. Smile

[ad]

In 1978, an art dealer named Don O’Neill and his wife, Sandy, decided to remodel the guest home of their traditional residence in the Art Nouveau-style of Don’s favorite architect, Antoni Gaudi. That guest house is pictured below and is actually the most famous portion of the property.

As you can see below, the detailing on it is nothing short of spectacular.

No matter what one’s architectural style preferences may be, I can honestly say that the residence is amazing to see in person. I don’t know that I would ever want to live there, but I sure could not get enough of looking at the place’s exterior.

Check out the molded fish sculpture to the right of the doorway that conceals what I believe is either a camera or a light fixture. As I said before, the detailing is spectacular!

After construction of the guest house was complete, Don and Sandy decided to rebuild the main part of the house in the same style. Sadly though, Don passed away before the project was finished, but I believe that Sandy still owns the property to this day.

The dwelling, which was designed by architect Tom Oswalt, boasts five bedrooms, six baths, 5,181 square feet of living space, a 0.34-acre plot of land, a pool, a library, maid’s quarters, and a boatload of ornate tile work. As you can see below, the front of the home is much less adorned than the back. According to the fabulous book Los Angeles Attractions, all of the rooms were built in a round or oval shape. You can check out some fabulous interior photographs of the property here.

The O’Neill house is shown very briefly in the Season 1 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 titled “The First Time”, in the scene in which Brandon Walsh (Jason Priestley) shows his former girlfriend, Sheryl (Paula Irvine), who is visiting from Minnesota, around Beverly Hills. As they drive through the city, Sheryl takes pictures of various ostentatious residences, one of which is the O’Neill House.

The O’Neill house was also where Jesse Lujack (Richard Gere) stole a baby blue Thunderbird convertible In the 1983 movie Breathless.

In the 1986 thriller 8 Million Ways to Die, the residence was where Angel Moldonado (Andy Garcia) lived. In the movie, Angel talks quite a bit about Antoni Gaudi and how he inspired the unusual home. Areas of the property that were shown in the flick include the guest house;

the breezeway between the guest house and the main house;

the living room of the main house;

and the kitchen.

I am still at a loss as to the other production I saw the O’Neill house featured in, so if any of my fellow stalkers recognize it, please let me know!

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! Smile

Stalk It: The O’Neill House, from “The First Time” episode of Beverly Hills, 90210, is located at 507 North Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. The guest house is located behind the property and can be viewed from the alley that runs north off of Park Way in between North Rodeo Drive and North Camden Drive.

March 26, 2013March 26, 2013

The Apple Pan from “Beverly Hills, 90210”

While the Grim Cheaper and I were out and about doing some stalking in the West L.A. area two weekends ago, we happened to pass by The Apple Pan, the exterior of which masqueraded as the original Peach Pit on fave show Beverly Hills, 90210. Finding ourselves both hungry, we decided to pop in for a bite to eat, which turned out to be quite the magical experience for this stalker, let me tell you! So, even though I have stalked and blogged about The Apple Pan once before – very, very briefly, way back in May 2008 (you can read that post here) – because it was such a short write-up and because I did not venture inside during that particular visit, I figured the place was most-definitely worthy of a re-hash.

[ad]

The Apple Pan was first established by Alan and Ellen Baker on April 11th, 1947 and, amazingly enough, still currently stands in the exact same spot that it did on that opening day. Even more astounding is the fact that the eatery is still owned and operated by the Baker family over six decades later! Alan and Ellen made the fortuitous decision to purchase the land on which The Apple Pan now stands (long before they ever built the restaurant, in fact), and, thankfully, despite countless – and very large – offers from developers to sell, held onto it, which is a big part of how it has managed to survive for so long.

Nothing, and I do mean NOTHING, about the eatery has been altered since its inception – not the menu (which consists of age-old family recipes), not the seating, not the décor, not even the employees, most of whom have worked there for well over thirty years! Such a refreshing thing to see in a city where change seems to be the norm.

The Apple Pan menu, which you can take a look at here, consists of a scant 11 items – two burgers (the Steakburger and the Hickoryburger), five sandwiches [Southern Baked Ham, Swiss Cheese, Combination (a ham and cheese combo), Tuna Salad, and Egg Salad], three pies (Pecan Pie, Fresh Apple Pie and Cream Pie), and French Fries, which are simply uh-ma-zing! According to a 2007 Los Angeles Times article, of the stalwart menu, owner Martha Gamble (Alan and Ellen’s daughter) said, “My dad was a perfectionist. He tried recipes out at home until it was the way he wanted it.” Alan is my kinda guy – why mess with something that is obviously working? There are also a few “secret” menu items available to those in the know, including Grilled Cheese, Tuna Melts, and Pickled Peppers.

I opted for the Steakburger with cheese and, even though I am not AT ALL a meat person, absolutely LOVED it. As you can see below, The Apple Pan serves its burgers standing up and wrapped in paper, utilizing much the same method as Johnny Rockets restaurants. Apparently, Johnny Rockets founder Ronn Teitelbaum used the The Apple Pan as the model for his popular diner chain. There are other similarities, as well, including the use of small cardboard plates to serve French Fries and ketchup, as you can see above.

The Apple Pan serves its sodas (Coca-Cola, Root Beer, Orange, and Dr Pepper) in paper cones that sit inside of stainless steel cup-holders, which apparently used to be commonplace back in the 1940s. This stalker had never seen anything like it before, though, and thought it was so incredibly cool!

The tiny, 26-stool, Zagat-rated eatery is so immensely popular that it is pretty much standing-room only every single day of the week (except for Monday, when it is closed). Even celebs have been known to frequent the place. Such stars as the Jonas Brothers, Tori Amos, Michael Kors, Emma Stone, Rob Lowe, Rob Reiner, Rodney Dangerfield, Sammy Davis Jr., Joel Siegel, Lee Iacocca, and Magic Johnson have all been spotted there at one time or another. Drew Barrymore and then fiancé/now husband Will Kopelman even ate Valentine’s Day dinner there in 2012. Of the eatery, Drew told the JustJared website, “It’s an institution basically and you HAVE to try it. You’ll love it.”

The exterior of the Apple Pan showed up only twice on Beverly Hills, 90210. It first appeared at the very end of the Season 1 episode titled “Every Dream Has Its Price (Tag)”, in the scene in which Dylan McKay (Luke Perry) took Brandon Walsh (Jason Priestley) out for a piece of “the best pie in L.A.”

It then showed up again in the episode titled “One on One”, in the scene in which Brandon stopped by his workplace to ask Nat Bussichio (Joe E. Tata) for his paycheck and, while waiting, ran into James Townsend (Tico Wells), his rival for a spot on the West Beverly High basketball team. Ironically, in the scene’s establishing shot of The Peach Pit, The Apple Pan sign was visible, as you can see below! LOL Oddly enough, in the very next episode, which was titled “Higher Education”, The Apple Pan had been replaced with a different exterior – one at 1027 Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice, which I blogged about here. That location was used throughout the end of Season 1, until it, too, was replaced by a third exterior in the Season 2 episode titled “Pass, Not Pass.” That third and final exterior, which I blogged about here, can be found at 45 South Fair Oaks Avenue in Pasadena.

While I knew (thanks to Darren Star’s DVD commentary for the Season 1 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 titled “Spring Dance”) that The Apple Pan had served as the model for The Peach Pit’s interior set, I was not at all prepared for how closely the real life restaurant would resemble its onscreen counterpart. When I walked through The Apple Pan’s front doors, I honestly felt like I had stepped right inside The Pit! For a die-hard 90210 fan like myself, the experience was nothing short of exhilarating! Not only is The Apple Pan set up exactly like The Peach Pit, with a small U-shaped counter surrounding an open kitchen . . .

. . . but, as you can see below, the doors and windows are also an exact match.

As is the wood wall paneling . . .

. . . and the vintage cash register! Love it, love it, love it!

In a 2008 interview with the Zap2It website, Jason Priestley mentioned The Apple Pan, saying, “That’s what the Peach Pit was modeled after. If you watch the early episodes of 90210, the Peach Pit is laid out almost exactly like The Apple Pan. Whenever I’d have dinner with Charles Rosin, the show runner, we’d go there. “ He also calls the burgers “amazing.” Smile

The Apple Pan was also featured in THREE different Huell Howser specials over the years – one in 1992, one in 1996, and one in 2009.

You can watch one of those specials by clicking 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! Smile

Stalk It: The Apple Pan, aka The Peach Pit from Beverly Hills, 90210, is located at 10801 West Pico Boulevard in West Los Angeles.

March 21, 2013March 20, 2013

Loretta Young’s Former West Hollywood House

Once I discovered that Loretta Young’s Palm Springs house (which I blogged about on Tuesday) was not, in fact, the place where Judy Lewis (the legendary actress’ secret love child with Clark Gable) learned the truth about her birth, I set out to track down the location where the encounter actually did take place. And thanks to Judy’s fascinating 1994 biography, Uncommon Knowledge, that endeavor was a snap.

[ad]

A woman obviously after my own heart, Judy named each chapter of her book after the street she lived on during the corresponding time period of her life. Um, LOVE it! The chapter chronicling the years 1955 to 1958 is titled “The Flores House” and, thankfully, featured a photograph (pictured below) of the front of Judy’s former abode in which an address number of 1308 was visible. From there I looked at the Google Street View image of the residence located at 1308 North Flores Street and, voila, it was the same residence pictured in Uncommon Knowledge. Thank you, Judy! So I ran right out to stalk the place while the Grim Cheaper and I were visiting L.A. this past weekend. (As you can see below, the exterior of the property still looks almost exactly the same today as it did when Judy lived there almost six decades ago.)

There seems to be quite a bit of misinformation about the dwelling floating around online, most of which states that it was specifically built for Loretta in 1927. While the original construction does indeed date back to 1927, it was not until 1952 that Loretta and her then husband, Tom Lewis, purchased the site, which at the time was actually an upscale apartment complex consisting of “two-storied maisonettes with individual private gardens”, from millionaire Huntington Hartford. The couple planned on using part of the property as a family home while renting out the remaining units for income. Loretta’s mother, Gladys Belzer, who was one of the most sought-after interior decorators in all of Los Angeles at the time, and famed architect John Elgin Woolf immediately began an extensive renovation of the site and the family moved into a leased beach house in Santa Monica (one that had formerly belonged to Harry Warner at 605 Pacific Coast Highway) while waiting for their new home to be completed.

The family finally moved into the Flores house sometime in 1955. Of the residence, Judy said, “Grandma had done a superb job of redesigning and redecorating. Our house had white-marble floors in the entry and black marble in the atrium; the ceilings were high and the rooms flooded in sunlight. Word spread rapidly and the maisonettes were occupied by members of the movie community, Joan Crawford and Rod Steiger among the first tenants.” Rock Hudson also supposedly lived on the premises at one point in time. The Flores residence boasted five bedrooms, four baths, 6,000 square feet of living space, several fireplaces, a formal dining room, high ceilings, hardwood flooring, separate maid’s quarters (natch!), a pool, and a pool house. According to fave book Hollywood: The Movie Lover’s Guide, Loretta sold the property sometime during the 1970s to actress Alexis Smith and her husband Craig Stevens.

As you can see in the below photographs from Uncommon Knowledge as compared to photographs from the property’s 2008 MLS listing, the living room area, with its built-it bookshelves, still looks much the same today as it did when Judy lived there.

The doors that Loretta famously twirled through each week on her wildly popular television series The Loretta Young Show were based upon the actual living room doors of the Flores Street house. So incredibly cool!

Judy learned of her secret heritage while visiting her mother at the Flores house during Labor Weekend 1966, six years after Clark Gable’s death. She confronted Loretta late one night in the actress’ opulent bedroom and before begrudgingly admitting the truth – that Judy was in fact her biological daughter with the “King of Hollywood” – Loretta went into the bathroom and threw up. After finally learning the real story, Judy said, “A feeling of utter relief went through me. It was as if I had been holding my breath for the past several hours and suddenly I could breathe again. Finally all doubts were gone, I had a name and a face and an identity to the other missing half of myself. I had known that my mother was my birth mother for years, even though we had never discussed it, but the mystery of my father was finally solved. Now I knew definitively once and for all that I was really Clark Gable’s daughter. I almost laughed with relief. It had been such a long and difficult journey to get to this moment. And now, finally, after all these years, I was past it, on the other side – a whole person.” When Judy published Uncommon Knowledge in 1994, Loretta publicly denied her daughter’s claims and it was not until three months after her own death in August 2000, when her authorized biography, Forever Young, was released, that Loretta finally admitted the truth – from beyond the grave. It is a heartbreaking story from beginning to end and I cannot even imagine the pain that Judy endured throughout her lifetime.

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! Smile

Stalk It: Loretta Young’s longtime former home is located at 1308 North Flores Street in West Hollywood. Note – Loretta’s former address is also sometimes listed as 8313 Fountain Avenue in West Hollywood.

March 19, 2013March 19, 2013

Loretta Young’s Palm Springs House

While doing research on the Playa del Rey house where Judy Lewis (secret love child of Loretta Young and Clark Gable) was born (which I blogged about here), I came across a November 2011 The New York Times article about Lewis’ recent death which stated that the actress/psychotherapist was finally told the true story of her birth in 1966 while at her mother’s home in Palm Springs. Well, I, of course, immediately set about doing some cyber-stalking in order to track down the address of the Desert property and found it fairly quickly (thanks to The Movieland Directory website), and then dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to stalk it just a few days later. In the meantime, I picked up Judy’s autobiography, Uncommon Knowledge, at my local library and started reading. (It is fabulous, by the way!) I had not yet gotten to the chapter that covered Loretta’s strained confession when I stalked her Palm Springs abode but, come to find out, not only was it NOT where the incident took place, but the actress did not even own the residence at the time! Think it’s too late for The Times to print a retraction?

[ad]

In The New York Times article, it is stated, “Ms. Lewis, a former actress who died on Friday at the age of 76, was 31 before she discerned the scope of the falsehoods that cast her, a daughter of Hollywood royalty, into what she later described as a Cinderella-like childhood. Confronted by Ms. Lewis, Young finally made a tearful confession in 1966 at her sprawling home in Palm Springs, Calif.” As it turns out, though, that confrontation actually took place at Loretta’s longtime house in West Hollywood, which I stalked this past weekend and will be blogging about soon. Being that Judy wrote a book that described Loretta’s confession in great detail, I am unsure of how such misinformation ever got printed. Especially considering the fact that Judy also stated in her book, which was published in 1994, that the last time she was ever in her mom’s home was on Mother’s Day 1986, seven long years before Loretta purchased a residence in Palm Springs.

It was not until 1993 that Loretta and her third husband, Jean Lewis (the famed Oscar-winning costume designer who created the dress my girl Marilyn Monroe wore when she famously sang “Happy Birthday” to President John Kennedy in 1962) purchased the Deepwell Estates home. At the time, the three-bedroom, three-and-a-half bath property, which was originally built in 1964, boasted fourteen-foot ceilings, indirect lighting, a pool, a suspended fireplace, and a circular living room that was decorated all in white. According to a September 2010 Palm Springs Life article, Loretta tended to the home’s exterior hedges herself, using a pair of scissors, and also decorated the site with a myriad of angels each Christmas. What I wouldn’t give to have been able to see that!

Sadly, Jean Louis passed away on April 20th, 1997 while sitting on the residence’s back patio. Loretta continued to live on the premises until her death at the age of 87 on August 12, 2000. The house was then sold by her estate in 2001 for $630,000, which, according to the fabulous book Palm Springs Confidential, was almost twice what she and Jean had paid for it in 1993.

While doing research for today’s post, I learned that one significant event between Loretta and Judy did actually take place at the Palm Springs property. In 2001, Judy appeared on Larry King Live and stated that Loretta had invited her to the Desert home shortly after Jean’s death in the hopes of mending their relationship, which they eventually did.

The couple who now own the property were nice enough to open it up to the public in 2011 for a party to raise the money needed to posthumously honor Loretta with a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars. The star was dedicated on May 19th, 2011 and is located at 121 South Palm Canyon Drive.

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 E.J., from The Movieland Directory, for finding this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Loretta Young’s Palm Springs house is located at 1075 Manzanita Avenue in the Deepwell Estates area of Palm Springs.

March 15, 2013April 26, 2018

The Safari Inn from “True Romance”

One oft-filmed-at locale that I had known about for ages, but had never gotten around to stalking was the historic Safari Inn on West Olive Avenue in Burbank. I had driven by the motel countless times over the years – I get my hair done right across the street, in fact – and, even though I knew of the site’s prestigious filming pedigree, for some odd reason, I never thought to stalk it. Then, a couple of weeks ago, my hair stylist happened to be running late, so I decided to pop on over to the decades-old inn to finally do some proper stalking of the place.

[ad]

The Safari Inn was originally constructed in 1955 and, amazingly enough, still looks almost exactly the same today as it did then.

The site is most famous for its iconic neon sign, which has stood as a beacon on Olive Avenue, beckoning passersby and road-trippers alike, since the day the motel was founded.

Today, the boutique hotel, which was just recently renovated, boasts 55 rooms and suites, most with their own kitchen or kitchenette, a fitness center, laundry facilities, free parking, and complimentary shuttle service to and from the Burbank Airport. Not bad for around $100 a night. And the traveler reviews on TripAdvisor all look to be pretty favorable, to boot.

The Safari Inn also features a large, second-story patio deck . . .

. . . which overlooks a pool.

I absolutely love the pool’s feather-shaped cut-out, which you can see in the bottom left of the photograph below and which matches the feather on the inn’s famous signage. So cute!

The Safari Inn’s most notable onscreen appearance was in 1993’s True Romance, where it masqueraded as the supposed Hollywood-area motel where Clarence Worley (Christian Slater) and Alabama Whitman (Patricia Arquette) stayed while visiting L.A. Some camera trickery and crafty editing was used to make the hotel appear as if it was located on Sunset Boulevard in the movie, though, and not in the heart of suburban Burbank.

The interior of Clarence and Alabama’s room was just a set and not an actual Safari Inn room. You can see what one of the hotel’s real life rooms looks like here. Despite this fact, a girl in one of my former acting classes booked the “True Romance room” for her True Romance-loving boyfriend’s birthday one year.

Because Clarence and Alabama’s door is never actually shown in the movie, I was not able to figure out what room was used for the exterior shots.

All I was able to ascertain was that it was a second floor room, located in the northwest corner of the property, in the vicinity of the area denoted with a pink arrow in the photograph below.

True Romance is hardly the first production to utilize the Safari Inn, though. Thanks to the L.A. Bizarro website, I learned that way back in 1970 the property masqueraded as the Sunshine Motor Inn where Shirley Renfrew Partridge (Shirley Jones) and her family stopped to take a shower after being sprayed by a skunk in the Season 1 episode of The Partridge Family titled “But the Memory Lingers On.”

In 1995’s Apollo 13, the Safari Inn stood in for the supposed Florida-area motel where Marilyn Lovell (Kathleen Quinlan) stayed the night before her husband, Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks), embarked on his mission to the moon.

In 2000, the motel was featured on the The Wallflowers’ sampler CD for (Breach).

In the Season 4 episode of Six Feet Under titled “Can I Come Up Now?”, which aired in 2004, the Safari Inn was where George Sibley (James Cromwell) and Ruth Fisher (Frances Conroy) visited George’s estranged son, Kyle, (James Waterston). In the episode, the exterior of the hotel is shown only very briefly.,

The interior of one of the Safari rooms was also used in the filming. It is while there that Kyle, who is somewhat agoraphobic, announces that he has purchased a $7,500 espresso machine so that he never has to leave his motel room. Now that’s an idea I can get behind! Winking smile

Thanks to fellow stalker Dal, I learned that the Safari Inn served as the finishing point for The Law Enforcement Desert Relay in the Season 4 episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation titled “Dead Ringer,” which also aired in 2004.

In the 2005 movie Coach Carter, the Safari Inn was where the Richmond High School basketball team stayed – and snuck out to go party – during the Bayhill Tournament Championship.

The real life interior of two of the Safari’s room were also used in the filming.

The Safari Inn also popped up in the Season 4 episode of Prison Break titled “The Price”, which aired in 2008, as the motel where Dr. Sara Tancredi (Sarah Wayne Callies) had a run in with Gretchen Morgan (Jodi Lyn O’Keefe – whom I did not even recognize in the role!).

One of the hotel’s real life rooms also appeared in the episode.

In 2009, the Safari Inn was where former child star Christine Rapp (Elizabeth Perkins) tried to hide out and wound up killing someone in the Season 8 episode of Monk titled “Mr. Monk’s Favorite Show.”

In the Season 7 episode of Desperate Housewives titled “Pleasant Little Kingdom”, which aired in 2010, the Safari Inn was where Gabrielle Solis (Eva Longoria) said goodbye to her switched-at-birth daughter, Grace Sanchez (Cecilia Balagot).

In 2012, the Safari Inn stood in for Sunset Boulevard’s Crystal Motel, where Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson (Kyra Sedgwick) discovered the body of Gwyneth Adler in the Season 7 episode of The Closer titled “Hostile Witness.” Only the interior of one of the Safari’s rooms appeared in the episode.

According to IMDB, both the Season 3 episode of T.J. Hooker titled “Undercover Affair” and the Season 7 episode of Falcon Crest titled “Legacies” were filmed at the Safari Inn, but I could not find copies of either with which to verify that information.

And while IMDB also states that the Season 1 episode of Southland titled “Mozambique” was filmed at the Safari Inn, that information is incorrect. “Mozambique” was actually filmed at the Saharan Motor Hotel located at 7212 Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood – a site I am going to have to stalk in the near future as it is where Patrick Swayze and his wife, Lisa Nieme, lived upon first moving to Los Angeles.

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my latest post – I FINALLY wrote a new one – about mozzarella-stuffed meatballs on my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Safari Inn, from True Romance, is located at 1911 West Olive Avenue in Burbank. You can visit the motel’s official website here.

March 14, 2013March 13, 2013

The “Easy A” House

The Easy A location that I was most excited about stalking while in the Ojai area almost two years ago was, not surprisingly, the charming clapboard residence where Olive Penderghast (Emma Stone) lived with her unique family (notice they are all named after a food of some sort) – dad Dill (Stanley Tucci), mom Rosemary (Patricia Clarkson) and brother Chip (Bryce Clyde Jenkins). So imagine my disappointment when we arrived there only to discover that the home was located inside of Persimmon Hill, which the sign outside the entrance stated was “a private community”. And while there was no gate restricting access to the neighborhood, nor any “No Trespassing” signs posted, I have always been a by-the-book kind of girl, so I decided to pose for a picture by the Persimmon Hill sign instead of venturing past. Well, as luck would have it, a community resident happened to drive by while I was posing for the photo and asked what I was doing. When I explained that I was a huge fan of Easy A and had come to see Olive’s house, he told me that it would be absolutely fine to head on over there and snap some pics. WAHOO!

[ad]

Many months prior to my and the GC’s visit to Ojai, fellow stalker Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, had spent copious hours trying to track down Olive’s residence, all to no avail. Then, one day, he happened to notice the number 300 painted on the curb outside of the home in the scene in which Lobster Todd (Penn Badgley) dropped Olive off after her disastrous date with Anson (Jake Sandvig) at the local Lobster Shack (which I blogged about here). And voila! Once he had a house number, finding the location was a snap.

As you can see below, Olive’s house was absolutely idyllic onscreen in Easy A.

And I am very happy to report that in person it did NOT disappoint. I love, love, love this residence. It reminds me a bit of the house where the Newton family lived in the 1992 comedy Beethoven, which I blogged about here.

And while I am fairly certain that the real life interior of the home was also used in the flick, I could not find any interior photographs with which to verify that hunch.

According to fave website Zillow, in real life, the residence, which was originally built in 1986, boasts four bedrooms, four baths, 2,894 square feet of living space, and sits on a huge 2.11-acre plot of land.

The property was last sold in 1998 (for $700,000) – and it’s not very hard to see why. If I owned that place, I would never let go of it either!

Best closing shot ever, by the way. I am a sucker for any ’80s movie reference. Smile

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 Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Olive’s house from Easy A is located at 300 Longhorn Lane in Ojai. Please remember that this home is inside of a private community and that permission is needed to enter.

March 12, 2013March 11, 2013

The Lobster Shack from “Easy A”

Another location from fave movie Easy A that fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, informed me of while the Grim Cheaper and I were out and about doing some stalking in the Ojai area almost two years ago was the Carrows Restaurant that masqueraded as the Lobster Shack where Woodchuck Todd (Penn Badgley) worked in the flick. So we drove right on over there shortly before heading home that afternoon. And while the Carrows chain serves up some of the best chicken strips and ranch dressing that this stalker has ever sampled, unfortunately, because it was getting late and we had a long drive home ahead of us, we did not wind up eating on the premises that particular evening.

[ad]

Even though we were not dining onsite, the staff at Carrows could NOT have been nicer and answered all of my silly little questions about the filming. The hostess informed me that the Easy A shoot had taken place not in the main section of the restaurant, but in an auxiliary room that is only used during the eatery’s busiest hours. And she was even nice enough to open up the room for us and turn on the lights so that I could snap some photographs of it. LOVE it!

The Lobster Shack popped up only once in Easy A, in the scene in which Anson (Jake Sandvig) took Olive Penderghast (Emma Stone) – in a clever twist, Penderghast is an anagram for “pretend shag” – out on a less-than-stellar first date. Interestingly, according to a September 2010 Ojai Valley News Blog article, Easy A director Will Gluck, who is a long-time resident of the “Shangri-La of Southern California,” decided to film in the city he calls home “because I wanted the town to be one of my ‘characters’ in the script. Ojai was the perfect place to capture this. It’s also the most beautiful town in the world, and I tried to make it look as good as we all know it to be.”

As you can see below, Carrows Restaurant was dressed heavily with marine-themed décor and white twinkle lights for the shoot.

A lobster tank was even brought in and positioned on the front side of one of the restaurant’s real life planters for the scene.

In what turned out to be a massive stroke of good luck, while I did not have any Easy A screen captures on hand for reference, I somehow managed to pose for a picture in the exact same spot where Olive sat in the scene. Why I chose that particular booth to pose, I will never know, but something in my memory clicked when I saw it and I had a hunch it was where filming had taken place. For whatever reason, my brain holds onto the oddest filming factoids, but, hey, I’ll take it! Winking smile

Olive’s booth is the second booth in from the back side of the room and is denoted with a pink arrow in the photographs below.

The Carrows parking lot also appeared in Easy A, although I accidentally took photographs from the opposite angle of what was shown onscreen.

As you can see below, all of the Carrows signage was swapped out for Lobster Shack signage during the shoot. What I wouldn’t give to have been there to see all of that in person!

In the scene, Anson’s car was parked in the space denoted with a pink X in the aerial view pictured 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.

Big THANK YOU to Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Carrows Restaurant, aka the Lobster Shack from Easy A, is located at 211 West Ojai Avenue in Ojai. Olive’s date scene was filmed in the restaurant’s auxiliary room, which is situated just to left (east) of the front entrance.