Famous houses – Page 34 – IAMNOTASTALKER

March 19, 2009March 18, 2009

Helen Twelvetrees’ House

A couple of weeks ago I picked up a book that is quickly shaping up to be my new stalking tome. It’s called Movie Star Homes: The Famous to the Forgotten and it features photographs and addresses of over 350 celebrity homes, most of them from the Golden Age of Hollywood. I have never really been much into the celebs of yesteryear (except for my girl Marilyn), but once I picked up this book I really couldn’t put it down. It wasn’t long before I had about thirty pages dog-eared and was dragging my boyfriend out the door with a whole new set of locations to stalk.

The first location on my list? The former home of a 30’s movie star whom you’ve probably never heard of, but whom I’ve always had a special place in my heart for – Helen Twelvetrees. I’ve never actually seen any of Helen’s movies, nor do I even really know what she looks like. But back when I was about 18, I came home from college one day and announced to my family that I was switching my major from pre-law to theatre because I wanted to become an actress. It was at that moment that my grandfather started calling me Helen Twelvetrees. My grandpa was always making up silly little nicknames for various family members, so I didn’t really think anything of it. For years this went on, with my grandpa saying “Well, if it isn’t Helen Twelvetrees!” every time I walked into a room and me thinking it was a name he had made up for me. It wasn’t until after my grandfather passed away in 2005 that I came across a listing for Helen on IMDB and realized that she had in fact been a real person – not to mention a big time movie star back in the ’30s.

So, when I saw the address of a home Helen lived in during the ’30s in my new stalking book, I just about fell out of my chair. And, of course, I immediately dragged my boyfriend right out to stalk it. So, Grandpa, this ones for you! 🙂 Helen’s former home is a very cute little Mediterranean style dwelling located on a one way street in the Whitley Heights section of Los Angeles. And, as it turns out, the house is currently for sale! While the real estate listing makes no mention of its famous former resident, it does indicate that the 3,000 square foot home, which was built in 1923, has parquet floors, crown moldings, and a hot tub. The asking price is a cool $1,150,000.

My favorite feature of the house, though, is the view of the Hollywood sign from the front yard. Love it! 🙂 You can see interior photos of Helen’s former home on its real estate listing here.

According to my buddy EJ over at The Movieland Directory, Rose McGowen and Rachel Bilson both owned a home located just a few doors down from Helen’s. The house pictured above was first owned by Miss McGowan who sold it to Rachel in November of 2004. Rachel then sold the house just a little over a year later in December of ’05. And it was sold yet again this past January for $1,075,000. I also read on this website that Busy Phillips owned the very same house at one point in time, but I haven’t been able to confirm that. Seems like it’s a pretty lucky house, though, being that several successful actresses have lived in it. I need to get me one of those! 🙂 You can see interior photos of the home here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Helen Twelvetrees’ former home is located just off the 101 Freeway at 6851 Iris Circle in Hollywood. Rachel Bilson and Rose McGowan’s former house is just down the road at 6867 Iris Circle.

March 18, 2009January 30, 2011

Tad Hamilton’s House

Another day, another Tad Hamilton location! Last week while searching for the Sex and the City honeymoon house I ran across aerial views of a Malibu home that looked very familiar to me (pictured above). It didn’t take long before I realized the house was used as Tad Hamilton’s ultra-modern white mansion in fave movie Win A Date With Tad Hamilton. So, of course, I dragged my boyfriend right out to stalk it! 🙂

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When I first saw Win A Date back in 2004, I assumed Tad’s house was just a set. I knew the pool area was most likely authentic, but the interiors seemed far too stylized to be real. But it turns out that Tad’s house is actually a real home located right on the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu.

In Win A Date, both the interior and the exterior of the real home were used quite extensively. The pool area shows up most prominently in a scene that was deleted from the actual movie, but that is featured in the DVD’s deleted scenes section. In the scene, Paris Hilton parachutes from an airplane into Tad Hamilton’s pool in an attempt to meet the movie star (pictured above).

Also featured in Win A Date is Tad’s entryway;

the front of the home;

the living room area;

and the wet bar.

I can’t even imagine living in a place like Tad’s. It’s just so modern and so . . . what’s the word I’m looking for? Oh, yeah, “blue”. In real life and in the movie the home has an odd blue tint to it, as you can see in all of the screen captures pictured above. It does look like a great place to have a party, though. 🙂 And it’s not hard to see why producers chose it as the home of the gorgeous, but somewhat shallow and morally empty movie star Tad Hamilton. You can compare the above screen captures to these real life interior photos of the house.

This same home was also featured in the 1991 movie Terminator 2: Judgment Day where it was used as the residence of computer scientist Miles Dyson and his family. It is this home that Linda Hamilton shoots up in an attempt to kill Miles towards the end of the movie. As you can see in the above screen captures, the interior of the home has been extensively remodeled since then and looks nothing like it did when Terminator 2 was filmed there over 18 years ago.

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In fact, at first glance the Win A Date house and the Terminator 2 house seem like different homes altogether. But they’re not. Although it is slightly hard to see, the above screen captures show that the stairs leading down to the living room area, the doorway leading to the kitchen, and the stairway and landing that lead to the second level are in the exact same position. The house has been given a major facelift, but structurally it’s the same as it was all those years ago in Terminator 2.

I can’t really say that I recommend stalking Tad Hamilton’s house. The above photographs show what you can see of the home from the Pacific Coast Highway – which is minimal. Aside from a white cabana-like structure, exterior pool lights, and a cement sign with the address number on it, virtually nothing is visible from the street. So Tad Hamilton and Terminator 2 fans will just have to be satisfied with cyber-stalking the home instead.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Tad Hamilton’s house is located at 30065 Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu.

March 13, 2009March 20, 2009

The Most Photographed Home in the World!

About three months ago my mom challenged me to find a house that had been used in a famous photograph back in the 1960s. The only information she remembered about the photograph was that it was an advertisement of some sort shot in black and white and that it featured two women sitting in a glass home that overlooked all of Los Angeles. With those small pieces of information, I got to googling and came up with . . . nothing. This went on for months with me having absolutely no luck in finding either the house or the advertisement she had been talking about. Then about two weeks ago while my mom was flipping through a magazine at a hair salon, she came across this photographwhich was described as “the most iconic image of Los Angeles”. Sure enough it was the picture my mom had been talking about – only as it turns out it wasn’t an advertisement at all, but a photograph by legendary architectural photographer Julius Shulman. And the house featured in the image is actually quite well known. In fact, it has been called “the most photographed home in the world”. Its name is the Stahl House, otherwise known as Case Study House #22.

When my mom first described the home to me all those months ago, I had an inkling that it was either a John Lautner house or a Case Study House. And sure enough, I was right! To tell you the truth, I don’t know a lot about the Case Study Houses. Up until a few weeks ago, I had never even seen a photograph of one. But my best friend Kylee has long been obsessed with the Houses and I had learned enough about them from her to know that the house my mom was describing just might be one. The Case Study project began in 1945, when John Entenza, editor of Art and Architecture Magazine, commissioned several legendary architects including Richard Nuetra, Raphael Soriano, Charles and Ray Eames, Eero Saarinen, Craig Ellwood, and Pierre Koenig to build affordable homes in California using mostly wood, steel, and glass. The houses were intended to be model homes which the typical American family could easily duplicate using affordable materials.

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Interestingly enough, the Stahl House which is arguably the most famous of all the Case Study Houses, wasn’t originally commissioned as one. In 1954, a man named C.H. “Buck” Stahl purchased a vacant lot high up in the hills of Los Angeles at a cost of $13,500. Buck had the idea to build a house on the property constructed almost entirely of glass to showcase the lot’s incredible views. He said to the architects “I don’t care how you do it, there’s not going to be any walls in this wing.” He built a scale model of his dream home and started shopping the project around to different architects. They all told him his design was impossible, that it couldn’t be done. Enter architect Pierre Koenig, who at the time was involved in the Case Study Project. Pierre told Buck and his wife Carlotta that not only could the house be built, but that he wanted it to be a part of the Case Study Program. And thus Case Study House #22 was born. It is incredible to me that the most famous Case Study House wasn’t designed by an architect – it was designed by a man with a vision who wouldn’t take no for an answer. The iconic photograph that was burned into my mother’s memory was actually taken before construction on the home had even been completed. Here is a great article detailing how the most famous photograph of Los Angeles came to be.

After my mom discovered the name of the house, I decided to do some research on it as I thought it would make for an interesting blog post. While searching the web I stumbled upon this website where I found out that it was possible to actually tour the home and I just about died! If only all of my stalking exploits were this easy! 🙂 I quickly made reservations for my mom and her friend and me and my best friend to take a tour of the legendary Stahl House the following week. And I must say, at the reasonable price of $20 per person, it was entirely worth it.

When you enter the front door of the house your mouth pretty much just drops to the floor at the site of the incredible views. Honestly I’ve never seen views like that anywhere in my entire life. They were literally breathtaking! And the house!!! Words can’t even properly describe the house! I can’t imagine living, or even getting to spend one night, there. Our tour, which lasted about an hour, was led by Buck Stahl’s widow and son, Carlotta and Mark Stahl, respectively. Mark said that growing up in the house he really had no idea how special it was. To him it was just his home. He said that only when he got a bit older and noticed his friends were always wanting to hang out there and swim in his pool, did he realize the home was anything out of the ordinary. I must say it was fascinating to be given a tour of the Stahl house by members of the actual Stahl family. Case Study House #22 is one of the only Case Study Houses that is still owned and occupied by the original residents, so it is in amazing condition. Due to the Stahl Family’s determination to keep the house true to its original form, the home is extremely expensive to maintain, which is why they started giving tours.

Another way the family generates revenue to maintain the home is by renting out the space as a filming location. Due to the house’s unique structure and striking views, Hollywood locations scouts come a-knockin’ quite frequently on the Stahl House door.

The house has been featured in countless movies including Playing By Heart (where it was used John Stewart’s house; pictured above) Why Do Fools Fall In Love, Galaxy Quest, The Final Power, Thirteenth Floor, The Marrying Man, Prescription Murder, Corina Corina, Nurse Betty, Where the Truth Lies, and Smog; the television shows Adam 12, Night Stalker, and Emergency;

the music videos for Wilson Phillips’ “Release Me”,

Scott Weiland’s “Missing Cleveland”,

and ATB’s “I Don’t Wanna Stop” ;

and dozens of commercials including one for Best Buy featuring the Black Eyed Peas.

The home was also featured in a Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen photo shoot for a 2003 issue of YM Magazine. I absolutely loved MK & A once upon a time (I even had their dolls!) and I used to collect every single magazine that featured the twins. So as soon as my my mom showed me the famous picture of the Stahl House taken by Julius Shulman, I said “Hey, that’s where Mary Kate and Ashley did their YM photo shoot.” LOL It might not be award winning photography, but the above image is one that was burned into my memory for many years. I so wanted to recreate the twins’ pose while touring the house, but, alas, venturing out on that ledge is not allowed. LOL 😉 You can see more photos from the Olsen’s YM shoot here.

My best friend and I did get to recreate Shulman’s famous photograph while at the house, though, and it has quickly become one of my favorite pictures of the two of us. I honestly cannot recommend taking a tour of the Stahl House enough! Go, go, go on this tour!! Even if you are not at all interested in architecture or filming locations, I can pretty much guarantee the house will still amaze you. Seeing it in person is an absolutely magical experience. The tour lasts about an hour and consists of a walk through of the main living area, kitchen, and the pool and spa area. The two bedrooms are currently off limits as they are undergoing a renovation. The Stahl House is fairly small, only 2,300 square feet, but I could have spent all day there! Tours can accommodate up to twenty people and are usually held on Saturdays and Sundays. Photographs for commercial use are not permitted and a photography waiver must be signed before being granted entry. The Stahl Family was kind enough to let me publish these photographs from my tour on my blog and for that I sincerely thank them.

Note: All photographs of the Stahl House are used with permission from the Stahl Trust.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Stahl House is located at 1635 Woods Drive in Los Angeles. The only way you’ll be able to catch a glimpse of it, though, is by paying for a tour as the house is located on a gated, private street. To find out specific tour information please visit the Stahl House Facebook page.

March 11, 2009March 11, 2009

Samantha Jones and Smith Jerrod’s Beach House

This weekend after stalking Carrie’s honeymoon villa from Sex and the City: The Movie, I dragged my boyfriend about 15 miles south to stalk yet another location from the film – Samantha and Smith’s beach house. Thanks to fave book Sex and the City: The Movie, which stated that the home was located on Malibu Road, this location was a snap to find! Smith and Samantha’s house, with its curved glass and steel architecture, is quite unique and it’s not hard to see why producers chose it as the residence of SATC’s trendy P.R. exec and her young movie star boyfriend.

In person, the house is absolutely breathtaking. Located right on the sand in Malibu, the home has five separate cantilevered balconies that seem to just hang right over the Pacific Ocean. I can only imagine what the views must be like at sunset! I’m not usually a big fan of modern houses, but this one is pretty special. At the time of filming the home was on the market for a cool $17 million (the price has now dropped to $14,500,000). I believe it was also vacant, which would have made filming there much easier than in a home that was occupied.

Filming of the Samantha/Smith scenes took two weeks to complete and both the interior and the exterior of the real life beach house were used extensively. Featured in the movie were the kitchen area (where Samantha cooks Smith homemade sushi),

the living room where Samantha and Smith celebrate New Year’s Eve in front of a fire,

and the master bedroom, where Smith asks Samantha to stop running off to New York every chance she gets. You can compare the above screen captures to the interior photos of the home shown on its real estate website and on this website. From the looks of it, it seems producers even chose to use the home’s real bedroom furniture for the filming.

The front of Samantha and Smith’s home wasn’t shown in Sex and the City: The Movie, but you can catch a glimpse of it in the above pic. Ironically, the front of the house looks like a normal everyday modern style home and doesn’t give any clue as to the amazing architecture located just on the other side of it. And while the front of the house will not be familiar to Sex and the City fans, the back definitely will be. Public beach access is located fairly close to the house, so if you would like to see the back view – and I really suggest you do – it’s less than a five minute walk down the beach.

The house directly next door to Samantha’s should also be recognizable to SATC fans. It was used as the home of Samantha’s hunky neighbor Dante (played Gilles Marini who is currently competing on Dancing With The Stars) on whom she develops quite a crush. As for Dante’s outdoor shower, I couldn’t find it anywhere. It is my guess that either another home was used for that scene, or a special shower was created especially for filming purposes that was later removed.

Also missing in real life – the balcony hot tub that Samantha relaxes in towards the beginning of the movie.

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Samantha’s house is absolutely beautiful in person and I highly recommend stalking it – or purchasing it if you have the means! If you don’t have $14,500,000 on hand to buy the home, it is also available as a rental property at the rate of $75,000 per month. Being that I’ve never made that amount in an entire year, let alone a month, I think I’m pretty much out of the running on this one. LOL

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Samantha and Smith’s beach house is located at 24826 Malibu Road in Malibu. Dante’s house is located directly next door at 24822 Malibu Road.

March 10, 2009February 4, 2010

The Sex and the City Honeymoon House

Ever since Sex and the City: The Movie premiered last May, I have been absolutely dying to stalk the hotel where the girls stayed during Carrie’s non-honeymoon. In the movie, Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte spend a week at what is supposedly a private villa located on the grounds of a Mexican resort. In actuality, though, not only were the Mexican hotel scenes not filmed in Mexico, but they weren’t even filmed at an actual hotel. LOL In reality, two different locales situated over forty miles apart from each other stood in for Carrie’s honeymoon hotel. The villa the girls stayed in is actually a private home located right off the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu. And the hotel restaurant where Carrie and the girls drank margaritas is actually a ballroom located at an equestrian compound in Simi Valley named Hummingbird Nest Ranch. And while I have yet to stalk the Ranch – something which I am planning to do in the near future – I did drag my boyfriend out to stalk Carrie’s villa this past weekend.

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My first clue in locating the villa came from fave book Sex and the City: The Movie, in which Sarah Jessica Parker mentioned that the honeymoon scenes were filmed in Malibu. Knowing that there is no hotel anywhere near Malibu that looks at all like the one Carrie and the girls stayed at, I started searching the internet for a private home near the coast that had an infinity pool flanked by two huge built-in planters holding palm trees. And I located the home almost immediately. Then when I came across these close up photos of the house, I knew for certain that it was the place where Carrie spent her honeymoon.

At first I couldn’t figure out why producers didn’t use a real Mexican resort to shoot the honeymoon scenes. But then I remembered that Kim Cattrall and Jason Lewis were already shooting on location in Malibu, so it would have made sense to shoot the honeymoon sequence there, as well. Apparently, the producers were even given the opportunity to film for free at a Caribbean resort (in exchange for a pretty prominent plug of the hotel, I’m sure), but they loved Carrie’s “Mexicoma” joke so much that they decided to keep the honeymoon in Mexico. I actually thought that joke was pretty lame and I can’t even believe they gave up a free five-star filming location to keep it in the script! LOL

Carrie’s honeymoon house is absolutely stunning in person and I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was quite a lot of it visible from the street.

Even the pool area, which was the part of the house featured most prominently in SATC, can be seen from the road! Love it! Quite a bit of the property can be seen from the Pacific Coast Highway, as well.

There is even what appears to be a chapel located on the property, so I am guessing that the owners must rent out their house quite often for weddings. Even though the place didn’t prove to be good luck for Carrie, it still looks like a pretty amazing place to get married. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Sex and the City: The Movie honeymoon house, aka Villa Lizton, is located at 4440 Encinal Canyon Road in Malibu. To see the house’s pool area, you have to drive a bit south of the property.

March 5, 2009March 5, 2009

The Pilot House!

One filming location that has pretty much been the bane of Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and my existence for quite some time now is the home that the Walsh family lived in during the very first of episode of Beverly Hills, 90210. Mike and I fondly, and sometimes not so fondly – LOL – refer to this location as “The Pilot House” since it was used in one episode and one episode only of our favorite 90’s series – the pilot episode. The home was never seen again on the series and the question as to why the Walshes lived in a different house when the show began than in later episodes has remained a location mystery for the past twenty years. It’s actually quite common, though, for certain elements of a television series, i.e. locations or actors, to be changed after a pilot episode is filmed. Pilots are usually filmed with extremely small budgets months before regular series filming begins. After a pilot is filmed, it is then shopped around to different networks in the hopes of being sold. The sad truth is that less than twenty five percent of the television pilots that are filmed ever get picked up by the networks, so producers aren’t usually willing to spend a boatload of money to shoot them. But even so the questions as to where the original Walsh home was located and as to why the Walsh home changed from the traditional style home pictured above to the famous Spanish style home that we all know and love have never been answered. Until now! 🙂

A few weeks ago while Mike was watching the pilot episode of 90210 he noticed the number 130 located above the front door of the Walsh home – a little location clue neither of us had picked up on before. (Pictured above). So pretty much immediately the two of us started searching 100 blocks in Los Angeles and its surrounding areas. We must have scrutinized almost every single square inch of L.A. looking for this house! With no luck, I might add. Mike’s instincts kept telling him that the house was located in a gated community due to the fact that the street in front of the home appeared extremely narrow on TV. But, knowing that the shooting budget for the pilot was most likely meager and that filming on a private road is usually a whole lot more costly than filming on your average city street, I disagreed with him. Until last week, that is.

While driving through Brentwood with my boyfriend last week I saw a gated community that I had never noticed before. I could tell just by driving by that it bore a striking resemblance to the 90210 pilot neighborhood. So when I got home that night I did some cyberstalking and quickly found a house in the community with a 130 address that looked a whole lot like the Walsh’s first Beverly Hills home. But I couldn’t be certain it was the Pilot House until I saw the property with my own two eyes. And I was really worried that, being that the home is located in a gated community, I would never get that chance. Well, I must have a guardian angel watching over me, because on a whim, last weekend, I asked my boyfriend to drive by the neighborhood. I knew there was a house for sale just up the road from the pilot house and I had a bit of a hunch. Sure enough – right as we drove up to the community, there on a sign in big red letters were the words I was hoping beyond all hope to see – OPEN HOUSE! 🙂 YAY! And that was my ticket in!

Let me tell you, as we came around the corner and the Pilot House came into view, I was so excited I thought my heart was going to beat right out of my chest!!!! 🙂 I was pinching myself the whole time! It was so surreal to finally be standing there in front of a filming location I had wondered about for almost twenty years! I almost felt as if any second I would wake up at home in bed only to realize that none of it was real. LOL The Pilot House is a lot smaller in person than it appeared on the show, but otherwise, even twenty years later, it looks EXACTLY the same as it did on 90210! And I could not have been more ecstatic to finally be seeing it with my own two eyes!!!!! The neighborhood where the Pilot House is located is really beautiful, too, with towering trees, huge lawns, and hilly, winding roads. The house for sale wasn’t too shabby, either – yes, of course, we went to go see it! 🙂

And once I determined that the home was located in a gated community, the other part of the 90210 pilot house mystery was solved, too. Upon entering, I just happened to ask the guard on duty at the guard shack if the community allowed filming of any sort to take place on the premises. He told me that in fact filming is not allowed and he laughed as if he gets asked that question all the time. I am sure location scouts come a-knockin’ at the guard shack door all too often. My best guess is that back in 1990, when the pilot episode was filmed, there was no ban on filming in the neighborhood. The pilot house was probably the first home on the premises ever used for filming of any sort. And I am pretty sure it must have belonged to someone on the production team – ie. the director, producer, art director, etc. It actually happens more often than you’d think that someone involved with a lower budget production will offer up their home for filming to keep costs down. Because the Pilot House is a beautiful home located in an upscale community, and since the 90210 pilot budget was most likely quite small, I think that is exactly what happened. Otherwise I just don’t see how they could have afforded to film there. If you’ve seen the pilot episode as many times as I have, you’ll remember that most of the location shooting at the Walsh house took place at night, which I am sure angered quite a few neighbors. Night shoots usually last from sunset to sunrise and can be loud, messy, and annoying to anyone whose house is nearby. So I am gonna go out on a limb and say that during the production of 90210, a few of the neighbors probably got a little miffed about the filming and as soon as the pilot wrapped, members of the small community (there are only 67 houses on the property) made certain nothing like that would ever happen again. So when Beverly Hills, 90210 got picked up as a series three to six months later, the producers were left without a home to use for filming. And that’s how we ended up with Casa Walsh. 🙂

Now we can FINALLY put to bed one of the greatest filming location mysteries of all time. Now if only I could find that darn Girls Just Want To Have Fun apartment! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The 90210 Pilot House is located at 130 North Gunston Drive in the Brentwood Circle community. Please remember that this home is located in a private, gated community, and unless they open their gates for a reason (ie. an open house), you should not be on the property.

March 2, 2009April 2, 2010

“The Bachelor” Mansion

I just about died this past Friday afternoon when my US Magazine arrived in the mail and looming out at me was the headline “Is The Bachelor Fake?” I have been absolutely enthralled with The Bachelor this season – and not because I am a fan of Jason Mesnick. I think the guy is pretty much a tool. But there was just so much drama this season that I absolutely could not tear myself away from the TV. And from the look of things, more drama is yet to come on tonight’s Final Rose Ceremony and After the Final Rose presentation. According to this week’s US Magazine article, a blogger named Steve Carbone, from RealitySteve.com, blew the lid right off of tonight’s shows! According to Steve (whose website I am now addicted to!) Jason is going to propose to contestant Melissa Rycroft at the end of tonight’s Bachelor finale. But (and here is where things get juicy!) during tonight’s After the Final Rose show (which was pre-taped six weeks ago) Jason is going to dump Melissa for second runner up Molly Malaney. And, the icing on the cake, supposedly Jason has been seeing Molly behind Melissa’s back ever since filming was completed – not that he will ever admit to that! What a snake! Steve believes in his heart of hearts that ABC concocted this whole scenario to increase their ratings and I have to say I agree with him. I started having my doubts as to the reality of The Bachelor way back during Season Two when my boyfriend’s boss spotted Bachelor Aaron Buerge on a date with contestant Gwen Gioia. Apparently not only were make-up artists fixing Gwen’s hair and make-up during the date, but producers were constantly stopping the filming to re-shoot certain segments. LOL Needless to say I cannot wait for tonight’s episode. I am sure I will walk away from it thinking Jason is an even bigger douchebag than I did before. LOL

Thanks to my buddy Whitney over at ZillowBlog, who alerted me to this article back in October, I was able to stalk the Bachelor house this past weekend. Ever since it was built in 2005, the Malibu area home pictured above has been featured on numerous seasons of The Bachelor. The mansion’s front entrance was used repeatedly as the famous limousine drop-off area where the past few Bachelors and Bachelorettes have welcomed their contestants during the first episode of each season. In fact, not only was the mansion’s entrance the very spot where Jason first met Deanna last season, but it was also the same locale where Jason welcomed the women of the show this season. The home’s living room area has also been the site of the numerous rose ceremonies of seasons past. But this season, not only was the home used for rose ceremonies and the big limo welcome, but it was also where the women lived during the filming. So I was pretty excited to stalk it! 🙂

Orignally priced at $13 million and later dropped to $8,750,000, The Bachelor house is currently for sale at the bargain price of $6,750,000. Apparently being “The Bachelor house” isn’t that great a selling point. LOL The six bedroom, nine bathroom Tuscan style manse measures a whopping 8,000 square feet and sits on almost ten acres of land! The home has a four car garage, a gourmet kitchen, an infinity pool with a swim-up barbeque and bar, and a detached 4,000 square foot studio/office area! To put it in Bachelor speak, the house is simply “amazing”! Ever notice how often they use that word on the show? LOL Somebody really needs to get the contestants a thesaurus – stat! Unfortunately, not much of the home is visible from the street, but it was still extremely exciting to stalk it knowing all the drama that took place there back in November.

Be sure to tune into tonight’s Bachelor Season Finale. It is sure to have “the most dramatic rose ceremony . . . ever”! And if you haven’t yet, you simply must check out Reality Steve’s blog – it’s enthralling!

UPDATE – This very same mansion was recently featured in the Season 2 episode of The Mentalist entitled “The Red Box” as the home of photographer Hopper Banks.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Bachelor house is located at 2351 Kanan Road in Malibu. You can visit the home’s real estate website here. You can also visit the owner’s website here.

February 25, 2009August 20, 2013

The Robinson House from “The Graduate”

A few weeks back fellow stalker Scott, from the Film in America website, asked me if I knew the location of the Robinson house and the Braddock house from the 1967 movie The Graduate. He told me that he feared the locations of those homes were lost to history being that the movie was filmed over forty years ago and the addresses didn’t seem to be posted anywhere. So I just had to get Mike from MovieShotsLA on the case – and sure enough he found the houses. Well, the house, actually, but I’ll get to that later. 🙂 While doing some cyberstalking Mike came across this Wikipedia article stating that the Robinson home was located on North Palm Drive in Beverly Hills, and after a quick search of Google Maps he found the house, right where Wikipedia said it would be. 🙂

The Robinson house looks much different today than it did back in 1967 when The Graduate was filmed. At the time of filming, the home had an all white exterior while today it has a red brick facade. My initial belief was that the brick exterior was added to the house sometime after filming had been completed, but after seeing the above screen capture, I realized that, in actuality, the home has always been brick. When The Graduate was filmed the bricks were just painted white. 🙂

Because the Robinson house looks so very different today than how it appeared onscreen forty years ago, I was shocked Mike was able to locate it. But he found two “landmarks” of a sort on Mrs. Robinson’s house that he used while searching Palm Drive. The first landmark was the wierd brown wooden design that appears to the left of the front door. The second was the house’s small peaked roof area. Both are pictured above. But here’s where things get really weird!

While looking at aerial images of the Palm Drive house, I realized that the pool area and backyard looked a whole lot like Benjamin Braddock’s backyard from the movie. Armed with a pretty big hunch I grabbed my Graduate DVD and fast-forwarded through the entire thing. And sure enough, my hunch was correct – the front of the Braddock house is never shown in the Graduate – only the backyard is shown. And after looking at all of the Braddock backyard scenes one more time, I realized that the Braddock house and the Robinson house were one in the same! LOL

So last week I dragged my boyfriend out to Beverly Hills to stalk the (one and only) Graduate house and while I was there taking photographs the owner happened to drive up. So, of course, I just had to talk to her! 🙂 I asked her if she lived in the home at the time The Graduate was filmed and her mouth pretty much just fell to the floor and she said “HOW did you know this was The Graduate house?” LOL I told her that my friend Mike was a master stalker and that he had found the house by doing some cyber-stalking. She confirmed that her home was indeed used in The Graduate, but said that she didn’t live in it at the time. She said that when she purchased the house about twenty years ago, the real estate agent was marketing it as “the Robinson house”. LOL Then I asked her if her backyard was in fact Benjamin Braddock’s backyard and once again her mouth just hung open. Apparently she didn’t realize who she was dealing with! LOL She told me that, in actuality, Benjamin Braddock’s backyard existed only on a soundstage, but that his backyard and pool area were indeed modeled after hers. I’m not sure she’s entirely correct on that, though. While I have no doubt that her backyard was re-created on a soundstage and that most of the filming probably took place there, if you watch some of the Graduate pool scenes closely it becomes obvious that at least some filming did actually take place at the Palm Drive home.

So, there you have it, the mystery of The Graduate houses is finally solved. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Graduate house is located at 607 North Palm Drive in Beverly Hills.

January 28, 2009February 17, 2009

Beverly Hills, 90291

A few weeks back while I was out stalking the Californication house, Mike (from MovieShotsLA) and I set out on a mission to find Kelly Taylor’s house from the new 90210 series.

I had been searching for the house for quite some time and on this particular day I called Mike at work (poor guy!) and said “We are going to find that house today!” I’m nothing if not determined! Mike and I knew the house was located in Venice from an article that appeared in Entertainment Weekly this past summer, and since I was already in the area, I realized it was now or never! I was not leaving Venice without finding that house. 🙂

Kelly’s house has appeared on 90210 quite a few times, beginning with the pilot episode. And each time it appears, a plaque with the numbers “2229” is clearly visible in the background. But neither Mike nor I could seem to find any area in Venice with house numbers in the 2200 range. We found blocks with addresses of 2100, 2300, and 2400, but for some reason 2200 was nowhere to be found. Mike had become convinced that the “2229” sign was just a prop added to the house for filming, but I held out hope. Something told me that sign was really there.

Since Google Street View does not cover the Venice area, I acted as Mike’s eyes and ears driving around Venice while he sat in front of his computer at work looking at aerial maps. LOL My boyfriend always says how amazing it is that Mike and I managed to find each other. I mean who else in their right mind would do this stuff with me?? LOL Anyway, after driving around for a while I was just about ready to give up hope. Then all of sudden, an idea struck Mike and he told me to head to Glyndon Avenue. He had remembered working once in a quaint little section of Venice and thought it might be the area where Kelly’s house was located. So, using my trusty GPS, I drove over to Glyndon Avenue and sure enough, there was the house – “2229” sign and all. See, you should always trust a woman’s intuition! 🙂

Many episodes of 90210 were filmed at the actual Venice Beach house and I also believe that some interior filming took place there, as well. This is apparent in both the pilot episode, in which fellow teacher Ryan stops by Kelly’s house, flowers in hand . . .

. . . and the episode entitled “Secrets and Lies” in which Silver’s house party gets slightly out of hand.

Kelly’s house is very cute and very picturesque in person. In fact, it is just the type of house I would expect to find a grown-up Kelly Taylor living in. Especially since she is so obviously still carrying a torch for Dylan and this house is so reminiscent of Dylan’s Craftsman style home from the original series. 🙂 I absolutely loved stalking Kelly’s house. In fact, driving around Venice that day while talking to Mike on the phone will always be one of my fondest stalking memories!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Kelly Taylor’s house is located at 2229 Glyndon Avenue in Venice.

January 27, 2009March 31, 2009

CSI: Pasadena

My dad is not a big fan of Hollywood. And by Hollywood I mean the industry, not the town. He can’t stand all of the overindulged, self-absorbed actors, even though his own daughter is one (minus the overindulged, self-absorbed part, of course). 🙂 He just barely tolerates my stalking and often asks me why I care so much about celebrities. But there is one actor and one show that my dad absolutely loves – and that’s loves with a capital L-O-V-E-S. That show is CSI: Miami and that actor is David Caruso. My dad often walks around the house randomly quoting characters from the show saying “H is on it!”, he nicknamed his Harley Davidson “H”, and he has so many CSI: Miami reruns saved up on TiVo that he often burns through all of the memory causing my mom’s shows not to record. Yes, my dad loves himself some Horatio Caine. When we were in New York this past December, my boyfriend and I just had to snap the above photo of Horatio Street for my dad. 🙂

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So when I found out that CSI: Miami would be filming in Pasadena last Wednesday, I just had to drag my dad out to stalk it. Except truth be told, there really wasn’t much dragging involved. My dad, who normally hates stalking with me, was more than a willing participant this time around. He was absolutely floored at the possibility of meeting his TV idol. And so was I. CSI: Miami has always been my favorite CSI and I, too, love me some Horatio Caine. I also love me some Emily Procter. I am absolutely obsessed with her cute little Southern accent – I want one just like it. 🙂 So on Wednesday morning, bright and early, we showed up at the Pasadena location where where they were filming. And I have to say that it was an absolute dream day!

The crew truly could NOT have been nicer to us. When we arrived and told them we were big fans of the show, they welcomed us with open arms and invited us to take a seat to watch the crew setting up the scene. One of the A.D.’s told us that David Caruso would arrive on the set within 45 minutes and that he was very fan friendly and would most likely take a photograph with us. Let me tell you we were floored! And I have to say that watching the crew set up for the scene was almost as exciting as watching the actual filming. It was amazing to compare the real life overcast grey sky that was above our heads with the orange and pink sky that appeared on the filming monitors. It turns out that a special filter is placed on top of the cameras during filming to make the sky look more bright, sunny, and “Miami-like”. It was eerie to see.

Just before actual filming was to begin, a large water truck came by and sprayed water all over the street. I had known from watching a director’s commentary on DVD a while back that streets are often wetted down prior to a film shoot – for some reason, wet streets look better on camera than dry streets – but I had no idea how it was done. So that was very cool to see. If you’ve never noticed this phenomenon before, you will now. 🙂 Start looking at streets in the background of your favorite television shows and movies – nine times out of ten they will be soaking wet. One of the crew members was joking that while you never see it rain on CSI: Miami, miraculously somehow the streets are always wet. LOL

After the street was sprayed, a white van pulled up and out stepped David Caruso. And I just about died. There he was, Horatio Caine, in the flesh, aviator sunglasses and all. He immediately waved to us and said “Hi guys!” while a make-up artist put the finishing touches on his face and hair. Then he called us over and introduced himself. It was unbelievable! Last October, when my dad and I got to watch The Closer be filmed, not one cast member came over to talk to us. So this was quite a surprise! And when my dad handed over his CSI: Miami Season One DVDs to be signed, David seemed genuinely touched and told us how appreciative he was to meet fans of the show. He also gave us little autographed pictures of himself. Then the A.D. called him over to begin filming and David gave both my dad and me a hug! 🙂 A few minutes later while they were setting something up for the shot, David walked over to us once again and asked if we wanted to take a picture with him. He really could not have been sweeter and I can honestly say that out of all the actors I’ve met in my eight years living in L.A., David Caruso was by far the nicest. A crew member told us that on one occasion when they were filming in Long Beach, a large tour bus filled with 75 German tourists pulled up, and got very excited that David Caruso was there. David stopped filming and proceeded to sign autographs and take pictures with each and every person on that bus!!! My dad kept saying “I just knew he’d be nice!” 🙂 I hope that when I become a successful, famous actress that I will be that nice! 🙂

After our pics, we got to watch David film a scene with Elizabeth Berkley (of Saved by the Bell and Showgirls fame), who play’s H’s ex-wife Julia on CSI: Miami. I cannot even tell you how amazing it was to be standing less than five feet away from David Caruso as he filmed a scene. And I just about died when he did his trademark putting-on-sunglasses-and-staring-off-into-the-distance move. It was the coolest thing ever! I was very impressed with how quickly filming moved, too. I’d say David filmed his scene in less than forty minutes, which in Hollywood time is almost unheard of! What I was most impressed with, though, was how happy the cast and crew seemed to be. There was a lot of joking around between takes and A LOT of laughter in the air. Everyone seemed to be really enjoying their jobs and like they were just happy to be there.

When David was wrapped for the day he had a crew member ask for my address as he had some CSI memorabilia in his trailer that he wanted to give us. How nice is that! Then, as we were leaving the set, one of the crew members told us to stop back by later in the afternoon when the rest of the cast would be there filming a different scene. So, of course, a few hours later my dad and I headed back to the set. 🙂 As soon as we arrived, one of the A.D.’s ran over to us and handed me a large envelope from David Caruso. Inside was the memorabilia he had planned to send me, including several photographs autographed to both me and my dad, a Horatio Caine bobble head, and some CSI: Miami postcards and buttons. That was just such a nice thing to do, we couldn’t even believe it!!! My dad was especially excited about the bobble head which is now sitting on his desk. 🙂

As if all that wasn’t enough, a few minutes later the same A.D. walked over with Rex Linn who plays Detective Frank Tripp on the show. Rex introduced himself and, like David, seemed genuinely happy to be speaking with fans of CSI:Miami. Rex signed my dad’s DVD’s, posed for pictures with us, and even let me hold his prop gun. 🙂 Like David, Rex could NOT have been nicer or more outgoingly friendly to us.

While we were speaking with Rex, Eva La Rue came out of the house where they were filming and Rex took us over to meet her! Eva was also completely friendly and super down to earth. And gorgeous in person – much prettier than she even appears on television.

Then the most amazing thing happened. Are you sitting down for this?? Rex asked if we wanted to go inside the house to watch a few scenes be filmed. Did we want to go inside and watch filming with Detective Frank Tripp as our personal tourguide????? Is he crazy? Of course we did! Rex then took us through the backyard of the house where a scene was being filmed, introduced us to virtually every crew member on set, explained what all sorts of equipment was, and what was happening during the filming. Rex is an amazing man and I could not believe he was taking time out of his busy day to give us a tour of the set. I mean stuff like this just doesn’t happen in real life!

Once filming began, Rex led us over to the monitors and pulled out Emily Procter’s directors chair for me to sit in. I was like WHAT? I can’t sit in her chair!!!! LOL

After we watched a bit of the filming that was taking place in the backyard, Rex was called inside to finish up a scene he was filming in the house with Eva La Rue. He told us we could come inside to watch, so we, of course, followed him. That scene was especially exciting for us because we got to watch firsthand as Eva administered one of the flashlight tests that the CSI shows are so famous for. SO COOL! After that scene, Rex was wrapped for the day, but he told us we could go back outside to watch more of the filming in the backyard.

Which we, of course, did. 🙂 And that is when we got to meet both Megalyn Echikunwoke, who plays the new medical examiner on the show and who was very sweet . . .

. . . and my fave, Emily Procter. Emily was a total sweetheart and she really does have Calleigh Duquesne’s cute little Southern accent in real life. I love it! Emily was wrapped for lunch at that time and we ended up walking out of the house behind her. On her way outside she made it a point to stop to thank the L.A. County policemen who were on duty and she gave both of them autographed pictures of herself. I was completely amazed at this. Not just Emily, but the entire cast seemed to be just so appreciative, thankful, and friendly. It was so heartening to see. And it just made me love the show even more than I already did. What a truly amazing group of people!

Sitting back and looking at these pictures of me on the set of my favorite TV show makes me think about how much I love L.A. As much as I say I want to move to New York, it’s days like this one when I realize I am right where I am supposed to be. 🙂 More importantly, though, being on the set was a truly extraordinary experience for my dad. Especially since he just recently got out of the hospital and has been sick on and off for the past few years. I believe having such a memorable encounter with the cast of his favorite television show brought him some much needed healing in a form he never would have found in a hospital or a doctor’s office. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: CSI: Miami was filmed at 887 El Campo Drive in Pasadena, right around the corner from the Brothers and Sisters House. Look for the episode to air sometime in March.