famous mansions – IAMNOTASTALKER

May 18, 2020May 31, 2020

The Petitfils-Boos Residence from “Hollywood”

My stalking backlog is ridiculously large, so much so that I often forget places I’ve been. Case in point? The Petitfils-Boos Residence. (With a name like that, you’d think I would have remembered it, right?) I stalked the historic Windsor Square mansion way back in November 2012 (which is crazy to me – looking at the photos, I feel as if it was just yesterday!) after it made a brief appearance on Dexter and then it promptly slipped my mind. Though I was reminded of the place when I saw it pop up on Feud: Bette and Joan in 2017, I somehow quickly forgot about it again. It was not until I spotted the pad in an episode of the new Netflix miniseries Hollywood recently that I decided it was finally time for a post! So here goes!

[ad]

The Italian Renaissance Revival-style mansion was designed in 1922 by architect Charles F. Plummer for Walter M. Petitfils, one of the confectioners behind the gorgeous Dutch Chocolate Shop in downtown L.A. Walter didn’t stay on the premises long – in 1927 he sold the pad to his friends Henry and Cassie Boos, hence its hyphenated, hard-to-pronounce name.

Not only is the property absolutely HUGE – between the main house and the guest house, it measures a total of 10,120 square feet! – but it looks even bigger than it actually is thanks to its V-shape and diagonal placement on a corner lot.

The 2-story estate boasts an 8,594-square-foot main house with 4 bedrooms, 5 baths, walnut paneling, stained glass windows, archways, murals hand-painted by Dutch artist Anthony Heinsbergen, and a Gladding, McBean terra cotta tile façade. There’s also a 1,526-square-foot guest house, a 0.74-acre lot, a pool, a hot tub, a BBQ, multiple gardens, a loggia, a courtyard, and a detached 2-car garage. You can check out some interior images of it here.

Every square inch of the place is stunning – even the front gate! With those dripping topiaries, the residence looks straight out of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.

Not only is the property listed on the National Register of Historic Places, but the Los Angeles Conservancy procured an easement on the entire frontage, assuring no alterations can ever be made to the exterior.

Considering the manse’s Old Hollywood feel, its appearance on the 1940s-set Hollywood must have been a no-brainer for producers. The residence pops up in the episode titled “Hooray for Hollywood: Part 2” as the supposed former Beverly Hills home of Bugsy Siegel – “Might even be the house he got shot in!” according to Ernie West (Dylan McDermott) – where Jack Castello (David Corenswet) escorts Avis Amberg (Patti LuPone) to an estate sale of the slain gangster’s belongings.

While there Avis bids on – and wins – a soup tureen that she says Bugsy borrowed from her and never returned.

Hollywood is hardly the Petitfils-Boos Residence’s first rodeo.

As I mentioned, the estate was featured on Dexter in 2012. In the Season 7 episode titled “Are You . . . ?”, it masks as the Ukrainian mansion of Isaak Sirko (Ray Stevenson).

In 2014, it portrayed the home of Governor Paul Lane (Joel Gretsch) and his family in the Season 1 episode of Scorpion titled ‘”Single Point of Failure.”

Jennifer Aniston posed there for People magazine’s 2016 World’s Most Beautiful issue. You can see some video clips of the shoot here.

Jennifer Garner also posed at the mansion in 2016 for the March issue of Vanity Fair. You can watch a behind-the-scenes video of the shoot here.

Exclusive: Jennifer Garner's Frank Talk About Kids, Men, and Ben ...

The Petitfils-Boos Residence played Hedda Hopper’s (Judy Davis) home – or as she calls it, “the house that fear built” – in the pilot episode of Feud: Bette and Joan, which aired in 2017.

And it popped up several times as the dwelling of Police Commission President Bradley Walker (John Getz) during the fourth season of Bosch, which aired in 2018.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Petitfils-Boos Residence, aka Bugsy Siegel’s house from the “Hooray for Hollywood: Part 2” episode of Hollywood, is located at 545 South Plymouth Boulevard in Windsor Square.

October 19, 2018October 16, 2019

Chateau Emanuel from “The Adventures of Mary-Kate & Ashley”

I am a HUGE fan of Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen movies, as I have mentioned previously. Passport to Paris, When in Rome, New York Minute – all favorites, even though I am just a wee bit off age-wise when it comes to their target demographic. So when fellow stalker Chris (he’s the one who tracked down the location of the Full House downhill derby) emailed me this past summer and mentioned that he knew of a few other locales from the twins’ many productions, I was all in. One he informed me of, Chateau Emanuel from “The Case of Thorn Mansion” episode of The Adventures of Mary-Kate & Ashley, especially piqued my interest. The massive property sits high atop a bluff overlooking pretty much all of Eagle Rock and I was shocked that in my 15+ years of living in neighboring Pasadena and stalking its environs, I had never come across the place. Because it played an abandoned and haunted house in the episode, I figured the pad had all the makings of a great October post. So I ran right out to stalk it.

[ad]

Chateau Emanuel was originally commissioned by Bekins Moving Company founder Martin Bekins. Designed by architect F. Eugene Barton, whom Martin also secured to design the seven-story Bekins Storage Building in nearby Glendale, the Dutch Colonial-style manse was completed in 1927.

When Martin passed away in 1933, the residence was acquired by philanthropist Wilfred “Bill” Lane, who made his fortune by inventing a perforating gun that expedited oil well drilling. The property did not change hands again until 1965, when Lane’s widow sold it to Emanuel and Maria Kvassay. It then remained in the Kvassay family for the next five decades.

The Kvassays, who founded the Sierra Packaging Company, emigrated to the United States from Czechoslovakia after it fell to communist rule. The couple became activists, working to free their native country from communism, and, as such, held numerous fundraisers and political events at the home, which at the time was known as the “Bekins-Lane Mansion.” The dwelling was also the site of countless press functions, weddings, meetings, and galas during the Kvassays’ tenure. Just a few of the politicos and luminaries who attended gatherings there over the years include Stan Lee, Oliver Stone, Marion Ross, Shirley Temple Black, Dr. Edward Teller, Eric Roberts, Rita Wilson, Jesse Jackson, Archbishop José Horacio Gómez, and Lech Wałęsa. Ronald Reagan even hosted a fundraiser for his presidential re-election campaign at the residence in 1984.

When Emanuel and Maria passed away, their three sons inherited the property. Two of the boys remained living on the premises and eldest son, Robert, became the main caretaker, rechristening the place “Chateau Emanuel” in honor of his late father.

The sprawling manse became too much for Robert to handle in recent years, not to mention too expensive – per the Tracy King Team website, water and power bills ran a good $3,500 each month and the lawn took a whopping four hours to mow! In 2010, Robert put the pad on the market with a price tag of $5.99 million. There were no takers, though. He relisted it the following year at a reduced $4.45 million, but no one bit. The Archdiocese of Los Angeles eventually expressed interest in purchasing the residence in 2016 in order to turn it into a retreat and prayer center. In an interesting twist, Katy Perry was even involved in the deal. The pop star offered to buy the pad for the church as part of her ongoing quest to acquire the former Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary convent in Los Feliz. That plan never came to fruition, though, due to zoning problems and in 2017, Chateau Emanuel was listed once again, this time for $5.5 million.

Per the real estate listing, which describes the place as a “compound,” the property boasts a 5,700-square-foot main house with 9 bedrooms, 10 baths, 2 full kitchens, numerous fireplaces, a wet bar, a game room, 2 sitting rooms, an art room, maid’s quarters with a full bath and separate entrance, and a dining room with space for 40 guests. There are also 2 detached guests homes on the premises, the first measuring 3,500 square feet and the second 1,100. The lush 2.1-acre grounds feature a greenhouse, a croquet court, a bistro, a pool, a spa, a stage, rose gardens, a pond, several fountains, pathways, arbors, four gates, cabanas, and parking for 40+ cars! I was particularly taken with the charming wooden footbridges, which look like something out of a fairy tale. I half expected to see Snow White running across one while we were there!

In January of this year, Chateau Emanuel finally sold to none other than Chris Hardwick for $5,250,000. The comedian does not plan on living in the abode, but instead purchased it out of a desire to protect it. Chris was first informed of the dwelling by his mom, real estate agent Sharon Hills, and was quickly smitten. As Curbed Los Angeles explained in an article about the sale, “His purchase of the Bekins estate was motivated in part by the worry that, because the property is so large, it could be sold and redeveloped or otherwise altered. ‘He truly bought this property to preserve it,’ says Hills.’” A man after my own heart! Chris is said to be keeping the home open to historical organizations who wish to hold events there. I’m guessing it will also be available for filming.

In “The Case of Thorn Mansion” episode of The Adventures of Mary-Kate & Ashley, which was released in 1994, Chateau Emanuel portrays the abandoned Thorn Mansion, supposedly located on Black Widow Lane in Transylvania, where the Olsen & Olsen Mystery Agency detectives (“We’ll solve any case by dinner time!”) investigate a supposed haunting. Spoiler alert – the pad turns out not to be haunted. As the twins discover, the “ghost” that neighbors reported seeing on the property was just Mr. Thorn’s granddaughter who was tending to her late grandfather’s beehives.

The property’s real life interior also appeared in the episode.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Chris for finding this location! Smile

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Chateau Emanuel, from “The Case of Thorn Mansion” episode of The Adventures of Mary-Kate & Ashley, is located at 1554 Hill Drive in Eagle Rock.

June 27, 2018June 26, 2018

The Valmont Mansion from “Cruel Intentions”

I have never been a fan of the movie Cruel Intentions (though the 1999 drama does feature one of my favorite onscreen moments). But during my April 2016 trip to the Big Apple, my good friend/fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, took me to stalk the Upper East Side estate that portrayed the Valmont Mansion – where step-siblings Kathryn Merteuil (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and Sebastian Valmont (Ryan Phillippe) lived and wreaked havoc on their friends and enemies – in the flick, and I pretty much fell in love with the place on sight. Known as the Harry F. Sinclair House as well as the Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion in real life, the massive French Gothic-style pad is nothing short of stunning. So, in spite of my disdain for Cruel Intentions, I figured the residence was most-definitely blog-worthy.

[ad]

Commissioned by railroad tycoon Isaac Fletcher in 1897, the Harry F. Sinclair House took two years to complete. The impressive C.P.H. Gilbert-designed dwelling was modeled after William K. Vanderbilt’s Petit Chateau, formerly located about 30 blocks south at 660 Fifth Avenue. The limestone masterpiece was furnished with an extensively carved façade, a mansard roof, an ornate wooden staircase, a library, a parlor, a ballroom, and an elevator. When Fletcher passed away in 1917, he left the estate, as well as his extensive art collection, to The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which immediately turned around and sold the place to industrialist Harry Ford Sinclair.

Shortly after serving 6.5 months in jail for his part in the infamous Teapot Dome Scandal, Sinclair departed the UES manse, selling it to longtime bachelor Augustus Van Horne Stuyvesant Jr., who lived out the remainder of his days there as a virtual recluse. Upon Stuyvesant’s passing in 1953, his furnishings and décor were sold off and the residence was left vacant.

Around that time, the Ukrainian Institute of America, a foundation established to promote Ukrainian art, culture, music, and literature, was looking to expand into a new, larger headquarters. The group quickly honed in on the Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion, snatching it up for $225,000 in 1955. Today, the site, which has been painstakingly restored and preserved, plays host to special events, art exhibitions, auctions, performances, concerts, lectures, and, of course, filming. Best of all – it is open to the public! Sadly, neither Owen nor I realized that when we stalked it, otherwise we most certainly would have ventured inside to see the stunning interior, which you can check out some photographs of here, here, and here.

The Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion popped up numerous times throughout Cruel Intentions.

Only the exterior of the estate was featured in the flick, though.

The lavish interior of Sebastian and Kathryn’s home was just a set built inside of a soundstage in Los Angeles. Production designer Jon Gary Steele had this to say of his concept of the Valmont Mansion, “Most of the story takes place in modern-day New York, but when you walked into the Valmont townhouse, I wanted you to feel like you were walking into a Parisian ballroom. The furniture in the living room was very Louis XIV. We stripped the wood and reupholstered it in a much more modern fabric so the room didn’t feel totally period. Then we added bronze chairs and a bronze table. I didn’t want it to feel like only one piece of the film was period and everything else was modern-contemporary. I wanted the audience to feel like it was a period piece, but once they examined the room and noticed the detail, they would realize the contemporary additions. Because these people have blue-blood money and are very much world travelers, I put in a little bit of everything. There are a lot of French buildings in New York. It’s not uncommon to find people like this now living in places like this.” Interestingly, the set was constructed long before locations managers had secured an estate to serve as the exterior of the Valmont Mansion. When the Harry F. Sinclair House was ultimately chosen, Steele was shocked to discover that the interior closely mirrored his design, “right down to the similar moldings and comparable room dimensions.”

Cruel Intentions is hardly the first production to feature the pad.

In the 1987 comedy Hello Again, the Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion portrays the home of Junior Lacey (Austin Pendleton), where Lucy Chadman (Shelley Long) and her sister, Zelda (Judith Ivey), go to ask for funding to start a day care center at the Knickerbocker Hospital.

The interior of the property appears in the movie, as well.

The manse pops up as the exterior of the Manhattan pied-à-terre of Estella (Gwyneth Paltrow) and Ms. Dinsmoor (Anne Bancroft) in 1998’s Great Expectations. Interiors were shot elsewhere, though.

The Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion appears numerous times as the both the 1876 and present-day interior of “Albany House,” the home of Leopold (Hugh Jackman), in the 2001 romance Kate & Leopold.

Only the inside of the pad is featured in the flick. The exterior of Leopold’s mansion can be found at 1 Hanover Square in New York’s Financial District.

The property also portrays the alternate-reality home of the Suarez family in the Season 4 episode of Ugly Betty titled “Million Dollar Smile,” which aired in 2010.

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

Big THANK YOU to my friend/fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for taking me to this location.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Harry F. Sinclair House, aka the Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion, aka the Valmont Mansion from Cruel Intentions, is located at 2 East 79th Street on New York’s Upper East Side.

April 28, 2017April 28, 2017

June’s House from “White Collar”

Sometimes the work and detail that go into creating certain locations absolutely boggles my mind. Case in point – the house belonging to June (Diahann Carroll) on the USA series White Collar. The imposing residence is actually an amalgamation of three different places – a spectacular estate on New York’s Upper West Side, the rooftop terrace of an ornate Murray Hill building, and a studio-built set. While in Manhattan last April, I stalked the estate, known in real life as the Schinasi Mansion, which is used in all of the establishing shots of June’s pad on the show.

[ad]

The sprawling Schinasi Mansion was originally built for Turkish-born cigarette magnate Morris Schinasi in 1909. Designed by William B. Tuthill of Carnegie Hall fame, the spectacular French Renaissance-style residence, which boasts Turkish influences, is often touted as being New York’s only remaining stand-alone single-family manse.

Though undeniably striking, Schinasi wasn’t altogether impressed with Tuthill’s final product and refused to pay the architect his $5,655.65 fee, which resulted in a lawsuit.

It’s hard to imagine what Schinasi found fault with. The exterior of the 4-story, 41-by-73-foot structure, which sits overlooking the Hudson River on a plot of land boasting 3,400 square feet of gardens, is a masterpiece of white marble and green-tiled roofing.

The exterior pales in comparison to the interior, though, which is a virtual work of art.

The 12,000-square-foot home features 12 bedrooms, 11 baths, a teak-paneled library with a fireplace and built-in window seat, a smoking room with ceiling frescos and gold leafing, a formal wood-paneled dining room with stained glass windows, a drawing room with carved ceilings, an English basement, two kitchens, a hall made entirely of ornate Egyptian marble, and an entry hall with a sweeping grand staircase and an almost-unbelievably-intricate honeycomb ceiling constructed of wood. The inside of the residence honestly has to be seen to be believed. You can check out some fabulous photos of it here and here.

When Schinasi passed away in 1929, his widow Laurette sold the mansion, at which time it became a finishing school known as the Semple School for Girls. Upon headmaster Rosa Semple’s death in 1965, the property was bought by Columbia University and was transformed into a daycare facility named “The Children’s Mansion.” Under Columbia’s ownership, the residence was also utilized as an Episcopal school and the offices of the Digest of Soviet Press. In 1979, the site transitioned into a private residence once again upon being purchased by Columbia University law professor Hans Smit for $325,000. Hans spent the next twenty years renovating the property, though when he put it on the market in 2006, the real estate listing noted that it still needed major rehabbing.

Originally listed at $31 million, the pad, which is on the National Register of Historic Places and is a New York City Landmark, received no bites. The price was slashed to $20 million in 2012 and the dwelling eventually sold for $14 million in 2013. The new owners immediately set about revitalizing the structure. The renovation was still in full swing when I stalked the place last Spring, as evidenced by all of my photos.

My dad has a saying he likes to use about people with uncanny good luck – “He could fall into a pile of sh*t and walk out with a brown suit.” That pretty much sums up the character of con man Neal Caffrey (Matt Bomer) on White Collar. In the series’ pilot, Neal is released from jail into the custody of the FBI’s White Collar division, where he is to act as a consultant, helping agent Peter Burke (Tim DeKay) catch art thieves and forgers in return for his partial freedom (though he is able to live on his own and move freely, he is forced to wear an ankle bracelet). When Neal scoffs at the seedy apartment the FBI has secured for him, Peter informs him that the low class digs cost $700 a month and if he can find more suitable accommodations for the same amount, he is welcome to move. While shopping for clothes at a nearby thrift store in the scene that follows, Neal meets a wealthy widow named June (Diahann Carroll) who is donating her late husband’s designer suits. Neal and June strike up a conversation – and an unlikely friendship (turns out June’s late husband was a con man, too!) – that ends with Neal moving into the idyllic attic apartment (complete with a large rooftop terrace) of June’s massive mansion, said to be located at 87 Riverside Drive, for the bargain price of $700 a month.

The exterior of the Schinasi Mansion was shown regularly in establishing shots of June’s palatial pad throughout White Collar’s six-season run.

The home’s actual interior was also utilized in several episodes, including the pilot (pictured below).

Neal’s fabulous attic apartment, unfortunately, does not exist in real life, but was a studio-built set. You can see what the Schinasi Mansion’s attic area actually looks like here and here.

I’ve recently decided that if the Grim Cheaper and I ever buy a place and have the means to have it professionally decorated, we are so hiring a set designer rather than an interior decorator! Ammiright?

While Neal’s uh-ma-zing terrace was also a studio-built set, I was thrilled to discover while researching this post that the patio scenes from the pilot were shot at an actual place – one of the penthouses at the Windsor Tower residential building, which is located at 5 Tudor City Place in Murray Hill. You can see a photo of one of the actual Windsor Tower penthouse terraces here and a video of another one here.

The set re-creation of Neal’s terrace, which very closely resembles the Windsor Tower terraces (albeit a much smaller version), is pictured below.

White Collar is hardly the first production to make use of the Schinasi Mansion.

In the 1994 comedy Bullets Over Broadway, the dwelling masked as the home of actress Helen Sinclair (Dianne Wiest).

In the Season 3 episode of Damages titled “Your Secrets Are Safe,” which aired in 2010, the mansion was the site of the Tobin family’s Thanksgiving dinner.

It, along with another massive mansion, was used as the residence of Spencer Fisher (Kyle Bornheimer) in the Season 2 episode of Royal Pains titled “Spasticity,” which also aired in 2010.

In the 2014 thriller Innocence, the property portrayed the home of Tobey Crawford (Graham Phillips).

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Schinasi Mansion, aka June’s house from White Collar, is located at 351 Riverside Drive on New York’s Upper West Side.

October 19, 2015November 3, 2017

The Phillips Mansion

The Grim Cheaper always tells me that it is not about the destination, but the journey. He’s right. Getting lost can have its perks. While driving around looking for Spadra Cemetery (which I blogged about on Friday) a couple of weeks ago, we happened upon a seemingly abandoned mansion set back from the road behind a chain link fence. The site appeared to be beckoning to me, so we pulled over for a closer look.

[ad]

As it turns out, the property is known as Phillip’s Mansion and it is one of Pomona’s oldest residences. The pad was originally constructed in 1875 by a wealthy rancher named Louis Phillips, who I wrote about in my Spadra Cemetery post.

According to the The Historical Society of Pomona Valley, the three-story, eight-room estate was built in the Second Empire or “Classic Haunted Mansion” style of architecture (I didn’t even know there was such a thing, but LOVE it) at a cost of $20,000. The exterior was fashioned out fired bricks that were hand-made on the premises, while the ornate interior featured gas lighting, sixteen-foot tall ceilings, a whopping six fireplaces (!!!!), and cherry and maple woodwork. Phillips, who in 1892 the Los Angeles Times named the “richest man in Los Angeles County” with an estimated net worth of around $3 million, lived there until his death in 1900. His wife continued to reside at the mansion until she passed away in 1918. Both are buried at Spadra Cemetery. Their tombstone was, sadly, upended by vandals a few years back, the sight of which only adds to the spookiness of the graveyard.

After it was sold, Phillips Mansion was used for a variety of purposes. At one point in time, the site was turned into apartments and then it later served as a dorm for Cal Poly Pomona foreign exchange students. Over the years, the property fell into disrepair and in the ‘60s was bought by an industrialist who planned to demolish it in order to build a factory. Thankfully, the Historical Society stepped in and purchased it in 1966, rescuing it from the wrecking ball. The organization immediately set about renovating the structure with the hopes of turning it into a museum. The project took years and the museum finally opened to the public in 1978. Sadly, it has not had much luck since that point. Phillips Mansion, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, suffered severe damage in both the Upland earthquake of 1990 and the Sierra Madre earthquake of 1991. The Historical Society began to restore the wreckage in 2002 and was even hosting special theatrical productions titled “A Premature Burial” on the premises each Halloween, but then tragedy struck in July 2008 when the property was damaged yet again in the Chino Hills earthquake. The group is still currently working to repair the manse and return to its original glory.

While stalking it, I felt like I was standing in front of the Bates’ house from Psycho. The two properties look so much alike!

Supposedly, two movies, one starring Buster Keaton and the other starring Tom Mix, were shot at a barn located on the Phillips Mansion property in the 1930s. I am unsure of the names of the films, though, and, unfortunately, the barn is no longer standing.

Fellow stalker Darnell let me know that the mansion itself appeared in the 2005 horror movie Mortuary as the home where Liz (Alexandra Adi) lived.

While researching the mansion for this post, I was floored to discover that there is a dilapidated residence located directly behind it. I had not noticed the second property while I was there, which is unfortunate being that not only is it fabulously run-down, but it was also featured prominently in Mortuary. The dwelling is known as the Currier House and it was designed by architect Ferdinand Davis for local politician/philanthropist Alvin Tyler Currier in 1907. The home, which cost $12,000 to construct, was originally located about 15 miles west in the City of Industry. In 2004, after standing vacant for over a decade, the City of Industry gave the house to the Historical Society of Pomona Valley and paid to transport it to the grounds of the Phillips Mansion.

In Mortuary, the Currier House masked as the abandoned Fowler Brothers Mortuary.

I am unsure if the real life interior of the Currier House was used in the filming. Being that the interiors shown in the movie do not appear nearly as run down as the exterior of the home, I am guessing that a set was used for all inside filming. That is just a hunch, though.

Update – my friend Scott Michaels, of the FindaDeath website and Dearly Departed Tours, recently got a chance to visit both the Phillips Mansion and the Currier House and was kind enough to share the photos he took with me to add to this post.

During his tour, Scott got to see the interior of both residences. The inside of the Phillips Mansion is pictured below.

The Currier House could not be more fabulously dilapidated!

I am in love with the photo below! Scott thinks the happy face might have been left over from a filming of some sort, but he isn’t sure. Either way, it’s spectacular! Thank you, Scott, for the great pictures!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Phillips Mansion is located at 2640 Pomona Boulevard in Pomona. The Currier House is located directly behind it.

April 30, 2015April 22, 2015

New “L.A.” Mag Post – About “The Gambler”

Be sure to check out today’s Los Angeles magazine post – about Villa de Leon and other L.A. locations featured in The Gambler. My articles typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours.

October 16, 2014September 29, 2017

Today’s “L.A.” Mag Post – About the Kimberly Crest House from “Hell Night”

Be sure to read my latest Los Angeles magazine post – about the Kimberly Crest House from Hell Night. My posts typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours.

October 6, 2014September 29, 2017

Anoakia Mansion from “Doppelganger”

There’s no denying that Doppelganger is a pretty horrible movie. But part of the fun of the Halloween season is watching ridiculously terrible horror flicks from years past – and stalking their locations, of course. I had long been on the hunt for the psychiatric institution from the 1993 thriller and was given a tip a couple of years ago that a historic, since-demolished mansion named Anoakia in Arcadia was the right spot. (For the life of me, I cannot remember who gave me the information. To whomever it was, I apologize.) Even though the place is long gone, I figured that it still proved blog-worthy being that several people have asked me about its location over the years.

[ad]

Anoakia was originally constructed in 1913 for Anita Baldwin, the daughter of Elias Jackson “Lucky” Baldwin, the founder of Arcadia. The 50-room estate was designed in the Italian Renaissance style and boasted 17,000 square feet of space, a bowling alley, a gym, wood-paneled rooms, etched glass doors, a pool, an aviary, a bee yard, tennis courts and murals painted by artist Maynard Dixon. The 20-acre grounds featured ponds, gardens, stables, a bathhouse and a chapel. Upon Anita’s death in 1939, the property was turned into a boarding school for girls. In 1944, it was purchased by Lowry McCaslin, a former manager of the Baldwin estate. He continued to operate a school on the premises for several decades. Unfortunately, after the Whittier earthquake in 1987, McCaslin was forced to make costly upgrades to the mansion to keep it up to code. Maintaining the site was no longer feasible for the 82-year-old, so he had the school moved and made plans to develop Anoakia’s grounds, keeping the mansion intact.

City officials rejected all of McCaslin’s proposals and Anoakia sat vacant for the next decade and began to dilapidate. In 1999, a developer from Orange County purchased the site from Lowry’s estate (McCaslin passed away in 1995) and came up with a plan to build a gated community of 31 homes on the land. To do this, the Anoakia would need to be demolished. While the developer met with some opposition from preservationists, the city eventually approved of his plans and the historic mansion was leveled in 2000. You can see some pictures of how it looked in its last days here.

Today, the upscale community is known as Anoakia Estates.

The only part of the original property to remain intact are the perimeter wall and a guard house located in the southeast corner of the grounds (circled in the two aerial views below).

I did not know about the guard house at the time that I stalked the location so I did not take any photographs of it, but you can see what it looks like it via the Google Street View image below.

In Doppelganger, Anoakia stood in for Our Lady of Mercy Psychiatric Institute, where Holly’s (Drew Barrymore) brother, Fred, was institutionalized.

True to life, the institute was said to be located in Arcadia in the movie.

Anoakia showed up a couple of times in Doppelganger.

The real life interior of the mansion was used in the movie, as well.

From what was shown in Doppelganger, it is obvious that Anoakia was an absolutely idyllic estate. What a shame that it is no longer standing!

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Anoakia Mansion, aka Our Lady of Mercy Psychiatric Institute from Doppelganger, was formerly located at around 1200 North Baldwin Avenue in Arcadia.

December 3, 2013December 2, 2013

Mr. Hart’s Mansion from “Nine to Five”

One of my favorite movies growing up was the 1980 comedy Nine to Five. I would watch it on an almost daily basis (no joke!) and practically had the thing memorized. I can still belt out the theme song to this day, in fact. (I am guessing the majority of my fellow stalkers can, too.) A couple of weeks ago, while rummaging through our DVD collection, I happened to come across the flick and realized I had not seen it in years, so I immediately popped it in. I was a little afraid that it would not live up to my memories of it, so I was floored to find myself laughing throughout. The movie definitely stands the test of time. That garage-door-opener/hang-glider contraption was pure genius! Anyway, immediately after watching, I, of course, headed straight to my computer to do some location sleuthing and was floored to discover that the mansion belonging to Franklin M. Hart Jr. (Dabney Coleman) in the flick had already been identified and that, according to the photos I found, still looked pretty much exactly the same as it did in Nine to Five. So I ran right out to stalk it while I was in L.A. a couple of weeks ago.

[ad]

In Nine to Five, Doralee Rhodes (Dolly Parton), Violet Newstead (Lily Tomlin) and Judy Bernly (Jane Fonda) hold their “sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot” of a boss, Mr. Hart, hostage (by forcing him into a hang gliding harness strapped to a customized garage door opener) for three weeks at his stately Tudor mansion while they try to find proof that he has been embezzling money.

As you can see below, today the house has quite a bit of foliage blocking its visibility from the street and the western portion of it seems to have been remodeled a bit since Nine to Five was filmed. Otherwise though, little else of the dwelling has been altered in the ensuing years.

In real life, the 1932 mansion boasts seven bedrooms, ten baths (!!!), 9,738 square feet of living space, and a 1.76-acre lot.

I was unable to determine if the estate’s actual interior appeared in Nine to Five, as I, unfortunately, could not find any interior photographs of the place online. In 1984, the abode was featured extensively in the pilot episode of Murder, She Wrote, which was titled “The Murder of Sherlock Holmes.” (Pictured below.) The interior shown in the episode looks completely different than the interior of the house from Nine to Five, though, so either the property was remodeled in between productions or a set was built for the filming of the movie. (It is highly unlikely that a set was built for Murder, She Wrote as the mansion only appeared in one single episode.)

Pictured below is the kitchen that appeared in Nine to Five, as compared to the kitchen that appeared in Murder, She Wrote. As you can see, they do not even remotely resemble each other.

Neither do the living rooms;

or stairways.

Further confusing the matter is that in Murder, She Wrote, a different location altogether was shown in establishing shots of the exterior of the mansion at night. And while I at first thought that interior filming might possibly have taken place at that second mansion, that does not appear to have been the case.

In “The Murder of Sherlock Holmes,” there is a shot of a character walking out of the interior of the residence onto the front porch, in which the exterior steps, arched façade and paneled front door are visible. Those elements match the exterior of the Nine to Five mansion (which you will be able to see more clearly later on in this post). I’ll leave it up to my fellow stalkers to be the judge on this one, but my best guess is that the interior of Mr. Hart’s mansion was just a set.

The exterior of the mansion also appeared very briefly in set-up shots of Bel-Air in the Season 1 episode of Dragnet titled “The Big Jade,” which aired in 1967.

The Nine to Five mansion was also where Jim Rockford (James Garner) and Warren Weeks (a very young Ron Rifkin) hid from the police by crashing a wedding in the Season 3 episode of The Rockford Files titled “The Trouble with Warren,” which aired in 1976.

As you can see below in a screen capture from Murder, She Wrote as compared to a screen capture from The Rockford Files, the front door, brick steps and arched overhang that appear in both episodes match each other perfectly.

A small portion of the interior of the mansion also appeared briefly in “The Trouble with Warren.”

And while the residence was also reportedly used in the 1981 television miniseries Jacqueline Susann’s Valley of the Dolls, I could not find a copy of that production with which to verify that information.

On a sad side note – I was heartbroken to learn that Paul Walker passed away in a car accident on Saturday afternoon. I had the pleasure of meeting Paul last December and he was easily one of the nicest celebrities I have ever encountered. You can read about his legendary kindness in this fabulous CNN article. And you can read about my experience meeting Paul on the Mike the Fanboy website here. Such a tragic loss.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Los Angeles magazine online. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Mr. Hart’s mansion from Nine to Five is located at 10431 Bellagio Road in Bel-Air.

August 26, 2013September 28, 2017

Dawnridge – Tony Duquette’s Former House

Last month, while perusing the July 2013 issue of InStyle magazine, I became just a wee-bit intrigued by the spot where the cover shoot with actress Salma Hayek took place – a residence formerly owned by legendary designer Tony Duquette that the article described as an oft-filmed-at locale. After reading through the story, I immediately ran to my computer to try to track the house down, which I, thankfully, managed to do fairly quickly. And my fascination only grew once I came across these uh-ma-zing photographs of the ultra-unique and visually mesmerizing property. While the interior of the house is pretty spectacular, it was the gardens that had me drooling. The outdoor space is like a fantasy land straight out of a movie, filled with twinkling lanterns, exotic statuaries, and overhanging trees. Drool! So I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to Beverly Hills to stalk the place while the two of us were in Los Angeles a couple of weeks back.

[ad]

Tony Duquette, who designed everything from sets to costumes to home interiors to jewelry during his 85-year lifetime and whose motto was “More is more” (LOVE IT!), devised the dwelling himself in 1949 along with architect Casper Ehmcke. The property, which was the primary residence of Tony and his wife, Elizabeth, originally consisted of a 30-foot by 30-foot box. The couple expanded and enhanced the site, which they dubbed “Dawnridge,” throughout the years, ultimately creating a whimsical, colorful and eye-catching abode that is like nothing else that I have ever seen. Just a few of the unique design elements they added include an enclosed indoor terrace with a mirrored ceiling, giant gold-plated antique lobsters, two 18th-Century Venetian dolphin sculptures, carvings from Southeast Asia, red-lacquered “Queen Anne” chairs, an abalone and amethyst crystal chandelier, and lots and lots of leopard vinyl cloth. Today, the home boasts three bedrooms, four baths, 2,746 square feet of living space, and a half-acre of land.

That half-acre of lush land, which can just barely be glimpsed from the road, features a multi-level garden, over two hundred different species of plants, seven pagodas, a lake, an Indian temple, several cantilevered pavilions (that Duquette called “spirit houses”), and a swimming pool. What I wouldn’t give to see it in person!

After Tony’s death in 1999, Dawnridge was purchased by his longtime business partner and protégé, Hutton Wilkinson, who now lives there with his wife, Ruth. The couple continue to update and enhance the residence to this day, which I honestly would not have thought possible. But, hey, more is more, right? You can read a more in-depth history on the house and all of its unique design elements here.

Unfortunately, very little of the property can actually be seen from the street, but what is visible is pretty darn unique. I am absolutely in LOVE with the front doors.

Photographs from Salma Hayek’s July 2013 InStyle cover story, which was titled “She’s Only Just Begun,” are pictured below.

She is hardly the first star to have posed at the property, though. Just a few of the other celebrities who have been lensed at Dawnridge include Shakira, who was photographed there for a Latin version of Harper’s Bazaar magazine. (I am unsure of what year that particular shoot took place.)

Sharon Stone posed there, with Tony Duquette, who was her good friend/neighbor, for the October 1999 issue of Town & Country magazine.

Jennifer Love Hewitt was photographed at Dawnridge, along with her dog Charlie, for the May 8th, 2006 “World’s Most Beautiful” issue of People magazine.

Dawnridge was the site of the cover story for Harper’s Bazaar April 2007 issue featuring Reese Witherspoon. You can check out more photos from that shoot on the r-witherspoon.com website.

Mandy Moore did a photo shoot there for the May 2007 issue of C Magazine.

James Franco posed there for Issue # 3/Autumn/Winter 2008/2009 of Man About Town magazine.

Selena Gomez shot the promo video and album artwork for her 2013 song “Come and Get It” at Dawnridge.

You can watch a behind-the-scenes video of that shoot here.

And New Girl actress Hannah Simone posed at the Duquette house for the Alice-in-Wonderland-themed “The Land of Ahhs” feature in the March 2013 issue of Los Angeles magazine.

You can watch a behind-the-scenes video of that shoot by clicking below.

For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Dawnridge, Tony Duquette’s former house, is located at 1354 Dawnridge Drive in Beverly Hills.