filming – IAMNOTASTALKER

March 5, 2013March 4, 2013

O’Brien’s Irish Pub & Restaurant from “The Truth About Cats & Dogs”

Last month, while spending the weekend in Santa Monica, the Grim Cheaper and I randomly grabbed dinner at Finn McCool’s Irish Pub on Main Street. Immediately upon sitting down, I asked the bartender if anything had ever been lensed on the premises – as I am apt to do whenever I find myself dining somewhere for the first time. (Shocker, I know. Winking smile ) And while he was not sure about Finn McCool’s filming history, he did inform me that a scene from the 1996 romantic comedy The Truth About Cats & Dogs had taken place at a different Emerald Isle-themed watering hole located just a few doors down – O’Brien’s Irish Pub & Restaurant. Because Los Angeles is a place where change seems to be an epidemic, I was absolutely shocked – and pleased – that an establishment that appeared in a movie shot almost two decades ago was still in existence. So I dragged the GC right on out there the following night.

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O’Brien’s Irish Pub & Restaurant was originally founded in 1995, the same year that The Truth About Cats & Dogs was filmed. Amazingly enough, though, despite its longevity, I could find little to no information about the place’s history online.

What I can say, though, is that the watering hole serves up some fabulous food. I opted for O’Brien’s Veggie Patty, with added toppings of cheddar cheese and sautéed mushrooms, and am happy to report that it was absolutely divine. The GC ordered the Slider Burgers and was also very happy with his choice. I was most excited about O’Brien’s champagne offerings, though, which were fantastic!

I loved the place’s low-lit, wood-paneled ambiance, as well.

Check out the antique books displayed on the shelf above the opening to the restaurant’s main room in the photograph below. Love it!

O’Brien’s Irish Pub was featured only once in The Truth About Cats & Dogs, in the scene in which Noelle (Uma Thurman) poses as radio host/animal expert Dr. Abby Barnes (Janeane Garofalo), who is in turn posing as Noelle’s fictional friend Donna, while the two are out on a date with Brian (Ben Chaplin).

It is while at O’Brien’s that Abby spills salsa all over the front of her shirt causing her to say, “Of course! Of course I would do that!” Amen, Abby! That is SO something I would do, as well.

The Truth About Cats & Dogs was filmed in O’Brien’s bar area, which is located towards the back of the restaurant.

The exterior patio area also appeared briefly in the flick.

In a rare twist, the restaurant’s real life name and location were used in the filming. Not only did Brian tell Noelle to meet him at the bar “on the corner of Main and Pier” – O’Brien’s actual location – for their date, but a sign reading “O’Brien’s Irish Pub & Restaurant” was visible on the door in the background of the scene. So incredibly cool!

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: O’Brien’s Irish Pub & Restaurant, from The Truth About Cats & Dogs, is located at 2941 Main Street in Santa Monica. You can visit the eatery’s official website here.

April 17, 2012April 16, 2012

The “New Girl” Apartment Building

My good friend/fellow stalker Lavonna has been begging me to track down locations from New Girl for a good three months now, but because I had never seen an episode of the series I was unable to do so. Until last Monday evening, that is, when the Grim Cheaper and I finally sat down and started watching it from the beginning. Thank you, Hulu! I have to admit that I did not have very high hopes for the show as, for whatever reason, I am not that big of a fan of actress Zooey Deschanel (whose mom played Eileen Hayward on fave series Twin Peaks, but I digress). I ended up LOVING it, though, and both the GC and I are now absolutely hooked! After watching the first few episodes, I immediately started doing research on the warehouse-style loft apartment building where the New Girl gang lives (Lavonna’s most coveted locale from the series) and thankfully, Christine, over at fave website OnLocationVacations, had posted the address several times on her Daily Filming Locations page. So I dragged the GC right on out to the Arts District in Downtown L.A. this past Saturday afternoon to do some stalking of the place. (On a side-note, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, just taught me how to process my photographs using the soon-to-be defunct Picnik editing program, so I have been having a little fun with them today. Don’t mind me. Smile )

I had never before visited – or even heard of – the “Arts District” (or “Artists District” as it is sometimes referred to) until this past Saturday, but according to the Los Angeles Downtown Arts District website, the area is the site of an average of 900 movie shoots per year! Um, yes please – sign me up! It is basically a stalker’s heaven – and one of the coolest spots that I have been to in all of my stalking travels. The District became a haven for the artistically-inclined in 1976 thanks to the many affordable studio-type spaces available in the countless then-abandoned buildings and warehouses located there. Artists gradually began to take over the many spacious lofts, turning them into art studios and illegal living spaces (the area was not yet zoned as residential). In the 1980s, the Artists-In-Residence ordinance was passed which allowed lessees to use their flats as live/work spaces and, as a result, even more artisans flocked to the area. Today, the Arts District is a flourishing mecca of artists and hipsters and boasts fabulous brick buildings, sidewalk cafes and more galleries than you can shake a stick at. While there, not only did I feel like I had been transported back to my beloved Manhattan, but we ended up falling bass-ackwards into one of my most sought-after filming locations ever! But that is another story for another post.

In real life, the property where the New Girl gang lives is known as the Binford Building and it was originally constructed in 1906, but was not converted into a residential structure until the mid-1980s. The 36-unit domicile was the brainchild of real estate developer Michael Kamin, owner of the Mika Company, who, in a 1986 Los Angeles Times article said, “We wanted to make the building a statement and an art piece — something that says this is an exciting place to live, something to keep the focus on this street.” I would say he succeeded – in spades! The structure is definitely unique and the most eye-catching on the entire block.

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In New Girl, the Binford Building is where Jess (Zooey Deschanel), Nick (Jake M. Johnson), Schmidt (Max Greenfield), and Winston (Lamorne Morris) live. The exterior of the structure is shown weekly on the series.

The building’s main entrance has also popped up from time to time.

That entrance is shown above.

As you can see, the Binford’s real life directory and intercom are even visible on the show. Love it!

The interior of the gang’s apartment is just a set, though, located at Fox Studios where (I am fairly certain) the series is lensed. You can check out some photographs of the interior of an actual Binford Building unit here. As you can see, it does not look anything like the New Girl loft. I am absolutely IN LOVE with the group’s sprawling, FOUR-bedroom, industrial, brick-walled loft, by the way. The GC and I also live in a loft-style apartment that I ADORE, but it is 750-square feet, has no actual bedrooms and only ONE teeny-tiny closet! Yes, ladies, I have to share a closet with my husband – GASP! The GC recently commented that he has noticed his side of the closet getting gradually smaller over the years. Ha! And here I thought I was being all sly. Winking smile So yes, I have been known to drool copiously while watching New Girl. I definitely have apartment envy!

I could do without their public-style bathroom, though, which is an aspect of the show that I still do not entirely understand.

According to a message board on the Animation Nation website, the premiere episode of the cartoon Family Dog (which was part of Steven Spielberg’s anthology series Amazing Stories) was created by animator Brad Bird in one of the Binford Building lofts. The family in the series was even named “The Binfords” in honor of the property. Traction Avenue, the street where the Binford is located, was also mentioned (and briefly seen on a freeway sign) in Bird’s 2004 hit, The Incredibles.

Binford Lofts–the “New Girl” Apartment Building

You can watch a video about the Binford Building lofts by clicking above.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Lavonna for asking me to find this location (and for turning me on to New Girl) and to Christine, from OnLocationVacations, for tracking it down! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Binford Building, aka the New Girl apartment building, is located at 837 Traction Avenue in the Arts District of Downtown Los Angeles.

April 16, 2012April 15, 2012

Shooters Bar & Grill from “Melrose Place”

One location that had been on my “To Stalk” list pretty much ever since I first moved to Southern California over twelve years ago was Fellini’s “Old Country” Italian restaurant – the Hollywood-area eatery that stood in for Shooters Bar & Grill on the 1992 Beverly Hills, 90210-spinoff Melrose Place. And while I was never a huge fan of the series (I think I was a bit too young for it as most of the storylines went right over my head), I did watch the entire first season and the pool hall/bar where the characters regularly hung out was a place that I had always wanted to see in person. For whatever reason, though, I had just never made it out there. So, while Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I were out doing some stalking in the Hollywood area two weeks ago, I suggested that we stop by. Sadly, this was a bit of a disappointing stalk for both of us, though, as the site has changed drastically since filming took place and is virtually unrecognizable from its weekly onscreen appearances as Shooters on Melrose Place.

Unfortunately, I could not find much information online about the history of Fellini’s, which is surprising being that the establishment seemed to be something of a Hollywood landmark and was around for almost two full decades. According to this December 1987 Los Angeles Times article, Fellini’s, which was named in honor of the legendary Italian film director Federico Fellini, was founded in 1976 by a man named Gary Michael Gilson. The portion of the building that stood in for Shooters was not actually a part of the original restaurant, but was added in 1982 when Gilson decided to expand into a vacant former antique shop located next door. During its heyday, such stars as Bonnie Raitt and Dennis Quaid were said to not only have hung out there, but were even known to jump up on the eatery’s tiny stage and sing a few tunes from time to time. Fellini’s ended up shutting its doors sometime in the late ‘80s, at which point it was transformed into a short-lived nightclub named Trinity that closed after less than a year. The establishment was then purchased by new owners and was reopened once again as Fellini’s, but not until 1993, so it seems that at the time Melrose Place was first filmed, the site was vacant. I am not sure when Fellini’s officially closed for the second time, but in mid-2010 the place housed a furniture store, as you can see in these photographs on the Daveland blog here. The storefront, which has since been painted a drab blue-grey color, currently houses MUSE Atelier hair salon.

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The exterior of Fellini’s showed up weekly on Melrose Place throughout the series’ seven-season run. You can check out some pictures of what Fellini’s used to look like when it was still in business here and a close-up of its doors here. As you can see in the photographs, not much was changed for the filming of Melrose Place. Sadly, that is not the case today. Gone are the familiar black awning, peach-colored paint, and arched double windows. Today, the storefront is a bleak reminder of its former self. As Mike said to me while we there, “This place looks like a morgue!” LOL Why the new owners would take a formerly very cute façade – not to mention a historic filming location – and turn it into something dismal is beyond me.

While we were there, Mike did notice that some markings from the former arched double windows were still visible on the exterior of the building. I SO love when there is some remnant, no matter how small, still in existence on filming locations that have been drastically altered. So incredibly cool!

While scanning through episodes of Melrose Place to make screen captures for today’s post, I noticed that something was not quite right about the close-up shots of Shooters’ front doors, and I came to the conclusion that a set of the entrance area had been created for all of the close-up filming.

As you can see in the above screen captures, the wall just to the left of the Shooters’ awning is popped out in the close-up view, but not in the faraway shot.

And in the close-up shot, the window to the left of the awning has no ornamentation surrounding it, but in the faraway shot it does.

Being that, in real life, the façade of the building is flat and does have ornamentation surrounding its side window, the only explanation is that a replica of the entrance was created on a soundstage at Santa Clarita Studios in Valencia where the series was lensed for all of the close-up shots. (You can see a pretty cool picture of the original Melrose Place apartment set on the Santa Clarita Studios website here.)

The interior of Shooters was also just a set and, from what I read online, it did not at all resemble the dark wood-paneled, Old World-style of the real life Fellini’s. Oh, what I wouldn’t give to have been able to have seen that place in person!

And while Fellini’s was used almost entirely for establishing shots on Melrose Place, some actual filming did take place there. In the pilot episode of the series, Jake Hanson (Grant Show) takes Kelly Taylor (Jennie Garth) on a date at Shooters and the two are shown pulling up to the front of the restaurant on Jake’s motorcycle.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for taking me to this location.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The former Fellini’s restaurant (now MUSE Atelier salon), aka Shooters Bar & Grill from the original Melrose Place, is located at 6808/6810 Melrose Avenue, just west of North Highland Avenue, in Hollywood.

April 13, 2012April 12, 2012

The Harper House from “Scream 3”

Last Thursday afternoon, before grabbing lunch at Pinches Tacos from The Hills which I blogged about on Tuesday, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, took me by a famous apartment complex in West Hollywood named the Harper House. Because the Spanish Baroque-style building was featured in Scream 3 (as well as countless other productions), Mike thought that I might be interested in blogging about it during my annual Haunted Hollywood month this upcoming October (and yes, I am already gathering locations for that!). After seeing the place in person, though, I became just a wee bit intrigued by it and started doing research immediately. So I figured that now was as good a time as any to do a post on the historic building.

The Harper House, which was built in 1929, was designed by Leland Bryant, the very same architect who also gave us the art deco-style Sunset Tower Hotel, one of my very favorite places in all of Los Angeles that I blogged about way back in September of 2008. The complex was originally constructed to provide housing for show business and studio professionals and such luminaries as silent film actress Norma Talmadge and silent film actor Gilbert Roland once called the place home. The four-story, 21-unit, L-shaped building, as well as the entire block that it is located on which is known as the North Harper Avenue Historic District, was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 28, 1996.

Mike had actually just recently scouted the Harper House a few weeks before taking me there and was nice enough to share the above photographs that he snapped of the building’s elevated central courtyard area, which is absolutely idyllic. It is no wonder that so many movies have been filmed on the premises!

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The Harper House pops up twice in Scream 3. It first shows up at the very beginning of the movie as the building where Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber) and his girlfriend, Christine Hamilton (Gossip Girl’s Kelly Rutherford), are murdered.

I am fairly certain that the real life interior of one of the apartments was also used in that scene. As you can see in these CurbedLA pictures of the inside of an actual Harper House apartment, the fireplace, doors, windows, and stairway railings all match up to what appeared onscreen.

The exterior of the Harper House next pops up in the scene in which Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) watches the news about Cotton’s murder on TV.

In the 1988 flick Cop, the Harper House was where Lloyd Hopkins (James Woods) investigated a murder at the very beginning of the movie.

The real life interior of one of the apartments was also used in the filming of that scene.

In 1989’s The Big Picture (which is a FABULOUS movie, by the way), the interior and the exterior of the Harper House stood in for the building where up-and-coming film director Nick Chapman (cutie Kevin Bacon – sigh!) moved after breaking up with his longtime girlfriend, Susan Rawlings (Emily Longstreth).

In 1991’s The Last Boy Scout, the Harper House is where murdered stripper Cory (Halle Berry) lived and where Joe Hallenbeck (Bruce Willis) and Jimmy Dix (Damon Wayans) go to investigate her killing.

Oddly enough, though, the interior of Cory’s apartment and her balcony were a different location entirely. As you can see in the above screen shots, the windows of Cory’s bedroom and the railings of her balcony do not match up with the actual building.

In the pilot episode of Murder One, which was titled “Chapter One”, the Harper House was where Jessica Costello (Collette White) was killed. Solving her case became the central storyline of the series’ first season, but the exterior of the building was actually only shown once, in the brief scene in which Ted Hoffman (Daniel Benzali) watched a news story about the murder while at home with his wife, Annie (Patricia Clarkson), and his daughter, Elizabeth (Vanessa Zima).

The real life interior of one of the units also appeared in that episode in the flash back scene in which Richard Cross (Stanley Tucci) recounts how he discovered the body.

And brief glimpses of the Harper House were also shown each week during the Murder One opening credits.

The Harper House was also featured in 1978’s The Big Fix, 1982’s Partners, and as the building where Alice Pieszecki (Leisha Hailey) lived on the Showtime series The L Word, but, unfortunately, I could not find copies of any of those productions with which to make screen captures for this post.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for telling me about this location, for the photographs of the building’s courtyard and for making the Cop screen captures which appear in this post! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Harper House, from Scream 3, is located at 1334/1336 North Harper Avenue in West Hollywood. Pink Taco, aka the former site of the Roxbury, is located just up the street at 8225 West Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood. You can visit the official Pink Taco website here. And Pinches Tacos, from the “It’s On Bitch” episode of The Hills, is located just around the corner at 8200 West Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood. You can visit the official Pinches Taco website here.

April 12, 2012April 11, 2012

Franck’s Wedding Coordinator Shop from “Father of the Bride”

When the Grim Cheaper and I first showed up to stalk Fig & Olive restaurant, from the 2012 “Matthew’s Day Off” Honda CR-V Super Bowl commercial which I blogged about last week, I became absolutely enchanted with Melrose Place, the tiny tree-lined street on which the eatery is located. Even though I had been a fan of the series Melrose Place back in the 90s, before tracking down Fig & Olive earlier this year I had no idea that the charming and idyllic little street, which runs a scant three blocks and is made up of mostly high-end boutiques, even existed. In a recent About.com Los Angeles article, author Shana Ting Lipton calls Melrose Place a “hidden gem” and she could not be more right! Because its name so closely resembles that of the neighboring, and far more well-known, Melrose Avenue, I believe Melrose Place often gets lost in the shuffle, which explains why this stalker had never before heard of it. Needless to say, I absolutely fell in love with the picturesque little thoroughfare on the spot, as did the GC.

While we were there, I happened to notice that the sidewalks on Melrose Place were extremely wide with brick ornamentation and my mind immediately flashed upon the shop where wedding coordinator Franck Eggelhoffer (Martin Short) and his assistant, Howard Weinstein (BD Wong), worked in fave movie Father of the Bride – a location that I had long been trying to track down. For some odd reason, I had remembered that the sidewalk in front of Franck’s shop was also quite wide and lined with brick (I know, I know – my mind retains the oddest of information), so I snapped a quick pic of the Melrose Place sidewalk so that I could compare the two when I returned home. Well, lo and behold, when I popped in my DVD later that night, I was able to confirm that the sidewalks were one and the same. Yay!

From that point, all I had to do was pinpoint the exact storefront where Franck worked and, being that Melrose Place is only three blocks long, the venture was an easy one. Then, last Thursday, after I had figured out the correct spot, I dragged Mike, from MovieShotsLA, right on back out there to do some stalking of it.

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Franck’s shop shows up only once in Father of the Bride, in the scene in which George Banks (Steve Martin) begrudgingly accompanies his wife, Nina (Diane Keaton), and daughter, Annie (Kimberly Williams-Paisley), to meet the hard-to-understand wedding coordinator for the first time. One of my very favorite lines in the movie is actually uttered during that scene – when George laments over the high price of the wedding cake, he says, “My first car didn’t cost $1,200!”, to which Franck responds, “Well, welcome to the ‘90s, Mr. Banks!” Love it!

In the scene, George, Nina and Annie are shown walking east on Melrose Place in front of the building numbered 8420.

And I, of course, just had to imitate them by posing for an action walking shot while I was there. Smile

I believe that the green “Antiques” awning that was visible in the background behind the trio was once attached to the building pictured above, which is located at 8422/8424 Melrose Place. Fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, came across an article about the vacant property which mentions that it did, in fact, once house an antique store. And, as fate would have it, back in 2007 the very same building was also the site of a Hanes Comfortique Event hosted by none other than Owen’s main squeeze, Jennifer Love Hewitt. Talk about synchronicity!

The building that stood in for Franck’s shop, which was also an antique store at the time of the filming, is now home to the Zero + Maria Cornejo boutique. According to the About.com Los Angeles article that I mentioned earlier, Melrose Place actually used to be known as “the antiquing street” thanks to the myriad of antique shops that were located there once upon a time.

And while the full exterior of the property was not shown in Father of the Bride, the door that Annie, George and Nina walked through still looks exactly the same today as it did back in 1991 when the movie was filmed! Love it!

The real life interior of the store was also featured in Father of the Bride. As you can see in these pictures, while that interior has since been remodeled, it is still set up in the same basic three-room configuration that it was during the filming.

Even the ribbed pillars that were visible in the background of the scene are still there, as you can see in the main photograph featured in this RackedLA post.

In the scene, George, Nina, Annie, and Franck sat on a couch in front of the store’s eastern-most window.

That window is pictured above.

It is thanks to that portion of the scene that I was able to pinpoint exactly where Franck’s shop was situated. While looking for clues, I had noticed a few distinct architectural elements on the building located across the street, which was visible through Franck’s window. From there I used Google Street View to search for those elements and, thankfully, it was not long before I found them. As you can see in the screen shot and Street View image above, the arched window (denoted with a pink arrow), horizontal lip (denoted with a yellow arrow) and rectangular-shaped cutout (denoted with a blue arrow) of the building located at 8417 Melrose Place all match up to what appeared onscreen.

Sadly, as you can see above, those elements are now covered over with large awnings and are no longer visible. Thank God for Street View!

I had also spotted a center island and a “Keep Right” sign through the window in the scene and, looking at aerial views, saw that that same island was located just east of the Zero + Maria Cornejo boutique. And while the island still exists to this day, the “Keep Right” sign has since been removed.

The Zero + Maria Cornejo employee that we spoke with while there could NOT have been nicer and was not only floored to learn that he worked in such a cinematically significant location, but also allowed Mike and me to snap some pics through the same window that Annie, Nina, George, and Franck sat in front of.

On a Father of the Bride side note – I just learned that the character of Franck Eggelhoffer was inspired by real life wedding planner Kevin Lee, who appeared on this past season of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills as the wedding coordinator hired by Lisa Vanderpump. You can watch a video clip of the “real Franck” by clicking above. And yes, Martin Short had the guy down to a T!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Zero + Maria Cornejo, aka Franck’s wedding planning shop from Father of the Bride, is located at 8408 Melrose Place in West Hollywood. Fig & Olive restaurant, from the 2012 “Matthew’s Day Off” Honda CR-V Super Bowl commercial, is located just down the street at 8490 Melrose Place in West Hollywood. You can visit Fig & Olive’s official website here.

April 10, 2012April 9, 2012

Pinches Tacos from “The Hills”

As always seems to happen when Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I get together, while out doing some stalking in West Hollywood this past Thursday afternoon, the two of us stumbled upon a filming location without even meaning to do so. After stopping by the Sunset Strip’s new Pink Taco to grab some lunch and finding it inexplicably closed, we headed across the street to a different pink-hued Mexican eatery named Pinches Tacos. Upon ordering our food, we made our way to the restaurant’s patio area and, as I am apt to do when dining at a new place, I started doing some iPhone research to see if, on the off chance, Pinches had ever been used as a filming location. Well, let me tell you, I just about fell off my chair when I came across some behind-the-scenes footage of my girl Kristin Cavallari shooting an unspecified Season 5 episode of fave show The Hills in the very spot where I was then sitting! How I had missed that tidbit when the episode originally aired is beyond me, but needless to say I was absolutely floored over the information and promptly grabbed my camera and ran inside to snap some pics and speak with the manager.

The Sunset Strip Pinches Tacos was first founded in 2007 by brothers Miguel, Jorge and Javier Anaya – nephews of Jose Prado, the former longtime chef of The Ivy turned restaurateur who established The Original Cha Cha Cha in Silverlake, Cocina Primavera in Beverly Hills, Prado Restaurant in Larchmont Village, and Cha Cha Chicken in Santa Monica and Northridge. Everything that the fast-fix hot spot serves – from the salsa to the tortillas – is homemade daily using hundred-year-old secret family recipes from the Anaya brothers’ hometowns of Guadalajara and Jalisco. Thanks to its extremely reasonable prices, fresh fare, and late-night hours (Pinches is open until 3 a.m. each Thursday through Saturday), the eatery became insanely popular virtually overnight and three more outposts have since been launched. Besides West Hollywood, the chain currently boasts restaurants in Culver City and Santa Monica, all of which are family-owned and operated. And Alabama native Ty Taylor loved the place so much that he convinced the Anaya brothers to partner with him in founding an annex in Taylor’s hometown of Homewood. That restaurant opened in January of 2011 and is doing so well that the group is already looking to establish another outpost in Birmingham.

And for those wondering where the name “Pinches” came from, while a note on the eatery’s door states that the term is Spanish slang for “kitchen boy”, Google translate dug up a far more interesting (and far more NSFW) meaning, which you can take a look at here. All I can say is LOL.

While the interior of Pinches Tacos is quite adorable, the patio area, which overlooks the Sunset Strip, is where most people choose to eat, including Mike and me. I cannot tell you how cool it was to sit there, just feet from the bustling Strip, and watch all of the cars zipping by, not to mention the countless Hollywood tour buses – one of which you can see in the background of the above picture. Love it!

Because I am extremely picky about my meat, I opted to order Pinches vegetarian tacos and not only were they bursting with flavor – not something one expects from vegetables – and FABULOUS, but, at $2.95 a piece, were less expensive than a Starbucks latte! I am so going to have to bring the Grim Cheaper back there for lunch. Winking smile

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Oddly enough, the behind-the-scenes footage of The Hills that Mike and I watched while at Pinches did not look at all familiar to me, so when I got home I popped in my DVDs of the series and scanned through each and every Season 5 episode. As it turns out, the Mexican eatery appeared in the episode titled “It’s On Bitch” as the spot where Brody Jenner, Jayde Nicole, Stephanie Pratt, Lo Bosworth, Stacie the Bartender (I so love that she was never referred to by her full name), Justin “Bobby” Brescia, and my girl Kristin Cavallari celebrated Frankie Delgado’s birthday. “It’s On Bitch” was actually the very first episode of The Hills that KCav appeared in, so I am extremely embarrassed that I failed to recognize it. I must be losing my mojo or something! Winking smile Besides being a filming location, Pinches Tacos is also something of a celebrity hotspot. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there include Kat Von D, Jesse James, Leonardo DiCaprio, Emma Roberts, Megan Fox, Brian Austin Green, Australian celebrity chef Curtis Stone, Gabriel Aubry, Balthazar Getty, Isabel Lucas, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, and Top Chef’s Padma Lakshmi.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Pinches Tacos, from the “It’s On Bitch” episode of The Hills, is located at 8200 West Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood. You can visit the restaurant chain’s official website here.

April 5, 2012April 4, 2012

The Historic Mayfair Hotel from “The Office”

Fellow stalker John Bengtson, from the SIlent Locations blog, sent me an email last week after reading my post on Red Studios Hollywood from The Artist (a location that I had learned about from his website) informing me that he had tracked down some locales from Season 7’s “The Search” episode of The Office that I might be interested in stalking, most notably The Historic Mayfair Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles where Michael Scott (Steve Carell) and Holly Flax (Amy Ryan) shared a rooftop kiss. Ironically enough, my good friend, fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, had also sent me this location on February 4th of last year, the day after the episode had originally aired, along with a list of all of the other places featured in “The Search”. And while I did stalk a few of them – Kung Pao China Bistro and Larry’s Chili Dog – for whatever reason, I never made it out to The Mayfair. So, this past weekend, I decided to change that and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over there. (I am not sure what happened with the above photograph, but somehow it turned out a bit wonky and neither the GC nor I realized it at the time.)

The Historic Mayfair Hotel was originally designed in 1927 by Alexander E. Curlett and Claud W. Beelman, the same architecture team who gave us the Park Plaza Hotel near MacArthur Park (an extremely popular filming location that I have stalked, but have yet to blog about), the Cooper Arms condominium building in Long Beach, and the Los Angeles Board of Trade Building in Downtown L.A. The 13-story hotel, which at the time was named simply The Mayfair, was commissioned by Texas oil tycoons and was constructed at a cost of $1.5 million – and we’re talking 1920’s dollars! In its heyday, the luxury property hosted such luminaries as Mary Pickford and John Barrymore. Raymond Chandler even wrote and set his 1939 short story “I’ll Be Waiting” at The Mayfair, although he dubbed the place the “Windermere Hotel” in the tale.

The property, which originally boasted 350 rooms, but now has just 304, was the largest hotel west of the Mississippi at one time and featured an immensely popular supper and dance club known as the Rainbow Isle Room, from which George Eckhardts, Jr. and the Rainbow Isle Orchestra would broadcast a live radio show each night. In 2004, after suffering from a long period of neglect, the structure underwent a massive and much-needed $40 million renovation, at which point it was renamed The Historic Mayfair Hotel. You can check out some great photographs of the place during its early days on The Mayfair’s Facebook page here.

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In “The Search” episode of The Office, after being stranded at a supposed Scranton, Pennsylvania-area gas station, Michael Scott goes on a walkabout which ends on the rooftop of The Historic Mayfair Hotel. When Holly finds him there and Michael tells her how much he has missed her, the two finally kiss, ending several years worth of will-they-or-won’t-they-get-together storylines and allowing audiences to finally breath a long-overdue sigh of relief. Not surprisingly, the roof area of The Mayfair is closed to the public, so I was unable to snap any pictures of it.

Mike, from MovieShotsLA, figured out that The Mayfair stood in for the supposed Chicago, Illinois-area The Addison Hotel where Beth Cappadora (Michelle Pfeiffer) attended her 15-year high school reunion in 1999’s The Deep End of the Ocean.

It was from the lobby of The Mayfair that Beth’s 3-year-old son, Ben Cappadora (Michael McElroy), was kidnapped.

As you can see above, despite the renovation, the lobby still looks very much the same today as it did back in 1998 when The Deep End of the Ocean was filmed.

The super-nice front desk clerk that we spoke with while we were there informed us that both the interior and the exterior of the property had also appeared in 1994’s True Lies, as the supposed Washington, D.C.-area Washington Mayfair Hotel where Harry Tasker (Arnold Schwarzenegger), on horseback, chased motor-cycle-riding religious zealot Salim Abu Aziz (Art Malik) through a lobby.

The Mayfair lobby was actually one of three different lobbies used in that particular scene. Harry is first shown chasing Salim across the length of The Mayfair’s lobby.

The two then turn a corner and are magically transported to the now-defunct The Ambassador hotel, the same lobby of which was used as the Regent Beverly Wilshire in 1990’s Pretty Woman.

The duo then heads outside, “across the street” and into The Westin Bonaventure Hotel. In reality, when the Ambassador was still standing, it was located a good two miles away from The Bonaventure. Ah, the magic of Hollywood!

Thanks to the Richard Dean Anderson Website, I learned that The Historic Mayfair Hotel was also used in the 1986 Season 1 episode of MacGyver titled “The Assassin”.

I am fairly certain that only the exterior of the property appeared in the episode, though, and that all of the interior hotel scenes were filmed on a set. And while IMDB states that The Mayfair was also featured in 2009’s Don’t Look Up, I scanned through the flick yesterday while doing research for this post and did not see it pop up anywhere.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalkers John Bengtson, from the SIlent Locations blog, and Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for telling me about this location and to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for informing me of its appearance in The Deep End of the Ocean! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Historic Mayfair Hotel, from “The Search” episode of The Office, is located at 1256 West 7th Street in Downtown Los Angeles. You can visit the hotel’s official website here.

April 4, 2012April 3, 2012

The Coffee Pot from “90210”

As I mentioned back in March in my post about Bar Keeper in Silver Lake, the whimsical little barware store that stood in for Upon Galley in the 2005 movie A Lot Like Love, one locale that I had been absolutely itching to stalk in recent weeks was the Coffee Pot, an Echo Park-area café that appeared in the Season 4 episode of fave show 90210 titled “Babes in Toyland”. And while tracking down this location required minimal effort on my part, stalking it would be a different story altogether.

The GC and I actually tried to stalk the Coffee Pot not once, but twice, and both endeavors proved futile. Our first attempt took place on a Sunday when we just happened to be in the neighborhood and decided to drop by, only to discover that the shop is closed on Sundays. Then, last weekend, we made a special trip out there, on a Saturday this time, only to be met with a sign on the front door announcing that the small café was closed because “I’m the mom and I said so!” Um, OK. And while it is said that “the third time’s the charm”, I think we will just cut our losses at two unsuccessful stalks for this location. It is unfortunate, too, because the place looked absolutely adorable and I had a major hankering for some coffee at the time.

I was so flummoxed over the shop being closed yet again that I completely forgot to have the GC take my picture out front. I was able to snap two photographs of the Coffee Pot’s interior through the café’s front windows, though, and being that there was also a Starbucks located right across the street and I did manage to score myself a latte, I guess the trip was not a total loss. Winking smile

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In the “Babes in Toyland” episode of 90210, troublemaker Vanessa (Arielle Kebbel) tries to sabotage Adrianna Tate-Duncan (Jessica Lowndes) and Dixon Wilson (Tristan Wilds) by sending them to the fictional “Echo Park Grill” for a fake meeting with the VP of A&R for Def Jam Records. Oddly enough, three different locations were used to stand in for the restaurant in the episode. The first establishing shot shown in the scene was of the 3900 block of West Sunset Boulevard in the Sunset Junction area of Silver Lake, where Bar Keeper is located.

The second establishing shot was of Figaro Bistro in Los Feliz, which I I blogged about back in August 2011. The exterior of Figaro also appeared in the Season 3 episode of 90210 titled “How Much is that Liam in the Window”.

And, finally, the Coffee Pot was used for all of the “Echo Park Grill’s” interior scenes, where Adrianna and Dixon waited futilely for the record executive. As you can see above, the café is a pretty cute spot.

Despite the conflicting establishing shots, this location was actually a snap to track down as I had noticed the words “Coffee Pot” on the door of the café while watching the episode. A simple input of the terms “Coffee Pot” and “Los Angeles” into a Google search spit back a result of the Coffee Pot in Echo Park. Yay! Too bad it wasn’t quite as easy to stalk.

Fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, also let me know that the Coffee Pot had appeared as “Spark Plug Coffee” where Officer Ben Sherman (cutie Ben McKenzie – sigh!) and Detective Sammy Bryant (Shawn Hatosy) arrested a man for having placed a hidden camera in a women’s bathroom in the Season 4 episode of Southland titled “Risk”.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for informing me of the Coffee Pot’s Southland appearance.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Coffee Pot, from the “Babes in Toyland” episode of 90210 and the “Risk” episode of Southland, is located at 2201 West Sunset Boulevard in Echo Park.

March 30, 2012March 29, 2012

“The Bodyguard” Mansion – aka The Beverly House Compound

After the sad passing of singer Whitney Houston last month, I mentioned to fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, that we should try to track down the mansion where one of Whitney’s most legendary characters, pop star Rachel Marron, lived in 1992’s The Bodyguard. For some very odd reason, I thought that the place had yet to be found, but Mike told me that way back in 2007 he had come across an article on fave website The Real Estalker about “The Beverly House Compound”, the most expensive home then for sale in the United States. In the comments section of the post, someone had reported that the very same mansion had been used as Rachel’s residence in The Bodyguard. How I had not previously come across that information in all my years of stalking is absolutely beyond me, especially considering that the location is one that I have long been itching to stalk. Well, believe you me, once Mike gave me the address, I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to Beverly Hills to see the place for myself.

The Beverly House Compound has a vast and storied Hollywood history. It was originally designed by Gordon B. Kaufmann, the very same architect who also designed the Hoover Dam, the Los Angeles Times Building, Scripps College, and the Athenaeum at the California Institute of Technology, a very popular filming location that I have yet to blog about. The Compound was commissioned by banker Milton Gerz in 1927 and cost over $1 million to construct – and we’re talking 1920’s money! In 1947, William Randolph Hearst and his mistress Marion Davies purchased the lavish three-story, 27-room estate, which sat on over 7 acres of land, for $120,000. Hearst died at the residence in 1951, as did Davies in 1961. Legend has it that John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier spent part of their 1953 honeymoon at the property and supposedly the mansion was also used as the West Coast headquarters for the Kennedy Presidential Campaign in 1960.

In 2007, financier Leonard Ross, who purchased The Compound in 1976, put it up for sale for a whopping $165 million, making it the most expensive home on the market in the entire country at the time. In 2010, the estate, minus three acres of land, was re-listed at the reduced price of $95 million. According to several articles, the lavish property, which has been expanded over the years, currently boasts four separate houses, a cottage, an apartment, 72,000 square feet of living space, 29 bedrooms, a two-story library, two movie projection rooms, a living room with a 22-foot arched ceiling, two tennis courts, a tennis pavilion, staff accommodations, a 50-foot entry hall, an 82-foot cascading waterfall, a disco, and three separate pools. You can check out some fabulous interior photographs of the mansion on the This and That and More of the Same blog here.

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In The Bodyguard, the exterior of The Beverly House Compound stood in for the exterior of the palatial home where Rachel Marron lived.

All of the interiors of Rachel’s estate were filmed at the nearby Greystone Mansion, though. You can see photographs of the room that was used as Rachel’s fake bedroom here and here.

And you can see a photograph of the Greystone Mansion kitchen here

And for the gate to Rachel’s home a third location was used! The gate actually belongs to the mansion located at 10231 Charing Cross Road in Beverly Hills, which just so happens to be the very same residence where Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston) lived in The Big Lebowski.

A current Google Street View image of that gate is pictured above. And while it looks considerably different today than it did in The Bodyguard, you can see that the basic positioning remains the same.

I tracked down the location of Rachel’s gate thanks to an address number of “10224” that was visible in the background of the scene in which Frank Farmer (Kevin Costner) first arrived at Rachel’s mansion.

That gate also looks considerably different today, but, as you can see above, much like was the case with Rachel’s gate, the basic positioning remains the same.

The Beverly House Compound has been the site of constant filming over the years. In The Godfather, it was used as the mansion where movie producer Jack Woltz (John Marley) lived. Yes, that mansion.

According to The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations website, only the exterior of The Compound was used in the filming, though. All of the interior scenes – including the infamous horse head scene – were shot at an estate located at 95 Middleneck Road on Long Island.

In the Season 1 episode of The Colbys titled “The Turning Point”, the residence stood in for the supposed Rome mansion where Francesca “Frankie”Colby (Katharine Ross) vacationed with Lord Roger Langdon (David Hedison).

Ironically enough, though, in the following episode, which was titled “Thursday’s Child”, Greystone Mansion stood in for that same Rome mansion.

In the 1979 movie The Jerk, the grounds of The Compound were used as the backyard of the home where Navin (Steve Martin) lived after he became rich.

As you can see above, though, the front of Navin’s home was a different location entirely.

In 1985’s Fletch, The Compound was where Alan Stanwyk (Tim Matheson) lived.

The real life interior of the property was also used in the filming.

In 1985’s Into the Night, the mansion was where Jack Caper (Richard Farnsworth) lived.

The real life interior of The Compound was used in the filming of that movie, as well.

Way back in 1966, The Compound was used as the home of Mrs. Sampson (Lauren Bacall) in the thriller Harper.

At that time, the backyard and pool area of the property looked considerably different than they do today.

In the Season 3 episode of Charlie’s Angels titled “Rosemary, for Remembrance”, the mansion was where Jake Garfield (Ramon Bieri) lived.

The real life interior of the mansion was also used in the filming of that episode.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for telling me about this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Beverly House Compound, aka Rachel Marron’s mansion from The Bodyguard, is located at 1011 North Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills. Greystone Mansion, which was used as the interior of Rachel’s home, is located at 905 Loma Vista Drive in Beverly Hills. The gate to Rachel’s mansion, which looks considerably different today, is located at 10231 Charing Cross Road in Beverly Hills.

March 29, 2012March 28, 2012

The Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey from “90210”

Way back in July of last year, the Grim Cheaper and I found ourselves on the West Side of Los Angeles with a few hours to kill, so we decided to head down to Marina del Rey as I had never before done any stalking there. I ended up absolutely falling in love with the seaside community, especially its downtown shopping area where I know I could have done some serious damage to my credit cards had the GC not been with me. Anyway, one of the area locations that had long been listed in my trusty stalking notebook was The Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey hotel, which had made an appearance in the 1998 remake of The Parent Trap. So I dragged the GC right on over there as soon as we got into town. Flash forward to this past February when I was checking out fellow stalker Geoff’s 90210Locations website and, let me tell you, I just about fell out of my chair when I saw that the hotel had been featured prominently in a recent episode of the series. Now, as you all know, I watch 90210 religiously and am always keeping my eye out for locations, but, for whatever reason, I had somehow not recognized the place at all! Am I losing my touch here? Winking smile

The Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey is situated on a 5.6-acre plot of land directly overlooking the picturesque marina from which the town gets its name. With its dark paneled walls, marble floors, and huge floral arrangements, the beautiful hotel reminded me quite a bit of The Langham Huntington in Pasadena, which, not so coincidentally, was formerly owned by the Ritz-Carlton Corporation. Needless to say, I fell in love with the place on the spot and so wanted to book a room and spend the night there, but the GC was having absolutely none of that. Shocking, I know. Winking smile

The Ritz-Carlton Marina del Rey, which is Los Angeles’ only waterside AAA Five Diamond hotel, features 304 guest rooms, each with its own “Juliet” balcony, tennis courts, marina and city views, over 30,000 square feet of event space, a fitness center, and a Michelin-recommend restaurant. According to the hotel’s website, it also boasts “L.A.’s only waterfront pool and whirlpool” (pictured above). Besides being a filming location, the place is also a big-time celebrity hot spot. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there include Adrian Grenier, John Travolta, Johnny Depp, Bridget Marquardt, Brooke Shields, Chris Henchy, Zac Efron, The Bachelorette’s DeAnna Pappas and then fiancé Jesse Csincsak, Brad Garrett, Mary Hart, Halle Berry, Hulk Hogan, Dave Annable, Odette Annable, Jason Lewis, Jason Mraz, Scott Caan, Paul Bettany, and Steve Carell. Snoop Dogg and childhood sweetheart Shante Taylor got married there in 1997. And pop star Britney Spears is a regular guest. In fact, these famous (and oh-so-classy) photos of BritBrit and then fiance Kevin Federline were taken on one of the hotel’s balconies.

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In the Season 4 episode of 90210 titled “No Good Deed”, the Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey, popped up twice. The hot tub area was first used as the spot where Naomi Clark (AnnaLynne McCord), wearing a very skimpy, blue cut-out bathing suit (and I’m telling you, if I had that body, I’d be wearing that bathing suit every single day of my life!), convinced movie star Mitchell Nash (Will Kemp) to let her throw a party for him.

That spa area is pictured above.

Later in the episode, the hotel’s pool area was the site of the Hillingsbrook Foundation’s “Clean Up Castillo Bay” charity event which Annie Wilson (Shenae Grimes) hosted.

The spot where Liam Court (my love Matt Lanter) rescued the drowning girl is located just outside of the pool area, in the Marina del Rey harbor.

The scene where the event’s silent auction was held was also most likely filmed at the Ritz, although I did not see any areas which resembled the screen captures above while I was there, nor can I find any similar-looking rooms on the hotel’s website.

In the 1998 remake of The Parent Trap, the Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey’s pool stood in for the pool of the fictional “The Stafford Hotel”. Interestingly enough, two other spots were also used to masquerade as The Stafford in the flick – the exterior was the Treasure Island Administration Building in San Francisco and the interior scenes were filmed at the Langham Huntington Hotel in Pasadena.

The Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey was also used extensively in the Season 5 episode of Dexter titled “Take It”, as the hotel where Jordan Chase (Angelina Jolie’s ex-husband Jonny Lee Miller) hosted his “Take It” convention. Quite a few areas of the hotel were used in the episode, including the exterior;

The Ritz-Carlton Ballroom, which you can see a photograph of here;

one of hotel’s outdoor terraces;

The Ritz-Carlton Suite, which you can see a photograph of here;

and two neighboring 7th floor suites.

Big THANK YOU to Geoff, from the 90210Locations website, for informing me of the hotel’s 90210 connection! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey, from the “No Good Deed” episode of 90210, the “Take It” episode of Dexter, and The Parent Trap remake, is located at 4375 Admiralty Way in Marina del Rey. You can visit the hotel’s official website here.