Tag: filming locations

Seattle’s Fairmont Olympic Hotel

Another location that I stalked back in May while visiting the Pacific Northwest was the famous Fairmont Olympic Hotel located in Downtown Seattle. The Olympic is a landmark Seattle building that has appeared in countless productions over the years and has played host to dozens of celebrities in its almost ninety-year history, so there was no way I was going to miss stalking it while visiting the area! The hotel, which first opened on December 6, 1924, was built on the former site of the University of Washington on an area of land known as the “Metropolitan Tract”. The Tract, which encompasses four square blocks, was donated to the University in 1861 by Arthur Denny, one of Seattle’s original founders, and is still owned by the school to this day. In the early 1920s, following the end of World War I, the Seattle Chamber of Commerce put together a committee dedicated to developing a luxury hotel in the downtown area. It was quickly decided that the hotel would be built on the former University of Washington site, which at the time was being leased out by the Metropolitan Building Company. After several battles with the Regents, construction of the hotel, which was made possible through a public bond drive, finally began on April 1, 1923.   Architectural firms George B. Post & Sons and Bebb & Gould were chosen to design the property, and construction, the cost of which totaled around $5.5 million, was completed in November of 1924. Amazingly enough, the property still looks very much the same today as it did when it first opened its doors over eight decades ago!

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The Olympic Hotel was constructed using only the finest materials including American Oak, granite, terra cotta, and Belgian marble. The room furnishings alone cost over $800,000 – and we’re talking 1920’s money! The hotel became an immediate success and despite suffering some economic loss during the Great Depression remains one of Seattle’s finest hotels to this day and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. That same year, management of the Olympic was taken over by the Four Seasons Group, who immediately commandeered a $60 million restoration of the property during which the number of guest rooms was actually reduced, in order to make suites larger and more comfortable. The hotel re-opened as the Four Seasons Olympic in 1981. In 2003, management of the property once again changed hands, this time with the Fairmont Hotels and Resorts group taking over, after which point the hotel became known as the Fairmont Olympic. And, as you can see in the above photographs, the property is absolutely breathtaking inside!

I honestly cannot recommend stalking the Olympic enough – not only is it beautiful, but the staff truly could NOT have been nicer! The concierge on duty spent about ten minutes speaking with me about the filming that has taken place on the premises over the years and even gifted me with this awesome Reel Life in Seattle film locations map. So darn cool!



And, in a lucky twist of fate, the property’s famed Spanish Ballroom happened to be unlocked while we were stalking the Olympic, so we got to go inside and take a quick peek at it.

The Fairmont Olympic Hotel has long played host to the rich and famous, including foreign dignitaries, presidents, and celebrities. A few who have stayed there over the years include Herbert Hoover, John F. Kennedy, Jimmy Hoffa, Elvis Presley, Joan Crawford, John Glenn, Bing Crosby, John Wayne, and Bob Hope. Most recently, Twilight actor Jackson Rathbone checked in to do some publicity for his new movie The Last Airbender.

And, as I mentioned above, the Olympic is also a filming location! In the 1994 thriller Disclosure, Tom Sanders (aka Michael Douglas) goes to the Fairmont to break into the room where his co-worker John Conley Jr. is staying in order to gain access to the “Arcamax” – a cutting-edge, digital reality machine.

According to the concierge that we spoke with, the hotel, which was then operated by the Four Seasons, was still using actual keys at the time and not key cards as was portrayed in the movie. For the scene in which John was shown fiddling with his key card, producers had to bring in a fake card reader to attach to one of the hotel’s real life doors. So cool!



In the 1987 thriller House of Games, con-man Mike (aka Joe Mantegna) and psychologist Margaret Ford (aka Lindsay Crouse) sneak into Room 1138 of the Four Seasons Olympic Hotel. It’s absolutely amazing to me that the property still looks so similar today to how it appeared in a movie which was filmed over 23 years ago!!!! At the time, much of the Olympic’s rich wood wall paneling was covered over with white paint, but otherwise the interior looks exactly the same today as it did then! So darn cool!



In 1987’s Black Widow, the Olympic was the Seattle hotel where murderess Catharine Peterson (aka Theresa Russell) holed up while trying to trap her latest mark.

The Olympic’s pool, which you can see a photograph of here, was also used in Black Widow as the spa where journalist Alex Barnes (aka Debra Winger) interviewed Etta (aka Diane Ladd) about her brother’s untimely death.

The Olympic’s former Seneca Street entrance also appeared very briefly in the 1989 flick The Fabulous Baker Boys. And the 1973 movie Harry in your Pocket, which starred James Coburn as a pickpocket, was also filmed at the hotel.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Fairmont Olympic Hotel is located at 411 University Street in Seattle. You can visit the hotel’s official website here.

August 31, 2010
Drew Barrymore’s Childhood Home

A few weeks ago, Drew Barrymore aficionado Ashley, from The Drewseum website, asked me and fellow stalker Owen for some help in tracking down the home where the young E.T. star lived from 1984 through 1988. Over the years, Ashley had accumulated a few clues as to the property’s location, mostly from Drew’s autobiography Little Girl Lost, which was published in 1990. In the book, co-author Todd Gold describes the house as “a lovely two-bedroom ranch-style home in Sherman Oaks, a comfortable upper-class neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley”. With that vague bit of information, Ashley tried to track down the residence’s location, but didn’t have much success. Then a few weeks ago, while looking at the Drew Barrymore Brasil fansite, she happened upon the above photograph of Drew from a 1987 photo shoot in which the then 12-year old actress was photographed while standing in front of her home.   And, lo and behold, an address number (4002) was visible! YAY! I just have to say here that I would absolutely die if I ever came across a photograph of my girl Jen A. standing in front of her childhood home. What I wouldn’t give to be able to stalk that residence! Anyway, armed with an address number, a city, and a picture of the front of the house, Owen set about tracking down the residence using aerial maps and Google Street View. And, amazingly enough, about ten minutes later he had an address for us. As it turns out, Drew’s former dwelling is not actually located in Sherman Oaks as author Todd Gold had described, but in the neighboring suburb of Studio City. In Todd’s defense though, the house is located right on the border of Sherman Oaks and Studio City and, for whatever reason, city boundary lines quite often get blurred in that area.

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Once Owen told me the address, I immediately dragged the Grim Cheaper – and both of my parents, for that matter – out to stalk the property. And I am VERY happy to report that it still looks much the same today, over 23 years later!, as it did in the photograph from Drew’s photo shoot.



Sadly, though, quite a bit of foliage has grown since the days when Drew called the place home, so I wasn’t able to take a picture that exactly matched Drew’s childhood photograph. The one pictured above was my best effort.



As you can see in the above photographs, though, several aspects of the house match up to Drew’s childhood picture, including the white door located next to the garage, the brick front stairwell, and the popped-out picture window located next to the front door. I was so hoping that the 4002 address post would still be standing at the front of the house, but alas that was not to be.





You can also see in the above aerial views that both the shape of the home’s pool and the shape of its deck area match the pictures taken during Drew’s 1987 photo shoot perfectly.

Drew’s former home is surprisingly normal-looking, especially considering that the E.T. phenomenon was living there during the height of her childhood fame. Of the home, Todd Gold says, “Compared to the West Hollywood bungalow they left behind, the move marked a significant leap up the economic ladder. Not that the Barrymores were rich. Not even close. But they were comfortable, and for the first time they were no longer encumbered by the constant worry of making ends meet each month”. The home, which was built in 1951, boasts two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and 1,763 square feet of living space. Drew’s mom, Jaid, sold the house in the summer of 1988 in order to move into a smaller condominium which was easier to maintain being that Drew was spending the majority of her time on location filming movies.

The above photographs were also taken at the star’s former home at what I’m guessing was around the year 1985.

On a side note – I just finished reading Little Girl Lost, Drew’s autobiography which she wrote in the winter of 1988 at the tender age of 14. For those who have yet to read the memoir, I highly recommend it! Drew’s story is absolutely heartbreaking at times, but it is also incredibly empowering and uplifting. I have always liked the actress, but I have such a massive amount of respect for her now after reading her story. It is absolutely mindboggling to me that she hit rock bottom at such a young age and then was able to somehow pull herself together after experiencing such a tumultuous childhood. She truly is an amazing person.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Owen for finding this location and to fellow stalker Ashley, from the Drewseum website, for challenging him to do so!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Drew Barrymore’s childhood home is located at 4002 Ethel Avenue in Studio City.

August 30, 2010
Franklin Library from “Beautiful Girls”

The final Beautiful Girls filming location that I stalked while visiting Minnesota this past May was the library where Tommy “Birdman” Rowland (aka Matt Dillon) met up with his married girlfriend Darian Smalls (aka Lauren Holly) and her daughter, Kristen (aka Sarah Katz), towards the end of the flick. I found this location, once again, thanks to fellow stalker Owen and his Beautiful Girls master locations list. And even though it was only featured in a very brief scene in the movie, for whatever reason, I was absolutely DYING to stalk the place. Unfortunately though, we ended up stalking it during our last day in the North Star State and it happened to be POURING rain at the time, which is why I look like such a dork in the above photograph.

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The Franklin Library first opened almost a century ago thanks to a gift from philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. In 1912, the Scottish-American businessman decided to donate $125,000 to the Minneapolis Public Library in order to build four new area branches. The Franklin Community Library, which was designed by New York architect Edward L. Tilton, was the first of those branches to be constructed. The land on which the library now stands was donated to the city by Minneapolis real estate tycoon Sumner T. McKnight. The Renaissance Revival-style building, which cost $41,000 to construct, first opened in August of 1914 and had its formal dedication ceremony on January 29, 1915. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000 and, while it underwent an extensive renovation in 2005, I am very happy to report that it still looks almost the same today as it did when it first opened.

And the staff there literally could NOT have been nicer – once they got over their initial confusion of why I was stalking the place, at least. Like the cashier working the front register at the Marine General Store in Marine on Saint Croix, which I had stalked just a few days beforehand, when I first asked about the filming of Beautiful Girls, the librarians on duty mistakenly thought that I wanted to rent the flick, not take pictures of where it had been filmed. 😉 Once they understood my purpose for being there, though, they were highly amused and one of them offered to take me and my parents on a mini-tour of the premises and then photocopied a bunch of historic information about the library for me to take home. Yay!

In Beautiful Girls, Tommy and Darian meet up, and then subsequently break up, while sitting in front of one of the library’s massively-large fireplaces. Because the library has no less than four similarly-looking fireplaces, though, pinpointing the exact one where filming took place proved to be a bit of a challenge. But after taking photographs of each of them and comparing those photographs to screen captures from the movie, I can say with 99.9% certainty that the east fireplace is the one which appeared in the movie.

As you can see in the above photographs, though, the fireplace and its surrounding area look a bit different today than they did back in 1996 when Beautiful Girls was filmed. According to the librarian that I spoke with, both the east fireplace and the one located directly across from it were restored back to their original 1914 state during the library’s 2005 renovation.

The super-cute student film Butterflies was also shot on location at the Franklin Library.

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Franklin Library from Beautiful Girls is located at 1314 East Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The scene between Birdman and Darian was filmed in front of the library’s east fireplace, which is adjacent to the American Indian book collection. You can visit the library’s official website here.

August 19, 2010
Nate ‘n Al’s Delicatessen

One location that I have been wanting to stalk for quite some time now is the historic Nate ‘n Al Delicatessen in Beverly Hills, but because I don’t get out to that area very often, the restaurant had remained an unchecked item on my extremely long “To-Stalk” list for over a year. Until a couple of weeks ago, that is, when I finally dragged my fiancé to grab a bite to eat there after we had stalked Will Rogers Memorial Park from 90210, which is located nearby. And I have to say that the place was definitely worth the wait! Although rather pricey (despite what some online reviews might state), the landmark restaurant serves up some FABULOUS food. And thanks to its huge deli counter, brown leather booths, and pastrami sandwiches stacked as high as the eye can see, eating there was like visiting a little slice of New York City right here in Southern California.

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Nate ‘n Al’s has been a veritable institution in Beverly Hills ever since it first opened way back on May 24, 1945. The deli was founded by Al Mendelson and Nate Reimer, who originally met while working at Boesky’s Deli in Chicago. The two entrepreneurs eventually decided to open their very own deli-style restaurant a few years later and figured LaLaLand was just the place to do so. At the time of its founding, the restaurant was Beverly Hills’ sole delicatessen and could only accommodate a scant 30 patrons. It became such an immediate success, though, that it was later expanded to its current, larger size which can hold up to 120 diners. Nate retired just a few years after the restaurant’s opening, but Al stayed on to helm the place and it is his ancestors who are still running it today. And I am happy to report that the restaurant is still going strong. According to this 2005 Daily News article, each year Nate ‘n Al’s serves up 130,000 matzo balls, 16,000 gallons of chicken noodle soup, and 80,000 pounds of corned beef! As I stated above, the food is phenomenal, but it’s also fairly expensive, so be prepared.

Because of its fabulous food and laid-back attitude, Nate ‘n Al’s has long been a celebrity magnet. You won’t find any autographed pictures decorating the establishment’s walls, though, because as founder Al Mendelson advised: “If you want them in the booths, keep them off the walls.” 😉 Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there over the years include Max Mutchnick (one of the co-creators of Will & Grace), Lew Wasserman, Suzanne Pleshette, Tom Poston, Robert Wagner, Neil Diamond, Jon Voight, Doris Day, Nicollette Sheridan, Jay Leno, Roseanne Bar, Adam Sandler, Dick Van Dyke, Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Jodie Foster, Nancy Sinatra, Courteney Cox, Rodney Dangerfield, Kareem Abdul Jabar, Tony Curtis, Sharon Osbourne, and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Television host Larry King loves the place so much that he not only dines there every single morning (not kidding!), but he also purchased his house in Beverly Hills for the sole reason that it was within walking distance of the deli! Love it!

And while we didn’t spot any celebs while dining there, fellow stalker Karen was lucky enough to be seated next to Jason Reitman on a recent visit to the deli. Her daughter snapped the above photo of the Juno director on the down-low during their meal. Love it! Jason wasn’t the only celeb that Karen and her daughter spotted at Nate ‘n Al’s that day, though – Larry King and Clint Howard were also dining at the time. Lucky girls! As Karen said, talk about “hitting a trifecta”! From what I’ve heard, the best time to spot celebs at Nate ‘n Al’s is in the morning, which means I’ve gotta go back there sometime soon to grab some breakfast!

And the place is also a filming location! In the Season 5 episode of Entourage titled “The All Out Fall Out”, Nate ‘n Al’s is the spot where Vinnie Chase (aka Adrian Grenier) finds out from his business manager that he may need to file for bankruptcy. The 1957 flick Pal Joey, which starred Frank Sinatra and Rita Hayworth, was also filmed at the historic restaurant.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Nate ‘n Al Delicatessen, from Entourage, is located at 414 North Beverly Boulevard in Beverly Hills. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here.

August 18, 2010
Holly’s Nashua House from “The Office”

Another location from The Office that I stalked recently was the supposed Nashua, New Hampshire-area house that Holly Flax moved into in the Season 5 episode titled “Employee Transfer”. I found this location, yet again, thanks to fellow stalker Owen who went on a mission a while back to try to track down as many Office locales as possible. So, thank you, Owen! Ironically enough, though, I actually didn’t need his help on this one because as soon as I first saw the “Employee Transfer” episode, I was fairly certain that the Nashua house scenes had been filmed either on or near Carroll Avenue in the Angelino Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles – an area which boasts the city’s largest concentration of Victorian-era homes. I was already quite familiar with Carroll Avenue and its architecture as the haunted house from Michael Jackson’s Thriller video and the Halliwell residence from the television series Charmed are both located there. And, sure enough, my stalking instincts were right on! While Holly’s house is not actually located on Carroll Avenue, it can be found just around the corner from it.

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In the “Employee Transfer” episode, Michael Scott (aka Steve Carell) and Darryl Philbin (aka the hilarious Craig Robinson) move Michael’s girlfriend Holly Flax (aka Amy Ryan) into her new home in Nashua, after she has been transferred back to the Dunder Mifflin branch where she formerly worked.

And I am very happy to report that the residence looks EXACTLY the same in person as it did on the show. Holly’s house is absolutely GORGEOUS and it is not very hard to see why producers chose to film there, although, in my mind at least, it looks far more like a San Francisco-area home than one that would be found in Nashua. I’ve never been to New Hampshire, though, so don’t quote me on that one. 😉

Holly’s Nashua house, which is known as the Jesse Hall Residence in real life, actually has quite a bit of history to it, as do most properties in the neighborhood. The Hall Residence was designed by contractor John M. Skinner in 1887 for $6,000 and it is a carbon copy of the property located directly to the east of it, which is known as the Henry G. Hall Residence. Because the homes are identical in appearance and were both owned by families with the last name of Hall, they are known in architectural circles as “the Hall Twins”. And while the house was originally a single-family dwelling, in 1915 Jesse Hall’s son, Tracey, transformed the property into a duplex and it remains so to this day. The Hall Twins were both designated Historic-Cultural Monuments in June of 1979. You can read more about their history on the Big Orange Landmarks blog here.

On an Office side note – EW Magazine is reporting that Amy Ryan will be back for a whopping eight episodes during the show’s upcoming seventh season. YAY! You can watch a clip of Amy appearing on fave show Chelsea Lately in which she talks about how she landed her recurring role as Michael Scott’s love interest Holly Flax. Apparently, after she was nominated for an Oscar for the movie Gone, Baby, Gone, she told her agent that she wanted to use her newfound Hollywood clout to land a guest spot on The Office, which was her favorite show. She ended up landing the part of Holly and when she arrived on the set the first day and told Rainn Wilson the story of how she booked the role, he told her “You really should aim higher.” LOL I first watched that interview long before I had ever seen an episode of The Office and remember being absolutely fascinated by the fact that Amy loved the show THAT much. But now that I’ve become an Office devotee, I TOTALLY get it. If I was nominated for an Oscar, I, too, would so try to use my clout to land a role on that show. 🙂

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Holly Flax’s Nashua house from The Office is located at 1347 Kellam Avenue in the Angelino Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles. The house from Michael Jackson’s Thriller video is located just around the corner at 1345 Carroll Avenue and the Charmed residence is located at 1329 Carroll Avenue.

August 17, 2010
The Athenian Inn from “Sleepless in Seattle”

Another location at the very top of my Must-Stalk-While-in-the-Pacific-Northwest list was the Athenian Inn Seafood Restaurant and Bar, which made a brief, but quite memorable appearance in the 1993 romantic comedy Sleepless in Seattle. I had been absolutely dying to stalk the restaurant for what seemed like years for a couple of reasons. One, because as I’ve mentioned before, Sleepless has long been one of my very favorite movies. And two, because fellow stalker Kerry had previously visited the place and told me that there were numerous photographs of the filming displayed on the restaurant’s walls. As you can imagine, I could NOT wait to see those photographs for myself! So, after grabbing a coffee at the very first Starbucks store, which I blogged about a couple of weeks ago, Kerry, her husband Jim, the Grim Cheaper, and I all headed across the street to Pike Place Market, where the Athenian Inn has been located for over a century. Yes, you read that right! The Athenian Inn, which was founded by the three Pappadakis brothers, who hailed from Greece – hence the “Athenian” in the name – first opened over one hundred years ago, in 1909. Originally a bakery/candy shop/luncheonette, the establishment later transformed into a bar (in 1933, it was one of the first places in Seattle to be granted a liquor license to serve wine and beer) and then eventually into a full-blown restaurant. In 1964, the Inn was purchased by Bob and Louise Cromwell, who added a lounge and a balcony to the premises, and although Bob passed away in 2002, Louise still owns and manages the place to this day. You can read a more comprehensive history of the restaurant here.

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In Sleepless in Seattle, the Athenian Inn was the restaurant where Sam Baldwin (aka Tom Hanks) and his friend Jay (aka Rob Reiner) discussed dating in the ‘90s, “cute butts”, and the mystery that is tiramisu. And even though the scene that was filmed there took up only one minute and thirty-eight seconds of screen time, it made such an impact on the movie-going public that seventeen years later the place is STILL one of Seattle’s top tourist attractions! Isn’t that amazing?!?! Less than two minutes of screen time in a movie that is almost two decades old and the restaurant is still drawing crowds! INCREDIBLE! It reminds me of what happened with Magnolia Bakery in New York – a cupcakery that appeared in a one minute and seventeen second scene from an episode of Sex and the City which first aired over a decade ago, and fans are STILL lining up around the block to catch a glimpse of the place. I think it is so incredibly cool when a movie or television show creates such a monumental impact like that! But I digress.

The Sleepless in Seattle scene that was filmed at the Athenian Inn was shot at the northwest corner of the restaurant’s counter, right near the main entrance.



Not that I really need to explain that here, though, because the restaurant actually has plaques which denote the exact location where filming took place. How incredibly cool is that???? Oh, how I wish EVERY filming location would honor its cinematic history by doing something similar. LOVE IT!!! LOVE IT!!! LOVE IT!!!

And fellow stalker Kerry and I, of course, just had to recreate the Sleepless scene while we were there!

Thankfully, little has changed at the Athenian Inn in the more than 17 years since Sleepless was filmed there and the place looks pretty much EXACTLY the same today as it did then.

In fact, from what I’ve been able to discern, it seems that not much has been changed in the more than hundred years since the historic restaurant first opened. The neon sign that was first hung over the establishment’s front door by the Pappadakis brothers in 1933 is still hanging in the very same spot to this day! So darn cool!

I honestly cannot recommend stalking the Athenian Inn enough! The food was great, the prices reasonable, the views of Elliot Bay amazing, and the staff super friendly. Not to mention the many nods to the restaurant’s cinematic history which are proudly displayed on the walls. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Athenian Inn from Sleepless in Seattle is located at 1517 Pike Place, inside Pike Place Market, in Seattle. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here. In Sleepless, Tom Hanks and Rob Reiner sat at the northwest corner of the restaurant’s counter.

August 16, 2010
The Bistro Garden

A couple of weeks ago, while searching online for different filming locations from The Office, I came across some information about an area restaurant which not only appeared in The Office, but in countless other productions over the years, as well – the Bistro Garden in Studio City. So, I, of course, dragged the Grim Cheaper right out to stalk it that very weekend! And I think it is safe to say that we both pretty much fell in love with the place immediately upon arriving! The Bistro Garden was first opened by Carolyn Niklas Pappas, the daughter of famed restaurateur Kurt Niklas (who founded the enormously popular celebrity hotspots Bistro and the original Bistro Garden in Beverly Hills) and her husband Gregory Pappas in 1990. Two decades later, the place is still one of the Valley’s most popular restaurants – and definitely its most romantic! According to this 2009 Los Angeles Times article, restaurant reviewer Max Jacobson said of the Bistro Garden that it “may have been the most beautiful restaurant he had ever dined in”. And he wasn’t exaggerating – the place is exquisite.

The Bistro Garden, which according to its website was modeled after a “European Wintergarden”, features a central indoor courtyard with a huge, peaked skylight roof, large French doors, and a perimeter of potted trees covered in twinkle lights, all of which give off the feeling of being outside in some sort of magical garden oasis. And I swear they must pump some sort of rose fragrance through the air conditioning vents, because the place smells like fresh cut flowers – it’s AMAZING!

The restaurant’s wood-paneled mahogany bar area, where the Grim Cheaper and I ate, definitely evokes a feeling of Old Hollywood, especially with the Michael Buble and Frank Sinatra music that plays in the background. Love it! 🙂 The staff also could NOT have been friendlier and answered all of my silly little questions about the filming that has taken place there over the years. Oh, and the food was absolutely incredible, too! And even though the restaurant is a bit pricey, the Grim Cheaper thoroughly enjoyed himself and said he can’t wait to go back! That in and of itself is a testament to how good the place is.

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In the Season 6 episode of The Office titled “Double Date”, the Bistro Garden stood in for Paparazzo’s (LOL!), the Italian restaurant where Michael Scott (aka Steve Carell) hosted a birthday luncheon for Pam’s (aka Jenna Fischer’s) mom, Helene (aka Linda Purl). It is there that Michael decides that Helene, at age 58, is far too old for him and promptly breaks up with her . . . in the middle of her birthday lunch.

Steve Carell also filmed a scene from 2005’s The 40-Year-Old Virgin at the Bistro Garden – the scene in which his character Andy attends a Date-A-Palooza speed-dating event.

Randomly enough, The Office’s Mindy Kaling also made an appearance in that scene.

In 2010’s Valentine’s Day, the Bistro Garden was the spot where Julia Fitzpatrick (aka Jennifer Garner) confronted her boyfriend, Dr. Harrison Copeland (aka Patrick Dempsey), after finding out that he was married.

In 1997’s Liar Liar, the Bistro Garden was the spot where Jerry (aka Cary Elwes) proposed to Audrey (aka Maura Tierney).

Bistro Garden has popped up twice in Desperate Housewives. In the Season 2 episode titled “Remember (1)”, the restaurant’s bar area was where Gabrielle Solis (aka Eva Longoria Parker) discovered (wrongly) via a newscast that her husband Carlos (aka Ricardo Chavira) had died in a car accident.

The restaurant was also where Zach Young (aka Cody Kasch) unveiled himself to be Gabrielle’s secret admirer in the Season 3 episode of Desperate Housewives titled “Not While I’m Around”.

The Bistro Garden also showed up twice on fave show Beverly Hills, 90210 – first in the Season 8 episode titled “Toil and Trouble” as the spot where Cooper Hargrove (aka Christopher Orr) gifted Valerie Malone (aka Tiffani Amber-Thiessen) with a diamond necklace.

And second in the Season 10 episode titled “Laying Pipe”. But in actuality only the exterior of the Bistro Garden was featured in the “Laying Pipe” episode.

As you can see in the above screen captures, the interior filming took place elsewhere. The restaurant was also featured in an episode of Melrose Place, but because I didn’t really watch that show, I am unsure of exactly which episode.

Bistro Garden is also something of a celebrity hotspot, as well. Just a few of the celebs who have been spotted dining there recently include Taylor Lautner, Taylor Swift, and Steve Carell.

On a side note – I will not be publishing a new blog post for tomorrow, or for the next two Fridays.  Because of my upcoming wedding, I wrote all of my August blog posts in advance and unfortunately was only able to get enough done to publish four each week. But I will be back on Monday with a whole new post. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Bistro Garden is located at 12950 Ventura Boulevard in Studio City. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here.

August 12, 2010
The “Date Night” House

Last night, the Grim Cheaper and I sat down to watch the movie Date Night which FINALLY came out on DVD this week. We somehow missed seeing the flick in theatres when it first came out in April and I have been not-so-patiently waiting for it to be released on DVD ever since. Especially since Mike, from MovieShotsLA, tracked down the house which belonged to Phil and Claire Foster (played by Steve Carell and Tina Fey, respectively) in it over four months ago. Because I suffer from the need for immediate gratification, I actually stalked the place immediately after Mike told me its location and, as you can imagine, have been ABSOLUTELY DYING to see the movie ever since – even though the previews didn’t look especially promising. I have to say that I was very pleasantly surprised while watching it, too – despite what the reviews said, Date Night is a really cute movie! It’s heartwarming and sweet and laugh-out-loud funny. Not to mention the fact that Tina Fey and Steve Carell are exceptional in it! Loved it, loved it, loved it! But I digress!

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Mike tracked down the Date Night house pretty much immediately after seeing the movie in theatres. He knew from the get-go that the supposed New Jersey-area home was actually located somewhere in Pasadena thanks to these JFX Online paparazzi photos taken of Tina Fey and Leighton Meester during the filming. He also spotted an address number of “620” while watching the movie and from there used Google Street View to search all of the 600 blocks in the Pasadena area until he found the right residence. Thank you, Mike!



The Foster house actually shows up only a few times in Date Night, most notably in the ending scene in which Phil and Claire return home after their disastrous date in New York City.



And I am very happy to report that not only does the home look exactly the same in person as it did in the movie, but it is also ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE. In fact, it is almost too adorable. Had Mike not found the property’s real life location and had I not seen the place with my own two eyes, I would have been absolutely convinced that it was a fake house located on a studio backlot somewhere in Hollywood. The residence has that “studio” feel to it even in person and looks like it belongs on Wisteria Lane and not in the real world. 😉

As you can see in these photographs of the inside of the home, the real life interior of the property was also used in the filming.

And, ironically enough, the “Byzantine/Mediterranean” house that Claire tries to sell at the beginning of Date Night is located right next door to the Foster home, which makes things convenient for us stalkers.

On a Date Night side note – If you haven’t yet watched the bloopers reel featured at the end of the flick, you REALLY need to and can do so by clicking above. They are absolutely hilarious and really show how much fun the movie must have been to work on. It was actually watching stuff like this that first made me want to be an actor. Yes, the hours are long and the work is tedious, but in what other kind of career does one get to laugh as much as this??? 🙂

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for finding these locations! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Phil and Claire Foster’s house from Date Night is located at 620 Vallombrosa Drive in Pasadena. The home that Claire tries to sell at the beginning of the movie is located right next door at 608 Vallombrosa Drive.

August 11, 2010
Jessica’s House from “Sleepless in Seattle”

One of the locations that I was most excited about stalking while visiting Seattle this past May was the home where Jonah Baldwin’s (aka Ross Malinger’s) best friend Jessica (aka Gaby Hoffman) lived in fave movie Sleepless in Seattle. Fellow stalker David, who I had the pleasure of meeting and doing some stalking with during my brief three-day vacation, managed to track down Jessica’s house just about a week before I headed up to the Pacific Northwest. He found the locale after posting an inquiry on this area filming locations thread on the West Seattle Blog website. David had spent quite a bit of time trying to find the house on his own without much luck, so thankfully the West Seattle Blog readers offered to lend a hand and through some amazing detective work came up with the right address. YAY! So, I immediately put the home high up on my must-stalk-while-in-Seattle-list and could NOT have been more excited about seeing it!

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The exterior of Jessica’s house was actually only featured in one very brief scene in Sleepless in Seattle in which BFF’s Jonah and Jessica mail a letter to Annie Reed (aka Meg Ryan) which they have written on behalf of Jonah’s father, Sam Baldwin (aka Tom Hanks). After putting the forged letter in Jessica’s mailbox, the two sit on her front porch and wait for the mailman to come pick it up.

Even though the home appeared only once, and very briefly at that, I was still absolutely floored over seeing it in person because, as I’ve mentioned before, Sleepless in Seattle is one of my very favorite movies of all time. And I am happy to report that Jessica’s house still looks very much the same today as to how it appeared onscreen in Sleepless, which is pretty darn amazing being that filming took place over 17 years ago! Sadly, though, the mailbox where Jessica and Jonah mailed Annie’s letter is not there in real life. I am fairly certain that it was never truly a part of the house, but was a prop that was brought in solely for the filming. 🙁 So sad! Also missing, of course, was Jessica’s mom’s “Four Winds” travel agency sign that was displayed on the home’s front porch in the movie.

I am fairly certain that the actual interior of the house was used in the filming, as well.

According to a comment posted by a West Seattle Blog reader named “westseattledood”, a home located just a few doors down from Jessica’s stood in for the Chicago-area residence where Sam and Jonah lived during the beginning of Sleepless. Only the interior of that house was shown in the movie in the scene in which Sam’s sister, Suzy (aka Rita Wilson), tells Sam how to prepare the food she has made for him.

And even though the residence’s exterior was never shown in Sleepless, since we were less than a block away, I just had to stalk that property, too! 🙂

Big THANK YOU to David and to the West Seattle Blog readers for their help in finding these locations! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Jessica’s house from Sleepless in Seattle is located at 1816 4th Avenue North in the Queen Anne neighborhood of Seattle. The home used for the interiors of Sam and Jonah’s Chicago residence can be found just down the street at 1701 4th Avenue North.

August 10, 2010
My “Sex and the City” Bachelorette Party

As I mentioned in Tuesday’s blog, this past weekend I headed up to Northern California to celebrate my final days of singlehood with a bachelorette party in San Francisco. My friends Nat and Kylee planned the entire celebration and until I actually arrived at the party site, I had absolutely no idea of what the evening would entail. As it turned out, they had put together a Sex and the City-themed soiree for me which was held at an amazingly chic New York-style loft in the Marquee Loft Building located in the heart of downtown San Francisco.   YAY!

When I first walked into the loft, Nat and Kylee had the Sex and the City theme song blasting from the TV in the living room, but I have to admit that I was so in awe of the actual loft that I didn’t even notice the music and therefore had no idea of the night’s theme.

The loft was simply AMAZING and walking in I truly felt like I had stepped into a residence in New York. The place was decorated so perfectly and was just so Sex and the City-ish, that I should have known right away what my friends had in store for me, but the blonde in me had taken over I guess, because I am ashamed to admit that I had absolutely no idea.

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Then I walked into the kitchen and immediately noticed the cupcake apron that Charlotte York (aka Kristin Davis) had worn in Sex and the City 2, but even then I STILL didn’t realize the night’s theme! I thought the apron was simply a part of the loft’s cool decor and when I pointed it out to Nat and commented on its movie connection she must have been ready to smack me because she said, “Yes, I KNOW!! I wanted you to feel like you were walking into Charlotte’s kitchen.” How incredibly cute is that????? Nat and Kylee finally explained the theme of the evening to me and needless to say I could NOT have been more excited.



Besides the loft fitting in with the party’s whole Sex and the City theme, the place was also, of course, a filming location! As it turns out, Nelson Moss (aka Keanu Reeves) lived in the Marquee Loft Building, in Unit #702, in the 2001 movie Sweet November.

And while we didn’t stay in the exact unit where filming took place, many elements of our loft, including the front door, living room windows, and kitchen area, were an exact match to Nelson’s loft in the movie.

The Marquee Loft Building, which was built in 1921, originally housed the Don Lee Cadillac Dealership and was designed by Charles Peter Weeks and William Peyton Day, the notable San Francisco architecture team who was also responsible for designing the Mark Hopkins Hotel, the Sir Francis Drake Hotel, and the Huntington Hotel. The former auto dealership, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, was converted into a residential loft building in 1999 and that same year won the San Francisco Business Times award for “Best Rehab of the Year”. My fiancé and I actually currently live in a loft-style apartment, but our entire place could literally fit in the master bedroom of the loft where my bachelorette party was held. 😉



My bachelorette loft, which is a vacation rental, featured two bedrooms (pictured above) and over 1,300 square-feet of living space. I was absolutely DYING over it as it is EXACTLY the type of place that I would love to own someday.

The ultra-chic pad also boasted a private computer office area;

a large living room with a sofa-bed;

and amazing views of the City . . .

. . . especially at night!   Sigh! What I wouldn’t give to live in a place like that!

But my story doesn’t end there! In keeping with the night’s theme, instead of just making a veil for me to wear throughout the evening, as is the norm with bachelorette parties, Kylee constructed an almost exact replica of Carrie’s feathered veil from Sex and the City: The Movie. I was absolutely DYING laughing when she first pulled it out of her bag, as I knew as soon as I saw that flash of blue exactly what it was.

Then to complete the look, she also had a Carrie-style necklace made for me that spelled out the word “Mrs.”, with a diamond stud standing in for the period. LOVE IT! I should really explain here that neither Nat nor Kylee is at all a fan of Sex and the City (in fact, Kylee downright hates the show) so the fact that they came up with all of this stuff is absolutely mind-boggling to me! I mean, I’m like the biggest Sex and the City fan in the entire world and I don’t think I would have thought of any of it!



But the soiree didn’t just involve spending the weekend at an exclusive New York-style loft. My friends also took me to Teatro ZinZanni, which is described on its website as “a bewitching evening of European Cabaret and Cirque, Divas and Madmen, Spectacle and Sensuality with Live Music and Gourmet Five-Course Dinner – set in the nightclub of your dreams!” I had never actually heard of the musical/comedy/dinner theatre show, which is currently celebrating its tenth year in San Francisco, before this past Saturday night, but, let me tell you, the whole thing was RIGHT UP MY ALLEY. The show was absolutely HILARIOUS, the food was AMAZING, and the costumes! Sigh, the costumes! I couldn’t take my eyes off of them! The subject matter of the show changes a few times each year and, as fate would have it, the current theme just happens to be “Love, Chaos, and Couture”, which fit in perfectly with my SATC-themed night. One of the stars of the show also just happened to be actress Liliane Montevecchi, who played Mrs. DeLauer in 2003’s How to Lose A Guy in Ten Days. Teatro ZinZanni was simply AMAZING and I honestly cannot recommend stalking it enough. As my friend Nat says, “It is my favorite thing to do in San Francisco.” And I can honestly say it is now mine, too!

All in all, the evening was spectacular and, as I said to Nat afterwards, she and Kylee could not have planned a more perfect evening for me had I given them a blueprint of what I wanted. 🙂 The following morning, my mom texted me and said that my dad was worried that I might have gotten sick during the party. That cracked Nat and Kylee up to no end and Kylee said sarcastically, “Yeah, ‘cause that would just be so Lindsay.” 😉 No, I did not get sick – the evening was fun, but extremely classy, which is exactly the way I wanted it. 🙂 As I mentioned in Monday’s post, planning this wedding has been a very stressful and trying endeavor, compounded mostly by the fact that my dad has been so sick (and yes, he is sick once again and has to have another surgery today – UGH). But looking at these photographs absolutely warms my heart and makes me realize that, when all is said and done, I am not going to look back on the past few months with irritation at the guests and family members who asked for ridiculous things , the vendors who fell through or messed up, or the invitations that didn’t arrive on time. All of that stuff is trivial. No, I am going to look back and be hit with how incredibly lucky I am to be surrounded by such an exorbitant amount of love in my life. As it turned out the evening’s Sex and the City theme could not have been more apropos, because the thing I thought about most that night was friendship. I have the most incredible group of friends a girl could possibly ever ask for . . . just like Carrie Bradshaw.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Marquee Lofts are located at 151 Alice B. Toklas Place in San Francisco. In Sweet November, Keanu Reeves lived in Loft #702. My bachelorette party was held in Loft #509, which is a vacation rental. You can visit the loft’s rental website here. Teatro ZinZanni is located at Pier 29 on the Embarcadero at Battery Street. You can visit the show’s official website here.

August 5, 2010