filming locations – Page 5

September 17, 2013September 16, 2013

Pharaoh’s Lost Kingdom from “CSI”

While watching the Season 4 episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation titled “Turn of the Screws” way back in May 2004, I became just a wee-bit obsessed with tracking down the theme park that stood in for the supposed Las Vegas-area Sphinx Amusement Park. My mom was the one who ended up locating it for me, thanks to this March 2004 AP news article that she found online. As she discovered, Sphinx Amusement Park was none other than Pharaoh’s Lost Kingdom located at 1101 North California Street in Redlands. And while I proceeded to pass by the property countless times on my way to and from Palm Springs over the years following, for whatever reason, I never stopped to stalk it. Then, two Sundays ago, while driving back to the desert, I convinced the Grim Cheaper to make a quick pit stop there. Sadly though, the site has since been transformed into Splash Kingdom water park and looks quite a bit different than it did nine years ago when CSI was filmed.

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In “Turn of the Screws,” Gil Grissom (William Petersen), Sara Sidle (Jorja Fox), Nick Stokes (George Eads), and Greg Sanders (Eric Szmanda) of the Las Vegas CSI team investigate a roller coaster that has run off its tracks, killing six people, at Sphinx Amusement Park.

The midway area of Pharaoh’s Lost Kingdom was utilized extensively in the episode. Sadly, all of the park’s rides were shut down in 2006 and later removed to make room for a state-of-the-art, 18,000-square-foot wave pool.

The Lost Kingdom’s Screaming Mummy stood in for Pharaoh’s Fever, the derailed roller coaster, in “Turn of the Screws.” The coaster was originally constructed in 1976 as part of Altoona, Iowa’s Adventureland and, at the time, was known as the Super Screamer. In 2000, the 45-foot tall steel ride was sold and transported to Pharaoh’s Lost Kingdom, where it remained in operation until mid-2006. I am unsure of its current whereabouts. You can check out some photographs of the Screaming Mummy from its Redlands days here.

Thankfully, the roller coaster and midway area are still visible via Bing Maps, as you can see below.

Pharaoh’s Lost Kingdom was originally opened in June 1996. The 17-acre Egyptian-themed park boasted four nine-hole miniature golf courses, three race car tracks, water slides, a laser tag arena, an outdoor 2,550-seat amphitheater, an arcade, banquet facilities, a sand beach, and midway rides. In April 2006, the site underwent an operational change and was re-christened Pharaoh’s Theme and Water Park. It was then that the ride portion of the property was closed. Shortly thereafter, Pharaoh’s became the site of all-night raves, infuriating local residents and setting off a messy legal battle between the park’s owner and management that lasted through October 2009. A judge ultimately granted the city of Redland’s request for an injunction against dance parties taking place on the premises and, in 2010, the location re-opened under new management as Pharaoh’s Adventure Park.

In 2012, the theme park was sold to new owners who performed an extensive renovation project which phased out much of the Egyptian theme. The site was re-christened Splash Kingdom and the Sphinx who stands guard at the front entrance given a pair of Ray-Bans to don.

The site still boasts most of its former amenities, such as the miniature golf courses and race car tracks, but has been revamped to include over twenty water slides (one of which, The Anileator, at 90 feet is the world’s tallest enclosed water slide), an upscale sports lounge, a quarter-mile long floating river, a 12,000-square-foot wall-to-wall indoor trampoline park, bumper boats, two activity pools, and the tallest freestanding water attraction tower in the U.S. Because we were on our way back to Palm Springs, we did not actually partake of any of the water slides, but they sure looked fun! I’m sensing a re-stalk in the near future. Winking smile

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Pharaoh’s Lost Kingdom, now Splash Kingdom, from the “Turn of the Screws” episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, is located at 1101 North California Street in Redlands. You can visit the Splash Kingdom website here.

September 16, 2013September 15, 2013

Derek’s Apartment from “Little Black Book”

The Little Black Book location that I was most interested in tracking down was the supposed New Jersey-area apartment building where Derek (Ron Livingston) lived and where his girlfriend, Stacy (Brittany Murphy), spent most of her time. I fell in love with the adorably charming building upon sight when first watching Little Black Book and while it continually lingered on my mind as a must-find spot, because I thought it was located somewhere on the East Coast, I never put much effort into it finding it. Then, a couple of weeks ago, while on my Little Black Book kick, I emailed some screen captures of the building to fellow stalker Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, and he wound up tracking it down – right here in Southern California. Sadly though, the place is no longer standing. As it turns out, Derek’s apartment was located on New England Street at the Universal Studios Hollywood backlot and was, unfortunately, one of the structures that was destroyed during the fire that took place there on June 1, 2008. Because I spent so long wondering about the locale, though, I figured it was still worthy of a blog post.

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As you can see below, in Little Black Book Derek’s building was extremely picturesque and idyllic – so picturesque and idyllic that I really should have realized it would be found on a backlot. In my defense, though, the CGI-ed backdrop of New York City that appeared behind it was pretty darn convincing!

Fortunately, Owen wasn’t so easily tricked. Thanks to the apartment’s backlot-y feel, he realized immediately that it was most likely located at a studio and, since I know both Paramount and Warner Bros. like the back of my hand, decided to start his search at Universal. After scouring countless Flickr images of the backlot, he wound up coming across this picture of Universal’s New York Street area in which a small section of Ron’s building was visible on the left-hand side. Heartbreakingly, it was that area that was destroyed in the 2008 fire. I cannot tell you how devastated I was to learn that I would never be able to stalk this particular locale.

After Owen told me the bad news, I did some Flickr scouring of my own and happened upon the below image on Kevin Garrett’s fabulous photostream in which the front of Ron’s building can be seen on the right. Kevin was even nice enough to allow me to post the picture here. Thank you, Kevin! I also came across this side view image of the façade. As you can see, Ron’s building was very thin in real life and producers added a side section – either via CGI or actual bricks and mortar – to the structure for the Little Black Book shoot.

The interior of Derek’s apartment was also, of course, just a set, built inside of a soundstage at Universal Studios Hollywood.

Owen also clued me in to the fact that the scene in Little Black Book in which Stacy walked Derek’s dog, Bob, at night – and wound up at the home of Derek’s ex-girlfriend, Dr. Rachel Keyes (Rashida Jones) – took place in the New York area of the Universal backlot, as well.

That scene was shot on Brownstone Street, which also, sadly, was burned in the 2008 fire. The area has since been rebuilt, but, unfortunately, does not look anything like it did prior to 2008. You can check out some great photographs of Brownstone Street before the fire and also what it looks like now on the fabulous The Studio Tour website here.

I was floored to discover that the brownstone where Rachel lived in Little Black Book was located right next door to the brownstone where Kevin McCallister (Macaulay Culkin) battled Harry Lime (Joe Pesci) and Marv Merchants (Daniel Stern) in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. The stills pictured below are from Little Black Book . . .

. . . while the ones below are from Home Alone 2.

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

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for finding this location and to Kevin Garrett, with the fabulous Flickr photostream, for sharing his photograph of it. Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Derek’s apartment building from Little Black Book was formerly located on New England Street on the Universal Studios Hollywood backlot. The site was sadly destroyed in a fire on June 1st, 2008 and no longer exists. Brownstone Street, where Dr. Rachel Keyes lived in the movie, was also destroyed in the fire. While the area has been rebuilt, it no longer resembles the neighborhood that appeared onscreen. Universal Studios is located at 100 Universal City Plaza in Universal City. You can visit the theme park’s official website here.

September 13, 2013September 12, 2013

Mission Street from “Little Black Book”

Back in November 2010, a fellow stalker named Clayton wrote a comment on my post about Fair Oaks Pharmacy from Mr. Deeds (which you can read here) alerting me that fave movie Little Black Book and the 1985 classic Back to the Future had also done some filming at the 50s-style soda fountain. And while he was actually wrong on both counts, his comment led me to the discovery that part of the opening sequence from Little Black Book had been filmed just down the road from Fair Oaks Pharmacy, at three different locations along South Pasadena’s picturesque Mission Street. So I ran right out to stalk them. For whatever reason, though, I completely forgot about writing the spots up for a blog post until a couple of weeks ago when I got on my kick of tracking down the remainder of the locales from the flick. Better late than never, though, right?

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Mission Street first popped up in Little Black Book’s opening scene (which was also featured at the end of the movie), in which Stacy (Brittany Murphy) is shown crying, while listening to Carly Simon and blocking what is supposed to be New Jersey city traffic, in her bright yellow Volkswagen bug.

That scene actually took place in front of Ellen’s Silkscreening on the corner of Mission Street and Mound Avenue. As you can see below, a few fake street signs were added for the shoot, but otherwise the location looks pretty much exactly the same in person as it did onscreen.

Mission Street pops up again just a few minutes later in Little Black Book’s opening montage in which Stacy is shown falling in love with her new boyfriend, Derek (Ron Livingston). In one of the montage scenes, the couple goofs around in a store window, making it appear as if they can fly.

That sequence took place in the doorway of Space Arts Center, just a few storefronts east of Ellen’s Silkscreening. I absolutely LOVE that the little bulletin board visible behind Stacy and Derek in the scene is there in real life, albeit in a different color.

Had to do it. Smile

Later in the montage, Stacy and Derek are shown walking Derek’s dog, Bob, in front of a large brick building, also supposedly located in New Jersey.

In reality, that building is the former Mission Arroyo Hotel, located about four blocks west of Space Arts Center. The 1923 structure no longer serves as a hotel, but is a commercial space comprised of offices and shops.

That same building masqueraded as the supposed Haddonfield, Illinois-area Nicol’s Hardware store, where Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and Annie Brackett (Nancy Loomis) ran into Annie’s father, Sheriff Leigh Brackett (Charles Cyphers), while he was investigating the robbery of “some Halloween mask, a rope and a couple of knives” in the 1978 classic horror film Halloween.

As you can see below, the building hasn’t changed much over the years.

The former Mission Arroyo Hotel can also be seen in the background of the 2008 comedy Step Brothers, in the scene in which Brennan Huff (Will Ferrell) and Dale Doback (John C. Reilly), after a failed job interview, realize that their destiny is to start an entertainment company.

And although the camera was facing the opposite direction and the Mission Arroyo Hotel can’t actually be seen, it was at that same intersection that an adult Jenna Rink (Jennifer Garner) dissed her childhood crush, Chris Grandy (Jim Gaffigan), in all-time favorite movie 13 Going on 30. You can read my November 2007 post about that location here.

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

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Clayton whose comment led me to find this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: In the beginning and end of Little Black Book, Stacy’s car is parked in front of Ellen’s Silkscreening, which is located at 1500 Mission Street in South Pasadena. The “flying” window from the movie’s opening montage is the doorway to Space Arts Center at 1506 Mission Street. Later in the montage, Stacy and Derek walk past what is now WOD Gear Clothing Company at the former Mission Arroyo Hotel, which is located at 956 Mission Street. Nicol’s Hardware from Halloween is now Radhika Modern Indian restaurant at 966 Mission Street, also a part of the former Mission Arroyo Hotel. The Mr. Deeds soda fountain, aka Fair Oaks Pharmacy, is located at 1526 Mission Street. And the hardware store from Teen Wolf can be found at 1518 Mission Street, but I have yet to blog about that particular locale.

September 12, 2013March 17, 2019

Phil’s Bar from “Little Black Book”

A couple of weeks ago, I got on a kick of tracking down locations from fave movie Little Black Book. Now I should mention here, before I go any further, that the 2004 romantic comedy really isn’t all that good. I can’t explain why I love it as much as I do, but I think my adoration stems from the fabulous soundtrack and the lead character, Stacy’s (Brittany Murphy), propensity to break out in song. For whatever reason, I find myself watching and re-watching the flick on a fairly regular basis – I just cannot get enough of it! So I was floored when I learned that, while set in New York, the vast majority of the movie was lensed right here in Southern California. One of the locales that I was most interested in finding was the fictional Phil’s Bar, which, as luck would have it, turned out to be a Starbucks – one that I had visited countless times in the past. It just took me a while to realize it.

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In Little Black Book (the storyline of which focuses on how past relationships can come back to haunt us), Stacy is shown walking with her new friend Joyce (Julianne Nicholson) by a place called Phil’s Bar, where they see Stacy’s current boyfriend, Derek (Ron Livingston), through the window. Derek also just so happens to be Joyce’s ex-boyfriend and he is at Phil’s to meet Joyce, not Stacy, for a drink. (Like I said, it’s really not that great of a movie. Winking smile ) While the two women are observing Derek, they walk by a large building that looked to me like it might be a bank. I sent some screen captures of said building to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and he recognized the place immediately as The Crocker Club in downtown L.A.

How in the heck Mike managed to recognize a building from a screen capture in which very little was visible is beyond me! My hat is definitely off to him!

Several things were added to the site for the filming, including some foliage, a fake street sign with what I believe says “Washington St” and a building sign that reads “Hoboken Savings and Loan.” Otherwise though, The Crocker Club looks exactly the same in person as it did onscreen. Even the yellow fire hydrant and electrical box flanking the sides of the building are there in real life! Love it!

And here’s where things start to get weird. In Little Black Book, Phil’s Bar is shown to be located in a fairly ornate building directly across the street from where Stacy and Joyce are standing. But I could find no such building across the street from The Crocker Club.

I was at a complete loss, until I looked more closely at the scene and spotted the back of a logo on the window behind Derek – a logo that looked a lot like that of Tully’s Coffee. (What can I say? This stalker knows her coffee!) Once the logo resemblance dawned on me, a light switch went off in my head and I realized that I had been to Phil’s Bar before – many, many times.

As it turns out, Phil’s Bar is the Starbucks located at West 6th Street and South Grand Avenue in downtown Los Angeles. (It occupies the corner space of an oft-filmed at building that I will be blogging about soon.) That particular Starbucks happens to be just steps away from the Millennium Biltmore Hotel, where the Grim Cheaper and I have stayed on many occasions, so, I, of course, have patronized it often. The storefront looks quite a bit different today than it did when Little Black Book was filmed, though, which is why I failed to recognize it.

What I did not realize until later (and what most-definitely added to my failure to recognize the location) was the fact that the image of the building that appeared onscreen was, for whatever reason, flipped. (Yes, producers will sometimes flip their film in post-production to achieve a certain orientation. Only one half of the Titanic was built for the filming of Titanic for instance. For the scenes involving the portion of the ship that had not been constructed, James Cameron simply flipped the film during the editing process and, voila, it appeared to be a full vessel. He even went so far as to print any sort of signage seen in those particular scenes backwards, so that when the image was flipped, the signs would appear in their correct orientation.) As you can see below, when I tried to photograph the angle of Phil’s Bar that was shown in Little Black Book, things did not quite match up. The lower portion of the bar exterior in the movie had a carved lip reaching from the sidewalk up to the bottom of the window, while the front of Starbucks did not. The front doors of Phil’s Bar were also on the opposite side of the building from where Starbuck’s front doors are located.

When I ventured around to the other side of Starbucks, though, things did match up. (And darn that scaffolding that ruined all of my photographs!)

Thanks to a little Pic Monkey magic, I was able to flip one of my photographs (check out the backwards watermark! Winking smile ) and, as you can see below, the result matches perfectly to what appeared onscreen.

The location pops up again in one of the final scenes of Little Black Book, in which Stacy is shown driving through what is supposedly downtown New York. In an odd twist, the space was a Grand Central Coffee store during the time of that shoot, as you can see below. When I first spotted the Grand Central Coffee sign, I thought that my initial identification of the Tully’s logo had been wrong, but then I came across this online listing for a Tully’s Coffee at that location. I also came across a listing for a Grand Central Coffee at the same location, though. So what I believe happened is this – either the driving-through-New-York scene or the Phil’s-Bar scene were pick-up shots, filmed months after Little Black Book had wrapped. In the interim, either Grand Central or Tully’s (whichever was there first) closed down and the other café opened in its place. That is just a guess, though.

The very same storefront was also visible in the background of the 1999 hit Fight Club, in the scene in which The Narrator (Edward Norton) and Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) blew up a computer store. And while the café looks to have had a name beginning with a “G” at that time, I was unable to make out any of the other letters on the sign in the front window.

In 2002, Tully’s appeared in the Season 3 episode of The West Wing titled “Posse Comitatus” as the supposed Washington, D.C.-area coffee shop where Josh Lyman (Bradley Whitford) discussed the president’s welfare reform bill with girlfriend, Amy Gardner (Mary-Louise Parker).

The Tully’s logos visible behind Derek in Little Black Book can clearly be seen in the episode.

In 2012, the Starbucks popped up in the Season 1 episode of Touch titled “Safety in Numbers,” in the scene in which Martin Bohm (Kiefer Sutherland) tried to talk to a homeless man named Walter King (Robert Patrick Benedict).

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

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for helping me find this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Phil’s Bar from Little Black Book is actually the Starbucks located at 523 West 6th Street in downtown Los Angeles. The building that Stacy and Joyce walked by in the scene, which is supposedly located across the street from Phil’s Bar, is The Crocker Club, which can be found five blocks away at 453 South Spring Street. You can visit The Crocker Club’s official website here.

September 10, 2013September 10, 2013

The “ALF” House

One location that I have been asked about repeatedly over the years is the Tudor-style home where the Tanner family – Willie (Max Wright), Kate (Anne Schedeen), Lynn (Andrea Elson), Brian (Benji Gregory), and their Melmacian house guest, ALF (who was voiced by series creator Paul Fusco) – lived in the 1986 television series ALF. And while I had never watched the show growing up, I became quite intrigued by the house and the fact that, in the 27 years since the comedy originally aired, it had never been found. I would sporadically look for the locale whenever I had a free moment, yet it remained a mystery – until last month, that is, when a dogged fellow stalker named Rafal managed to track the place down. In a heartbreaking twist, Rafal also discovered that the property had been demolished sometime in 2012 and a large Mediterranean-style dwelling built in its place. As sad as I was to learn that the residence was no longer, I was also glad that its former location had, at least, been found and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to stalk it this past weekend while the two of us were in L.A.

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On ALF, the Tanner family lived in an absolutely adorable cottage said to be at 167 Hemdale Street in Los Angeles. When I first saw images of the residence years ago, I was convinced that it was located somewhere in Pasadena. I was so sure, in fact, that I would have bet money on it. Then, in July, a fellow stalker named Mick led me to an ALF TV Fan Forum message board on which ALF-aficionados were discussing the property. One poster named Tedm mentioned that Paul Fusco had stated in an interview that the Tanner house was located in the Pacific Palisades area. So I did a bit of searching there, but came up empty-handed. Then, on August 12th, Rafal visited the site and announced to all that after a grueling ten-hour search, he had found the residence. Apparently, while watching an ALF episode the previous day, he started to wonder about the home’s location. A Google search led him to the ALF TV Fan Forum where he came across Tedm’s comment about Pacific Palisades. He spent the next ten hours searching the Palisades and its environs for an L-shaped property with a steep slanted roof, and finally found the right spot – at 708 Moreno Avenue in Brentwood.

While looking at the site on Google Earth, though, Rafal noticed that some sort of construction seemed to be taking place and surmised that the residence had been completely leveled at some point in 2012 and a new, much larger home built in its place.

He was right. As you can see below, aside from the tall hedge running along the western side of the property, not one shred of the ALF home remains. What is most heartbreaking about this whole thing, to me at least, is that if the residence had been found just one year sooner, I would have been able to stalk it.

I did manage to dig up some photographs of the former residence on fave website Zillow. As you can see, prior to its 2012 tear down, the Tanner house looked exactly the same as it did in 1986 when ALF was filmed!

The charming two-bedroom, two-bath, 1,474-square-foot abode, which was originally built in 1926, was sold in February 2012 for $2.05 million. I guess it should not come as a surprise that the place was torn down being that, according to Zillow, it was marketed as a “fixer” whose sole value was its location and 9,000-square-foot lot.

The Tanner residence is currently still visible via Google Street View and Bing maps. While stalking the place, I asked the GC (who was flabbergasted that I would stalk a property no longer in existence) where I should stand for the first photograph that appears in this post. His response, “How about at home in front of your computer screen with a Google Street View image of the house pulled up!” LOL

The interior of the Tanner house was, of course, just a set built at the studio where ALF was lensed. According to Wikipedia, the set was an intricate one constructed on a platform raised four feet off the ground which enabled Paul Fusco and second puppeteer Lisa Buckley to operate the ALF puppet from underneath the stage. Numerous trap doors were installed in the flooring that allowed for ALF to pop up unexpectedly in various places. Manning the puppet was such a grueling task that it often took 25 hours to film a 22-minute episode! Of the process, Anne Schedeen said in the June 19th, 2000 issue of People magazine, “There was no joy on the set. It was a technical nightmare – extremely slow, hot and tedious. If you had a scene with ALF, it took centuries to shoot.” Tensions ran so high, apparently, that on the night that the series finale was filmed in 1990, Max Wright walked off the set immediately after shooting wrapped without so much as a goodbye to any of his fellow cast members. Yowza! Today, Wright looks back fondly on the show and says, “It doesn’t matter what I felt or what the days were like. ALF brought people a lot of joy. They adored it.” The countless fellow stalkers who have emailed me over the years inquiring about the Tanner house are a testament to that fact. I am sorry that I did not have better news to share about its current state. Sad smile

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

Big THANK YOU to Rafal, from the ALF TV Fan Forum, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Tanner house from ALF was formerly located at 708 Moreno Avenue in Brentwood. It was bulldozed in 2012 and a much larger home now stands in its place.

September 5, 2013September 11, 2013

The Hyatt Regency Valencia from “Little Miss Sunshine”

A couple of months ago, the Grim Cheaper and I sat down to re-watch fave 2006 dramedy Little Miss Sunshine and I just about fell out of my chair when I spotted the Hyatt Regency Valencia pop up in a brief scene. I had actually stalked and blogged about the Santa Clarita-area hotel way back in November 2009 (you can read that post here) due to its appearance in Twilight. Because the post was fairly brief, though, and had been published during the early days of my site, I figured it was most-definitely worthy of a redo. So the GC and I headed right on over there last month while the two of us were in L.A. for a visit.

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The Hyatt Regency Valencia, which has actually been featured in countless productions thanks to its Anywhere, U.S.A. look and feel, boasts 244 guest rooms, 11 of which are suites, a pool, a gym, a business center, an outdoor fireplace lounge, a lobby lounge, three gardens, 12,000 square feet of meeting space, a day spa, and access to three different local golf courses.

The hotel’s onsite eatery, Vines Restaurant & Bar, has become one of my and the GC’s favorite pit stops over the years; we often find ourselves dropping in for lunch or a cocktail whenever we are in the area.

In Little Miss Sunshine, the Hyatt Regency Valencia stood in for the Scottsdale, Arizona-area Desert Courtyard Suites where Richard Hoover (Greg Kinnear) tracked down Stan Grossman (Bryan Cranston) to confront him about his defunct “Nine Steps” deal. Several areas of the hotel were utilized in the short scene including the front entrance;

the lobby;

the lobby lounge, which was changed a bit for the filming;

and the pool. (I somehow failed to snap any pictures of the pool while I was stalking the Hyatt, so I snagged the one that appears below off of the hotel’s official website.)

In the Season 4 episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation titled “Fur and Loathing,” which aired in 2003, the Hyatt Valencia stood in for the Las Vegas-area King’s River Hotel where PAF CON ( the Plushies and Furries Convention – yes, plushies and furries) took place.

In the 2008 tween hit Twilight, the Valencia Hyatt masqueraded as the Phoenix-area hotel where Bella (Kristen Stewart), Alice (Ashley Greene), and Jasper (Jackson Rathbone) hid out while on the run towards the end of the movie. And while the exterior of the property . . .

. . . and the lobby were featured in the filming;

the interior of Bella, Alice and Jasper’s suite was filmed elsewhere. As you can see in these photographs as compared to the screen captures below, what appeared onscreen does not match the Hyatt’s actual rooms.

In 2010, the Hyatt again popped up as the site of a convention on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, this time for vampire- and werewolf-wannabes in the Season 11 episode titled “Blood Moon.” And while one of the hotel’s hallways;

outdoor fireplace lounge;

and a ballroom were used in the filming;

the interior of the room where Michael Wilson (Thad Luckinbill) was attacked was just a set. As you can see below, it looks nothing like the Hyatt’s actual rooms.

In the Christmas-themed Season 9 episode of NCIS titled “Newborn King,” which aired in 2011, the Hyatt Regency Valencia masqueraded as The Freemont Inn, where Navy Captain Jake Marsden (Marc Aden Gray) was killed.

One of the hotel’s suites (I think Room 334) also appeared in the episode.

As I mentioned in my March 2012 post about the Florida-area house where Erin Hannon (Ellie Kemper) lived during two Season 8 episodes of The Office, the Hyatt Regency Valencia masqueraded as the Palmetto Suites Tallahassee, the supposed Sunshine State hotel where the Dunder Mifflin gang stayed for a few weeks while setting up a chain of Sabre retail stores in the Season 8 episodes titled “Tallahassee” and “After Hours.” Quite a few areas of the Hyatt were utilized in the filming, including the front exterior;

the lobby;

the lobby lounge, where a fake gift shop was set up for the shoot;

several rooms, including Room 243 where Cathy (Lindsay Broad) stayed, Room 244 where Jim Halpert (John Krasinski) stayed, Room 248 where Erin stayed, and Room 249 where Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) stayed;

two hallways;

and Vines Restaurant & Bar.

According to the Visit Santa Clarita website, episodes of Parenthood, CSI:New York, Make It or Break It, Las Vegas, Big Love, and The Unit have also been filmed at the Hyatt Valencia, but, unfortunately, I am unsure of which episodes in particular.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Hyatt Regency Valencia from Little Miss Sunshine is located at 24500 Town Center Drive in Valencia. You can visit the hotel’s official website here.

September 3, 2013January 5, 2017

Mitch’s House from “Baywatch”

A couple of weeks ago, a fellow stalker named Michelle posted a comment on my site asking me to track down the house where lifeguard Mitch Buchannon (David Hasselhoff) lived with his son, Hobie Buchannon (first played by Brandon Call and then later by Jeremy Jackson), on the immensely popular 1989 television series Baywatch. Ironically enough, I had already stalked the residence about a year prior, but had yet to blog about it. Back in July 2012, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I had embarked upon a Venice Canal stalking adventure, during which he pointed out countless waterfront homes that had been immortalized onscreen – so many, in fact, that I had to grab my iPhone and start taking notes! One of the dwellings that he showed me just so happened to be Mitch’s house. Because we stalked over fifty different locales on that particular day, though, I had completely forgotten about it until I received Michelle’s query. So thank you, Michelle!

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As I mentioned in my October 22nd, 2012 post about Lana Clarkson’s former home, the Venice Canal area is an absolutely gorgeous little waterfront idyll that was founded by real estate developer Abbot Kinney in the early 1900s. (You can read a more in depth history on the Canals here.) What better place for the world’s most iconic fictional lifeguard to live? In real life, Mitch’s house boasts three bedrooms, three baths, 1,665 square feet of living space, 0.06 acres of land, and it’s own private dock. The property, which was originally built in 1980, last sold in May 2001 for a whopping $900,000.

As you can see below, the dwelling is quite picturesque. I mean, it looks like it belongs on a postcard or something, especially with the two small boats docked in front!

I have never actually seen an entire episode of Baywatch (which is shocking being that, according to IMDB, the show aired in 148 different countries and on every single continent excluding Antarctica during the height of its popularity!), so I had to rely on Michelle for information about Mitch’s home. According to her, the Venice-area residence was used in establishing shots throughout the series’ first nine seasons, at which point Mitch (and the production) moved to Hawaii.

Unfortunately, quite a few changes have been made to the exterior of the property since filming took place back in 1989, the most odd of which being the removal of the rather large rear chimney. Why on earth someone would remove a chimney is absolutely beyond me.

Thanks to fellow stalker Richard, author of Emergency!: Behind the Scene, I learned that the interior of Mitch’s house was a set. Said set first existed at Culver Studios, where the series’ inaugural season was lensed. When production moved to a former-McCulloch-Chain-Saw-warehouse-turned-studio located at 5433 Beethoven Street in Playa Vista during Season 2, Mitch’s house set went with it.

Richard also alerted me to the fact that images of the home’s real life interior are posted on Zillow. Two are pictured below. As you can see, the actual inside of the residence is vastly different from Mitch’s house. You can check out some more images of the property here.

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

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Michelle for challenging me to find this location and to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for tracking it down! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Mitch Buchannon’s house from Baywatch is located at 469 Sherman Canal, on the Venice Canals, in Venice.

August 29, 2013August 10, 2018

Echo Park

One location that I have wanted to stalk ever since June 2012, when I wrote my post about MacArthur Park from New Girl (which you can read here), was the similar-looking Echo Park in L.A.’s Echo Park neighborhood. Sadly though, my efforts were thwarted for over a year due to an extensive restoration project that was taking place on the premises. The property eventually reopened two months ago and I was absolutely chomping at the bit to stalk it, and finally managed to do just that a couple of weekends ago when the Grim Cheaper and I were in Los Angeles for a brief stay. I can honestly say that the place was worth the wait, though, because it is easily one of the most beautiful locales that I have ever visited.

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The 29-acre parcel of land now known as Echo Park was originally a natural ravine created from the flow of the Arroyo de Los Reyes stream. A 20-foot dam was built on the site in 1868 that turned the ravine into Reservoir Number 4, which provided drinking water to nearby residents. In 1892, the city decided to turn the reservoir and its neighboring land into a public park and landscape architect/Superintendent of the Department of Parks Joseph Henry Tomlinson was commissioned to design it. Legend has it that the site got its name due to the fact that Tomlinson heard an echo as he shouted across the property one day while developing the space. Echo Park, which was declared a City of Los Angeles Cultural Monument in 2006, is one of the oldest public parks in L.A.

Today, the 26-million-gallon, 13-acre Echo Park Lake serves as a detention basin for the City’s storm drain system. As stated in the “Land o’ Lake” article that was featured in the June 2013 issue of Los Angeles magazine, “Runoff from streets and storm drains pauses here before heading into the Los Angeles River and, ultimately, the ocean. In dry weather about 110,000 gallons pass through the lake each day.”

The lake is perhaps best known for its iconic three-geyser fountain, which was installed as part of a Los Angeles beautification project just prior to the 1984 Olympic Games.

In 2011, a two-year, $45-million restoration/water quality project was begun, during which 40,000 cubic yards of sediment was removed from the bottom of the lake – as was trash, debris and random discarded items including a skateboard, a Frisbee and a toilet (LOL!). Four acres of wetland were also added to the premises . . .

. . . as well as two observation decks, a café and a large jogging path.

The site’s vast lotus bed (once the largest lotus bed in the western United States), which had disappeared by 2008, was also restored thanks to a fortuitous bit of thievery.

In 2005, a horticulturalist named Randy McDonald pilfered a lotus from the lake, violating a municipal code which states that removing plants from city parks is illegal. He cultivated the small stem and began selling its offshoots to unsuspecting customers. A few years later, when the restoration project first got underway, landscape architect Josh Segal heard buzzings that McDonald had a spawn of the iconic Echo Park lotus plant and contacted him. He wound up purchasing 376 plants from the thief – at a cost of $30,000! – to stock the new and improved lake. As journalist Marisa Gerber wrote in a June 2013 Los Angeles Times article, “Finding McDonald gave the restoration ‘a special story that involves theft,’ Segal said, breaking into a laugh. ‘It’s L.A.’”

The netting that currently covers the lotus bed, as well as most of the other vegetation in the park, will be in place for about a year and serves to protect the greenery from hungry birds.

The newly restored Echo Park was reopened to the public on June 15th, 2013.

The result is easily one of the most picturesque places I have ever visited in my life.

Shortly after the reopening, the lake’s infamous pedal boats were also brought back. And, as you can see below, business was booming when we showed up – the wait time to rent a boat was about two hours!

A café named Square One at the Boathouse was also launched in the park’s iconic 1932 boathouse shortly after the reopening.

Due to its immense picturesqueness, Echo Park has been featured in countless productions over the years – so many that it would be virtually impossible for me to list them all. What follows are some of the property’s onscreen highlights.

The park’s most famous appearance was arguably in the 1974 classic Chinatown, in which it was the spot where JJ Gittes (Jack Nicholson) secretly photographed Commissioner Hollis Mulwray (Darrell Zwerling), who was boating with a woman who was not his wife.

In 1991, Echo Park masqueraded as the Stationary Bike Riding Park, where running was not allowed, for the opening scene of fave movie L.A. Story.

In the 1991 thriller Dead Again, Mike Church (Kenneth Branagh) took Grace (Emma Thompson) on a date to Echo Park, where they ate at the boathouse and then walked around the lake.

Despite several websites claiming that the scene took place in MacArthur Park, Echo Park was actually where Dr. Kimberly Shaw (Marcia Cross) and Sydney Andrews (Laura Leighton) plotted to kill Dr. Michael Mancini (Thomas Calabro) in the 1994 Season 2 finale of Melrose Place, which was titled “Till Death Do Us Part.”

As you can see below, the view of the U.S. Bank Tower and Citigroup Center that was shown in the episode matches perfectly to the view of those buildings from Echo Park.

Echo Park was used again in the 1996 Season 4 episode of Melrose Place titled “Melrose Unglued,” as the place where Jo Reynolds (Daphne Zuniga) and Dr. Dominick O’Malley (Brad Johnson) confronted Laurie (Justine Priestley – Jason Priestley’s twin!) about their suspicion that her son was being abused.

In the 1992 flick Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot, Echo Park was where Sgt. Joe Bomowski (Sylvester Stallone) picnicked with him mom, Tutti Bomowski (Estelle Getty).

Echo Park was turned into the supposed San Francisco-area cemetery where the the funeral for Mark Chao (John Cho) was held in the Season 1 episode of Charmed titled “Dead Man Dating.”

The park also popped up in the 2003 Season 5 episode of Charmed titled “House Call,” as the spot where Paige Matthews (Rose McGowan) reunited with Glen Belland (Jesse Woodrow).

In 2001’s Training Day, Det. Alonzo Harris (Denzel Washington) and Jake Hoyt (Ethan Hawke) drove by Echo Park shortly after Harris forced Hoyt to smoke PCP.

In the 2003 comedy National Security, Earl Montgomery (Martin Lawrence) almost got arrested by police officer Hank Rafferty (Steve Zahn) for “breaking into” his own car while at Echo Park.

Emily (Amanda Peet) tells Oliver (Ashton Kutcher) about her new fiancé at Echo Park in a deleted scene from the 2005 romcom A Lot Like Love.

Echo Park was where Dwight ‘Bucky’ Bleichert (Josh Hartnett) met with Pete Lukins (Gregg Henry) to talk about an upcoming fight in the beginning of the 2006 film The Black Dahlia.

Southland filmed at Echo Park no less than three times during its five-season run. It first popped up in the 2010 Season 2 episode titled “U-Boat,” as the place where Officer John Cooper (Michael Cudlitz) and Officer Chickie Brown (Arija Bareikis) pulled over a car after seeing dope being thrown out of the window.

In the Season 2 episode titled “What Makes Sammy Run?,” which also aired in 2010, Echo Park was where Tammi Bryant (Emily Bergl) was confronted by thugs while taking photographs.

And in the Season 3 episode titled “Fixing a Hole,” which aired in 2011, Officer Cooper and Officer Ben Sherman (my man Benjamin McKenzie) interviewed park-goers outside of the Echo Park boathouse about a boy who had just been found.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Echo Park is located at 751 Echo Park Avenue in the Echo Park neighborhood of Los Angeles.

August 26, 2013September 28, 2017

Dawnridge – Tony Duquette’s Former House

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

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

August 22, 2013September 6, 2017

Special Café from Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” Video

[UPDATE – The Special Café site still stands! You can read all about it here. Even though this post contains erroneous information, I am leaving it up as it chronicles an important part of the long, arduous journey my fellow stalkers and I embarked upon to track the locale down.]

Since we’re on the subject of Michael Jackson . . . in May of this past year, a fellow stalker/MJ aficionado named Justin published a comment on my post about the Monte Carlo café, which I had blogged about back in March 2010 as being the possible café that appeared in the King of Pop’s “Beat It” video. (You can read my second post on that same location here. I suggest reading both of my Monte Carlo write-ups, as well as all of the comments posted therein, as it will make this post easier to understand.) I was never entirely convinced about the location (even though it bears a remarkable resemblance to the diner in the video) due to many elements not matching what appeared onscreen, and opened it up to my readers to share their opinions. While Justin originally commented that he thought the Monte Carlo was the right spot, a full two years later he was able to figure out where filming actually had taken place – the Special Café located at 416 East 5th Street in downtown Los Angeles – which I was OVER THE MOON about! Thank you, Justin! Sadly, as he mentioned in his comment, the locale had been demolished shortly after “Beat It” was shot and remained a parking lot for almost three decades. (Today, a building is being constructed on the site, as you can see above.) I still ran right out to stalk it, though, just a few weeks later.

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One of the main doubts I had as to the Monte Carlo being the “Beat It” café was the fact that in the video an address number of 416 was visible, which did not mesh with the Monte Carlo’s 109 address number.

Further leading to doubt was the fact that the words “Special Café” were visible in the diner’s window (denoted with pink arrows below) in a behind-the-scenes photograph that was included in Todd Gray’s book Michael Jackson: Before He Was King, which fellow stalker David in Spain had taken a picture of and posted in the comments section of my first post on the Monte Carlo. (Please disregard the markings on the picture, which were in reference to a since-solved mystery that my fellow stalkers were discussing at the time.)

The issue that raised the most doubt, though, was the fact that the buildings visible across the street from the “Beat It” diner did not match the buildings located across the street from the Monte Carlo.

Because the interior of the “Beat It” diner so closely resembled that of the Monte Carlo, though, I was completely flummoxed.

Then, while searching for images of “East Fifth Street” (countless news articles stated that the café where filming took place was located on Fifth Street in L.A.’s Skid Row area), Justin happened to dig up the 1955 Los Angeles Examiner photograph below, in which a restaurant with the words “Special Café” written in the window was visible. Judging by the 414 address number posted on the storefront next door, the café most likely had an address of 416, which matched the address that was visible in “Beat It.”

A few weeks after Justin posted his comment, fellow stalker John, of the Silent Locations blog, taught me how to search through archived digital phone records of the Los Angeles area. I, of course, immediately did a search for “Special Café”, and, sure enough, in the 1973 listing, found it. (Only certain years of the phone directory are available digitally and, unfortunately, there is no directory for 1983, the year that “Beat It” was filmed.) The next directory that was available online was for the year 1987, by which time the Special Café had been demolished and its phone listing, therefore, removed.

Oddly enough, I also found a listing for the Monte Carlo Café in the 1973 phone book, which means that there were two almost identical diners located on the same street only four blocks apart from each other at that time! How incredibly weird is that?

As Justin pointed out in his comment on my original “Beat It” diner post, the buildings located across the street from the Special Café site are an exact match to the buildings that were visible in the background of the video, further proving that he had found the right spot.

Why the across-the-street image was different when Michael walked through the café doors remains a mystery. All I can figure is that some sort of screen – or maybe even a bus or large vehicle – was put up to block the view of the set from the many fans who were on location trying to get a peek at their hero. Who knows, though.

Unfortunately, while I thought that Justin’s find solved the mystery of the “Beat It” diner, it only appears to have deepened it. While researching the Special Café, I looked up its former address on the Historic Aerials website and, oddly enough, there is NO building located in that spot in the years 1972 and 1980 (pictured below, respectively). As you can see below, the site is a parking lot in both images. Since we know that the eatery was around from at least 1955 (the year that the photograph that Justin found was taken) to 1983 (the year that “Beat It” was filmed), the building’s absence on Historic Aerials is absolutely mind-boggling!

Further confusing things is the fact that a building is visible in that spot in the 1952 aerial view.

And what’s odder still is that the building next door, the Southern Hotel, which was originally built in 1912 and is currently registered as being historically significant (meaning that it most likely has not been altered very much from its original state), looks COMPLETELY different today than it did in 1980, as you can see below. Like I said – the mystery deepens. Feel free to let me know your thoughts on this conundrum, my fellow stalkers.

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

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Special Café, from Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” video, was located at 416 East Fifth Street in downtown Los Angeles. An apartment building now stands at that site. This location is smack dab in the middle of Skid Row, so please exercise caution.