Griffith Park – IAMNOTASTALKER

August 15, 2018August 14, 2018

Michelle’s Downhill Derby from “Full House”

There’s nothing like remnants of a film shoot remaining behind years after the fact to set my heart aflutter. Last June, a fellow stalker named Chris kindly emailed me a lengthy and comprehensive list of Full House locations he had tracked down, one of which was the Griffith Park road where the Downhill Derby from Season 7’s “Michelle a la Cart” took place. Though I did not remember the episode, the locale had me particularly intrigued thanks to some vestiges from the shoot Chris noted were still visible. As he wrote in his email, “In the 2007 imagery on Google Street View, you can still see the faded lane markings on the road from the race.” Um, sign me up! So onto my To-Stalk List the site went and I finally headed out there to see it in person a few weeks ago.

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In re-watching “Michelle a la Cart” in preparation for this post, I realized there’s a reason I did not recall it from its original airing in 1994 – the episode just isn’t all that memorable. It centers around three less-than-scintillating storylines. First, D.J. Tanner (Candance Cameron) laments a phone message left by her ex-boyfriend, Steve Hale (Scott Weinger) – she thinks he’s despondent over their recent break-up, but it turns out he just really wants a CD back. Then there’s Joey Gladstone (Dave Coulier) who attempts to learn ballet from Stephanie Tanner (Jodie Sweetin) in the hopes it will improve his hockey-playing skills, which gives us this great visual. Oh, Joey!

In the main narrative, Michelle Tanner (Mary-Kate and Ashely Olsen) decides to build a soapbox car with her aunt Becky (Lori Loughlin) so she can compete in the local Downhill Derby and defeat neighborhood meanie Kenny (K. Evan Bonifant), who thinks she can’t win because she’s a girl. Though lackluster as a whole, the episode did give us a great zinger from Michelle. When faced with her nemesis’ jeering, she tells him, “My dad said if I can’t say anything nice then I shouldn’t say anything at all . . . but my dad’s not here and you’re a weenie!” (You can see a clip of the fabulous moment here.)

The episode culminates in the big Downhill Derby competition, which was set up on Vista Del Valle Drive just west of where it intersects with North Vermont Canyon Road in Griffith Park. The race’s starting point was positioned at the very eastern edge of Vista Del Valle Drive, close to where it dead ends.

The finish line was set up about two hundred feet away, where the hilly part of the road bottoms out.

(Spoiler alert – Michelle, of course, wins the derby and, in the process, learns that girls can do anything boys can do.)

In the episode, the racers’ lanes are made up of uninterrupted white lines and dotted yellow lines, as you can see below.

It is those lines that are still visible today – not just on Google Street View imagery from 2007 as Chris had mentioned, but in real life, too.

Though extremely faded, the dotted yellow lines . . .

. . . and the uninterrupted white lines are still somewhat intact, as you can see in my photos above and below.

While I originally assumed that the markings were painted onto the road strictly for the Full House shoot, it is entirely possible they were there prior to the filming – especially since the yellow lines pictured in my images appear to be newer additions. Considering said lines are not typical road boundaries, though (I have never seen anything like them, at least), and it is unclear as to exactly what they designate, I do not believe they are original elements of the street. Either way, I love that markings visible in a shoot that took place 24 years ago remain evident today.

While I was stalking the Downhill Derby site, security guards happened to be setting up street closures on the premises for a concert that was taking place nearby later that night. I can only imagine their befuddlement in seeing me bounce all over the road, enthusiastically snapping photo after photo of faded lines and loudly exclaiming to the Grim Cheaper how thrilled I was to be seeing them in person. Ah, to be on the outside looking in.

Big THANK YOU to Chris for finding this location and telling me about it! Smile

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Downhill Derby from the “Michelle a la Cart” episode of Full House took place on Vista Del Valle Drive just west of where it intersects with North Vermont Canyon Road in Griffith Park. (Be advised, some maps refer to Vista Del Valle as “Boy Scout Road,” though Google Maps and my GPS both recognize the street as Vista Del Valle.)

July 23, 2018July 26, 2018

The Trails Café from “The Catch”

Today’s locale required a ridiculous amount of stalking – of myself. A few months back, while scanning through a television show making screen captures for a post, I spotted what I thought was the side of The Trails Café, one of my favorite L.A. eateries. A quick look at Google Street View’s imagery of the restaurant confirmed my hunch. Distracted by the piece I was writing, I failed to jot down the information, though, and promptly forgot about it. Flash forward to last weekend when the Grim Cheaper and I found ourselves hungry during a stalking trip to Griffith Park. I suggested we pop by The Trails and, while enjoying our scrumptious egg salad sandwich, was reminded of the place’s onscreen appearance. The only trouble was I could not for the life of me recall what show I had seen it in. Figuring it would come to me eventually, I snapped photos of The Trails and added it to my To-Blog List. Days later, though, I was still at a loss. The only remedy I could think of was a deep dive through my browser history. That dive turned out to be far deeper than I had envisioned. With the GC as my guide, I pulled up my search history, inputted “Trails Café” and quickly discerned that I made the discovery of the restaurant’s cameo on January 9th. As I backtracked through all of the other queries I performed on that date, I felt like I was entering A Beautiful Mind territory. I don’t normally consider myself as having ADD tendencies, but my online habits are evidence to the contrary. At no time that day did I have less than ten windows open – often on multiple browsers. Using the disjointed information to pinpoint what show The Trails had appeared in proved extremely time consuming (and a bit unnerving), but I eventually hit pay dirt – the eatery was featured in the pilot episode of The Catch, which I had discovered while making screen captures for my post on Emerson College Los Angeles. Phew!

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The Trails Café was founded by Grammy-winning music producer Mickey Petralia and television executive Frank Lentz in June 2005. The venture might seem an unusual one for two people with backgrounds so widely removed from the culinary world, but as Petralia told L.A. Weekly in a 2010 interview, “When I first started putting this place together, I code-named it ‘Operation Exit Strategy.’ The record industry had started to change, and I was pretty certain it was never going to get back to where it was. It’s hard to sustain a house and two kids on music alone now.”

Situated just steps from the idyllic Ferndell Nature Center, another one of my favorite L.A. spots, the structure that now houses The Trails was originally a city-owned concession stand that served mediocre burgers. By the time that Petralia and Lentz got their hands on the place, it had long been sitting vacant and boarded up and had grown run-down.

The duo spent about nine months cleaning up the property and transforming it into a charmingly rustic eatery, all of which was done during off time from their day jobs.

While the menu was originally helmed by musician Aaron Sperske, at some point pastry chef Jenny Park came on board as a co-owner and the mastermind behind The Trails’ delectable offerings including pastries, sandwiches and salads, all of which are made from scratch each day on the premises.

The tiny café (it measures less than 400 square feet!) quickly became an area staple, with hungry patrons flocking there like bees to honey. Most days you’ll find the colorful picnic tables packed and throngs of people waiting at the order window.

It is not hard to see why The Trails is so beloved. Not only is the fare amazing, but the setting is absolutely idyllic. Sitting there, you half expect woodland fairies to come flying by, sprinkling pixie dust in their wake.

The restaurant is also something of a celebrity hot spot. Such stars as Amanda Seyfried, Flea, Minka Kelly, Jessalyn Gilsig, Jayma Mays, Drew Barrymore, Alia Shawkat, and Paul Adelstein have all popped by for a bite to eat. Mandy Moore even did a photo shoot at The Trails for How You Glow.

Considering its celebrity clientele and gorgeous aesthetic, it is no surprise that the eatery wound up onscreen.

In the pilot episode of The Catch, private investigator Alice Vaughan (Mireille Enos) discovers that her fiancé, Christopher Hall (Peter Krause), is a fraud who has made off with her entire life savings. Her team decides to try to ensnare him, but, as her employee Danny Yoon (Jay Hayden) laments, “This guy was good – like really good. His entire web presence is gone. No archived search items, no photos. I don’t even know how to start investigating.” Alice assures him that she has photographs of Christopher, but when she heads to her computer to bring them up she realizes that his face is obscured or turned away from the camera in every single one. Two of the pictures she scans through in the scene were taken at The Trails Café. The restaurant’s appearance is fleeting at best in the segment, which is perhaps why I had such a hard time recalling it.

Alice and Christopher are sitting on the café’s southern side in the images, in the area pictured below.

The Trails Café was also featured in the Season 14 episode of Visiting . . . with Huell Howser titled “Ferndell,” which aired in 2006.

In the episode, which you can watch here, we are given a glimpse of what the eatery looked like when Petralia and Lentz first took it over in 2004. The industrial shack is quite a stark contrast to the whimsical café that exists now.

Thanks to fellow stalker Justin, I learned that The Trails also appears as The Tummy Pleaser concession stand in the Season 1 episode of Salute Your Shorts titled “Cheeseburgers in Paradise,” which aired in 1991.

Quite an extensive scene was shot there affording us a fabulous look at the property in its original state.

I cannot say enough good things about The Trails Café. There’s a reason I included the place in My Guide to L.A. – Coffee post. It is definitely one of the best spots in the city to grab a latte and enjoy a shaded respite.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Trails Café, from the pilot episode of The Catch, is located at 2333 Fern Dell Drive in Griffith Park. The entrance to Ferndell Nature Center, my favorite L.A. walking trail, can be found just south of the restaurant at the intersection of Fern Dell and Black Oak Drives.

September 3, 2015August 27, 2015

New “L.A.” Mag Post – About the Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round from “Teen Witch”

Don’t forget to read my latest post for L.A.mag.com about the Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round from Teen Witch. My articles typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours.

June 2, 2015June 2, 2015

The “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” Park

Today’s post was a true labor of love – one that required stalking a location three separate times and a massive amount of help from a fellow stalker named Michael. While most of the locales from the 1985 movie Girls Just Want to Have Fun (one of my all-time faves) have been tracked down and detailed on this blog, one that I have long wondered about is the park where portions of the dance practice montage sequence took place. As luck would have it, I happened to meet the flick’s leading man, Lee Montgomery who played hunky Jeff Malene, at the Hollywood Show back in April and got the information straight from the horse’s mouth.

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When I heard that Lee would be making an appearance at the Hollywood Show, I just about flipped my lid from excitement and informed the Grim Cheaper that I would be attending come hell or high water. And I am so glad that I did. Lee truly could NOT have been nicer! He spent quite a bit of time chatting with me and filled me in on several behind-the-scenes tidbits, including the fact that he and Sarah Jessica Parker, who played Janey Glenn, underwent extensive dance training for weeks before filming began and that much of the onscreen dancing, including the lifts, was actually performed by them. At one point, I mentioned that there was a missing GJWHF locale that I was interested in tracking down. Now, in no way, shape or form did I expect Lee to remember a location from over 30 years ago, but I decided to broach the subject anyway and was shocked when he recalled it immediately! When I asked him where the dance montage in the park had taken place, without skipping a beat, he replied, “Oh, the row of trees? That was in Griffith Park, near the merry-go-round.” Um, THANK YOU, Lee!

For those not familiar with the Girls Just Want to Have Fun dance practice montage (and if that’s the case, then for shame!), you can watch it by clicking below.

The three spots that I was interested in tracking down were the row of trees that Janey and Jeff danced between . . .

. . . the tree that Jeff flipped off of while his sister, Maggie Malene (my girl Shannen Doherty), sat nearby . . .

. . . and the hill that Janey and Jeff flipped down.

As soon as I got home from the Hollywood Show, I popped in my Girls Just Want to Have Fun DVD and was SHOCKED to discover that the area of Griffith Park featured in the dance practice montage was Park Center, the very same area that was utilized in the Full House Season 1-3 opening credits. I had detailed that exact spot in a September 2014 blog post, but until that moment had failed to recognize its appearance in GJWTHF. I figured out the location thanks to a very unusual tree that I remembered from the Full House credits.

The tree has an extremely unique shape. From the trunk it immediately bends to the side and runs almost parallel to the ground and then turns back upward, forming an almost 90-degree angle with its lower portion. Its white, speckled bark is also quiet unusual.

As it turns out, that is the very same tree that Jeff flipped off of in Girls Just Want to Have Fun. As you can see below, the curve of the tree, the speckled bark and the chopped off branch on the left-hand side match perfectly to what appeared onscreen.

Now I should mention here that the first time the GC and I stalked Park Center, we made the unfortunate decision to head out there on a Sunday and not only was the place jam-packed with picnickers, but there was a piñata tied to Jeff’s tree! Humph! So these photos were taken during our second stalk of the park. On that particular visit, I, of course, had to re-created the montage moment . . .

. . . but I did not attempt Jeff’s flip. That tree is a LOT higher off the ground than it looks! I did jump off the tree, however, but was not nearly as graceful as Jeff.

I have never been very good at pinpointing outdoor locations, so to track down the other two Girls Just Want to Have Fun montage spots I enlisted the help of a fellow stalker who I knew had an aptitude for park-like settings – Michael. He is the one who had originally made the discovery of Park Center’s appearance in the Full House opening credits. Michael was only too happy to help and was an immeasurable source of guidance with this particular hunt. He immediately noticed that the hill that Jeff and Janey flipped down was the same hill that was featured in Full House, just shot from a slightly different angle. Griffith Park’s Park Services Building, which is visible in the background of both productions, is denoted with pink arrows below.

While it was hard to pinpoint the exact angle from which the hill scene was shot (as I said, outdoor places are not my forte), I believe my photograph below was taken from pretty much the right spot. I believe the pine tree to the right of the frame is now gone, but the split-branched tree in the middle of my photograph appears to match was was pictured onscreen, as does the shaping of the hill itself.

The one spot that Michael was unsure about was the row of trees that Janey and Jeff danced between. So during our first trek out to the park (on picnic day!), the GC and I walked around all of Park Center to see if we could find the right place and he fairly quickly zeroed in on the trees pictured below. In my recollection of the scene, Janey and Jeff had danced between two parallel rows of trees, while the trees that the GC had found were situated in one row, with a lone tree situated parallel to it. I was certain it was the wrong spot.

When I got home and compared my photographs to the montage scene, though, I saw that he was spot on! Nicely done, GC!

As fate would have it, during our second venture out to Griffith Park, a man happened to be sleeping next to the row of trees, in the exact spot where we wanted to take photographs. I did end up posing for a pic, but because of Sleeping Beauty, we could not match the angle of the photo to the angle shown in the movie – which meant (you guessed it!) another trip out there. I swear, if the GC never sees Griffith Park again it’ll be too soon.

During our third trip to the park, we managed to take photographs from the right spot. Well, almost.

We should have moved one tree farther back. As you can see below, the tree that is in the foreground of our photograph is the second tree visible in Girls Just Want to Have Fun. That is as good as it is going to get, though, because there is no way the GC is ever setting foot in Park Center again. Winking smile

And I am pretty sure that if I ever ventured out there on my own and asked a stranger to take my photograph posing like I am below, they’d probably try to have me committed. Winking smile

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

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Michael for all of his help in finding these locations! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Girls Just Want to Have Fun dance montage was shot in the Park Center area of Griffith Park, which is located at 4730 Crystal Springs Drive in Los Feliz. A detailed aerial view denoting where the montage’s three park segments were filmed in relation to the merry-go-round is pictured below.

August 15, 2012November 28, 2016

Griffith Park’s Pote Field from “Jerry Maguire”

Another location that Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I stalked way back in early June (shortly before we stalked the legendary Perino’s restaurant, which I blogged about yesterday) was Pote Field in Griffith Park, which was featured in the closing scene of one of my favorite romantic comedies of all time – 1996’s Jerry Maguire. Mike had discovered this locale quite a few years back and while I was beyond excited about it and had immediately added the address to my To-Stalk list, for whatever reason, I had just never gotten over there to see the place. Then, in June, while we were in Griffith Park doing some stalking of nearby Harding Municipal Golf Course, which has appeared in several movies, Mike reminded me about Pote Field and I just about had a heart attack right there on the spot. So, we quickly headed over there to stalk it. Yay!

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In the closing scene of Jerry Maguire (which was easily one of flick’s cutest scenes), the film’s title character, who was played by Tom Cruise, is shown walking hand-in-hand with his new wife, Dorothy Boyd (Renee Zellweger), and her son, Ray (Jonathan Lipnicki), next to a little league game taking place on Pote Field, when a runaway baseball lands in front of the trio. Young Ray picks it up and tosses it high over the fence back towards the waiting players. Jerry, who is a sports agent, is thoroughly impressed by Ray’s throw and says, “Whoa! Did you see?”, causing Dorothy to exclaim, “Oh no! Let’s go!” The three then walk off into the sunset as the strains of Bob Dylan’s “Shelter From The Storm” start to be heard over Jerry’s pleas to Dorothy to let Ray play baseball.

As you can see below, Pote Field, which was named in honor of Major League Baseball scout Phil Pote, looks pretty much exactly the same today as it did back in 1996 when Jerry Maguire was filmed. And while this stalker is not AT ALL into sports, I cannot tell you how excited I was to see this location in person. So incredibly cool!

And I, of course, just had to imitate Jerry walking and swinging Ray’s hand while we were there. Smile

Mike found the field thanks to the large hill that was visible in the background of the baseball-throwing scene. He had played ball at Pote several times as a teen and, as soon he spotted that hill while watching Jerry Maguire, he recognized the place immediately. Ironically enough, upon first moving to Southern California in 2000, I had attended a special exhibit on area filming locations at the Pasadena Central Library. One of the movies featured in the exhibit was Jerry Maguire and the display piece on it mentioned that some filming had taken place at Villa-Parke Community Center in Altadena. Well, as soon as I saw the word park in the write-up, I immediately assumed that the scene alluded to was the baseball-throwing scene and just about had a heart attack. I drove over to the park immediately upon leaving the exhibit (not kidding!), but when I got there nothing about the place looked familiar. After doing some cyber-digging later that night, I learned that Villa-Parke’s gym had been used in one of the movie’s auxiliary scenes (although I can no longer find any mention of that online, so now I am even more confused than I was before!) and not the closing scene as I had originally thought. So when Mike told me about Pote Field years later, I was absolutely floored!

I am fairly certain that Pote Field was also featured in Jerry Maguire’s opening montage as the supposed Indio, California-area baseball field where Jerry’s client Art Stallings (Jordan Ross) is shown swinging a bat. Because the shot is so incredibly tight, though, it would be extremely hard to verify that hunch, but, as you can see below, the scoreboard behind Stallings is a match to Pote’s real life scoreboard, as is the foliage visible in the background.

Pote Field also appeared in the 1991 flick Hook as the location of Jack ‘Jackie’ Banning’s (Charlie Korsmo) final little league game of the season – a game that his workaholic father, Peter Banning (Robin Williams), shows up extremely late for and winds up missing entirely.

On a Jerry Maguire side-note – a very young Emily Procter (aka CSI: Miami’s Calleigh Duquesne) was featured as one of Jerry’s ex-girlfriends in the mini-movie that was shown during the bachelor party scene. And, according to IMDB’s Jerry Maguire trivia page, the film was originally written with Tom Hanks and Winona Ryder in mind for the lead roles. All I can say to that is blech! THANK GOD that never came to be, because Jerry Maguire would have been just about the worst movie ever with those two at the helm!

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Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Pote Field, from the closing scene of Jerry Maguire, is located on Crystal Springs Drive, just east of where it intersects with Fire Road, inside of Griffith Park in Los Angeles. Jerry Maguire was filmed in the northeast section of the field, in the area denoted with a blue arrow above.

October 22, 2010October 21, 2010

The Old Zoo In Griffith Park

Just around the corner from the Griffith Park Merry Go Round, which I blogged about yesterday, is the location of the park’s former zoo – an abandoned site which is commonly referred to as the Old Zoo or the Old Zoo Picnic Grounds. I first found out about this location from favorite stalking tome Hollywood Escapes: The Moviegoer’s Guide to Exploring Southern California’s Great Outdoors and was shocked to discover that in the almost decade that I’ve lived in Southern California and in all of the stalking that I have done during that time period, I had never before even heard the place mentioned. As “Javier J.” commented in his Yelp review of the Old Zoo, “It’s one of the biggest in-plain-sight secrets of Old Los Angeles”. So incredibly true! After stalking it a couple of weeks back, I couldn’t help but wonder why more about the landmark location has not been written. It is a truly AMAZING place!

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The Old Zoo property was first built almost a century ago in 1912 and continued to operate until 1965, when a new zoo attraction was opened in another area of Griffith Park, about two miles north of its predecessor. Thankfully, but for reasons I am not entirely sure of, the city had enough foresight to keep the former property intact for the future citizens of L.A. to enjoy and explore. The Old Zoo site, which had been completely renovated and expanded in the mid-1930s, is an absolutely AMAZING piece of L.A. history and is comprised of such structures as animal enclosures;

aviaries and monkey habitats;

rows of cages of all different shapes and sizes;

and a house-like structure of some sort . . .

. . . all of which are (unbelievably) open and accessible to the public.

I was absolutely shocked upon our arrival to discover that there were no fences or gates barring access to the former enclosures and cages. Guests are pretty much given a free pass to wander around and explore the entire property, including the insides and employee-access areas of the former bear habitats. SO incredibly cool!

The website WebUrbanist recently named the Old Zoo one of its Seven Most Amazing American Abandonments and I have to say that I completely agree with that sentiment. While stepping inside one of the old abandoned cages, I turned to my husband and said, “How lucky are we to live in a city that has stuff like this?” It still boggles my mind – and I often have to pinch myself to actually believe it – that we live in such an amazing place! Each week we get to go on these incredible stalking adventures during which we discover countless hidden and historic gems located throughout the city. Los Angeles seems to be an unending treasure trove of unique and historically significant locations and I still can’t believe that I am fortunate enough to have the opportunity to explore them all. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – I SO HEART L.A.! 🙂

And the Old Zoo is, of course, a filming location! It stood in for the Central Park Zoo in the 1996 movie Eraser in the scene in which Lee Cullen (aka Vanessa Williams) and U.S. Marshal John Kruger (aka Arnold Schwarzenegger) face off against U.S. Marshal Robert Deguerin (aka James Caan).

The zoo was redressed significantly for the shoot in order to make it appear as if it was an actual working zoo. Fake entrance gates, resembling those of the real Central Park Zoo in New York, were added to the property for the filming . . .

. . . as was a large indoor exhibit. According to the Hollywood Escapes book, Eraser director Chuck Russell said of the site, “The whole complex is a fun bit of L.A. history. The Old Zoo’s barred cages supplied a nice retro touch. More importantly, the area’s grassy field was big enough for us to land a helicopter, fire weapons, and crash vehicles through our prop gates, activities we were not allowed to do in New York.”

In the 2004 flick Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, the Old Zoo stood in for the San Diego Zoo where Lee Wong, the Panda, gave birth.

The big bear tank that Veronica Corningstone (aka Christina Applegate) and Ron Burgundy (aka Will Ferrell) fell into is not there in real life. It was in actuality just a set that was built solely for the filming.

The Old Zoo was also featured in the Season 2 episode of CSI: New York titled “Zoo York”. (I blogged about this same episode yesterday, as it was also filmed at the nearby Griffith Park Merry Go Round). In the episode, the property stood in for the Central Park Zoo where a dead body is found in one of the tiger cages.

The Old Zoo also appeared in the movies Human Nature, Crazy Mama, and The Star.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Old Zoo is located inside of Griffith Park, just northwest of the Merry Go Round which I blogged about yesterday. It is a bit tricky to find, but the best way to get there is to take Los Feliz Boulevard to Crystal Springs Drive and head north. Make a left onto Fire Road and bypass the first parking lot that you come to (denoted with the blue arrow in the above map). Keep driving until you reach “Merry Go Round Parking Lot #2”, which is denoted with the pink arrow in the above aerial view. Walk due west from that lot and follow the signs to the Old Zoo Picnic Grounds.

October 21, 2010October 24, 2010

The Griffith Park Merry Go Round from “The Mentalist”

One location that I have wanted to stalk for almost two years now, ever since November of 2008 when it appeared in the Season One episode of The Mentalist titled “Seeing Red”, was the merry go round where Patrick Jane (aka Simon Baker) lured murder suspect Travis Tennant (aka Noel Fisher). The only problem was that I had absolutely NO idea whatsoever where to find it, as in my ten-plus years of living in Southern California the only merry go round that I had ever encountered was the one located on the Santa Monica Pier and it didn’t look anything like the one that had appeared in The Mentalist. So, I immediately called up Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and asked him if he knew where it was located. Sure enough, he did! As fate would have it, the merry go round is located right in the heart of L.A.’s Griffith Park and Mike used to ride it regularly when he was a kid!

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The Griffith Park Merry Go Round is actually something of a Los Angeles landmark and I am extremely shocked that, up until its appearance on The Mentalist two years ago, I didn’t even know of its existence. The Merry Go Round was first built in 1926 by the Spillman Engineering Company and is currently the only full size Spillman carousel still in operation today. It was originally commissioned by the Spreckels family, of the Spreckels Sugar Company, to be used at their San Diego theme park, the Mission Beach Amusement Center. Sadly, the amusement center was shuttered in 1935 in the midst of the Great Depression and the Merry Go Round was subsequently moved to Balboa Park to be featured in the California Pacific International Exposition. When the exposition ended in 1937, a man named Ross Davis purchased the carousel and transported it over 120 miles north to its new home in Griffith Park, where it is still in operation to this day, over seven decades later.

The Griffith Park Carousel is comprised of 68 different hand-made horses, all of which “jump” – ie. move up and down – and boast tails made of authentic horse hair.

The carousel also features a custom-built Stinson 165 Military Band Organ, which plays a library of over 1500 different songs.

And, incredibly enough, the Griffith Park Merry Go Round even served as the inspiration for one of the most famous landmarks in the entire world – Disneyland! Yes, you read that right. According to one of my very favorite stalking tomes, Hollywood Escapes: The Moviegoer’s Guide to Exploring Southern California’s Great Outdoors, Griffith Park historian Mike Eberts states, “Walt Disney brought his young daughters to the carousel and this is one of the places where he began to dream up the idea that would lead to Disneyland.” So incredibly cool! The bench where Walt used to sit during those outings (which is pictured very poorly above) is still on display at the merry go round to this day. And, according to the book Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination, Walt’s daughter Diane “thought the inception [of Disneyland] took place during the Sunday afternoons when Walt picked the girls up from religious services – he never attended himself – and took them to the Griffith Park merry-go-round, where they would spend hours. ‘He’d see families in the park,’ Diane would later recall, ‘and say, ‘There’s nothing for the parents to do . . . You’ve got to have a place where the whole family can have fun.’” Further adding to the carousel’s celebrity status is the fact that James Dean’s very first acting job took place there! It was a commercial for Pepsi Cola and, in it, the newbie actor was shown handing out bottles of the soft drink to teenagers who were riding the merry go round. Such incredible history!

I, of course, had to take a ride on the carousel while I was there and it was so incredibly fun! Being there brought me RIGHT BACK to my childhood when I used to ride the Edgewater Packing House Carousel on Monterey’s Cannery Row each and every weekend. In an odd coincidence, I just found out today that my childhood merry go round was also designed by the Spillman Engineering Company, but it is sadly no longer in operation publicly as it was purchased by a Vegas millionaire who had it installed in a room in his home! Not kidding! But I digress.

In the “Seeing Red” episode of The Mentalist, Patrick Jane hypnotizes a young murder suspect named Travis in order to lead him to a supposed Sacramento-area merry go round so that he can be captured by the CBI.

Mike clued me into the fact that the Merry Go Round was also featured at the very end of the 1988 comedy Twins, in the scene in which Julius and Vincent Benedict (aka Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito, respectively) meet up with their wives, Marnie and Linda Mason (aka Kelly Preston and Chloe Webb, respectively), and their new twin children at a carousel in a park.

Once Mike told me about the Merry Go Round, I started noticing it popping up in all sorts of movies and television shows, including the Season 2 episode of CSI: New York titled “Zoo York”, in which the body of a teenage debutante is found on the supposed Central Park carousel.

The Griffith Park Merry Go Round also showed up in the 1992 flick Buffy the Vampire Slayer, as the spot where Amylin (aka Paul Reubens) turned Grueller (aka Sasha Jensen) into a vampire.

And it also appeared briefly in the Season 1 episode of MacGyver titled “Every Time She Smiles” as a supposed Bulgaria-area merry go round.

And thank you to fellow stalker Eileen, who informed me that the carousel also appeared in the video for the Jessica Simpson/Nick Lachey song “Where You Are”.

The Merry Go Round was also featured in the Sally Field-directed movie Beautiful, but I don’t own that movie, so I was not able to make screen captures.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Griffith Park Merry Go Round is located at 4730 Crystal Springs Drive, inside of Griffith Park, in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles. The Merry Go Round is open each Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. During the summer months, it is also open on weekdays. The Merry Go Round can be a bit tricky to find and is not entirely visible from the road. The easiest way to get there is to take Los Feliz Boulevard to Crystal Springs Drive and head north. Make a left onto Fire Road and park in the first lot that you come to. The Merry Go Round is located just north of that lot.

September 14, 2010September 14, 2010

Griffith Observatory

A couple of months ago I dragged my parents and my then-fiancé/now husband out to Los Feliz to do some stalking of the Griffith Observatory in Griffith Park – a place which I had never before visited despite having lived in Los Angeles for over a decade. I had actually wanted to stalk the Observatory for close to 18 years – ever since November of 1992, to be exact – thanks to the fact that it was featured in a Season 3 episode of fave show Beverly Hills, 90210. But more on that later.

The land that now encompasses Griffith Park was donated to the City of Los Angeles by Welsh industrialist Colonel Griffith J. Griffith (and no, that was not a typo – the guy’s first name was actually the same as his last!) on December 16, 1896. Griffith stipulated that the donated parcel of land, which measured 3,015 acres, was to be used as a public park. He said, “It must be made a place of rest and relaxation for the masses, a resort for the rank and file, for the plain people. I consider it my obligation to make Los Angeles a happy, cleaner, and finer city. I wish to pay my debt of duty in this way to the community in which I have prospered.” When Griffith passed away 26 years later, in 1919, he bequeathed the majority of his $1.5 million estate to the city for the purposes of building a theatre and an observatory inside of the park. Construction on the observatory, which was designed by architect John C. Austin and engineer Russell W. Porter, began on June 20th, 1933 and the building opened to the public just under two years later, on May 14, 1935.

The Griffith Observatory, which sits high atop Mount Hollywood, features a 300-seat state-of-the-art planetarium, a 2,700-square foot multimedia theatre, a Zeiss refracting telescope, an exhibit hall, and, as you can see above, views which are nothing short of incredible.

Hollywood location scouts took notice of the property right from the very beginning when it was chosen to appear in the 1935 movie The Phantom Empire shortly after its opening. Since that time, the Observatory has been featured in hundreds upon hundreds of productions – far too many for me to be able to properly catalog here, but I’ll do my best to give my fellow stalkers a broad overview.

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As I mentioned above, the Observatory was featured in a Season 3 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210. That episode was titled “Rebel With A Cause” and it was, ironically enough, one of my least favorite episodes in the entire history of the series. The episode centers around the break-up of longtime couple Dylan McKay (aka Luke Perry) and Brenda Walsh (aka my girl Shannen Doherty), immediately after which Dylan puts the moves on Brenda’s best friend Kelly Taylor (aka Jennie Garth). Mind you, Dylan and Kelly had also been seeing each other behind Brenda’s back for an entire summer at that point in the series. Dylan then decides to take Kelly out on a date – just two nights after his break-up with Brenda! – and when Brenda randomly catches the two of them together in a restaurant, she calls Kelly a “bimbo” and Kelly actually has the nerve to be mad at Brenda. I mean, HELLO, Kelly! Not only did you spend an entire summer making out with your BEST FRIEND’S boyfriend, but when said best friend and said boyfriend break-up, it’s not 48 hours later that you are out on a date with him. With friends like that, who needs enemies?? Let me tell you, had that happened to me, I would have been calling Kelly a whole lot worse things than “bimbo”. And yes, I realize Beverly Hills, 90210 is just a television show and that the “Rebel With A Cause” episode aired almost two decades ago, but the whole thing still seriously upsets me! But I digress. Anyway, in the episode, before taking her out to dinner, Dylan brings Kelly to the Griffith Observatory, where they watch a show in the planetarium.

After the show, the two little home-wreckers head outside for a heart-to-heart chat and, even though I was strongly opposed to the whole Kelly/Dylan romance, for whatever reason, it was the location of that chat that I was most interested in stalking.

I had a very difficult time locating the wall where Dylan and Kelly sat, though, as it is not in an easily-visible part of the building. It actually wasn’t until we were heading back to our car that I finally spotted the right place.

As it turns out, Kelly and Dylan’s wall is located in the eastern-most section of the Observatory. It is actually the wall to a ramp which leads to the back of the building and is located on the left-hand side of the Observatory (as you are facing it) and is denoted with a pink arrow in the above aerial view.

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The Observatory’s most famous onscreen appearance was, of course, in the 1955 James Dean classic Rebel Without a Cause, which, amazingly enough, I have never actually seen! In the beginning of the flick, Jim (aka James Dean) and Judy (aka Natalie Wood), along with the rest of their high school class, go on a field trip to the Observatory where they watch a show in the planetarium.

And the very same wall from 90210 also appears in that scene.

Rebel’s final scene also takes place at the Observatory, but I do not want to post any screen caps of that scene as they would spoil the ending.

There is a statue of James Dean on display on the Observatory’s front lawn which commemorates the historic filming that took place there in 1955. So darn cool!

Griffith Observatory was also the site of the climatic scene in 1999’s hilarious comedy Bowfinger, in which renegade, wanna-be movie director Bowfinger (aka Steve Martin) and his ragamuffin film crew secretly tape Daisy (aka Heather Graham) and Kit Ramsey (aka Eddie Murphy) fighting off a fictitious band of aliens.

In the first Transformers movie, Mikaela Banes (aka Megan Fox) and Sam Witwicky (aka Shia LaBeouf) are at the Observatory when they witness a group of Transformers crash landing on earth in the form of meteorites.

In The Terminator, the Observatory is the spot where the Terminator (aka Arnold Schwarzenegger) first emerges from a time warp and begins his mission to kill Sarah Conner (aka Linda Hamilton).

In 2008’s Yes Man, the Observatory is the location of Allison’s (aka Zooey Deschanel’s) weekly jogging/photo class, during which Carl (aka Jim Carrey) crashes after drinking waaaaaaay too many Red Bull energy drinks.

It is also where Carl professes his love to Allison at the very end of the movie.

And it is during that ending scene that Carl and Allison run right by the exact spot where Beverly Hills, 90210 was filmed 16 years beforehand. 🙂

The scene in which Natalie Cook (aka Cameron Diaz), Dylan Sanders (aka Drew Barrymore) and Alex Munday (aka Lucy Liu) discover that Madison Lee (aka Demi Moore) is actually a fallen angel in Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle takes place at the Observatory.

The observatory was also featured in the music video for Paula Abdul’s hit single “Rush Rush”, which was an homage to the movie Rebel Without a Cause.

You can watch the full video, which starred Keanu Reeves, by clicking above.

Griffith Observatory has also appeared in the movies Dragnet, Devil in a Blue Dress, The Rocketeer, House on Haunted Hill, Nancy Drew, and Earth Girls are Easy, and in episodes of NCIS: Los Angeles, 24, Star Trek Voyager, Alias, MacGyver, Melrose Place, Angel, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and The Colbys.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Griffith Observatory is located at 2800 East Observatory Road, inside of Griffith Park, in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles. You can visit the observatory’s official website here. Admission is free. The observatory is closed to the public on Mondays and Tuesdays.

September 24, 2009September 23, 2009

The Other 17 Again House

After stalking Zac Efron’s house from the movie 17 Again, I set my sights on finding the home belonging to his zany, long time best friend Ned Gold in the flick. In the movie, Ned, who has made an absolute fortune inventing various software programs, lives in an ultra-modern, ultra-posh pad somewhere high up in the hills above Los Angeles. And I absolutely fell in love with his house the moment I saw it. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not usually a huge fan of modern-style architecture, but, for some reason, as of late it really seems to be growing on me. Since Ned’s house was proving to be somewhat of a difficult find, I had to yet again enlist the help of fellow stalkers Mike, from MovieShotsLA, Owen and Chas. Because we knew that the address number of Zac Efron’s 17 Again house had been changed for the filming, we had a feeling that the address of Ned’s house (which was shown to be 6355) was also a fake. So, we definitely had our work cut out for us on this one.

According to the movie’s production notes, Ned Gold’s house was located “in the hills near Griffith Park”, but exactly where we couldn’t be sure. Thankfully, though, while looking at the above screen capture I had sent him, Owen noticed that a street sign was visible in the distance. But because neither one of us could make out what the sign said, Owen suggested renting 17 Again on Blu-ray DVD to see if it would give us a clearer picture. And sure enough, it did! The street sign in the distance read “Los Encantos Way” – and from there it was simply a matter of using Google Maps Street View to look at houses located near Los Encantos Way in Los Feliz. And it wasn’t long before I had found the house. So, of course, I immediately ran right out to stalk it! 🙂

I am very happy to report that the 17 Again house looks exactly the same in person as it did in the movie – despite just a few minor changes.

When filming at this location, producers went so far as to not only change the address placard on the wall next to the front door, but they also painted a fake address number on the curb in front of the house! Unfortunately, you can only make out the fake curb and sign numbers while watching the Blu-ray copy of the DVD, which my computer is unable to make screen captures of. But if you happen to own the Blu-ray copy of the movie, keep your eyes peeled for the number 6355 in the two areas that I have circled in the above screen cap.

The other difference I noticed was that in real life Zac Efron’s basketball hoop is ostensibly missing from above the garage door.

Other than those two minor changes, though, the 17 Again house looks very much the same in person as it did in the movie. And, let me tell you, it is such a cool house!! With its cement exterior and polished wood details, it is slightly reminiscent of the home from the Showtime series Californication.

As you can see in the above screen capture and aerial image, the home’s real life backyard was used for the high school party scene in the movie. And, from how it appears, I believe the house’s real life interiors were also used for the filming of some scenes.

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On a side note – be sure to check out my new blog page called “Look Who’s Stalking!” where fellow stalkers can send in their photos for me to post. 🙂 I just posted some simply AMAZING photos of the new Sex and the City movie being filmed that were sent to me by fellow stalker Leslie. LOVE IT!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Ned Gold’s 17 Again house is located at 2223 Hobart Boulevard in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles.

May 29, 2009May 29, 2009

The Bronson Caves

This past weekend, on a recommendation from fellow stalker Steve, I dragged my dad and my fiance out to stalk the Bronson Caves in Griffith Park. Friends have been urging me to stalk the Bronson Caves, which are most commonly known as being the location of “the Batcave” from the 1966 television series Batman, for years now, but somehow I just never made it out there. Until this past Saturday, that is. 🙂

And I am so glad I finally did!! The term “caves” is actually something of a misnomer, though, as the passages look more like tunnels than they do caves. Surprisingly enough, the Bronson Caves were actually man-made. In 1903, a rock excavation company named Union Rock Company built a quarry on the site, which was then known as Brush Canyon. The company drilled three tunnels through the base of a small mountain and used the excavated rocks to pave Los Angeles city streets. When the company called it quits in 1920, the three tunnels remained and were coined the Bronson Caves. The rest, as they say, is Hollywood history.

The Caves have been featured in countless Hollywood productions over the years, most notably standing in for “the Batcave”, where Batman spent most of his time in the 1966 television series of the same name. You can watch the opening credits of Batman, which feature a very brief clip of the Batmobile leaving the Batcave, here.

The Caves also popped up in the alternative ending to the movie Army of Darkness. The ending, which was thought to be too depressing for movie audiences, can be found on special edition DVD’s of the 1992 flick. On a side note, one of my very favorite movie lines of all time was uttered in Army of Darkness. In the movie, one of the knights announces “I am Henry the Red, Duke of Shale, Lord of the Northland, and Leader of its Peoples”, to which Bruce Campbell replies “Well, hello Mr. Fancy Pants! I got news for you, Pal, you ain’t leading but two things right now – Jack and Sh*t. And Jack left town!” LOL LOL LOL

The Bronson Caves also showed up in the horror flick Cabin Fever as the location where Rider Strong finds one of the many dead bodies.

At the end of the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Miles and Dana used the Caves as a hiding place from the pod people. You can watch that scene here. All in all, the Bronson Caves have been featured in well over one hundred productions including: The Lone Ranger, The Three Musketeers (1933), The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Sleeper, Night of the Bloodbeast, Robot Monster, The Cyclops, MacGuyver, It Conquered the Earth, The X-Files, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Short Cuts, and The Scorpion King.

As luck would have it, we even ran into some filming while stalking the Bronson Caves. Shooting on location was a very small, independent caveman/apocalypse film. And the crew was even nice enough to let us snap some pics of them. 🙂 Ironically enough, it was close to one hundred degrees outside that day and the poor caveman had to walk around in those ridiculous fur boots. LOL He must have been dying in those things!!!!

I HIGHLY recommend stalking the Bronson Caves. They are very cool to see in person, even for those of you who are not movie locations buffs. My dad, who, as I have mentioned before HATES stalking, really enjoyed seeing the Caves, as did my boyfriend.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Bronson Caves are located just off Canyon Drive inside of Griffith Park. To reach Canyon Drive, follow Hollywood Boulevard to Bronson Drive and head North. When you hit Canyon Drive, make a left. You will pass through some stone gates, a couple of parking lots, and a playground. Head to where Canyon Drive ends and park in the public lot. The Caves are a short quarter mile walk from the parking lot. To walk to the Caves, head up the first pathway – it has a red curb – to the right. You will pass through a fire gate. Head up the hill and the Caves will be around a short bend to the left. You can see some photographs of the trail that leads to the Caves here.