Los Angeles attractions – Page 2

February 11, 2011February 10, 2011

The Little Door Restaurant from “Monster-in-Law”

One restaurant that I have long wanted to stalk, but could just never seem to find was the adorable little outdoor courtyard spot where Kevin Fields (aka Michael Vartan), his mother, Viola Fields (aka Jane Fonda), and his new fiancé, Charlie Cantilini (aka Jennifer Lopez), lunched towards the end of the 2005 romantic comedy Monster-in-Law. Then, as fate would have it, back in September while trying to track down the French restaurant where Brenda Walsh (aka my girl Shannen Doherty) and Donna Martin (aka Tori Spelling) accidentally ate veal brains during Season 2 of fave show Beverly Hills, 90210, I came across the website for The Little Door on West 3rd in Los Angeles and immediately recognized it as the restaurant from Monster-in-Law. I added the spot to my “To-Stalk” list and the Grim Cheaper and I finally headed out there this past Saturday night to grab some cocktails. And I have to say the place was AMAZING!

The Little Door, which was opened in 1996 by French-born brothers Frederic and Nicolas Meschin, is easily one of the most adorable restaurants I have ever had the pleasure of dining at. The property, which is actually a converted former schoolhouse, is made up of four different dining areas: the Blue Room, the Winter Garden, the Patio, and the Piano Room. The most popular area, and the area where Monster-in-Law was filmed, is the Patio, a romantic garden setting complete with trees, trickling fountains, twinkle lights, and a retractable glass roof that is opened during the summer months. (The room is also very dimly-lit, which is why the above photographs came out so poorly.) The Little Door has been named “Most Romantic Restaurant of L.A.” and it is not very hard to see why. It is easily one of the romantic places I have ever visited. The staff was also incredibly NICE and lacked any sort of that fancy-L.A.-restaurant-type snootiness. In fact, the bartender and I talked non-stop about celebrities while we were there, which was refreshing as many servers in L.A. try to act like they are above the whole Hollywood thing, when in reality over 90% of them are actors. Winking smile And while the eatery is on the pricier side, the food is absolutely FABULOUS and I honestly cannot recommend stalking the place enough!

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In Monster-in-Law, Charlie, Viola,and Kevin meet up for lunch in the Patio area of The Little Door whereupon Charlie finally turns the tables on her soon-to-be horrendous mother-in-law Viola and announces “It’s my game now!”

The Little Door was also featured in the Season 2 episode of Entourage titled “The Abyss”, in the scene in which Eric Murphy (aka Kevin Connolly) and Sloane McQuewick (aka Emmanuelle Chriqui) discuss the fact that Vinnie Chase (aka Adrian Grenier) no longer wants to be in the movie Aquaman.

Besides being a filming location, the restaurant is also a big-time celebrity hotspot. Just a few of the stars who have dined there recently include Russell Brand, Katy Perry, Jim Carrey, Britney Spears, Gary Oldman, Scott Weiland, Mark McGrath, Cameron Diaz, Justin Timberlake, Scarlett Johansson, Ryan Reynolds, Eva Longoria, Tony Parker, Jay-Z, Jessica Alba, Christina Aguilera, Posh Spice, David Beckham, Lisa Marie Presley, Pink, Tara Reid, Salma Hayek, Nigel Lythgoe, and Paris Hilton. The list literally goes on and on! In fact, the GC and I spotted Dennis Haysbert, who played President David Palmer on the hit television series 24, having a quiet dinner while we were there. So incredibly cool!

While we were dining, our bartender informed us that an episode of Entourage had also been filmed next door at the Little Door’s sister restaurant, Little Next Door. So, after we finished eating, we ran right over to stalk the place. Little Next Door, which is a full-service restaurant as well as a bakery and a café, is an absolutely adorable little spot and is already on my list of places that I need to re-stalk in the very near future.

Little Next Door popped up in the Season 4 episode of Entourage titled “No Cannes Do” in the scene in which Eric and Vinnie have a production meeting with independent film director Billy Walsh (aka Rhys Coiro) and actress Anna Faris, who played herself on the series.

Little Next Door is also a celebrity hotspot and such stars as Rachel Bilson, Lo Bosworth, Tyra Banks, Jessica Biel, Audrina Patridge, Michelle Trachtenberg, Ali Larter, and Isabel Lucas have all been spotted there.

On a side note – Ever since seeing Blair Waldorf (aka Leighton Meester) gorging herself on macarons in the Season 4 episode of Gossip Girl titled “Juliet Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”, I have been dying to find a bakery that sells the tiny French cookies so that I could sample some for myself.

So, when I saw a myriad of them on display in the bakery case at Little Next Door, I just had to purchase a boxful. And, let me tell you, they were simply AMAZING! Like the best cookies I have ever had in my entire life! Macarons, which consist of flavored ganache sandwiched between two almond meringue cookies and are not to be confused with the similarly-named macaroons that are made out of coconut, are light, airy, flavorful and literally melt in your mouth! It is no wonder that Blair Waldorf is obsessed with them! Because I am diabetic, I only sampled a bite of both the chocolate and Dulce de Leche-flavored macarons, but the Grim Cheaper tried a few of the other flavors and absolutely LOVED them all! The cookies aren’t sold in many places in L.A. that I have found, but let me tell you, if you can get your hands on some, you simply must try them!!!!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Little Door restaurant, from Monster-in-Law and “The Abyss” episode of Entourage, is located at 8164 West 3rd Street in Los Angeles. Contrary to what was shown on Entourage and in Monster-in-Law, the eatery does not serve lunch, but is only open for dinner beginning at 6 p.m. nightly. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here. Little Next Door, from the “No Cannes Do” episode of Entourage, is located at 8142 West 3rd Street and is open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Thursday and from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday through Sunday.

January 12, 2011January 11, 2011

Patrick Swayze’s Former Apartment

Ever since the Grim Cheaper purchased the Dirty Dancing: Limited Keepsake Edition DVD for me this past Christmas, I have become just a tad bit obsessed with finding out more behind-the-scenes information about the movie. So, the other day I picked up Patrick Swayze and wife Lisa Niemi’s autobiography which is titled The Time of My Life and, let me tell you, I’ve hardly been able to put it down since. It is an absolutely FABULOUS book and Patrick Swayze was an absolutely AMAZING man! The unbridled love that he had for his wife is riveting to read about and heartbreaking at the same time, now that he has since passed away. Let’s just say that theirs was not a typical Hollywood union. Patrick married Lisa on June 12, 1975, when he was only 22 years old and she was only 19, and they remained together and completely devoted to one another throughout the rest of his life. While the majority of married actors surrounding him on movie sets were conducting on-set affairs during filming, Lisa accompanied Patrick on each and every single shoot – whether he was filming in Los Angeles or in the far reaches of Africa – and I think that is part of what made their marriage so strong. If you have any interest whatsoever in learning more about Patrick Swayze or the movie Dirty Dancing, I honestly cannot recommend The Time of My Life enough! The book also doles out quite a few stalking addresses, including one of the couple’s first Los Angeles apartments, which I ran right out to stalk yesterday!

Patrick and Lisa first moved to Southern California in 1979, after spending several years together in New York. The two first lived in the ground-floor apartment of a home owned by two older women in the Hollywood Hills. Of his new landlords, Patrick said, “The women upstairs were real characters, and one of them seemed always to have a tumbler of scotch in her hand.” LOL In 1980, after living in that apartment for a little over a year, the couple moved to what Patrick describes in the book as “an apartment in West Hollywood, on La Jolla Avenue”. Well, as soon as I read those words I knew I was going to have to track down that apartment! Thankfully though, Patrick made the job extremely easy for me by putting in the book the above photograph of himself, along with his mother and Lisa, standing outside of their apartment in which an address number of “623” was visible. Because he had described the place as being in West Hollywood, I had assumed it would be located on North La Jolla Avenue, but when I searched for that address via Google street view, nothing matched up. So, I then looked at the building located at 623 South La Jolla Avenue and there was his apartment, looking almost EXACTLY the same as it had back in the early 80s when the Swayzes had called the place home!. So incredibly cool!

In the book, Patrick says that his apartment came with a two-car garage that he and Lisa turned into a woodworking shop as the couple ran a carpentry business on the side, which kept them afloat financially in between acting gigs. I am guessing that their garage was the one denoted with the pink arrow in the above photograph.

But, for whatever reason, in the above photograph, which was included in the book, Patrick is shown posing with his brand new DeLorean car outside of the garage belonging to the neighboring apartment building. That area, too, though looks very much the same today as it did back in the early 80’s.

Shortly after moving into the apartment, the Swazyes found themselves broke with only $3 in their bank account. Patrick says, “The saving grace of our new apartment was the orange tree in the backyard, which ended up feeding us for the difficult weeks we spent trying to pull our financial life together. We managed to scrape together enough coins to buy a jar of peanut butter and a loaf of bread, and that, with the oranges, was what we ate.” Just a few weeks after going broke, fate intervened and Patrick landed the lead role of “Bandit” in the television series Renegades. His career took off from there. The couple continued to live in the La Jolla Avenue apartment for the next few years as Patrick’s fame continued to grow. But after the television series North and South aired in 1985, the actor became a household name and the Swayzes had to move from their beloved, but entirely-too-accessible apartment. Patrick says, “Lisa and I also realized that we’d now have to take steps to protect our privacy. Even in those pre-internet days, there were still paparazzi all over Hollywood, not to mention some overzealous fans who weren’t above staking us out at home. When I got the role of Orry Main, it allowed us to buy a five-acre ranch, where we could keep horses and enjoy nature without being disturbed.” That ranch, which they named “Rancho Bizarro and which Lisa still owns to this day, is located on Lemoncrest Avenue in Sylmar, about twenty miles north of Los Angeles.

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Another location that Patrick talks about in The Time of My Life – one that I was absolutely DYING to stalk until I found out that it was no longer there – was the Harkness Theater at Lincoln Center in New York. In September of 1973, Patrick, who was at the time a member of the Harkness Ballet Company, was hired to pose for artist Enrique Senis-Oliver who had been commissioned by oil heiress Rebekah Harkness to paint a large mural in her new theatre, which was then just being built. The enormous painting, which Patrick says “stretched from the stage to the very top of the proscenium and down both sides”, was titled Homage to Terpsichore and it featured hundreds of nude men dancing. Incredibly, all of those men were Patrick! Over a period of several weeks, Enrique had used the actor/dancer as the model for each and every single male featured in the mural! Sadly though, that mural is no longer as the Harkness Theatre was torn down in 1977, only a few short years after it had been built. So incredibly sad! You can see photographs of part of Patrick’s mural here and here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Patrick Swayze’s former apartment building is located at 623 South La Jolla Avenue in Los Angeles. The garage Patrick posed in front of with his new DeLorean is located just north of his apartment building and is denoted with a pink arrow in the above aerial view.

December 23, 2010December 23, 2010

The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles from “My So-Called Life”

Fellow stalker/My So-Called Life aficionado Andrew recently went on a mission to try to track down the church that was used in the Season 1 Christmas-themed episode of fave show My So-Called Life titled “So-Called Angels”. He had just picked up the most-recently released boxed set of the series, which came out in 2007, and was floored to discover that actor Wilson Cruz, who played Ricky Vasquez on the show, had recorded a commentary for the “So-Called Angels” episode and had described the location of the church as being on 6th Street close to Downtown Los Angeles. Even with that detailed information, though, this locale proved to be a tough one to track down. Thankfully, Andrew hit a stroke of luck, though, when he noticed that the doors of the church in the episode featured very intricate carvings. He figured those doors had to be unique and, sure enough, they were! Just type the words “carved doors”, “church”, and “Los Angeles” into Google and the very first entry that appears is for the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, located on the corner of South Commonwealth Avenue and West 6th Street, about a mile from Downtown Los Angeles, right where Wilson Cruz had said it would be. Yay! So, once Andrew told me the good news, I immediately dragged my dad right on out to stalk the place – just in time for Christmas, too!

The Gothic revival-style First Congregational Church of Los Angeles was constructed in 1932 by brothers James Edward Allison and David Clark Allison, the same architecture team that designed the Beverly Hills Post Office and UCLA’s Royce Hall. Both the exterior . . .

. . . and the interior of the property are absolutely gorgeous in person. In fact, I think it is safe to say that I have never seen a more beautiful place of worship in my entire life! The church is literally breathtaking – especially decked out in all of its Christmas glory!

The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles’ main sanctuary, which stretches 198 feet in length and reaches 76 feet in height, is home to the world’s largest pipe organ, features carved oak pews, and is dotted with countless stained glass windows which were designed by Judson Studios in Pasadena.

The bronze doors that Andrew noticed in the “So-Called Angels” episode were designed in 1946 by artist Albert Gilles and, unbelievably, they measure three inches thick and weigh in at a whopping one thousand pounds apiece! The doors were so heavy, in fact, that I could hardly open them when we went to leave!

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In the “So-Called Angels” episode of My So-Called Life, the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles was the spot where Angela Chase (aka Claire Danes), along with the rest of the Chase family, and her friends Brian Krakow (aka Devon Gummersall) and Ricky wind up on Christmas Eve night after a heartbreaking course of events during which Ricky gets beaten up by his father and ends up first living on the streets and then in an abandoned warehouse. I had actually forgotten how very heartbreaking the episode was until I re-watched it last week. So incredibly sad!

The area where Patty Chase (aka Bess Armstrong) found Ricky lighting candles is located just to the left of the church’s main altar, although that area looks a bit different today. There are no candles located in that particular alcove (which I was seriously bummed about as I had planned on lighting one), nor is there a visible stained glass window. The red carpet has also since been removed.

The pew where Patty and Ricky sat in the scene is located just to the left of the alcove.

The exterior of the church looks a bit different today than it did during the filming, as well. The large potted plants which flanked the front of the church in the episode are no longer there, but I have a hunch that those trees were actually props brought in specifically for the filming and were never actually there in real life.

The street lamp that was pictured at the very end of the episode is actually there in real life, though, which I thought was just about the coolest thing ever! Smile

My So-Called Life is not the only production to have filmed at First Congregational. The church also stood in for New York’s St. Thomas Episcopal where Wilhelmina Slater (aka Vanessa Williams) almost married Bradford Meade (aka Alan Dale’s) in the Season 2 episode of Ugly Betty titled “A Nice Day for a Posh Wedding”.

First Congregational was also where the funeral for Preston Blake (aka Harve Presnell) was held in the 2002 Adam Sandler comedy Mr. Deeds.

It was also used as the church where Mary Jane Watson (aka Kristen Dunst) almost married John Jameson (aka Daniel Gillies) in Spiderman 2.

And it stood in for New York’s Trinity Church where the climactic final scene of 2004’s National Treasure took place.

Both the opening and one of the closing scenes from 2003’s Daredevil were also filmed at the church.

The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles has also appeared in episodes of Californication, The Riches, The West Wing, Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Shark, The Closer, Bones, The Practice, Cold Case, Joan of Arcadia, Six Feet Under, Jag, and The X-Files and in the movies Nancy Drew and Into the Wild. The church even has a page on its website which chronicles the many productions that have been filmed on the premises over the years (although My So-Called Life is ostensibly missing from the list). So love it!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, from the “So-Called Angels” episode of My So-Called Life, is located at 540 South Commonwealth Avenue in Los Angeles. You can visit the church’s official website here and you can check out its extensive filming resume here.

December 21, 2010December 21, 2010

The Michael Buble “Crazy Love” Concert – A Second Time!

Last Monday night, my mom, my dad, the Grim Cheaper, and I all headed to Staples Center in Downtown Los Angeles to attend the final show of Michael Buble’s “Crazy Love” Tour. And, as you can imagine, I could NOT have been more excited! When I attended the cutie crooner’s concert back in April of this year, the experience was extremely bittersweet for me as my dad, who – if it is at all possible – loves Michael even more than I do, was too sick to attend. Thanks to a hook-up from fellow stalker David, we had absolutely AMAZING seats and although I enjoyed myself immensely while there, I couldn’t help but be distracted by the fact that my dad was not sitting next to me, as he would absolutely died over our proximity to the stage. So, when I found out a couple of weeks ago that MB would be returning to Los Angeles to finish up his tour, I just about had a heart attack and informed the GC that, come hell or high water, we would ALL be attending – my mom, my dad, the GC, and I. You see, after three years of living with pancreatitis – to the point that he was giving himself numerous daily injections of Dilaudid pain medication at home – after over 15 surgeries and one very unsuccessful trip to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, and after literally almost missing my wedding due to pain, my dad is finally, FINALLY healthy again! As it turns out, one of his cholesterol medications was causing the pancreatitis, which we only discovered thanks to an extremely astute emergency room doctor at Huntington Hospital in Pasadena, whom we happened to meet by chance after my dad’s pancreatic specialist told my mom, while en route to a West L.A. hospital in the midst of one of my dad’s attacks, that there was “nothing more he could do for him” (not kidding!). My mom immediately turned the car around and drove to Huntington, their local hospital, and the rest is history! My dad is now on his 45th day (and counting) of (relatively) no pain! Halleluiah! The bad news is that, for better or worse, he will forever have pancreatitus and will, therefore, always be subject to pain, but at least now it’s a manageable pain and he can once again live a normal life. So, to celebrate my dad’s newfound good health and his 64th birthday, which was on the 16th of December, the GC and I purchased four tickets to the MB “Crazy Love” show. Because I love surprises, we waited until the day before the concert to tell my dad of our plans and he started bawling upon opening the box and seeing the tickets. Smile One of the best moments of my life, right there.

Thanks to another hook-up from fellow stalker David, I was again able to secure FABULOUS seats to the show – in fact they were the EXACT same seats that we sat in during the previous MB concert! My dad almost died when he saw how close we were to the stage! Thank you, David!

The arena was literally JAM-PACKED with people, so the fact that we were able to get tickets at all, let alone such great ones, was absolutely incredible!

MB’s opening act was, again, Naturally 7 , an acoustic group that specializes in what they call “vocal play” – i.e. they perform without the assistance of instruments, but instead use their voices and bodies to simulate various musical instruments and sounds. And I have to say that they were absolutely A-MA-ZING! If I hadn’t been there, witnessing the whole thing with my own eyes, I would have been CONVINCED that they had instruments onstage with them!

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After Naturally 7 performed for about an hour, the lights went down and it was time for Mr. Buble to come out. He opened up the show with a rousing rendition of “Cry Me A River” and, let me tell you, the crowd went absolutely wild! But no one more so than me and my dad! My dad’s mouth literally hung open – and I am fairly certain that he also teared up a bit – upon seeing Michael step out onto that stage and realizing how very close to him we were. Smile

I can easily say that Monday night’s concert was JUST as fabulous as the one we saw in April, if not more so! Before seeing the show, I was a little worried that it would simply be a carbon copy of the previous concert and that all of Michael’s jokes were, in actuality, scripted and were not as off-the-cuff as they had seemed. But I am VERY happy to report that that was not the case AT ALL! Even though the song list was, for the most part, identical to April’s show, it truly felt as if we were attending a completely different concert, mostly due to the fact that all of Michael’s jokes and monologues were new and spontaneous. He truly plays off and engages the crowd and all of the hilarious stories we heard this time around were different than the ones he told at the previous show. LOVE IT!

And, as I mentioned last time, Buble is FUNNY! Like ABSOLUTELY HILARIOUS! His show is equal parts concert/stand-up comedy act. At one point he introduced his pianist Alan Chang, who has been with him since 2003, by saying, “He is my friend, my pianist, my writing partner, my musical director, and . . . my part-time lover,” and then he broke out into a spontaneous rendition of Stevie Wonder’s 1985 hit “Part-Time Lover”. LOL LOL LOL Michael is also a fabulous impersonator and can speak in just about any accent imaginable, which he did throughout the night. He also did a fabulous impersonation of Elin Nordegren for us, during which he danced across the stage, pretending to wear clogs, while reprimanding Tiger Woods for his lascivious ways. Afterwards he said, “I’m sure she doesn’t really sound like that, but in my head she does.” Winking smile

It is also readily apparent not only how much the guy loves being onstage, but how much he enjoys interacting with his fans. One lady in the front row had a sign stating, “Michael, I’ve been with you for FORTY shows!” Well, Michael took one look at that sign, said “I have GOT to give you a hug!”, immediately jumped down to the floor, and embraced the woman. As you can imagine, I just about died over that one! I mean, is that all it takes to get a hug from Michael Buble? Oh GC, you know what that means! Next year we are going to at least forty of his shows! Winking smile

The most unique aspect of an MB concert, though, is that while there you feel as if you are hanging out with the singer in his living room. Even though there are 14,000 people surrounding you, due to his easy-going and sincere nature, Michael somehow manages to make the whole thing seem intimate and personal.

And his show is FUN! Michael is a barrel of energy and spends the entire two hours sliding across the stage, spinning around, and bouncing up and down. His jubilance is absolutely contagious and he has somehow even managed to make a fan out of the GC, who, prior to April’s concert, could just take or leave the guy.

As was the case last time, Michael was accompanied onstage by nothing more than a microphone, a stool, and his amazing band. There were no histrionics, no big dance numbers, no special effects. It was just a man and his voice and, let me tell you, he ABSOLUTELY BROUGHT DOWN THE HOUSE! He had that audience on its feet for the entire second act of the show! Even my mom and dad were standing and dancing for the last hour! So incredibly cool!

Also, much the same as last time, my favorite segment of the show definitely had to be the big Michael Jackson Tribute/”Twist & Shout” number. Michael introduced the segment by saying he was going to sing a song from the movie that won the 1986 Academy Award for Best Picture – Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Then he said, “No, I’m just kidding – Ferris Bueller did not actually win the Oscar that year, but it TOTALLY should have!” LOVE IT! LOVE IT! LOVE IT!

At one point during the concert, Michael actually walks through the audience over to the “B-Stage”, which is located on the other side of the venue. While there he sang an absolutely beautiful acoustic version of his hit song “Home” accompanied only by his guitar player. I don’t remember him singing the song in that manner during the April show and it turned out to be one of my favorite performances of the entire evening. Sigh!

Michael ended the show with his new song “Hollywood” while accompanied by Naturally 7 and it was FABULOUS. I absolutely LOVE that song!

He, of course, came back out after “Hollywood” to sing an encore, during which a cloud of confetti burst from the sky setting the stage for “Let It Snow”. Because the Christmas tune is one of my dad’s very favorite Buble songs, we could NOT have been more excited to hear it.

As always, Michael finished his encore with the Leon Russell-penned “Song For You”, which he says he hopes to end every show with for the rest of his life.

All in all, it was an ABSOLUTELY amazing night and the BEST possible present we could have ever given my dad in honor of his newfound good health! Amazingly enough, my mom actually saw the Beatles perform live in concert when she was a teenager and she said that the Michael Buble show was far more exceptional. Talk about a compliment!

A BIG, HUGE THANK YOU to fellow stalker David from both me and my dad for hooking us up with these amazing tickets! You rock, my friend! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Sadly, you can’t – last Monday night’s show was the last of Michael Buble’s “Crazy Love” Tour. But you can find out information about the singer’s upcoming appearances on his official website here. And you can follow Tory Class, MB’s Tour Marketing Manager, on Twitter at @ToryonTour here.

November 23, 2010November 23, 2010

The Whisper Lounge – One of Michael Buble’s Favorite L.A. Restaurants

Last week, Michael Buble’s tour marketing manager, Tory Class, who I follow on Twitter (@ToryonTour), sent out a link to a recent interview the cutie crooner had done with The Hollywood Reporter during which he named his five favorite places to hang out in Los Angeles. I, of course, watched the video immediately and just about died when he mentioned the Whisper Restaurant and Lounge at The Grove as one of his favorite area restaurants, being that the Grim Cheaper and I had just dined there a few months prior. I, unfortunately, did not take any photographs of the place at that time, though, so I promptly added the eatery to my ever-growing “To Stalk” list and informed the GC that we would be dining there that very weekend. And we, indeed, did, this past Saturday night. Ironically enough, Michael actually mistakenly referred to the place as the “Viper Lounge” in his interview, but being that there is no such restaurant at The Grove and being that there is only one spot there that has the word “lounge” in its name, I was able to figure out which establishment he was talking about.

The Whisper Restaurant and Lounge, which first opened in January of 2004, is owned and operated by billionaire real estate developer Rick Caruso (no relation to actor David Caruso), the man who was the brains behind both The Grove shopping center and the more recent Americana at Brand in Glendale. The eatery was modeled after the private supper clubs that thrived during the heyday of Hollywood and was designed to resemble a 1940’s speakeasy (hence the “whisper” in the name), with dim lighting, dark wood-paneled walls, large leather booths, an indoor/outdoor canopied patio, and Rat Pack music on the stereo. It’s a very quiet, intimate spot and both the GC and I fell in love with the place immediately. Being that it is on the pricier side, though, I almost fell right off my bar stool when the GC announced that he couldn’t wait to bring my parents back there as he knew that they would also love it and suggested that we do so this upcoming weekend!

In The Hollywood Reporter interview, Michael mentioned that the restaurant serves “the best flat crust pizza ever” and I have to say that I wholeheartedly agree with that sentiment. The GC and I opted for the Wild Mushroom and Truffle version and it was nothing short of A-MA-ZING! The couple dining next to us ordered the Pizza Margherita with prosciutto added to it and, holy schmoley, did it look good. I am going to have to sample that myself on my next visit there. The Grilled Baby Broccoli with Garlic Butter side dish that I ordered was also spectacular – easily the BEST broccoli I have ever eaten in my entire life. I was seriously tempted to lick my plate clean. Winking smile

The service was also impeccable and lacked any sort of the typical L.A. snootiness that is usually found in upscale Hollywood-area restaurants. The bartender was INCREDIBLY nice and, because she had only worked at the Lounge for two months, was not sure if Michael Buble had ever frequented the place, so she sought out a few of the more veteran servers to find out for me, and, sure enough, they confirmed that the singer is a regular patron. So incredibly cool! While we were dining, we also had the pleasure of meeting the Assistant General Manager, a SUPER nice man named Eric Todd, who was very excited to hear that Michael had mentioned the eatery in a recent interview and did not think I was at all weird for stalking the place because of it.

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Apparently, Michael Buble is not the restaurant’s only famous fan. In fact, the place seems to be a veritable celebrity haven. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there recently include Halle Berry, Kim Kardashian, Kris Kardashian, Bruce Jenner, Spencer Pratt, Heidi Montag, Keanu Reeves, Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Leah Rimini, Lauren Conrad, Jessica Simpson, Lara Flynn Boyle, Vivica A. Fox, Nick Lachey, David Spade, Sam Worthington, former Bachelor- contestant Jerry Ferris, and Antonio Sabato, Jr. And while we, unfortunately, did not spot any celebs while dining at the restaurant, we did see actress and former Real World-er Jacinda Barrett and her husband, actor Gabriel Macht, and comic book legend Stan Lee, who was doing a signing at Barnes & Noble, while walking around The Grove earlier in the day.

Michael Buble’s Five Favorite Places in L.A.

You can watch Michael Buble’s Hollywood Reporter interview by clicking above. And for those who are not able to watch, his five favorite Hollywood haunts are as follows: 1. Koi Restaurant, 2. The Chateau Marmont hotel, 3. His house in West Hollywood, 4. The Grove and the Whisper Lounge, and 5. Disneyland! Because I am an absolute Disney freak, I was incredibly excited to hear that last one. Of the park, Michael says, “When I walk in there now and I go through the gates, I’m seven years old. I go right back. I just, I can’t get enough of it.” Love it! And congratulations are also in order here as MB won his very first American Music Award this past Sunday night for Favorite Adult Contemporary Artist! Whoo-hoo!

Justin Bieber’s AMA Speech

On an AMA side note – I just have to say that I absolutely LOVED Justin Bieber’s speech after winning Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist, in which he acknowledged the King of Pop, saying, “I want to thank Michael Jackson because without Michael Jackson, none of us would be here.” Love it! Then when he called Usher up on stage after winning the Artist of the Year award, I literally got tears in my eyes! (You can watch his Artist of the Year award speech by clicking above). What can I say? I love me some Biebs!

New Kids on the Block and Back Street Boys 2010 AMA’s Performance

I also absolutely LOVED LOVED LOVED the NKOTB/BSB performance! It was – dare I say it – the best performance of the night and, because I’ve had New Kids on the Blocks songs on my iPod for as long as I can remember, so think I am going to have to get myself some tickets for that tour!

On another side note – While doing some stalking in Hollywood this past Saturday morning, the Grim Cheaper and I spotted the above-pictured Tom Cruise look alike in the forecourt of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre and I just about died from excitement! The guy looked SO much like the movie star that it was absolutely UNCANNY. The GC and I both did a double take and for a few brief moments I actually believed he was the real Tom Cruise doing some sort of a press appearance at the legendary Hollywood theatre.

The guy was being absolutely MOBBED by people wanting to take a photograph with him and I have to admit that in the ten-plus years that I have lived in Los Angeles, never once have I paid – or been tempted to pay – to have my picture taken with the faux celebrities or superheroes who make their living on the Boulevard, but I HAD HAD HAD to get my picture taken with Tom. Smile There was absolutely NO way I was going to let that opportunity pass me by.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The Whisper Lounge is located inside of The Grove shopping center, near where Farmers Market Place meets Gilmore Lane, across the street from the Wonderland Bakery, in Los Angeles. The restaurant’s exact location is marked with a pink arrow in the above aerial view. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here, its Facebook page here, and you can follow the Lounge on Twitter here. The Whisper Lounge is currently hosting a “Blues Beats, Exquisite Eats” event each Sunday night, with live jazz music and a five-course tasting menu. You can find out more information about “Blues Beats, Exquisite Eats” here.

October 29, 2010September 29, 2017

The Fisher & Sons Funeral Home from “Six Feet Under”

One location that I stalked well over a year ago, but for whatever reason have yet to blog about, is the Victorian-style residence which stood in for the supposed North Hollywood-area Fisher & Sons (and later Fisher-Diaz) Funeral Home on the immensely popular HBO series Six Feet Under. Amazingly enough, up until yesterday morning, I had never seen even one episode of the show and, unfortunately, I have to say that after watching the pilot episode yesterday morning, I wasn’t all that impressed with it. It’s a bit of an odd series. The only part I enjoyed was one of the opening scenes in which David Fisher (aka a pre-Dexter Michael C. Hall) tells a supposedly grieving widower (played by Harper Roisman) that his wife is at peace now, to which the widower replies, “If there’s any justice in the universe, she’s shoveling sh*t in hell!” LOL LOL LOL

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But while I didn’t especially like the pilot, I did absolutely fall in love the main house featured in it. In real life, the property is known as the Auguste Marquis Residence and it was originally built in the Queen Anne/Eastlake style (much like the “Thriller” house that I blogged about yesterday) in 1904 and is Los Angeles’ 602nd historic cultural monument. The dwelling, which currently houses the Filipino Federation of America, boasts 5 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a whopping 6,324 square feet of living space, and sits on over half an acre of land. The home was originally built for a Swiss native named Auguste Rodolphe Marquis, who worked for Death Valley’s Johnnie Consolidated Gold Mining Company, from which he made a considerable fortune. The property was purchased shortly after the second World War by General Hilario Camino Moncado, a native of the Philippines and founder of the Filipino Federation. His heirs still own the property to this day.

The Auguste Marquis Residence was featured each week as the home where the dysfunctional Fisher Family – siblings David, Nate (aka Peter Krause), and Claire (aka Lauren Ambrose) and their mother Ruth (aka Frances Conroy) – lived and operated their mortuary business on Six Feet Under, which ran from 2001 through 2005.

In real life, the Fisher & Sons Funeral Home sign is, of course, not there.

And while the home was mostly just used for establishing shots, some occasional filming was also done onsite there throughout the series five year-run, as was the case with the pilot episode, screen captures of which are pictured above.

The interior of the Fisher home was a set that was built on a soundstage at the Columbia/Sunset Gower Studios in Hollywood and, from what I’ve been able to discern online, looks nothing like the interior of the actual Auguste Marquis Residence. A short film named Good Night was also filmed on location at the Six Feet Under funeral home in September of 2009 and Don Cunanan, the set photographer, snapped some pictures of the filming, in which you can see some of the residence’s real life interior. You can take a look at those photographs here.

On a coincidental side note – I was floored to spot Mountain View Cemetery, which I just blogged about this past Tuesday, featured quite extensively in the pilot episode of Six Feet Under, as the site of the funeral of Nathaniel Samuel Fisher (aka Richard Jenkins).

And I’d like to wish all of my fellow stalkers a VERY happy Halloween! Hope your holiday is fun and candy-filled!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Filipino Federation of America – aka Fisher & Sons funeral home from Six Feet Under – is located at 2302 West 25th Street in the West Adams District of Los Angeles.

October 26, 2010September 29, 2017

Mr. Bones Pumpkin Patch . . . A Second Time

This past weekend, I dragged the Grim Cheaper out to one of my all time favorite Halloween-themed stalking locations – Mr. Bones Pumpkin Patch in West Hollywood. The family owned and operated patch, which is located on a vacant plot of land on North Doheny Drive in between Keith and Harland Avenues, has been serving L.A.’s west side since 1986 and each year during the month of October is the place to see and be seen in Southern California. And even though I’ve actually blogged about this location once before, way back in October of 2008, since it is a landmark Haunted Hollywood stalking venue, I thought it was only fitting that I write about it once again since we are just a few days away from Halloween.

For whatever reason – I am guessing due mostly to its centralized location – the patch has been a celebrity magnet ever since its inception almost two and a half decades ago. Anyone who’s anyone stops by there during the month of October for a bit of Halloween fun. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there recently include Tobey Maguire and Jennifer Meyer, Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale, Tori Spelling and Dean McDermott, The Girls Next Door’s Holly Madison and Bridget Marquardt, Britney Spears, Marcia Cross, Scott Baio, Chris Noth, Sara Gilbert, Justin Chambers, Jessica Alba, Mark Wahlberg, Courteney Cox, Christina Aguilera, Laurence Fishburne, Halle Berry, Usher, Breckin Meyer, Dave Grohl, Victoria’s Secret-model Alessandra Ambrosio, and Cougar Town’s Busy Philipps. I could literally go on and on here, but that gives you somewhat of an idea of the patch’s extensive celebrity clientele. Unfortunately, the GC and I did not see any stars while we were stalking the place this past Sunday, but we did run into Heidi Klum and Seal during our first visit there back in 2007 (the two are pictured above) and last year we missed both Tori Spelling and Gwen Stefani by mere minutes! UGH!

And while I love Mr. Bones, I must admit that the Grim Cheaper isn’t too crazy about the place thanks to the fact that they charge a $4 entrance fee for each adult (kids are $2). That fee can later be applied to any pumpkins or Halloween merchandise that is purchased, but as the GC says, Mr. Bones has to be the only pumpkin patch on the planet that has a cover charge. 😉 Besides pumpkins, the patch also boasts plenty of activities to keep the kids (and those adults who want to join in on the fun) occupied, including a large pumpkin-shaped jump house, face painting, a super slide, a small straw maze, a petting zoo, and a pumpkin decorating station. The patch also offers catered lunches of pizza, kosher hot dogs, and sausages. And I can personally attest to the fact that the hot dogs there are fabulous. 😉

Mr. Bones also boasts quite a large paparazzi following. The paps have been a fixture there pretty much ever since the place first opened. As you can see in the above pictures, for a time Mr. Bones employees tried to thwart photographers’ efforts by surrounding the property with large black-out curtains which blocked views of the patch from the street. And each year it seemed that not only did those curtains grow taller and taller, but so did the paparazzo’s ladders.

But this year things changed considerably. I guess the patch has now resigned itself to the fact that as long as it is going to be there each year, so are the paparazzi, because they have now set up a cordoned off “press area” at the corner of the property in which the photogs are allowed to stand and take pictures. A pumpkin patch with a cover charge and a press area? Only in L.A., I swear! SO LOVE IT!

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I honestly cannot recommend stalking Mr. Bones enough! Be forewarned, though, its pumpkins do run on the expensive side – but, then again, you can’t put a price tag on celebrity sightings now can you? 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Mr. Bones Pumpkin Patch is located at 702 North Doheny Drive in West Hollywood. You can visit the official Mr. Bones website here. The patch is open this year from October 2nd through the 31st. Mr. Bones charges a cover fee of $4 per adult and $2 per child during the weekends. That fee can later be applied to the cost of any pumpkins or Halloween merchandise that is purchased while there.

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.

August 17, 2010August 7, 2010

Holly’s Nashua House from “The Office”

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

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

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

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

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

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

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

July 21, 2010July 20, 2010

24/7 Restaurant from Glamour Magazine’s “Glee Gets Glam” Photo Shoot

One location that I have been ABSOLUTELY DYING to stalk for what seems like forever now is the diner-style restaurant where the girls from Glee – Lea Michele, Dianna Agron, Amber Riley, and Jenna Ushkowitz – posed for the May 2010 Glamour Magazine “Glee Gets Glam” photo shoot. After months of searching for it, though, and having absolutely no luck whatsoever, I had become convinced that the shoot had taken place on a studio set somewhere in Hollywood and not at an actual restaurant. And then last Sunday night fate stepped in and, as so often happens with stalking, I ended up stumbling upon images of the Glee diner while searching for another location altogether. Maddeningly enough, as it turns out, the Glee girls were photographed at a locale that I have not only been to several times, but one that I’ve actually blogged about before – the Standard, Downtown L.A. Hotel. I have a pretty valid excuse at to why I didn’t recognize the place immediately when I first read the magazine, though – the girls were actually photographed inside the hotel’s 24/7 Restaurant, a place which I had never before visited. So, I of course, dragged the Grim Cheaper right out to stalk it this past weekend! 🙂

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And the place did not disappoint! I honestly cannot say enough good things about 24/7! The restaurant’s hipster decor is a definite throwback to the 1950s and is unlike anything else I’ve ever seen in L.A. Apparently photo shoots and filming take place on the premises all the time and it’s not very hard to see why – the diner is bright and funky and completely unique. And the food is INCREDIBLE! As I’ve mentioned before, I am an EXTREMELY picky eater, especially when it comes to chicken, but, let me tell you, I ate up every last bite of my 24/7 Cobb salad. It was AMAZING! And the prices are extremely reasonable, as well, which pleased the Grim Cheaper to no end. To top it all off, the staff was also incredibly friendly and let me take all of the photographs of the place that I wanted. Yay! 🙂

Lea Michele and Amber Riley’s “Glee Gets Glam” photograph was taken in the center booth located just to the right of the restaurant’s lobby entrance.

Dianna Agron and Jenna Ushkowitz posed for their photograph in front of the windows which face 24/7’s patio area.

And, as you can see in this picture, the photograph of all four girls playing around in a bathtub was shot in one of the Standard’s hotel rooms.

And, much to the Grim Cheaper’s dismay, I just HAD to recreate Lea Michele’s pose from the issue’s contents page while I was there. I so wish I could have also been wearing her Marchesa dress while doing so, but unfortunately I didn’t have an extra $6,600 lying around! 😉 Sigh.

I honestly cannot recommend stalking the 24/7 Restaurant enough. For lack of a better word, it is just simply a cool, cool place to grab a bite to eat. 🙂 Note – The magazine images which appear in this post do not belong to me, but remain the property of Glamour Magazine and photographer Peggy Sirota (who also shot these fabulous Jen Aniston pictures for GQ Magazine).

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The 24/7 Restaurant can be found inside the Standard, Downtown L.A. Hotel, which is located at 550 South Flower Street. As the name implies, the restaurant is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can visit the official 24/7 website here.