Movie Locations – Page 30

June 19, 2009June 18, 2009

The Step Brothers House

Got a challenge last week from my good friend Chelsea who wanted me to find the home used in the 2008 movie Step Brothers. Lucky for me, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, had already found this location a few months back and told me where it was located. 🙂 So, today – after stalking about a million wedding locations 🙂 – I ran right out to stalk the Step Brothers house. Thanks, Mike!!!!

My friend Chelsea had a hunch that the Step Brothers home was located in the Pasadena area and she actually wasn’t too far off! Am I a good stalking teacher, or what?? 🙂 The Step Brothers home is located just a few miles north of Pasadena proper, in the city of Altadena. And although the coloring is now a bit different, for the most part the home looks exactly the same in person as it did onscreen in the movie. The Step Brothers house is absolutely ginormous in real life, which I found to be slightly ironic, being that in the movie John C. Reilly and Will Ferrell are forced to share a room because John won’t give up the third bedroom which houses his “sound laboratory”. LOL According to Zillow, the home actually has four bedrooms, four bathrooms and measures 3,502 square feet. In the movie, John C. Reilly tells Will Ferrell that the home was built in 1825 by General Custor (LOL LOL LOL), but in reality it was built in 1935.

The home is featured several times in the movie, most notably as the location where John C. Reilly and Will Ferrell get into their massive front yard brawl. LOL

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On an interesting side note, in real life, Step Brothers star John C. Reilly is a long time Altadena resident. My mom and I actually saw him a few years back attending a movie at Laemmle Playhouse in Pasadena. He was in line waiting to buy popcorn at the concession stand when a woman walked up to him and very loudly said “Are you from Philadelphia? I think we went to high school together.” John was very gracious and explained that he actually grew up in Chicago. And just as he opened up his mouth to say what I’m assuming was something along the lines of “I’m an actor, maybe you recognize me from one of my movies,” the woman interrupted him and said, “No, I’m POSITIVE we know each other!!!! Are you sure you’re not from Philadelphia?” LOL John’s wife was standing next to him the whole time, head down, completely CRACKING UP! John quickly paid for his popcorn and started walking down the hall toward the theatre, but the douchebag lady ran – yes, ran!! – after him, saying things like “Maybe you know my sister in Des Moines.” LOL LOL LOL When John finally entered the theatre and the doors closed behind him, my mom tapped the lady on the shoulder and said “You recognize that man because he is John C. Reilly, the actor.” The woman got a look on her face like she absolutely wanted to just crawl into a hole and die!!! LOL To quote Chelsea Lately once again, “What . . . a douchebag!” The whole thing was absolutely HILARIOUS and one of my very favorite “only in L.A.” moments.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Step Brothers house is located at 1987 Midwick Drive in Altadena.

June 18, 2009June 16, 2011

Il Cielo

Looking at wedding venues is so darn fun that, I swear, I think I would be happy just remaining engaged forever. It could be my full time job. What do you do? Oh, I’m engaged – full time! 🙂 LOL On Tuesday, my wedding venue expedition led my mom and me to a little restaurant in Beverly Hills named Il Cielo. And I have to say that the place was downright amazing!!! So much so that it’s at the very top of my very narrowed down list of possible locations. Because I am such a picky eater, for years I’ve been steadfast about serving a buffet at my wedding, as opposed to a set menu. Il Cielo doesn’t offer a buffet – they only do sit-down dinners – yet they are STILL at the top of my list! Now, that’s saying a lot! 🙂

Il Cielo, which means “the sky” in Italian, was opened up in 1986 inside of a tiny Beverly Hills bungalow by a man named Pasquale Vericella. In the 70s, that bungalow was the home to another Italian restaurant named En Brochette. A frequent visitor to En Brochette, Pasquale adored the intimate, homey feel of the restaurant and decided it was just the type of place he himself wanted to own someday. He was so adamant about opening his restaurant in that exact spot, in fact, that for years he begged En Brochette’s owners to sell the restaurant and the bungalow to him. They finally relented in 1986, and Pasquale opened up his own Tuscan-style restaurant, featuring his mother and grandmother’s traditional family recipes. I had the pleasure of meeting Pasquale yesterday and of course asked him all sorts of questions about which celebrities had dined at Il Cielo. He quickly brushed off my queries and said “When you get married here, the only celebrity we are concerned with is YOU!” 🙂 So cute!!!!

Il Cielo has been voted “the most romantic restaurant in Los Angeles” numerous times by numerous publications. It has also been named “one of the top five places to get married in the country” – yes, the COUNTRY – by The New York Times. Those are some pretty amazing accolades! The restaurant has hosted over 1,500 weddings in its 23 year history. According to the restaurants’ events manager, Fabio, Il Cielo’s philosophy is service first, food second, and ambiance third. And from what I witnessed yesterday, all three of those seem to be top notch, especially the service. When I asked where the bar gets placed during a wedding reception, Fabio looked at me with confusion on his face. Then, realization dawning, he explained, “Oh no, we do not do waiting in line here. Our servers walk around taking drink orders, so that your guests never have to get out of their chair!” OMG LOVE IT! Even better than that, after the reception ends, guests are served lattes, cappuccinos, and biscotti out on the sidewalk while waiting for the valet to retrieve their cars. SO LOVE THAT! I mean, this place is downright A-MA-ZING.

And, of course, there’s also the celeb factor! Google the words “Il Cielo” and “celebrities” and a list of a hundred well-known names will pop up, including Christian Bale, Nancy Reagan, my girl Jennifer Aniston, Ellen DeGeneres, Portia De Rossi, Robert Redford, Rod Stewart, Colin Farrell, Claudia Shiffer, Ali Larter, Brandon Routh, Michael Douglas, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Nikki and Cathy Hilton. Lesley Ann Warren was married at Il Cielo and (that little homewrecker) Brad Pitt took Gwyneth Paltrow there on their first date.

And, of course, Il Cielo is also a filming location. At the beginning of Legally Blonde, it’s the restaurant where Elle Woods’ boyfriend, Warner, does not propose. When Warner first announces he is taking Elle to Il Cielo, she says “Oooh, I love that restaurant. I heard Madonna went into labor there.” LOL LOL LOL

Il Cielo’s patio area stood in for the patio of Adam Sandler’s restaurant in the 2004 movie Spanglish. The exterior of Adam’s restaurant (pictured above) is actually the exterior of the Hal Valentine Hair Salon, which is located directly next door to Il Cielo.

On the Season Three episode of Entourage entitled “Strange Days”, Ari Gold re-proposes to his wife after 15 years of marriage with a ginormous diamond ring on Il Cielo’s back patio. The restaurant has actually popped up in Entourage no less than three times!

In the Season 3 episode of The Hills entitled “A Date With The Past”, former flame Ste-phen Colletti takes Lauren Conrad out for a “strictly platonic” dinner at Il Cielo. Smart move, Ste-phen, bringing a girl you just want to be friends with to the most romantic restaurant in all of L.A.! LOL Il Cielo was also featured in the Season Five opener of The Simple Life entitled “Welcome to Camp Shawnee” as the location where Paris Hilton and Nicole Ritchie finally bury the hatchet and become friends again over an Italian lunch.

I honestly can’t recommend stalking Il Cielo enough – either as a wedding venue or for a romantic dinner!!!! This place is truly one of a kind!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Il Cielo is located at 9018 Burton Way in Beverly Hills. You can visit their website here. Il Cielo is closed on Sundays.

June 16, 2009December 6, 2013

Miceli’s Restaurant

After watching Kyra Sedgwick’s Star Ceremony last week, my friend Blaze and I headed over to Hollywood’s oldest pizzeria, better known as Miceli’s Restaurant, to grab a bite to eat. Miceli’s – pronounced Micheli’s – opened its doors way back in 1949 and has the distinction of being known as Hollywood’s first pizza house. The restaurant was started by an Italian couple named Carmen and Sylvia Miceli, along with four of their siblings, who brought their family recipes all the way from Sicily to Los Angeles. The restaurant is still owned and operated by the Miceli family and apparently, most nights, Carmen, himself, is on hand to great his guests! Because of the restaurants’ storied Hollywood history, I just HAD to stalk the place. 🙂

And I wasn’t disappointed!! The second you walk through Miceli’s front doors you are immediately transported back in time! With its dimly lit interior, red leather booths, and black and white photographs of celebrities of yesteryear lining the entryway, the restaurant definitely gives off an Old Hollywood vibe. It is such a cool place!!!! My favorite part of Miceli’s had to be the intricately carved wood and red leather booths. I’ve never seen booths like that in my entire life! Ironically, the booths originally belonged to the old Pig N’ Whistle restaurant, which I blogged about yesterday. When the Pig N’ Whistle closed its doors in 1949, its gorgeous wooden booths were sold to Miceli’s, where they remain to this day.

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I was also pretty obsessed with the ceilings at Miceli’s. 🙂 I don’t know what it is with me and ceilings lately, but every time I walk into a historic building my eyes always go directly up to the roof. Nine times out of ten, the ceilings of old buildings are like works of art. And Miceli’s ceiling certainly did not disappoint. Intricate wrought iron chandeliers hang from gorgeous carved wooden beams throughout the restaurant. Unfortunately, because Miceli’s is so dimly lit, my photographs of the interior did not come out very well. 🙁

Not surprisingly, Miceli’s Restaurant has always been popular with celebrities. During Hollywood’s Golden Era, stars like Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, my girl Marilyn Monroe, and Presidents Nixon and JFK all dined at Miceli’s. In more recent years, Jim Carrey, Adam Sandler, The Beatles, and Julia Roberts have all been spotted at the eatery.

And, yes, Miceli’s is also a filming location! In 2007’s Knocked Up, Seth Rogan takes his baby momma, Katherine Heigl, to the historic restaurant on a date.

I HIGHLY recommend stalking Miceli’s! The place is worth a trip just for the ambiance alone! But besides the decor, the food at Miceli’s is also EXCELLENT and the portions are ginormous! I just about died over the restaurant’s garlic toast!! Sadly, though, since we ate at Miceli’s during lunchtime, we missed the “singing waiters” which the Italian restaurant is famous for. 🙁 Every night, the Miceli servers step up to the piano to serenade diners with authentic Italian arias, show tunes, and the standards. Sometimes patrons are even invited to get up and sing a note or two themselves. Since karaoke is one of my very favorite past times, I am definitely planning on dragging my fiance there for a nighttime visit! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Miceli’s Restaurant is located at 1646 North Las Palmas in Hollywood.

June 12, 2009June 11, 2009

Robbie Hart’s House

Thanks to fellow stalker Owen, last week Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I were able to stalk Robbie Hart’s house from the 1998 romantic comedy The Wedding Singer. I had actually been wanting to find The Wedding Singer house for quite a while now, so when Owen told me that he knew where it was located, I just about died!!! And Mike and I literally ran right out to stalk it. 🙂

I am very happy to report that Robbie’s house looks EXACTLY the same today as it did when The Wedding Singer was filmed there over eleven years ago. I mean, even the paint colors are still the same!! LOVE IT! The home was originally built in 1908 by one of Pasadena’s first major landowners and prominent citizens, David MacPherson, who was a design engineer for the Mt. Lowe Railway.

In The Wedding Singer, the home actually belongs to Robbie’s sister and her husband. Robbie lives in the basement area, which, as you can see in the above screen captures, is reached through a little side door marked 1075 1/2. LOL In reality, though, that door and basement area do not exist – they were built solely for the filming of the movie.

Robbie’s house, especially the front porch area, is featured numerous times throughout The Wedding Singer. It is a very cute and very unique, almost barnlike, structure and I highly recommend stalking it!

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location!!! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Robbie Hart’s house from The Wedding Singer is located at 1075 East Topeka Street in Pasadena.

June 11, 2009June 10, 2009

The Bedtime Stories School

Last week, while searching for the Bedtime Stories house, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I decided to also try to find the school featured in the movie. We started our search by looking at street views of different elementary schools in the Los Angeles area, but pretty much came up empty-handed. So, I decided to once again ask my friend who had worked on the movie if she happened to remember where the school was located. She, of course, did not, but what she did remember was that the school from the movie wasn’t actually a school at all, but a public library. She said that the exterior of the library had been changed quite extensively for the filming and made to look a lot bigger than it actually is. Two whole wings were actually added to one side of the building to make it look more like an elementary school. So, armed with that little bit of information, off I went to search local libraries. And, sure enough, it wasn’t long before I found the right one! 🙂

In real life, Daniel Webster Elementary School is, in fact, the Los Angeles Memorial Branch Library which was constructed in 1930. It was built to honor twenty alumni of Los Angeles High School, which is located directly across the street, who had lost their lives in the first World War. Students had originally purchased a small parcel of land across the street from the high school in 1922 and turned it over to the Park Commission with the decree that a memorial park, in honor of all alumni who had fought in the war, would be built on the premises. Today, that park is known as L.A. High Memorial Park. The following year, students and alumni purchased an additional parcel of land adjacent to the park. In 1929, the City of Los Angeles decided to build a library on that adjacent piece of land and commissioned the architecture firm Austin and Ashley, who had also designed the high school, to build it. The library was designed to match the English Tudor style architecture of the high school, which had been built twelve years beforehand. A stained glass window, designed by Judson Art Studio, with the names of the twenty alumni who had lost their lives, was installed in the adult reading room. The library officially opened to the public on April 29, 1930.

Sadly, the original Los Angeles High School building was badly damaged in the 1971 Sylmar Earthquake and was quickly condemned by the City of Los Angeles. Preservationists tried to stop the demolition of the beautiful building, but a mysterious fire gutted the school, thereby sealing its fate. The building was completely demolished later that same year and a huge blue and gold cement monstrosity was built in its place (pictured above). That monstrosity even pops up in Bedtime Stories, in the scene when Adam Sandler picks his niece and nephew up from school. You can see pictures of what Los Angeles High School used to look and pictures of its demolition here and here. So sad!!!!

Ironically enough, the original Los Angeles High School building was a frequent filming location, showing up in A Kiss Before Dying (1956), Compulsion, and the television series Room 222. You can watch the intro to Room 222, in which the school is featured prominently, here.

As you can see in the above screen capture and photographs, the Los Angeles Memorial Branch Library looks much different and much smaller in person than how it appeared onscreen. You can also see the wing that was added to the right side of the building.

The front door of the library is very recognizable from the film, though. 🙂

Because the real interior of the library looks nothing like an elementary school, the interior scenes were shot about 20 miles away at McKinley School in Pasadena. And, according to the librarian who I talked to while stalking the place, the interior of the Memorial Branch Library, but not the exterior, was featured in the 1987 movie Baby Boom. Go figure. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Bedtime Stories school is really the Memorial Branch Library located at 4625 West Olympic Boulevard in Los Angeles. The interior school scenes were filmed at McKinley School located at 325 South Oak Knoll Avenue in Pasadena.

June 10, 2009June 10, 2009

The Pantages Theatre

As promised earlier in the week, I thought I would dedicate today’s post to the historic Pantages Theatre in Hollywood where I saw Dirty Dancing – The Classic Story On Stage last Tuesday night . And let me tell you, the Pantages Theatre is a site to see, in and of itself! The Art Deco landmark was built in 1930 by vaudeville theatre mogul Alexander Pantages for a whopping $1.25 million – and we’re talking 1930’s money!!!! It was designed by architect B. Marcus Priteca, who conceived most of the theatres in the Pantages chain. But, in an ironic twist of events, when the theatre first opened to the public on June 4, 1930, it was not opened as a Pantages, but instead under the Fox Theatre name. In 1929, while the Pantages was being built, Alexander was knee-deep in a scandal involving another of his many theatres. It seems Alexander, who was in his sixties at the time, was accused and found guilty of raping one of his sixteen year old female ushers at his theatre in Downtown Los Angeles. After being sent to jail, he was forced to open his new Hollywood theatre under a different name. In 1931, Pantages appealed the case and was awarded a new trial. His defense in the second trial maintained that rival theatre company RKO along with Joseph Kennedy (yes, that Joseph Kennedy) had framed him in order to purchase his theatre chain at a low price. Since the broom closet where the rape had supposedly occured was too small a space for two people to fit in, the jury acquitted him and Alexander was released from prison. But Pantages never regained his luxor in Hollywood. Alexander Pantages passed away only two months after his release from prison, broke and broken.

The Pantages has gone through a succession of owners during its almost eighty year history. In 1949, Howard Hughes purchased the theatre and renamed it RKO Pantages. His offices were located above the theatre on the building’s second floor. During the RKO years, from 1949 to 1959 , the Pantages hosted ten Academy Awards ceremonies. It was also home to the Emmy Awards through 1977. In 1967, the Pantages was taken over by Pacific Theatres, who in 1977 joined forces with the Nederlander Theatre Organization to refurbish the property and turn it into a live theatre venue. In October of 2000, Disney opened its hit show The Lion King at the Pantages, which ran for over two years and almost 900 performances. Just prior to The Lion King’s opening, the Pantages underwent a painstaking $10 million renovation process, bringing the theatre back to her original splendor. Since that time, the theatre has been home to over 45 live stage productions including Mama Mia, Annie, Rent, Cats, and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.

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The Pantages is an absolutely beautiful theatre and a stunning example of Art Deco architecture.

From its sweeping staircases . . .

. . . to its sparkling Art Deco chandeliers, I was absolutely mesmerized by the architectural detail throughout. The Pantages is truly a wonder and I HIGHLY recommend stalking it, if you get the chance!

The Pantages is no stranger to the silver screen, either. It was featured in The Bodyguard, as the site of the Academy Awards ceremony where Whitney Houston was a presenter;

the exterior of it shows up very briefly in The Black Dhalia, as Josh Hartnett makes his way into the Frolic Room which is located right next door;

and in L.A. Confidential, as Kevin Spacey does the very same thing;

and its stage was featured in Michael Jackson’s music video for the song “You Are Not Alone”. The Pantages also showed up in Season Two of Ugly Betty (it’s the “New York” theatre where Henry takes Betty to see the musical Wicked), Paparazzi (it’s the site of Cole’s movie premiere at the very end), Ed Wood, The Jazz Singer, Money Talks, and Batman Forever.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Pantages Theatre is located at 6233 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood. You can visit their website here. Dirty Dancing: The Classic Story On Stage is currently running at the Pantages now through June 28th. Upcoming shows include Legally Blonde: The Musical and How The Grinch Stole Christmas.

June 5, 2009June 4, 2009

The Bedtime Stories House

Got a challenge last week from fellow stalker Owen who wanted me to find Courteney Cox’s house from the 2008 movie Bedtime Stories. And even though I had yet to see the movie, I was actually in luck with this challenge as one of my acting classmates had worked as a production assistant on the Adam Sandler flick. So, I immediately called her up to ask her where the house was located. But, sadly, as is often the case with this sort of thing, she could not for the life of her remember. UGH! But she did tell me that she thought the home might be in Pasadena. So, I got Mike from MovieShotsLA in on the hunt and we started our search there. And, as usual, it wasn’t long before Mike had found the house! He’s so the man!! 🙂 The Bedtime Stories house is actually located on a quiet, tree-lined street in South Pasadena, a few miles south of Pasadena proper. And yesterday, I ran right out to stalk it. 🙂

The Bedtime Stories house is absolutely adorable and looks much the same in person as it did in the movie. And, while I was there stalking the place, I was lucky enough to get to chat with the owner, who gave me some scoop on the filming! 🙂

She told me that some filming actually took place inside of the house, too. Filmed inside of her home were the living room scenes;

the kitchen scenes;

and the backyard party scene.

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The children’s room where Adam Sandler tells his bedtime stories, however, was built on a soundstage at Universal Studios. The owner said that producers changed the interior of her home quite a bit for the filming and that in real life it looks much different than how it appeared on screen. All in all, filming at her house took just about two weeks to complete.

A few months after the filming had been completed, producers returned to the home yet again to film one more exterior set-up shot. Apparently, long after filming had wrapped, it was decided that a shot of the home in the rain at night was needed. So, they brought in a huge rain machine and set it up behind the house. So cool!

What I found most interesting, though, was that for the scene when Keri Russell and Adam Sandler meet, producers actually painted fake parking spaces up and down the entire street in front of the house! Apparently, they so loved the idea of Adam taking up two parking spaces and Keri giving him a hard time about it, that they created fake parking spaces along an entire city block!! LOL When I watched that scene while trying to locate the house the other day, I remember thinking how odd it looked for a cute little house in a cute little neighborhood to have vertical parking spaces in front of it. LOL Ah, the magic of the movies! 🙂

Amazingly enough, the lines from the fake parking spaces are still visible in front of the house! So cool!!!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Bedtime Stories house is located at 800 Adelaine Avenue in South Pasadena.

June 4, 2009June 3, 2009

The Cellular House

Back in September of last year, while stalking the house from fave 80s movie License to Drive, I just happened to stumble upon another famous movie home – Kim Basinger’s residence from the 2004 flick Cellular. Well, truth be told, “stumble upon” isn’t exactly the terminology I should be using here. 🙂 The real story is that while taking pictures in front of the License to Drive house, the owner came outside and struck up a conversation with me. And while he had no idea that he was living in a famous home, he did tell me that the movie Cellular had been filmed on the street directly behind his! So, of course, off I went to stalk that house! But somehow, in all this time, I never got around to blogging about it. So, here goes. 🙂

In the very beginning of Cellular, Kim Basinger, aka Jessica Martin, is kidnapped out of the large, traditional style home pictured above. Her only hope for rescue lies in reluctant hero – and total cutie – Chris Evans, whose cell phone accidentally intercepts a 911 call Jessica is trying to make.

In the movie, we are told that Jessica’s home is located at 3270 Bonhill Road in Brentwood. And, while a Bonhill Road in Brentwood does actually exist, the street numbers there don’t go higher than 800. In actuality, the home where filming took place is located about three miles east of Brentwood.

And, as you can see in the above screen capture, producers even went so far as to paint the number 3270 on the curb in front of the home! Which would have made locating this house extremely difficult for stalkers!!!!! So, I definitely owe a big THANK YOU to the owner of the License to Drive house. 😉 If you haven’t seen the movie Cellular yet, I highly recommend doing so! While the campy thriller has to be one of the cheesiest movies ever made, I have to say that I absolutely LOVED it! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Cellular house is located at 527 Loring Avenue in Los Angeles.

June 2, 2009June 1, 2009

The Swordfish Hostage Scene

This past weekend, my parents, my fiance and I drove up to Ventura for a little weekend vacay. And I was absolutely floored to discover – thanks to my new favorite stalking book – that the hostage scene gone wrong from the 2001 movie Swordfish had been filmed in the coastal town! But, while my stalking book stated that all of the filming took place on Main Street in Downtown Ventura, it unfortunately didn’t specify exactly which stores were used in the production. So, me being me, I just had to stalk pretty much every shop and ask around until I found the right ones. 🙂 Filming of Swordfish took place back in October of 2000 and, all in all, three main stores were used. Come to find out, though, every single storefront featured in the movie was drastically remodeled for the filming and today they are all virtually unrecognizable. Such a bummer!!!!!

All of the filming took place on one of Downtown Ventura’s main street corners, where producers were lucky enough to find two vacant storefronts that faced each other. The first storefront, which was formerly the location of a used bookstore named Second Time Around, was where producers built the set of John Travolta’s favorite coffee shop, Traveler’s Coffee Company. Yep, that’s right – the ENTIRE coffee shop was just a set built solely for the filming!

Today, that storefront houses an American Apparel store, which looks nothing like the coffee shop in Swordfish. 🙁 Being the coffee fiend that I am, I was actually pretty bummed out when I learned that the coffee shop was a fake! I was really hoping to grab an iced latte there. LOL Thank goodness there was a Starbucks located just a few blocks away. 🙂 You can see some pics of the Traveler’s Coffee Company set being built here.

Directly across the street from “Traveler’s Coffee Company”, is the bank that John Travolta set out to rob. The interior and the facade of the building, which housed a restaurant named O’Brien’s up until a few months before filming began, were changed significantly for the filming.

Today, an upscale clothing store named Parts Unknown and a restaurant named Riviera Bistro call that space home. You can see some great photographs of the bank set being built here.

The final storefront used in Swordfish was that of Nicholby’s Nightclub, which popped up in the background of the hostage scene quite a few times. Producers built a fake newsstand on the side of the Nicholby’s building for the filming.

As you can see in the above photograph, that newsstand does not exist in real life. You can see pics of the fake newsstand being built here.

It is actually very surprising to me that producers used a real life street corner and real life storefronts to shoot Swordfish’s hostage scene. For action sequences of that magnitude, producers usually opt to film inside of studio soundstages. But because Ventura is a somewhat sleepy town, I am guessing it was fairly easy for them to take over a few vacant storefronts and close down a street corner. According to one of the business owners I talked to, production of the hostage scene took over two months to complete!!!! While the actual filming only took about three weeks, a significant amount of time was needed to both construct and dismantle the extensive sets. I can’t even imagine being able to watch all of that take place! It must have been an amazing experience for the Ventura locals. 🙂 Oh, how I wish I had been there!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The hostage scene from Swordfish was filmed on the corner of East Main and South Oak Streets in Downtown Ventura. Traveler’s Coffee Company is really the American Apparel store located at 391 East Main Street. World Banc is the clothing store named Parts Unknown, which is located at 394 East Main Street #A. Nicholby’s Nightclub, which can be found at 404 East Main Street, was the newsstand that showed up in the background of the scene.

June 1, 2009June 1, 2009

Cameron Frye’s House

Last Wednesday morning I almost fell out of my chair as I opened up my email account and saw an AOL news headline screaming out at me “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off House For Sale!” At first, I thought the article was talking about the Long Beach area home that stood in for Ferris’ in the film. But, in reality, it is the ultra-modern glass and steel abode that belonged to Ferris’ best pal Cameron Frye in the film that just recently went on the market. And, while I don’t usually like to blog about places that I have not actually visited myself, since I have received about a million emails this week about the cinematically historic home, I figured what the heck! So, here goes. 🙂

The house, which was built entirely out of steel, cedar, and glass, measures 5,300 square feet, sits on almost an acre of land, and boasts four bedrooms and four bathrooms. The home was built in 1953 by prominent architect A. James Speyer for a prominent textile designer named Ben Rose, and his wife, Fran. The famous garage – which is actually called “the Pavilion” or auto museum – is separate from the house and was not built until 1970. It was designed by architect David Haid and, in line with how it was portrayed on film, was built to store Ben’s antique car collection. The house had been featured in numerous architectural books and magazines long before Ferris Bueller was filmed and, apparently, it was through those magazines that location scouts discovered the house. 🙂 With its glass walls and simplistic design, the home reminds me quite a bit of the Stahl House in Los Angeles and the other Case Study Houses. Cameron Frye’s home is selling for a cool $2.3 million, which I think is pretty low considering you’d be buying a cinematic and architectural landmark! 🙂 You can read a great article about the home and its original owners here.

Several memorable scenes from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off took place at Cameron Frye’s home, including the “He’ll keep calling me, he’ll keep calling me until I come over. He’ll make me feel guilty. This is – uh – this is ridiculous! OK, I’ll go, I’ll go, I’ll go, I’ll go, I’ll go, I’ll go. Sh*t!” scene. LOL

I believe the real interior of the Ben Rose House was used in the scene when Ferris continually calls Cameron begging him to come over. The walls of the actual home are built entirely out of glass and, as you can see in the above screen capture, so are the walls of Cameron’s room.

But, of course, the most memorable scenes took place in the Pavilion and involved Cameron’s father’s 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California.

It is in the Pavilion that Cameron says to Ferris, “Less than 100 were made. My father spent three years restoring this car. It is his love, it is his passion . . .” to which Ferris replies. “It is fault he didn’t lock the garage.” LOL God, I love that movie!!!!

It is also in the Pavilion that Ferris “runs the car in reverse” in the hopes of removing the mileage that was accrued during their “day off”.

When that plan doesn’t work, Cameron flips out and ends up “killing the car”. LOL To shoot that scene, producers had to not only replace the Pavilion’s real life windows with breakaway glass, but also build several fake cars out of fiberglass, complete with small bombs that made the car smoke upon impact. I can’t even imagine being there to watch that scene be filmed!!! It must have been so much fun for the owners of the house!!!! Apparently, there is an entire wall of photographs from the filming of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off on display in the Pavilion. Love it!!!

You can visit the home’s real estate website and see photos of its interior here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Cameron Frye’s house is located at 370 Beech Street in Highland Park, Illinois.