movie restaurants – IAMNOTASTALKER

August 16, 2013August 15, 2013

The Derby Restaurant from “Step Brothers”

During a recent visit to Los Angeles, the Grim Cheaper and I stayed at an Arcadia hotel that just so happened to be located right across the street from a nine-decades old eatery that I had always wanted to stalk – The Derby Restaurant, which was featured in the 2008 comedy Step Brothers. As y’all know, this stalker absolutely loves herself any location with a history! So I dragged the GC right on over there to partake of what turned out to be a fabulous happy hour. (And correct me if I’m wrong here, but isn’t stepbrothers one word? Why, oh, why was it separated into two for the movie’s title? This is most-definitely a case for fellow stalker Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog!)

[ad]

The Derby Restaurant was originally founded by Arcadia Rotary Club charter member Hudson M. Proctor in 1922 at a location on Foothill Boulevard near the Santa Anita Park racetrack (which I blogged about here). At the time it was known as Proctor’s Tavern. Nine years later, when the main thoroughfare in Arcadia shifted from Foothill Boulevard to Huntington Drive, Hudson decided to move his eatery to its current home at 233 East Huntington. The new site featured two dining rooms, two fireplaces and a second-floor apartment where Hudson lived with his wife.

In December 1938, the steakhouse was purchased by Canadian-born jockey legend George “The Iceman” Woolf, who is best known for riding Seabiscuit to several victories, and his partner Bill Peterson. The duo renamed the site “The Derby Restaurant” in honor of the Kentucky Derby, the first leg of the U.S. Triple Crown. Woolf decorated the property with memorabilia and photographs from his racing career, most of which are still displayed on the premises to this day.

When Woolf was tragically killed during a race on January 3, 1946, his wife, Genevieve, took over daily operation of the restaurant. In 1951, she sold the property to Dominic and Lorene Sturniolo, who continued to run the eatery, along with their son, for the next fifty-plus years. Today, The Derby, which has the distinction of being one of the oldest restaurants in Los Angeles County, is owned by Dustin Nicolarsen and Michael Thomas. On August 11th, 2011, the Arcadia Historical Society presented a historical marker (one of only eight) to the Zagat-rated site commemorating its significance to the city that it has called home for over 90 years.

While The Derby’s menu is on the pricier side, fortunately the happy hour offerings are very reasonable (which is the only reason the GC agreed to eat there Winking smile ). And I can honestly say that the food is delicious! The place is extremely popular, though, and the bar area was absolutely jam-packed when we arrived, so be prepared for a wait if you happen to venture out there on a Friday night.

In Step Brothers, The Derby Restaurant masqueraded as RJ Posner’s steakhouse, where the birthday party for Derek Doback (Adam Scott) was held. It is during the party that Brennan Huff (Will Ferrell) and Dale Doback (John C. Reilly) unveil their new music video, which alerts their father/stepfather, Dr. Robert Doback (Richard Jenkins), to the fact that his beloved boat has been destroyed.

The birthday party scene was shot in The Derby’s main dining room, which is located just east of the front entrance.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Derby Restaurant, from Step Brothers, is located at 233 East Huntington Drive in Arcadia. You can visit the eatery’s official website here.

August 2, 2013August 1, 2013

The “Little Miss Sunshine” Restaurant

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, while doing research on the former Abiquiu eatery (now Wokcano) from Get Shorty (which I blogged about here), I came across a Chowhound message board on which a commenter named Kevin stated that Pann’s restaurant in Ladera Heights was the spot where the Hoover clan – Olive (Abigail Breslin), Richard (Greg Kinnear), Dwayne (Paul Dano), Grandpa Edwin (Alan Arkin), Sheryl (Toni Collette), and Frank Ginsberg (Steve Carell) – stopped for a mid-road-trip breakfast in fave movie Little Miss Sunshine. Because the breakfast scene was one of my favorites in the entire flick, I was extremely excited to learn this information. Unfortunately though, as is so often the case with locales that are posted online, this one turned out to be wrong.

[ad]

While Pann’s menus were visible in the scene, as you can see below, one look at online images of the interior of the restaurant and I knew that it was not the right place. Convincing me further was the fact that Pann’s is not located directly below a freeway overpass, as the Little Miss Sunshine café was shown to be (which you can also see below).

So I got to cyberstalking and fairly quickly came across an absolutely amazing YouTube video (that you can watch by clicking below) in which a fellow stalker named smbstressfest chronicled pretty much every single locale that appeared in the movie. And while he did not state the addresses of any of the places, in response to a commenter named starbucksmunkey (love it!), he did give the Google Earth coordinates of the restaurant. Woot woot! And even though smbstressfest had mentioned that the eatery was no longer in operation, I was still chomping at the bit to stalk it and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over there this past weekend while the two of us were in L.A.

The Little Miss Sunshine production notes state that the flick was lensed over a thirty-day period during the “hot” summer of 2005, at which time, according to the mmm-yoso!!! website, the space housed an eatery named Rutt’s Hawaiian Café. Rutt’s was shuttered by the time smbstressfest stalked it in 2007 (the chain still boasts an outpost in Culver City, though) and at some point thereafter a Mexican steakhouse named Don Carlos was opened on the site, but it, too, has since been closed. According the property’s LoopNet listing, the 5,130-square-foot building also once housed a Denny’s.

Which makes sense because the property does look very much like a Denny’s location – to me, at least.

And while a sign in the window states that Maly’s Pizza Buffet is “coming soon”, I do not know how accurate that is.

In Little Miss Sunshine, the Hoover family stops at the café towards the beginning of their road trip from Albuquerque to Redondo Beach. It is there that Olive orders waffles “alamodie” and is lambasted by her father for choosing to eat something so high in fat.

The interior of Rutt’s was used quite extensively in the filming. Oh, what I wouldn’t have given to have been able to go inside that restaurant!

Thankfully, I was able to snap a few photographs of the interior through the front window, although they are not of the section of the restaurant that appeared in the movie. In Little Miss Sunshine, Olive and her family dined in the southeast portion of the building, but the only area in which the blinds were not drawn was the northern part, unfortunately. Boo!

The exterior of Rutt’s was also shown in the scene.

You can watch the Little Miss Sunshine restaurant scene by clicking below.

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

Big THANK YOU to smbstressfest for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The supposed Pann’s restaurant from Little Miss Sunshine is actually the former Rutt’s Hawaiian Café located at 17371 East Valley Boulevard in La Puente. Unfortunately, the eatery is currently closed.

May 14, 2010May 13, 2010

The River Oasis Cafe from “Beautiful Girls”

Another Stillwater, Minnesota location that my family and I stalked last week was the River Oasis Cafe from fave movie Beautiful Girls. And I’m really hoping that my fellow stalkers are not yet sick of reading about Beautiful Girls locations, ‘cause there are still quite a few of them that I’ve yet to blog about. 😉 Anyway, I found out about this locale thanks to the master locations list that fellow stalker Owen purveyed for me before I left on my trip to the North Star State. Thank you, Owen! And even though the River Oasis Cafe only appeared in one fairly brief scene in the movie, I just had to stalk the place. Especially since my mom was absolutely starving upon our arrival in Stillwater and mentioned that she wanted to dine at a “local greasy spoon”, to which I said, “I know just the place!” 🙂

[ad]

The River Oasis Cafe appeared in the very beginning of Beautiful Girls, in one of the opening scenes in which Tommy “Birdman” Rowland (aka Matt Dillon), Paul Kirkwood (aka Michael Rapaport), and Kev (aka Max Perlich) are shown eating an early morning breakfast after finishing that day’s snow plow rounds. And I am very happy to report that the restaurant looks much the same in person as it did onscreen in the movie!

Except for the large billboard which stands in the cafe’s front parking lot, though, which was covered over during the filming to read “Welcome to Knight’s Ridge”, the fictional town where Beautiful Girls was set.

Because a wide shot of the interior of the River Oasis Cafe was never shown in the movie, I wasn’t exactly sure of where Paul, Tommy, and Kev sat during the scene, but thankfully our SUPER nice waitress was able to point me in the right direction. 🙂

And while some people were already occupying the Beautiful Girls’ booth when we first arrived at the restaurant, as soon as they left I immediately ran over and snagged it so that I could snap a pic in the exact spot where Matt Dillon and Max Perlich sat during the filming. 🙂

Ironically enough, while we were dining my dad randomly took a photograph of the above-pictured sign which hangs near the River Oasis Cafe’s front door. So, imagine my surprise when I re-watched Beautiful Girls upon returning home from Minnesota and saw that very same sign hanging in pretty much the very same spot near the restaurant’s front door in the scene in which Paul is shown making a phone call to his former girlfriend Jan (aka Martha Plimpton). Nice work, dad!!! 🙂

While we were stalking the Cafe, my parents and I had the pleasure of meeting Craig Beemer – the restaurant’s owner/dishwasher, as he likes to call himself 🙂 – who truly could NOT have been nicer. Not only did he agree to pose for a photograph with me for my blog, but he also snapped a pic of me sitting in the Beautiful Girls’ booth to put on the River Oasis Cafe’s “Faces of Oasis” Facebook page. 🙂 He even seemed amenable to my suggestion of putting a plaque on the Beautiful Girls’ booth so that diners would be aware of the movie magic that took place in that spot just over fourteen years ago! So, Craig, if you’re reading this, I fully expect to see that plaque in place the next time I’m in Stillwater! 🙂 I honestly cannot recommend stalking the River Oasis Cafe enough – it’s a fabulous restaurant, which serves up some excellent food, and the staff truly could not be nicer! Love it! Love it! Love it!

On a side note – The owner of Willie’s house from Beautiful Girls, which I blogged about on Wednesday, mentioned that his neighbors always joke about creating a tour of all of the movie’s locations in the Stillwater area. I told him what a FABULOUS idea I thought that was, but I don’t think he took me seriously. But, let me tell you, even though I’ve already visited pretty much every spot which appeared in the movie, I would SO sign up for that tour.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The River Oasis Cafe from Beautiful Girls is located at 806 Main Street South in Stillwater, Minnesota. You can visit the River Oasis Cafe’s Facebook page here.

March 9, 2010March 8, 2010

Bun ‘N Burger Restaurant from “An American Summer”

I must apologize in advance for today’s fairly short blog post as I just got back from spending pretty much the entire day (over seven hours – not kidding!) on the set of CSI: Miami yet again. And while I promise to write a detailed post about my experiences there in the very near future, I’ve unfortunately gotta keep this particular column short and sweet. So, without further ado . . . a few weeks ago Mike, from MovieShotsLA, took the day off from work so that the two of us could do some stalking in the Malibu area. But before heading over to the ‘Bu, Mike told me that he was taking me out to breakfast – at a filming location, of course. That filming location turned out to be a little place named Bun ‘N Burger restaurant that was featured very briefly in a movie called An American Summer. Before that day a few weeks ago I had never actually heard of An American Summer, which premiered in 1991, but as fate would have it, the flick starred a very young actor by the name of Brian Austin Green, aka David Silver from Beverly Hills, 90210. So, of course, once I learned that little tidbit of information, I just had to run right out and buy myself a copy of the movie.

[ad]

Bun ‘N Burger restaurant shows up in one very brief scene in An American Summer, the very cheesy (but in a good way) and very 80’s plot of which revolves around a young Chicagoan named Tom (aka Michael Landes) who is begrudgingly sent to live with his aunt in California for the summer while his parents go through a divorce. While in Los Angeles, Tom ends up befriending a young surfer named Fin (aka Brian Austin Green) who not only teaches him how to sell sunglasses, deliver newspapers, and surf, but also how to pick up girls. At the very beginning of the movie, right after the boys first meet, Fin takes Tom to Bun ‘N Burger restaurant for some “java”, because as he says, “Every grown-up drinks java!” LOL

Amazingly enough, Bun ‘N Burger restaurant still looks very much the same today as it did back in 1991 when An American Summer was filmed. As you can see in the above screen captures and photograph, even the signs that appeared in the background behind Tom and Fin in the movie are still there in real life over 19 years later! A few more signs have been added since that time, but still so darn cool!

Mike found this location thanks to the fact that he used to work directly across the street from it in the late 80s and would frequently take his lunch breaks there. So, when he saw An American Summer for the first time in the movie theatre he recognized the place immediately. 🙂

Bun ‘N Burger restaurant, which was first established in 1941, is a super cute little roadside diner which features red leather booths, authentic ‘50s style furniture, a sit-down countertop, black-and-white checkered flooring, and countless old time photographs papering the walls. It is such an adorable little spot, in fact, that I am actually quite shocked it hasn’t been featured in more productions over the years. And despite what some online reviews have stated, the place serves up some fabulous food, including Mike’s personal favorite – the famous Bun ‘N Burger breakfast burrito. Unfortunately, though, because I am still on my new low carb diabetic diet, I didn’t get to sample the breakfast burrito, but instead opted for three hardboiled eggs. Mike was a bit flabbergasted over my menu selection and, after I ordered, said , “I take you out to breakfast and you order three hardboiled eggs?????” LOL What can I say – diets are absolutely NO fun. But, let me tell you, his burrito looked fabulous and if I ever get the urge to cheat, you know where I’m heading. 😉

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Bun ‘N Burger restaurant from An American Summer is located at 1000 East Main Street in Alhambra.