Scandal – IAMNOTASTALKER

January 12, 2018January 11, 2018

Emerson College Los Angeles from “Scandal”

Despite the fact that I live in Palm Springs, I tend to think of myself as having my finger on the pulse of L.A. But when penning A Film Lover’s Guide to Tomorrow’s Movie Location Stars for Los Angeles magazine in 2015, I overlooked two key spots, which I hope speaks more to the vast landscape of the city than it does to my lack of awareness. Though I noted Wilshire Grand Center, Hollenbeck Community Police Station, 8500, Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust, and the revamped Grand Central Air Terminal as the then newly-constructed sites I thought location managers would soon be flocking to, I somehow failed to include The Broad, a contemporary art museum in DTLA with a highly unusual perforated exterior, and Emerson College Los Angeles, an arts and communication school in Hollywood with a campus the Times deemed “a futuristic complex of aluminum and glass.” I actually did not become aware of the latter until watching the Season 5 episode of Scandal titled “Pencils Down” in March 2016, a full two years after its completion.

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In “Pencils Down,” Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) clandestinely meets up with Alex Vargas (Danny Pino) outside of the supposed Washington, D.C.-area venue where Mellie Grant (Bellamy Young) and Susan Ross (Artemis Pebdani) are participating in their first presidential debate. One look at the staggering wall of geometric panels pictured in the background of the scene and the dramatic vistas shown in wide shots and I was transfixed. I promptly paused my DVR and began trying to figure out where filming had taken place. Because Scandal shoots in L.A., I knew the locale had to be somewhere within the thirty-mile-zone, though I was certain I had never come across it in any of my stalking travels. So I did a Google search for “new modern building” and “Los Angeles” and pored through the countless images that were kicked back until finally landing upon one of Emerson College that matched what I had seen onscreen. Pulling up additional photos of the campus only served to make me more obsessed with the place. Though I immediately added the school to my To-Stalk list, it was not until this past December that I finally made it out there. Thankfully, Emerson, or ELA as it is also called, was worth the wait.

Construction on the 107,000-square-foot, 10-story, $110-million structure began in 2012 and grew out of a need for a more permanent place for the Boston-based Emerson to house and teach students in its semester-abroad program – abroad in this case being Hollywood.

The program, originally established in the 1980s, allows for participants to not only spend a semester studying in the show business capital of the world, but to also participate in invaluable internships at places like MTV, Comedy Central, and E! Entertainment. With no West Coast home base to call its own, students were originally taught in leased space in Universal City and put up in furnished units at the Oakwood at Toluca Hills by Avalon complex in Burbank. That all changed when Emerson’s Hollywood campus was completed in early 2014.

The striking complex, situated on the site of a former Sunset Boulevard parking lot measuring a scant 0.80 acres, essentially consists of one large box-shaped building with an open center. Two residential towers housing 217 dorm rooms, as well as a few faculty apartments, make up the framework of the structure.

Common areas, which include classrooms, editing labs, two black box theatres, a screening room, a conference room, rehearsal space, and lecture halls, are situated in between the two towers.

To say the site, which is the brainchild of Pritzker Prize-winning architect Thom Mayne of the Morphosis architecture firm, is dramatic would be an understatement.

As ELA’s founding director (and the executive producer of Friends!) Kevin Bright said of the structure, “I don’t care whether you walk around it or drive by it or you see it from a distance; the thing about this building is it demands your attention.”

I’ve honestly never seen anything quite like it.

Considering the building’s completely unique and dramatic aesthetic, it is no surprise that location scouts came a-calling pretty much immediately.

As this ArchDaily article puts it, “Looking to the local context, the center finds a provocative precedent in the interiority of Hollywood film studios, where outwardly regular facades house flexible, fantastical spaces within. With rigging for screens, media connections, sound, and lighting incorporated into the framework, the upper platform serves as a flexible armature for outdoor performances, transforming the undulating scrim into a dynamic visual backdrop. The entire building becomes a stage set for student films, screenings, and industry events, with the Hollywood sign, the city of Los Angeles, and the Pacific Ocean in the distance providing added scenery.” The place truly is a location manager’s dream.

Besides appearing in the scene in which Olivia and Alex exchange damaging information on rival presidential candidates in “Pencils Down” . . .

. . . one of Emerson’s residential hallways served as the spot where Susan breaks up with her cheating boyfriend David Rosen (Joshua Malina).

At the beginning of the Season 1 episode of Extant titled “More in Heaven and Earth,” which aired in 2014, ELA portrays the upscale The Villas condominium building where Molly Woods (Halle Berry) attempts to question Derek Pearce (Rocco Vienhage) about the Aruna mission.

Molly returns to The Villas in a later scene only to discover that Derek has died, the victim of an apparent suicide.

Julie Gelineau (Grace Gummer) and Odim James (Charlie Bewley) also dine on the premises in “More in Heaven and Earth.” In the episode, the two share a meal at Emerson Kitchen, a restaurant that was formerly located on the college’s ground floor. Today that space houses Homeward Ground.

On The Catch, a now defunct series that aired on ABC from 2016 to 2017, ELA appeared regularly as the exterior of the Anderson/Vaughan Investigations office.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Emerson College Los Angeles, from the “Pencils Down” episode of Scandal, is located at 5960 Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. You can visit the school’s official website here.

April 24, 2017April 24, 2017

Studio Gate 3 from the “Feud” “Hollywood Drive” Promo

It will probably come as a shock to most readers that I don’t know a lot about Old Hollywood. Sure, I am well-versed in all things Marilyn Monroe and have stalked my fair share of noir locations, but on the whole, I’d say I’m pretty lacking in knowledge about the Tinseltown of yesteryear. I am always itching to learn more, though. So I was thrilled when it was announced that the inaugural season of Ryan Murphy’s new anthology series Feud was tackling the decades-long discord between screen legends Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, a rivalry dating back to the 1930s of which I knew virtually nothing. (The second season is set to center around Prince Charles and Lady Di. Um, count me in!) I avidly watched the show (which ended its eight-episode run last night), eating up details of the actresses’ mutual animosity for one another with a spoon, as well as obsessively researching its locations. I even went so far as to stalk a spot that only appeared in a brief 31-second promo – a first for me.

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In the promo, titled “Hollywood Drive,” Davis and Crawford are shown simultaneously arriving at Gate 3 of an unnamed Hollywood studio and then playing chicken with each other to get in. (Though Jessica Lange and Susan Sarandon portrayed Joan and Bette, respectively, on Feud, the promo made use of unnamed actresses for the roles.)

You can watch the trailer by clicking below.

I recognized the “studio” gate immediately thanks to its appearance in a Season 3 episode of Scandal in which it masked as the front gate of the White House. (More on that in a bit.) I logged a ridiculous amount of man-hours looking for the site after seeing it in Scandal (so much so that visions of it are now burned into my brain!) and finally pinpointed it as the entrance to Beth Olam Cemetery-Hollywood, which is part of Hollywood Forever Cemetery. (More on that in a bit, as well.) So when the gate popped up in the Feud promo, identifying it was a no-brainer.

Not much of the locale was changed for “Hollywood Drive,” aside from the addition of a few boxed plants and signage reading “Studio Gate 3.” The structure’s central blue dome was also kept out of frame.

Hollywood Forever was originally established in 1899 as Hollywood Memorial Park Cemetery. In the late 1920s, the southwest portion of the then 102-acre property was appropriated for Jewish burials and became known as Beth Olam Cemetery-Hollywood. Though it has its own gate, it still very much a part of Hollywood Forever. (Today, Hollywood Forever boasts 62 acres due to the fact that in 1920, 40 acres were sold off to 2 different movie studios to develop what is now collectively Paramount Pictures.)

In 1939, the cemetery was purchased by convicted felon Jack Roth, who had just finished serving 5 years of a suggested 11- to 95-year prison sentence for grand theft and securities fraud. Jail did not change Roth’s criminal tendencies. He immediately set about spending the burial ground’s funds on himself, installing a wet bar in his office and purchasing a yacht that he claimed was used to scatter clients’ ashes and was therefore tax deductible. Not surprisingly, the state of the cemetery began to severely decline under Roth’s tutelage. As this fabulous 2011 Tablet article states, “In one year, Hollywood Memorial made more money disinterring bodies than interring them—relatives wanted their loved ones moved to better-kept environs.” When Jack passed away in 1998 (for those wondering, yes, he is buried at Hollywood Forever), the site was sold to brothers Tyler and Brent Cassity, who revitalized and cleaned up the neglected graveyard, renamed it “Hollywood Forever Cemetery,” and began offering tours, as well as hosting the insanely popular Cinespia movie nights. (I saw Pee-wee’s Big Adventure there back in 2008 and had an absolute blast.) The duo also eventually wound up facing their own complicated tangles with the law, which are detailed in the Tablet post.

While Hollywood Forever is used in filming all.the.time., for this post, I thought it would be best to focus solely on the Beth Olam gate.

Though a gate at The Huntington Library, Art Collection, and Botanical Gardens masked as the White House’s front gate in previous seasons of Scandal, for reasons likely having to do with convenience, the production utilized the Beth Olam gate in Season 3’s “Mama Said Knock You Out.” The structure appeared twice in the episode. It first popped up in the scene in which Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) received an ominous phone call from her mother upon arriving at the White House.

Later in the episode, Cyrus Beene (Jeff Perry) tried to convince Olivia not to abandon her post as presidential fixer while at the gate. A makeshift guard shack and wall of hedges were installed for the Scandal shoot and the White House later digitally added into the background of the segments.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Studio Gate 3, from the Feud “Hollywood Drive” promo, is actually the gate to Beth Olam Cemetery-Hollywood (which is part of Hollywood Forever Cemetery) located at 900 North Gower Street in Hollywood.

March 10, 2017March 8, 2017

Màs Malo from “Scandal”

Los Angeles is often ridiculed for having no history – or no appreciation of its history. Demolition of the Ambassador Hotel aside, I don’t find that to be true. There is history – well-preserved history – around pretty much ever corner. You just have to know where to look. Case in point – Màs Malo, a downtown L.A. Cal-Mex eatery that is situated inside of a gorgeous former 1920s jewelry emporium. The site first hit my radar while I was researching DTLA watering holes for my Double Shot: Two Downtown Bar Crawls article for the June 2016 issue of Los Angeles magazine. As I mentioned in the piece, Màs Malo’s second-floor lounge was featured in a Season 5 episode of Parks and Recreation. I became completely enamored of the gorgeous space after perusing photos of it online and added it to my To-Stalk List, but somehow never made it out there. Then when I spotted the restaurant pop up on a recent episode of Scandal, I decided I had to head over there stat and finally did, Grim Cheaper in tow, two weeks ago.

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The 1922 building that Màs Malo calls home was initially constructed as the headquarters and flagship store of Brock & Company Jewelers, one of the city’s most prominent jewelry shops at the time. Originally founded in the 1880s by George A. Brock, Brock & Co. was often referred to as the “Tiffany of the West.”

The Spanish Colonial Revival-style property, which boasts Churrigueresque elements, was designed by William James Dodd and William Richards of the Dodd & Richards architecture firm.

The structure’s highly ornate exterior was assembled out of terra cotta.

Though the building’s façade is undeniably beautiful and definitely picture-worthy, it is the interior that had me so intrigued.

The ground floor of the property, which served as the watch and jewelry showroom during Brock & Co.’s tenure, boasts a stunningly intricate and sweeping vaulted ceiling.

The ornamental carvings are nothing short of breathtaking. In fact, pictures don’t do them justice – they are even more spectacular in person.

Brock & Co. was eventually taken over by George’s son, George C. Brock, who had no children. With no one to leave the company to upon retiring in 1964, he sold it to real estate developer Ben Weingart, who continued to operate the site as a jewelry store for a few years before eventually shuttering it. In 1975, the grand space was leased to the Clinton family, owners of the popular Clifton’s Cafeteria chain.

The Clintons modified the former jewelry store in order to transform it into another Clifton’s outpost, this one named Clifton’s Silver Spoon Cafeteria, which operated from 1975 to 1997. Thankfully, the modifications were minor and the building’s baroque ceiling was left intact, as were the handmade Mahogany display cases that lined the interior. You can see some images of the building during the Clifton Silver Spoon days here, here, and here.

After Clifton’s was shuttered, the Brock & Co. building, which is a Los Angeles Cultural-Historic Monument, remained vacant for close to a decade. In 2007, 213 Nightlife Group founder Cedd Moses set his sights on the property’s second floor, which the jewelry company had utilized as a silver, china and crystal department. He revamped the space into Seven Grand, a dimly-lit, wood-paneled whiskey bar festooned with mounted buck heads. Moses even made use of Brock & Co.’s original display cases to store the watering hole’s extensive liquor collection. Seven Grand became an immediate hit and though the bar is also a popular filming location (it has popped up on The Office, Lie to Me, Body of Proof, and Modern Family, just to name a few), I have yet to stalk it. But don’t worry, it’s on my list.

In 2010, Brock & Co.’s lower level was leased by Mitchell Frank and Jeff Ellermeyer. Along with interior designer Tracy Beckmann and restoration expert Amy Higgins, the two renovated and reimagined the former jewelry showroom, transforming it into Màs Malo, a sister restaurant to their Silver Lake eatery, Malo. The site opened to the public in January 2011. You can check out some fabulous photographs of Amy’s restoration work on the ceiling here.

Màs Malo is hands down one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever visited. Even if the food was bad, I’d recommend the place for the ambiance alone. Thankfully, that’s not the case, though.

As the GC and I came to find out, the fare at Màs Malo is out of this world! I opted for the Ground Beef & Pickle Tacos, which were recommended by the bartender. Pickles on a taco? I was skeptical, too. The entrée was actually created by chef Robert Luna’s mother. As he explained to The Huffington Post, “I was twelve years old and my mom was prepping for hamburgers when she realized she had no bread. She took a tortilla and turned it into a hard taco with the beef and the pickles. Since then I haven’t wanted hamburgers any other way.” Countless Angelinos agree. The dish quickly became a signature item. While the pickles add a unique and altogether pleasant touch, for me, the taco’s real pièce de résistance is the tortilla shell, which is the perfect blend of crispy and chewy.

Considering its gorgeous aesthetic, it is no surprise that the Brock & Co. space has been featured in several productions.

In the Season 6 episode of Scandal titled “Hardball,” Màs Malo masked as the supposed Washington, D.C. bar where Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) took FBI Director Angela Webster (Saycon Sengbloh) for drinks to distract her so that Huck (Guillermo Diaz) could search her car. The scene was shot in the restaurant’s mezzanine area.

Shortly after Clifton’s Silver Spoon Cafeteria closed, the then vacant space appeared in the 1999 film Fight Club as the spot where The Narrator (Edward Norton) ate for free while warning Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter) that she needed to leave the city. As you can see, the site looked quite a bit different at the time due to a huge wooden partition that was set up around the ground floor.

In the Season 5 episode of Parks and Recreation titled “Animal Control,” which aired in 2013, Màs Malo’s mezzanine masked as the Pawnee Smokehouse, where Ben Wyatt (Adam Scott) gave a Sweetums charity pitch to perfume mogul Dennis Feinstein (Jason Mantzoukas).

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Màs Malo, from the “Hardball” episode of Scandal, is located at 515 West 7th Street in downtown Los Angeles. You can visit the eatery’s official website here.

December 7, 2015June 16, 2017

Andy’s Coffee Shop from the “Cups” Music Video

There is nothing my mom likes better than a greasy spoon-type restaurant. She is a virtual expert on seeking them out – whether near our home, while on vacation somewhere, or passing through a town. So imagine my shock when I recently learned about Andy’s Coffee Shop, a small greasy spoon that has been a Pasadena staple for over 80 years! Somehow my mom had never heard of the place, despite the fact that we lived in Crown City for a decade and a half! What makes our ignorance of the roadside restaurant even more shocking is that it is a popular filming location and has been featured in several big-name productions. How neither my mom nor I knew about it is beyond me! This was a major fail on both our parts! I discovered Andy’s in mid-October thanks to a Curbed LA commenter who mentioned the eatery’s appearance in an episode of Mad Men. I immediately added it to my To-Stalk list and the Grim Cheaper and I ran right on over there for breakfast a couple of weeks later. It turned out to be quite the fortuitous stalk, too!

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Andy’s Coffee Shop was originally established in the late 1930s and does not look like it has been touched since. And I mean that in the best possible way.

The current owner, who was nice enough to chat with me and answer all of my silly questions about the various filmings that have taken place there over the years, purchased the property nine years ago.

With its fabulous retro décor, old school counter seating and vintage signage, Andy’s Coffee Shop is everything you could ever want in a roadside diner. One look around and it is not hard to see why location scouts return to the place time and time again.

The food, which is of the down-home variety, was also fabulous!

As I mentioned above, prior to stalking Andy’s, I knew that the restaurant had been featured in the Season 4 episode of Mad Men titled “Public Relations.” In the episode, the eatery was where Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss) and Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser) met up with two actresses they had hired to fight over a Sugarberry Ham in a public relations stunt.

An ornamented prop screen was brought in to separate the dining area from the entry for the shoot. In real life, Andy’s dining area consists of one open room.

Some memorabilia and photographs from the filming are proudly displayed on Andy’s walls, which I had a blast looking at.

Until dining at Andy’s, I had been unaware of the eatery’s other film credits. As soon as I walked through the bell-clad front door, though, I immediately recognized the place as a locale I had been looking for ever since writing my The Fast and the Furious post for Discover Los Angeles. While researching for that post, I had fruitlessly tried to track down the coffee shop where Brian O’Conner (Paul Walker) took Mia (Jordana Brewster) in the series’ fourth installment, 2009’s Fast & Furious. When I stepped into Andy’s and saw the large front windows, wood-paneled walls and red booths, I realized it was the exact spot I had been hunting for. I so love it when that happens!

I asked the owner to confirm my hunch and she informed me that I was indeed correct and then pointed me in the direction of a photo taken of the shoot displayed on the restaurant’s wall.

Though the layout of the booths has since changed, Andy’s still looks much the same as it did onscreen.

Amazingly, Andy’s was even recognizable to the GC! After we placed our order, he turned to me and said, “I think this is where Anna Kendrick’s ‘Cups’ music video was filmed!” While I love the song, I had never seen the “Cups” video. Anna Kendrick is the GC’s celebrity crush, though, so he is pretty well-versed on all things concerning the actress. I immediately grabbed my iPhone to see if he was right and, sure enough, we were sitting in the exact spot where the video had been lensed! Well done, GC!

“Cups” made extensive use of Andy’s Coffee Shop. At the beginning of the video, Anna is shown baking biscuits in the restaurant’s kitchen.

The kitchen is actually much smaller in person than it appeared to be onscreen.

While I was back there, I just had to pose for a photo. Winking smile

After popping the biscuits into the oven, Anna then ventures out of the kitchen . . .

. . . and into Andy’s dining area.

The camera proceeds to follow her through the restaurant in one long take while she walks by customers who are performing the famous Cups routine.

I can only imagine how difficult the video must have been to film being that the fifty or so the actors on-hand had to perform the routine perfectly, sans any mistakes, in order to complete the single continuous shot.

You can watch the “Cups” video by clicking below.

Interestingly, the origin of the “Cups” song dates all the way back to 1931. You can read a more in-depth history of it here, but, in a nutshell, it was originally written and recorded by the Carter Family and was known as “When I’m Gone.” That original version can be heard here. (Don’t confuse it with the Carter Family’s similarly titled “Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone?”) The tune has been sampled a few times over the years, but did not find real fame until 2009, when a group named Lulu and the Lampshades re-worked the arrangement, adding in the “I’ve got my ticket for the long way ‘round” lyrics and re-naming it “You’re Gonna Miss Me.” The music video the group created for the song (below), which features acapella singing accompanied by a plastic cup routine, instantly went viral and inspired countless re-creations.

Anna Kendrick only perpetrated the trend when she performed the “Cups” routine in 2012’s Pitch Perfect (below). It proved so popular that the actress released a single of it in 2013 and the video was made soon after.

Andy’s owner also informed me that in the recently-aired Season 5 episode of Scandal titled “Yes,” the eatery played the Fayetteville, North Carolina diner where Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) and Jake Ballard (Scott Foley) took murder suspect Gavin Price (Josh Brener). While there, Gavin alerts the women at a neighboring table of the presence of Olivia, who has just been outed as the president’s mistress, causing all of the customers in the restaurant to go crazy trying to take selfies with her.

Andy’s also popped up in the Season 6 episode of Veep titled “Judge” as the Birmingham, Alabama truck stop where Mike McLintock (Matt Walsh) and Amy Brookheimer (Anna Chlumsky) looked for Mike’s diary.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Andy’s Coffee Shop, from Anna Kendrick’s “Cups” music video, is located at 1234 East Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena. You can visit the eatery’s official Facebook page here.

November 11, 2015December 30, 2019

The Daily Dose Café from “Scandal”

UPDATE – After closing and then reopening briefly as Café Société in 2018, this spot shuttered for good early last year. It currently remains vacant.

There’s pretty much nothing I love more than a cool coffee house. So when Cupcakes and Cashmere blogger Emily Schuman wrote about the Daily Dose Café, a downtown Los Angeles coffee shop “nestled between two large industrial buildings” that feels like “your own secret spot” this past August, I was mesmerized! I happened to be in the area when I read the post and ran right out to stalk it just a few minutes later. Emily’s description of the place was spot on and I fell in love with it on sight. I still consider the Daily Dose Café one of the coolest coffee shops I have ever visited. So when it popped up in the Season 5 episode of Scandal titled “Dog-Whistle Politics” a couple of weeks ago, I was floored! And while I had written about the café in My Guide to L.A. – Coffee article in August, I decided it was worthy of its own post. So here goes.

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The Daily Dose Café was founded by a real estate developer named Sarkis Vartanian, who became inspired to establish an “honest food” eatery after receiving a reality check from his doctor. Sarkis had been living on a fast food diet, was feeling crappy most of the time, and, when his doctor informed him that his unhealthy ways were taking a toll on his physical well-being, decided to make a major life change. What better way to do so than by setting up his own organic restaurant? Vartanian soon quit his real estate job and, along with partner/executive chef Christian Page, opened the Daily Dose Café in August 2011.

The tiny restaurant is situated in a small alley that sits tucked in between two non-descript buildings.

So tucked and so non-descript, in fact, that you could easily walk right by it without realizing it was there.

But what lies beyond the clandestine entry is nothing short of magical!

Vartanian set out to create a European-style coffee shop in the heart of downtown L.A. and it took a full two years for his vision to come to fruition.

One look at the space and it is not very hard to see why. Every square inch of it is teeming with charm, warmth and romance. With its canopy of strung Edison lights, towering shrub-covered walls, cobblestone flooring, and reclaimed wood furnishings, the Daily Dose Café evokes all the beauty and allure of a Parisian garden.

The Daily Dose Café also boasts an indoor space, but it was jam-packed while we were there, so I did not snap any photos of it – outside of the mugs on display, that is, which I fell in love with.

The eatery, which serves breakfast, lunch and dinner, as well as a wide array of coffee drinks and fresh juices, is well-known for its organically grown non-GMO food offerings. While the meals I saw being served looked uh-ma-zing, the Grim Cheaper and I only partook of some java while we were there. And I have to say I was quite impressed! The iced latte I ordered was easily one of the best I have ever tasted.

In “Dog-Whistle Politics,” the Daily Dose Café stood in for the Café Graisseux (translation Greasy Coffee Shop) in Paris, where Jake Ballard (Scott Foley) and Charlie (George Newbern) waited for a contact.

Not only was the space dressed heavily for the shoot, but Parisian buildings were digitally added to the background in post-production, making the restaurant virtually unrecognizable.

I identified it immediately, though, thanks to the canopy of Edison bulbs visible throughout the scene.

The Daily Dose Café has appeared onscreen several times throughout the years. In the Season 3 episode of Revenge titled “Endurance,” which aired in 2014, the exterior of the eatery is briefly shown as the spot where Conrad Grayson (Henry Czerny) pays Jess (Nazneen Contractor) for a sneak peek at an upcoming issue of Voulez magazine.

Later that same season, in the episode titled “Impetus,” Margaux LeMarchal (Karine Vanasse) talks to Daniel Grayson (Josh Bowman) about the death of her father while standing outside of the Daily Dose Café, though virtually none of the restaurant is visible in the scene.

In the Season 1 episode of CSI: Cyber titled “Fire Code,” which aired in 2015, the Daily Dose Café masks as the Washington, D.C.-area coffee shop where Elijah Mundo (James Van Der Beek) asks his estranged wife, Devon Atwood (Alexie Gilmore), for another chance.

In the Season 6 episode of Rizzoli & Isles titled “Scared to Death,” it played the role of the Boston, Massachusetts-area cafe where Nina Holiday (Idara Victor) interviewed a hacking victim.

And it is the New York alley Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) runs down in order to escape Candace Stone (Ambyr Childers) in the first episode of the second season of the Netflix series You, titled “A Fresh Start.”

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Daily Dose Café, from the “Dog-Whistle Politics” episode of Scandal, is located at 1820 Industrial Street in downtown Los Angeles’ Arts District. It is currently closed.

August 3, 2015August 16, 2015

Olivia Pope’s Apartment from “Scandal”

While Scandal has fallen a bit out of favor with me (for reasons mentioned here), there are two parts of the series that I will never get over – Olivia Pope’s (Kerry Washington) wardrobe (Gah! Her clothing is amazing!) and her apartment. I recently did a bit of research on said apartment and was floored to discover that a real unit in a real building was used for a time as Olivia’s pad. So yes, that means that Olivia’s apartment actually exists!

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Thanks to a 2013 Hooked on Houses blog post, I learned that the set of Olivia’s apartment had been based off of real units at the El Royale in Hancock Park. Upon doing further research, I came across this CurbedLA article from 2011 which mentioned that the series had also done some filming inside of the building during its inaugural season, angering residents in the process.

The El Royale was originally designed in 1929 by architect William Douglas Lee, who also built the famed Chateau Marmont hotel.

The 12-story Spanish Renaissance Revival-style property, which houses 56 units, has been a celebrity magnet from the very beginning. Just a few of the luminaries who have called the place home over the years include Harry Cohn, Clark Gable, George Raft, Loretta Young, Harry Langdon, William Faulkner, Huell Howser, Cameron Diaz, Ben Stiller, Uma Thurman, Jack Black, Ellen Page and Katie Holmes.

Olivia Pope’s apartment first showed up in the Season 1 episode of Scandal titled “Hell Hath No Fury.” The apartment featured in that episode – as well as all of the subsequent episodes of Season 1 – is an actual unit inside of the El Royale.

Scandal was initially picked up as a mid-season replacement in 2012 and, due to that fact, its inaugural season was a short one that consisted of only seven episodes. I am guessing that is why a set of Olivia’s apartment was not built until Season 2.

You can check out some photographs of what a few different El Royale units look like here.

By the beginning of Season 2, a set modeled after the El Royale apartment had been built. Of the set, production designer Corey Kaplan said in a 2013 People magazine article, “We took the basic elements of the El Royale apartments to stage. We loved the moldings and the embellishments, but we made it a little bit larger scale with larger arches.”

The exterior of the El Royale also appeared in a couple of Season 1 episodes of Scandal. The Rosewood Avenue side of the building was where Olivia ambushed David Rosen (Joshua Malina) to ask for dirt on one of his colleagues in “Hell Hath No Fury.”

And the building’s large courtyard was where the supposed “New Hampshire” Veteran Pancake Breakfast was held in “The Trail.”

According to my buddy E.J. of The Movieland Directory website, the El Royale also served as Steven Carrington’s (Jack Coleman) apartment building on Dynasty.

And according to fave book Los Angeles Attractions, the building was also featured in Switch and Other People’s Money.

For whatever reason (most likely those angry residents mentioned in the Curbed LA article), from Season 2 onward The Gaylord Apartments building in Koreatown was used for all on location filming supposedly taking place at Olivia’s apartment.

The Gaylord Apartments was originally designed by the Walker & Eisen architecture firm in 1924. At the time, the 13-story Italian Renaissance-style property, which was named in honor of land developer Henry Gaylord Wilshire, was the city’s tallest building.

Celebrities also flocked to The Gaylord over the years. A few of the stars who have lived onsite at one time or another include John Barrymore, Constance Talmadge, Kevin Dillon, and Lance Robertson, aka “DJ Lance Rock” from Yo Gabba Gabba. Richard Nixon is also rumored to have spent some time there.

I have blogged about The Gaylord once before, back in March 2011, after a visit to its historic ground level restaurant, HMS Bounty.

To me the building has a very East Coast feel to it and it is not hard to see why producers chose it to stand in for Olivia’s Washington, D.C.-area apartment.

The exterior of The Gaylord has appeared in several episodes of Scandal, including Season 4’s “Run.” During filming, the building’s signage is changed to read “Barrington Court.”

The interior of the building also occasionally makes an appearance onscreen. The Gaylord’s lobby was featured in the Season 2 episode “White Hat’s Back On.”

And an almost-naked Jake Ballard (Scott Foley) ran down The Gaylord’s main stairwell in “Run.” You can check out a photograph of that stairwell here.

The Gaylord has appeared onscreen several times over the years. In the 2015 thriller Insidious: Chapter 3, the building was where Quinn Brenner (Stefanie Scott) lived with her father, Sean Brenner (Dermot Mulroney).

The Gaylord was also featured in Sparkle and The Master.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The El Royale Apartments, aka Olivia Pope’s apartment from the first season of Scandal, is located at 450 North Rossmore Avenue in Hancock Park. You can visit the building’s official website here. The Gaylord Apartments, aka the exterior of Olivia Pope’s apartment building from Season 2 on, is located at 3355 Wilshire Boulevard in Koreatown. You can visit the building’s official website here.

July 28, 2015April 14, 2020

Wonderland from “Scandal”

I realize this is a complete about-face, but I am so over Scandal! I know, I know – my love for the series was incredibly short-lived. The Grim Cheaper and I just finished watching Season 4, though, and both felt that it went downhill fast. The last few episodes proved so ridiculous that I don’t think we’ll be watching Season 5 when it starts airing in September. Case in point – and warning, there be spoilers ahead! – one of the series’ main storylines centers around a super secret agency known as B613 that works outside of the government. The agency is responsible for killing and torturing numerous people in the name of protecting the republic. During Season 4, Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) and her fellow gladiators vow to take down B613 and in one of the last episodes a grand jury is convened to review evidence about the agency’s past evils. After testimony is heard, all of the jurors are gunned down and killed, as is the court stenographer, and NO ONE notices or cares – not the media, not the government, not the courthouse workers. Nothing is done about the killings, they aren’t investigated, the show just moves on from there. I mean, wouldn’t it be a fairly easy crime to solve? Entire jury gets massacred after hearing testimony – gee, I wonder if murderer happens to be a member of B613? Oh, and did I mention that the jurors were killed in a court van while inside the courthouse parking garage? I mean, come on! I’m all about suspending disbelief, but that scenario is just so ridiculously implausible that I was angered upon watching it. There were several other asinine storylines that played out this past season (I won’t even get into the fact that Olivia is completely safe after returning home from being kidnapped despite the fact that it was made apparent she could easily fetch over a billion dollars if she was sold on the black market) that just added to my annoyance. So I just can’t even with Scandal anymore. BUT I did happen to stalk the headquarters of B613 a couple of weeks ago while I was in L.A. and figured what better time than today to blog about it. OK, end rant! Winking smile

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On Scandal, the B613 headquarters has a litany of names. It is known as Wonderland (because it is said to be located on Wonderland Avenue in Washington, D.C.), ACME Limited, and ACME Paper Company. And, as we found out in the Season 3 episode titled “No Sun on the Horizon,” the agency does actually sell paper. As wannabe B613 agent Quinn Perkins (Katie Lowes) says upon being relegated to answer the ACME Limited sales line as a way to pay her dues, “I don’t know if we sell copy paper. Because I just don’t, OK! Ugh, yeah, well your phone manner sucks, too!” Ah, such a great scene from back when Scandal was good!

The exterior of Wonderland was featured in the Season 3 episode titled “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.”

The location manager did a fabulous job with this location. The building chosen for filming is equal parts non-descript and foreboding.

In real life, the building serves as the headquarters of the J.M. Carden Sprinkler Co. The Art Dec-style structure was originally built in 1931 as the Valley Dairy Company offices. According to this The Eastsider LA article, the interior of the property is quite fabulous. I am kicking myself now for not having ventured inside.

I am unsure if the interior of Wonderland, which was shown in the “No Sun on the Horizon” episode, was a set or if filming took place on location somewhere. I am 99.9% certain, though, that the interior of the J.M. Carden Sprinkler Co. building was not used onscreen.

Thanks to fellow stalker Richard (you may remember him from this post and this post), I learned that the building masked as a downtown Los Angeles 9-1-1 dispatch center in the Season 3 episode of 9-1-1 titled “The Taking of Dispatch 9-1-1.”

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Wonderland, aka B613 Headquarters from Scandal, is located at 2909 Fletcher Drive in Glassell Park.

July 24, 2015July 23, 2015

The White House Gates from “Scandal”

My life as of late seems to be absorbed by Scandal. As I mentioned last week, the Grim Cheaper and I have recently become addicted to the ABC series. Besides watching it during pretty much every free waking moment, I have also been furiously researching the show’s filming locations. While set in Washington, D.C., Scandal is lensed in Los Angeles. The crew does some seriously amazing work to hide that fact, though. Gary, from the Seeing Stars website, uncovered a few key Season 1 locales a while back, including the White House gates, which I was beyond floored to learn were located at Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens (one of my very favorite spots in all of L.A.). The explanation as to the gate’s precise location was a bit hazy, though, so I set out to remedy that this past week while I was in Pasadena.

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The White House gates from Scandal are located just beyond Huntington Library’s main entrance, which is on Orlando Road.

Upon entering the property and driving past the guard shack, head south on Palm Drive towards Huntington’s massive parking lot.

About 700 feet south of the main entrance, there is a sign that directs visitors to turn left into the parking area. That sign is pictured below.

Just beyond the sign, Palm Drive intersects with a small tree-lined road named Mausoleum Drive. The eastern entrance to Mausoleum Drive is denoted with a pink arrow below.

The White House gates can be found just beyond that eastern entrance.

I was just a little excited upon finding them!

The gates’ exact location is denoted below. Because they are situated near the parking area, you can actually see them without having to purchase a ticket to enter the Huntington Library grounds. Though why anyone would not want to enter the grounds is beyond me. It’s honestly one of the most beautiful places on earth and a spot I’ve long considered a Must-Stalk location for visitors to L.A.

The gates have appeared twice on Scandal. They first popped up in the Season 1 episode titled “Dirty Little Secrets.”

On the series, the gates are manned by White House security guard Morris Elcott (Troy Winbush). Though minor, Morris is a fabulous character who, for some odd reason, stopped appearing after Season 3. I really wish they’d bring him back.

The gates were next featured in the Season 1 finale titled “Grant for the People.”

A green screen is used, rather convincingly I might add, to make it appear as if the White House is located just beyond the gates in the series.

What is actually located beyond the gates is a single lane tree-lined road that leads to Huntington Library’s Mausoleum. Ah, the magic of television!

The same gates were also used as the entrance to Helen’s (Rose Byrne) mansion in Bridesmaids.

For reasons that most likely had to do with convenience, a different set of gates was used as the White House gates in the Season 3 episode of Scandal titled “Mama Said Knock You Out.”

It took me for-ever to track those gates down, but I finally did so while writing this post. They are actually Hollywood Forever Cemetery’s Gower Street gates. Though dressed a bit for filming, they are definitely recognizable from their onscreen stint.

Several areas of Huntington were used in Scandal’s “Dirty Little Secrets” episode, including the Mausoleum, which masked as a Washington, D.C.-area park . . .

. . . and the American Art gallery, which masked as the exterior of the White House.

And in “Grant for the People,” the property’s Boone Gallery masqueraded as the exterior of the White House.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens are located at 1151 Oxford Road in San Marino. The White House gates from Scandal can be found just beyond the property’s main entrance, at the intersection of Palm and Mausoleum Drives. The gates used in the Season 3 episode titled “Mama Said Knock You Out” are Hollywood Forever Cemetery’s Gower Street gates and can be found at approximately 900 North Gower Street in Hollywood.