television – Page 13 – IAMNOTASTALKER

September 22, 2010October 16, 2011

First Christian Church of North Hollywood – Where Phyllis Got Married on “The Office”

Brace yourselves, my fellow stalkers, ‘cause today’s post is going to be a long one! A few months back, I dragged my then-fiancé and my parents out to re-stalk the First Christian Church of North Hollywood – a location which is most commonly known as “the 7th Heaven church”, thanks to its recurring role as the Camden Family’s local parish throughout the Aaron Spelling series’ ten-year run. Even though I never watched 7th Heaven, I stalked and blogged about the church way back in April of 2008 after receiving a challenge to find it from my Aunt Lea. So, when the very same location popped up on new favorite show The Office as the spot where Phyllis Lapin (aka Phyllis Smith) married Bob Vance (aka Robert R. Shafer) – of Vance Refrigeration – in the Season 3 episode titled “Phyllis’ Wedding”, I decided I just had to re-stalk it and do a more in-depth write-up of its extensive filming history.

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The First Christian Church of North Hollywood was originally built in 1949 on the corner of Moorpark Street and Colfax Avenue in what is, contrary to what the name might suggest, actually Studio City. Construction on the 19,000-square foot, Colonial-style structure took just under a year to complete and the first mass was said there on March 12, 1950. Today the church boasts one of the largest Protestant congregations in the entire San Fernando Valley. Location scouts have long been drawn to the property, which includes a main sanctuary, several offices, a kitchen, a garden, a nursery school, a social hall, and a courtyard, for decades due to its Anytown, U.S.A.-style facade. Countless upon countless productions have been filmed there over the years – far too many for me to properly catalog here, but I’ll do my best to try. I must give major props to whoever runs the First Christian Church of North Hollywood website, by the way, because it boasts a very well-organized Film Shoots” page that chronicles all of the filming that has ever taken place there. Love it!

The “Phyllis’ Wedding” episode of The Office was filmed almost in its entirety on location at First Christian Church of North Hollywood and both the interior and the exterior of the property were used extensively in the production. The areas which appeared in the episode include the front entrance;

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the entryway and front stairwell;

the main sanctuary;

the altar;

the social hall (which we unfortunately did not get to see);

the top of the exterior side stairwell, where Pam Beesly (aka Jenna Fischer) and Roy Anderson (aka David Denman) danced;

the north exterior side of the church, where Dwight Schrute (aka Rainn Wilson) danced with Angela Martin (aka Angela Kinsey);

and the side courtyard, where Michael Scott (aka Steve Carell) “found” Phyllis’ Uncle Al (aka George Ives).

And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention here that it is while in the First Christian Church of North Hollywood that Dwight utters fellow stalker Owen’s very favorite television line of all time. While filing into the church with the other wedding guests, Dwight turns to Jim Halpert (aka John Krasinski) and says, “Why are all these people here? There’s too many people on this earth. We need a new plague.” LOL LOL LOL Love it! So, of course I just had to stand in the exact spot where Dwight was standing during that scene and repeat his famous line.

As I mentioned above, the First Christian Church of North Hollywood is most well-known for its countless appearances on 7th Heaven where it popped up almost weekly during the series’ eleven season run.

It is also at First Christian Church that Indiana Jones (aka Harrison Ford) marries Marion Ravenwood (aka Karen Allen) while Mutt Williams (aka Shia LaBeouf) looks on at the end of 2008’s Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Shia LaBeouf returned to First Christian Church that very same year to film his character’s brother’s funeral scene for the movie Eagle Eye.

The church was also where Barbara Keeley (aka Calista Flockhart) married Val Goldman (aka Dan Futterman) at the end of the 1996 movie The Birdcage.

In What About Bob?, the church was where Bob Wiley (aka Bill Murray) tied the knot with Lily Marvin (aka Fran Brill).

The church was also the wedding location in the music video for Katy Perry’s hit song “Hot & Cold” –

– which you can watch by clicking above.

Most recently, the church appeared in the Season 6 opener of How I Met Your Mother, which was titled “Big Days” and which aired this past Monday evening.

The First Christian Church of North Hollywood was also used in the movies Death Becomes Her, Nothing to Lose, and The Suburbans, and in episodes of United States of Tara, Desperate Housewives, Parks and Recreation, Samantha Who?, Crossing Jordan, Swingtown, Hart to Hart, Ghost Whisperer, Gilmore Girls, and Melrose Place.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The First Christian Church of North Hollywood is located at 4390 Colfax Avenue in Studio City. You can visit the church’s official website here. The areas of the church used in the “Phyllis’ Wedding” episode of The Office are denoted above. Pam and Roy danced at the top of the church’s north-side stairwell, which is located on Moorpark Street and is marked with the blue arrow above. The windows where Dwight and Angela danced are located just below the stairwell and a few feet east, also on Moorpark Street. Michael’s courtyard is located on Colfax Avenue, in between the main church building and the nursery school, and is denoted with the pink arrow in the above aerial view. The social hall, where Bob and Phyllis held their wedding reception, is located on the second floor of the nursery school building.

September 21, 2010September 21, 2010

The Restaurant Where Brenda and Donna Ate Veal Brains on “Beverly Hills, 90210”

One location that I have been on the lookout for for over eighteen years now is the Paris restaurant where Donna Martin (aka Tori Spelling) and Brenda Walsh (aka Shannen Doherty) ate veal brains in the Season 3 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 titled “Too Little, Too Late/Paris, 75001”. Because almost two decades have passed since filming took place, though, and because there were virtually no clues visible in the background of the veal-brains-eating scene, this one proved to be a VERY tough find. So, a few weeks back I finally decided to call in the team – Mike, from MovieShotsLA, Chas, from ItsFilmedThere, and fellow stalker Owen – and, amazingly enough, Owen found the restaurant in record time – in less than an hour, in fact! Not joking! I really need to start taking lessons from Owen, as he always comes up with extremely innovative ways of tracking locations down. In this particular case, he decided to contact a few of the guest star actors who appeared in the episode, one of them being a girl named Lindsey Rosin. Now, to someone like Owen who has never in his life watched an episode of 90210, the name Lindsey Rosin doesn’t mean a whole lot, but to all of us diehard fans out there, the girl is a celebrity! For those who are not in the know, Lindsey just happens to be the daughter of 90210’s longtime executive producer Charles Rosin and, as a child, she appeared in several episodes of the series, including the “Too Little, Too Late/Paris, 75001” episode. When Owen told me he had contacted her, let me tell you, I just about died from excitement! Even more exciting, though, was the fact that not only did she write him back almost immediately, but she also knew exactly where the filming of the veal brains scene had taken place. YAY!

As it turns out, Brenda and Donna’s Paris restaurant was named Le Chardonnay and it used to be located on Melrose Avenue in West Hollywood. Sadly, though, the eatery closed its doors for good just about a decade ago. Since that time, the property has undergone several renovations and has re-opened as a few different restaurants, including the now-defunct French bistro Carafe and the Danny Masterson/Wilmer Valderrama/Ashton Kutcher-owned eatery Dolce. Today, the space which once housed Le Chardonnay is an upscale Chinese food restaurant named Philippe Chow and even though it no longer looks anything like it did when it appeared on 90210, I just HAD to stalk the place. So, this past Friday afternoon, since we were in the area running some errands, I dragged my dad there to grab some lunch.

Philippe Chow is a SUPER cute little restaurant that serves up some FABULOUS food! Especially the chicken satay in cream sauce, which the restaurant is famous for. The food is pricey, though – a bottle of sparkling water cost me a whopping $10!!!!!!!! – but, as they say, you get what you pay for, and the grub at Philippe Chow is EXTREMELY good! The service was also fabulous and definitely lacking in the typical hoity-toity attitude one comes to expect from upscale L.A. eateries. I honestly can’t recommend the place enough!

In the “Too Little, Too Late/Paris, 75001” episode of Beverly Hills, 90210, Brenda and Donna go out for dinner on one of their very first nights in Paris, France. Neither one can speak the language very well and they end up ordering the one item on the menu that contains a word they recognize, Cerveaux de Veau – “veau” meaning veal. As it turns out, though, Cerveaux de Veau actually translates to veal brains – something they don’t discover until after they have already sampled the dish. The scene is absolutely hilarious, mostly due to the comedic antics of Tori Spelling, who spits a bite of the brains out onto her plate and then proceeds to gargle with a glass of water. And they say Tori Spelling can’t act! In my never-to-be-humble opinion, I think she was FABULOUS in that particular scene –

– which can watch by clicking above.

And while there is absolutely no trace of Le Chardonnay left on the Philippe Chow premises, there is some good news about this location. After doing some research online, I discovered that Le Chardonnay was actually an almost-exact replica of the famous Restaurant Vagenende in Paris, France, which is still open, and as you can see in the above photographs, looks VERY similar to the restaurant which appeared on 90210. So, while Le Chardonnay is no longer stalk-able, Vagenende thankfully is! And, believe you me, if I ever go back to Paris, I am FOR SURE going to stalk the place!

Beverly Hills, 90210 is not the only production to have filmed on the Le Chardonnay premises. Back when the restaurant had first been purchased by Wilmer Valderrama, Ashton Kutcher, and Danny Masterson, it was used in the Punk’d episode in which Ashton plays a prank on Wilmer by having a jealous boyfriend pretend to destroy his beloved Escalade – which you can watch by clicking above.

At the time Punk’d was filmed, Dolce had yet to open and was undergoing an extensive renovation process, and, as you can see in the above screen capture, the walls had yet to be painted and were still the same color pink that they were on 90210. Love it!

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Philippe Chow also recently appeared in the Season 5 episode of The Hills titled “Can’t Always Get What You Want” as the spot where Kristin Cavallari and Brody Jenner meet up and discuss his wanting to get back together with ex-girlfriend Jayde Nicole.

Philippe Chow is also something of a celebrity magnet. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there include Charlize Theron, Rihanna, Nick Nolte, Matt Kemp, Stephanie Pratt, Kelly Osbourne, Paris and Nicky Hilton, Lauren Conrad, Lindsay Lohan, Nick Jonas, Sofia Vergara, Selena Gomez, Lamar Odom, Kobe Bryant, and Kim and Khloe Kardashian. Unfortunately, we didn’t spot any celebs while we were there, though.

Big THANK YOU to Owen – and to Lindsey Rosin! – for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Philippe Chow, the former Le Chardonnay restaurant where Brenda and Donna ate veal brains on Beverly Hills, 90210, is located at 8284 Melrose Avenue in West Hollywood. You can visit the Philippe Chow website here. Vagenende, the restaurant that Le Chardonnay was modeled after, is located at 142, boulevard Saint-Germain, in Paris, France. You can visit the Vagenende website here.

September 15, 2010September 15, 2010

Pickwick’s Pub from “The Office”

This past weekend, I dragged my husband (that is SO weird to say!) out to stalk Pickwick’s Pub – the Woodland Hills watering hole that stands in for the Dunder Mifflin gang’s favorite local hangout, Poor Richard’s Pub, on fave show The Office. And while there is actually a real life Poor Richard’s Pub located in Scranton, Pennsylvania, where the series is based, thankfully, both the interiors and exteriors which appear on the show can be found right here in Los Angeles, just about ten miles away from Chandler Valley Studios where the series is taped. I am ashamed to admit that I spent more than a few hours online trying to track down this locale and came up completely empty-handed. Thankfully though, fellow stalker Lavonna was also in on the hunt and managed to find this Poor Richard’s page on the Dunderpedia website, which led us to the right place. And while Poor Richard’s Pub is referred to almost weekly on The Office, Pickwick’s has actually only been used for filming twice.

Pickwick’s Pub has been a San Fernando Valley staple for over three and a half decades, ever since it first opened way back in 1974. The watering hole suffered a brief set-back in 2004 when it burned to the ground after a disgruntled customer set fire to the place. The rebuilding project took a full year to complete, but in 2005 the bar reopened and has been going strong ever since. And, let me tell you, the place is not your ordinary, everyday pub. The menu is quite extensive and features everything from traditional British fare such as bangers & mash and Irish beef stew to Indian delicacies like chicken curry and pork korma to such American favorites as chicken pot pie and homemade mac and cheese. There is also an extensive breakfast menu, which is available all day. And, let me tell you, the food was excellent! Our waitress was also extremely nice and answered all of my silly little questions about the filming of The Office. Unfortunately, she didn’t work at Pickwick’s at the time either of the episodes was filmed, so she didn’t have much insider information to share with me. 🙁 Pickwick’s is a super cute and cozy little place and seems to be mostly inhabited by regulars. It definitely has a hometown feel to it and is exactly the kind of place I picture Pam and Jim grabbing a drink after work. 🙂 Pickwick’s also features a trivia night every Wednesday starting at 8 p.m. and an 80’s acoustic band which plays live every Saturday night – both of which sound like an absolute blast! 🙂

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As I mentioned above, Pickwick’s Pub has appeared twice on The Office – first in the Season 3 episode titled “Cocktails”, in which Pam Beesly (aka Jenna Fischer), Roy Anderson (aka David Denman), Kelly Kapoor (aka Mindy Kaling), and the rest of the Dunder Mifflin crew cut out of work early in order to grab drinks together at their favorite local hangout. It is at Pickwick’s that Pam admits to Roy that she and Jim once kissed.

The mirror which Roy subsequently breaks in a fit of anger is, of course, not there in real life.

Neither is the Toy Chest game machine where Toby Flenderson (aka Paul Lieberstein) spends the evening trying to win Pam a duck.

The bar showed up again in the Season 4 episode titled “Local Ad”, in which the Dunder Mifflin gang gathers together to watch the airing of their recently-filmed local television commercial.

A picture of Steve Carell during the filming of that episode is even on display on the official Pickwick Pub website. So darn cool!

The exterior that is shown on The Office is actually Pickwick’s back entrance, which looks EXACTLY the same in person as it does on the show, except for the Poor Richard’s signage, of course. Love it!

Fellow stalker and Office aficionado Owen, who I am EXTREMELY jealous of!, recently made a stalking pilgrimage to Scranton, Pennsylvania where he got to visit the real life Poor Richard’s Pub, which in reality is located inside of a bowling alley. As Owen wrote when he emailed me the above pictures, “Does that carpet not scream bowling alley?!?!” LOL

Sadly, the bar was closed when Owen showed up to stalk it, but as you can see in the above photograph, which I got off of the Poor Richard’s website, the place does bear a striking resemblance to Pickwick’s. Both bars have a very British/Tudor-style look to them and both also appear to display Christmas lights year-round.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Lavonna for finding this location and to fellow stalker Owen for loaning me his photographs of the real Poor Richard’s Pub to display in this post! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Pickwick’s Pub from The Office is located at 21010 Ventura Boulevard in Woodland Hills. You can visit the bar’s official website here. The real Poor Richard’s Pub is located in Scranton, Pennsylvania at 125 Beech Street, inside of South Side Bowl. You can visit the official Poor Richard’s website here.

September 14, 2010September 14, 2010

Griffith Observatory

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

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

September 1, 2010August 7, 2010

Oscar’s House from “The Office”

Another filming location from The Office that I stalked recently was the ranch-style abode where accounting executive Oscar Martinez (aka Oscar Nunez) lives on the show. I found this location, as always, thanks to fellow stalker Owen who, along with a bit of assistance from fellow stalker Chas, of ItsFilmedThere, has somehow managed to track down pretty much every single locale that ever appeared on the show. Thank you, Owen!

While watching the Season 2 episode of the series titled “The Secret” a few years back, Owen spotted an address number of 5232 in the background of a scene. He immediately set about searching aerial views of neighborhoods near Chandler Valley Center Studios in Van Nuys, where the series is lensed, for homes with a 5232 address number, and, sure enough, it wasn’t long before he had found the right place. YAY! So, while I was in the area with my fiancé – ahem, my husband 🙂 – a few weeks ago, I dragged him right out to stalk Oscar’s abode!

Oscar’s house actually only appeared in “The Secret” episode and has yet to show up again on the series. In the episode, Oscar calls in sick to work on a Friday and his co-worker and part-time volunteer sheriff’s deputy Dwight Schrute (aka Rainn Wilson) becomes convinced that Oscar is not truly ill. Dwight decides to investigate the matter further and, after first conducting interviews with everyone in the office to get their take on whether Oscar is faking or not, he heads over to “the perp’s” house to see if he is actually ill. When he catches the not-yet-out-of-the-closet Oscar with another man in his driveway, he becomes ecstatic, drives up to the couple and proclaims, “Man, you are so busted! Ice skates, shopping bags! I think I know what’s going on here . . . you weren’t sick at all!” Not realizing that he has stumbled upon a much larger secret, Dwight blackmails Oscar into owing him “one great, big, giant favor redeemable by me at a time and place of my choosing.” Have I mentioned how much I love this show? 😉

I am very happy to report that, minus a few trees in the front yard, Oscar’s house looks exactly the same in person as it did on the show. Love it!

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Located less than a block away from Oscar’s house is the residence where Pam bought a lamp during “Michael Scott’s Dunder Mifflin Scranton Meredith Palmer Memorial Celebrity Rabies Awareness Pro-Am Fun Run Race For the Cure” (and yes, that was the race’s actual name) in the Season 4 episode of the series titled “Fun Run”. During the race, Jim and Pam happen upon an estate sale at a local residence and instead of continuing on with the run in order to “prevent a disease that’s already been cured” (LOL), they decide to do some shopping. I know this probably goes without saying, but I also found this location thanks to fellow stalker Owen. And even though it only appeared very briefly in one episode of the series, because I was already in the area, I just had to stalk it!

And it, too, looks much the same in person as it did on the series, even though very little of it was ever actually seen in the episode.

Ironically enough, the “Fun Run” house looks like it could almost be a twin to Oscar’s house! Many homes in the area actually have that extra little roof gable above the garage and, therefore look quite a bit alike, so it is truly a feat that Owen was able to track down the houses which were used on the show.

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding both of these locations!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Oscar’s house from The Office is located at 5232 Longridge Avenue in Van Nuys. The house where Pam buys the lamp in the “Fun Run” episode is located a few blocks north of Oscar’s house at 5306 Longridge Avenue.

August 18, 2010July 26, 2010

Nate ‘n Al’s Delicatessen

One location that I have been wanting to stalk for quite some time now is the historic Nate ‘n Al Delicatessen in Beverly Hills, but because I don’t get out to that area very often, the restaurant had remained an unchecked item on my extremely long “To-Stalk” list for over a year. Until a couple of weeks ago, that is, when I finally dragged my fiancé to grab a bite to eat there after we had stalked Will Rogers Memorial Park from 90210, which is located nearby. And I have to say that the place was definitely worth the wait! Although rather pricey (despite what some online reviews might state), the landmark restaurant serves up some FABULOUS food. And thanks to its huge deli counter, brown leather booths, and pastrami sandwiches stacked as high as the eye can see, eating there was like visiting a little slice of New York City right here in Southern California.

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Nate ‘n Al’s has been a veritable institution in Beverly Hills ever since it first opened way back on May 24, 1945. The deli was founded by Al Mendelson and Nate Reimer, who originally met while working at Boesky’s Deli in Chicago. The two entrepreneurs eventually decided to open their very own deli-style restaurant a few years later and figured LaLaLand was just the place to do so. At the time of its founding, the restaurant was Beverly Hills’ sole delicatessen and could only accommodate a scant 30 patrons. It became such an immediate success, though, that it was later expanded to its current, larger size which can hold up to 120 diners. Nate retired just a few years after the restaurant’s opening, but Al stayed on to helm the place and it is his ancestors who are still running it today. And I am happy to report that the restaurant is still going strong. According to this 2005 Daily News article, each year Nate ‘n Al’s serves up 130,000 matzo balls, 16,000 gallons of chicken noodle soup, and 80,000 pounds of corned beef! As I stated above, the food is phenomenal, but it’s also fairly expensive, so be prepared.

Because of its fabulous food and laid-back attitude, Nate ‘n Al’s has long been a celebrity magnet. You won’t find any autographed pictures decorating the establishment’s walls, though, because as founder Al Mendelson advised: “If you want them in the booths, keep them off the walls.” 😉 Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there over the years include Max Mutchnick (one of the co-creators of Will & Grace), Lew Wasserman, Suzanne Pleshette, Tom Poston, Robert Wagner, Neil Diamond, Jon Voight, Doris Day, Nicollette Sheridan, Jay Leno, Roseanne Bar, Adam Sandler, Dick Van Dyke, Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Jodie Foster, Nancy Sinatra, Courteney Cox, Rodney Dangerfield, Kareem Abdul Jabar, Tony Curtis, Sharon Osbourne, and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Television host Larry King loves the place so much that he not only dines there every single morning (not kidding!), but he also purchased his house in Beverly Hills for the sole reason that it was within walking distance of the deli! Love it!

And while we didn’t spot any celebs while dining there, fellow stalker Karen was lucky enough to be seated next to Jason Reitman on a recent visit to the deli. Her daughter snapped the above photo of the Juno director on the down-low during their meal. Love it! Jason wasn’t the only celeb that Karen and her daughter spotted at Nate ‘n Al’s that day, though – Larry King and Clint Howard were also dining at the time. Lucky girls! As Karen said, talk about “hitting a trifecta”! From what I’ve heard, the best time to spot celebs at Nate ‘n Al’s is in the morning, which means I’ve gotta go back there sometime soon to grab some breakfast!

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And the place is also a filming location! In the Season 5 episode of Entourage titled “The All Out Fall Out”, Nate ‘n Al’s is the spot where Vinnie Chase (aka Adrian Grenier) finds out from his business manager that he may need to file for bankruptcy. The 1957 flick Pal Joey, which starred Frank Sinatra and Rita Hayworth, was also filmed at the historic restaurant.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Nate ‘n Al Delicatessen, from Entourage, is located at 414 North Beverly Boulevard in Beverly Hills. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here.

August 17, 2010August 7, 2010

Holly’s Nashua House from “The Office”

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

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

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

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

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

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

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

August 12, 2010July 20, 2010

The Bistro Garden

A couple of weeks ago, while searching online for different filming locations from The Office, I came across some information about an area restaurant which not only appeared in The Office, but in countless other productions over the years, as well – the Bistro Garden in Studio City. So, I, of course, dragged the Grim Cheaper right out to stalk it that very weekend! And I think it is safe to say that we both pretty much fell in love with the place immediately upon arriving! The Bistro Garden was first opened by Carolyn Niklas Pappas, the daughter of famed restaurateur Kurt Niklas (who founded the enormously popular celebrity hotspots Bistro and the original Bistro Garden in Beverly Hills) and her husband Gregory Pappas in 1990. Two decades later, the place is still one of the Valley’s most popular restaurants – and definitely its most romantic! According to this 2009 Los Angeles Times article, restaurant reviewer Max Jacobson said of the Bistro Garden that it “may have been the most beautiful restaurant he had ever dined in”. And he wasn’t exaggerating – the place is exquisite.

The Bistro Garden, which according to its website was modeled after a “European Wintergarden”, features a central indoor courtyard with a huge, peaked skylight roof, large French doors, and a perimeter of potted trees covered in twinkle lights, all of which give off the feeling of being outside in some sort of magical garden oasis. And I swear they must pump some sort of rose fragrance through the air conditioning vents, because the place smells like fresh cut flowers – it’s AMAZING!

The restaurant’s wood-paneled mahogany bar area, where the Grim Cheaper and I ate, definitely evokes a feeling of Old Hollywood, especially with the Michael Buble and Frank Sinatra music that plays in the background. Love it! 🙂 The staff also could NOT have been friendlier and answered all of my silly little questions about the filming that has taken place there over the years. Oh, and the food was absolutely incredible, too! And even though the restaurant is a bit pricey, the Grim Cheaper thoroughly enjoyed himself and said he can’t wait to go back! That in and of itself is a testament to how good the place is.

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In the Season 6 episode of The Office titled “Double Date”, the Bistro Garden stood in for Paparazzo’s (LOL!), the Italian restaurant where Michael Scott (aka Steve Carell) hosted a birthday luncheon for Pam’s (aka Jenna Fischer’s) mom, Helene (aka Linda Purl). It is there that Michael decides that Helene, at age 58, is far too old for him and promptly breaks up with her . . . in the middle of her birthday lunch.

Steve Carell also filmed a scene from 2005’s The 40-Year-Old Virgin at the Bistro Garden – the scene in which his character Andy attends a Date-A-Palooza speed-dating event.

Randomly enough, The Office’s Mindy Kaling also made an appearance in that scene.

In 2010’s Valentine’s Day, the Bistro Garden was the spot where Julia Fitzpatrick (aka Jennifer Garner) confronted her boyfriend, Dr. Harrison Copeland (aka Patrick Dempsey), after finding out that he was married.

In 1997’s Liar Liar, the Bistro Garden was the spot where Jerry (aka Cary Elwes) proposed to Audrey (aka Maura Tierney).

Bistro Garden has popped up twice in Desperate Housewives. In the Season 2 episode titled “Remember (1)”, the restaurant’s bar area was where Gabrielle Solis (aka Eva Longoria Parker) discovered (wrongly) via a newscast that her husband Carlos (aka Ricardo Chavira) had died in a car accident.

The restaurant was also where Zach Young (aka Cody Kasch) unveiled himself to be Gabrielle’s secret admirer in the Season 3 episode of Desperate Housewives titled “Not While I’m Around”.

The Bistro Garden also showed up twice on fave show Beverly Hills, 90210 – first in the Season 8 episode titled “Toil and Trouble” as the spot where Cooper Hargrove (aka Christopher Orr) gifted Valerie Malone (aka Tiffani Amber-Thiessen) with a diamond necklace.

And second in the Season 10 episode titled “Laying Pipe”. But in actuality only the exterior of the Bistro Garden was featured in the “Laying Pipe” episode.

As you can see in the above screen captures, the interior filming took place elsewhere. The restaurant was also featured in an episode of Melrose Place, but because I didn’t really watch that show, I am unsure of exactly which episode.

Bistro Garden is also something of a celebrity hotspot, as well. Just a few of the celebs who have been spotted dining there recently include Taylor Lautner, Taylor Swift, and Steve Carell.

On a side note – I will not be publishing a new blog post for tomorrow, or for the next two Fridays. Because of my upcoming wedding, I wrote all of my August blog posts in advance and unfortunately was only able to get enough done to publish four each week. But I will be back on Monday with a whole new post. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Bistro Garden is located at 12950 Ventura Boulevard in Studio City. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here.

August 4, 2010August 3, 2010

Jim and Pam’s Wedding Church from “The Office”

Another wedding-themed location that I stalked recently was the San Fernando Valley-area church where Jim Halpert (aka John Krasinski) married Pam Beesly (aka Jenna Fischer) in the Season Six episode of my new favorite show The Office titled “Niagara”. I found out about this location quite a while ago, thanks to both fellow stalker Owen, who had told me about it in an email, and fellow stalker Snidely Whiplash, who posted a comment about it on my site. And literally, as soon as I finished watching the “Niagara” episode a few weeks back, I dragged my fiancé right out to stalk the place. Unfortunately, I must have been having a blonde moment at the time, though, because we stalked the church on a Saturday evening when it was, sadly, locked up and closed. SUCH A BUMMER! The experience taught me a very valuable lesson, though – if you are going to stalk a church, do so on a Sunday morning when it is almost guaranteed that the property will be open to the public. 😉

In real life, the supposed Niagara Falls, New York-area church where Pam and Jim tied the knot, which was referred to as Spruce Avenue Presbyterian Church in the episode, is known as the Congregational Church of the Chimes and it can actually be found right here in Southern California, in the San Fernando Valley suburb of Sherman Oaks. Jim and Pam’s wedding did not take place in the church’s main building, though, but in the smaller Walter H. Staves Chapel, which is pictured above.

And while I didn’t get to see the inside of the chapel, my fiancé and I were able to wander around the church grounds quite a bit and, thanks to some very friendly parishioners who pointed me in the right direction, I got to stalk the fountain where Jim and Pam posed for the photograph that appeared on their official wedding website. YAY!

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We also got to stalk the patch of grass where Jim kicked around a soccer ball before the wedding, so the day wasn’t a total loss. 🙂

My good friends, fellow stalkers Lavonna and Melissa, who were Office aficionados long before I was, stalked the church when they were in town this past April and had much better luck than I did. As fate would have it, they happened to pull up to the property just as the church’s wedding coordinator, a super nice woman named Lila, was locking the chapel up. They told her that they were major Office fans and asked if she might let them take a quick peek at the interior and she happily obliged! Thankfully, Lavonna and Melissa were kind enough to loan me the photographs they took that day to use in this post. Thank you, ladies!

Not only did the two of them get to stalk the inside of the chapel, though, but Melissa also got to re-create the “Forever” dance routine that the Office staff performed during the ceremony! Sigh! I had SO wanted to do that very same thing while I was there! Ah well, looks like I’ll just have to re-stalk this place again sometime soon . . . on a Sunday, of course. “:)

You can watch Jim and Pam’s wedding scene from the “Niagara” episode by clicking above. And I am not ashamed to admit that I absolutely CANNOT watch that scene without crying – even though I’ve probably seen it a dozen times by now! It literally gets me EVERY SINGLE TIME! Especially when Jim says, “And Plan A was marrying her a long, long time ago. Pretty much the day I met her.” Sigh!

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalkers Owen and Snidely Whiplash for finding this location and to Lavonna and Melissa for allowing me to post their photos of it on my blog! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Congregational Church of the Chimes, aka Jim and Pam’s wedding church from The Office, is located at 14115 Magnolia Boulevard in Sherman Oaks. You can visit the church’s official website here. Jim and Pam got married in the Walter H. Staves Chapel, which is located on the southwest portion of the church grounds and is denoted with the blue arrow on the above map. The fountain where the couple posed for their wedding photograph is located inside of the Katharine Gibson Chapel of the Garden and is denoted with a gold star on the above map. The patch of grass where Jim played soccer before the ceremony is located in the center of the property and is denoted with a pink “X” on the above map.

August 3, 2010August 2, 2010

The “Party of Five” House

Sunday night I returned home from my bachelorette party weekend, which turned out to be a surprise Sex and the City-themed soiree thrown up north in San Francisco. Needless to say, I was absolutely FLOORED about it. 🙂 The celebration was, of course, held at a filming location, so I will, of course, be blogging about it, but I am still waiting on some pictures that my friends took before I can do so. In the meantime, though, I thought I’d blog about a location that I have been wanting to stalk for what seems like forever now – the San Francisco home where the Salinger Family – Bailey (aka Scott Wolf), Charlie (aka Matthew Fox), Julia (aka Neve Campbell), Claudia (aka Lacey Chabert), and Owen (aka toddler twins Brandon and Taylor Porter) – lived on the 90’s television series Party of Five. For whatever reason, even though I’ve had the place on my To-Stalk list for ages now, every time I’ve visited San Francisco over the past two years, I haven’t been able to make it out to the house. So, I begged my good friend Nat to take me there the morning following my party and, let me tell you, I could NOT have been more excited to finally be seeing it in person.

Because I accidentally left my trusty stalking notebook at home, I didn’t have the address of the house with me this past weekend, so, before heading out there, Nat and I did a little cyberstalking to find the address online and as it turns out the property has its own listing on Yelp! Love it, love it, love it!

I am VERY, VERY happy to report that the Salinger house looks EXACTLY the same today as it did back in 1994 when Party of Five was filmed. Even the paint colors have remained the same! YAY! The home is absolutely GORGEOUS in person and so quintessentially symbolizes San Francisco that it is not at all hard to see why producers chose to use it as the main residence on the Bay Area-based series.

In real life, the three-story dwelling, which was built in 1900, features seven bedrooms, five and a half bathrooms, a whopping 6,705 square feet, cathedral ceilings, a four-car garage, an elevator, a gourmet kitchen, a greenhouse solarium, stained glass windows throughout, two decks, and views of the Golden Gate Bridge, the Palace of Fine Arts, and San Francisco Bay. The property was sold to new owners earlier this year for $6,550,000. I can’t even imagine owning an iconic piece of television history like that! So darn cool!

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The house was featured each week in the Party of Five opening credits and in establishing shots throughout the series’ six-year run.

Because parts of the Party of Five pilot were shot on location in San Francisco, I assumed that the real life interior of the house was also used in the filming of that episode. But if you look at this recent real estate listing for the home and compare it to the above screen captures, you can see that that was not actually the case. But I am happy to report that the real life house does boast a small garden courtyard, much like its onscreen counterpart.

You can watch the Party of Five opening credits, which feature the house, by clicking above.

Big THANK YOU to Nat for taking me to stalk this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Party of Five house is located at 2311 Broadway in the ultra-exclusive Pacific Heights neighborhood of San Francisco.