The Client List filming locations

July 30, 2012July 27, 2012

Floodlights Nightclub from “Beverly Hills, 90210”

Located directly across the street from Calvert Studios – the studio where fave show Beverly Hills, 90210 was lensed and the location that currently stands in for the exterior of The Rub massage parlor on the Lifetime television series The Client List – is the office building that masqueraded as Floodlights nightclub in the Season 1 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 titled “Slumber Party”. And while I had known about this locale for what seems like ages, for some reason, I had never stalked it during any of my prior visits to Calvert Studios. Thankfully though, when I was there with Mike, from MovieShotsLA, a couple of months back, he reminded me about the place and suggested that I stalk and blog about it. So here goes!

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In the “Slumber Party” episode of Beverly Hills, 90210, Steve Sanders (Ian Ziering) takes Brandon Walsh (Jason Priestley) to a nightclub named Floodlights. After the teens are denied entry at the door, due to the fact that they are both obviously underage, they walk back to the club’s parking lot area where they meet Trina (Growing Pains’ Julie McCullough) and Shelly (Judie Aronson), two scam artists who end up stealing Steve’s Corvette. And while the police do catch and arrest the women later on in the evening, Trina begs Steve to bail them out of jail, promising to “make it up to” him, and Steve being Steve, he, of course, does – after which Trina gives him a coupon for a free manicure. Ah, the good old days!

In real life, the Floodlights building is not a nightclub at all, but a simple office space that currently serves as the headquarters for ProAction Products, which, according to its website, is a custom plastic injection molding, assembly and tool manufacturing firm – whatever that means. And while I am not sure what the structure housed back in 1991 when the “Slumber Party” episode was filmed, judging by the industrial nature of the area, I am guessing it was a similar type of company. I cannot express how incredibly weird it is to see the small, quiet and normal street where Calvert Studios is situated and picture the Beverly Hills, 90210-gang arriving there each and every morning to tape what was then the most popular television series on the planet. Most movie studios are surrounded by huge gates, fences and guard shacks, and, barring a tour, are largely off-limits to the public. But Calvert Studios is, in essence, just a warehouse and, while it is slightly more inaccessible now, back in the 90210 days, it was completely visible from the street. I cannot even imagine working in one of the nearby offices at the time and getting to see Shannen Doherty and Luke Perry arrive on set everyday. How incredibly cool would that have been?!? Sigh!

Oddly enough, thanks to its unique façade, producers did not have to do much to transform the 1972-office building into Floodlights nightclub. They simply covered over the glass entrance doors to make the structure appear less “officey”, added a neon sign and a fake cactus plant, and, voila, they had themselves what looked exactly like an early ‘90s-era club.

Ironically enough, while scanning through the pilot episode of The Client List, which was titled “The Rub of Sugar Land”, to make screen captures for last Friday’s post, I spotted the Floodlights office building in the background of the scene in which Riley Parks (Jennifer Love Hewitt) discovered that the word “whore” had been spray-painted on her car.

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Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for reminding me about this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Floodlights Nightclub, from the “Slumber Party” episode of Beverly Hills, 90210, is located at 14940 Calvert Street in Van Nuys. The Rub from The Client List is located across the street at 15001 Calvert Street. The back of the Peach Pit and the door to the After Dark from Beverly Hills, 90210 is actually the east side of the warehouse located right next door to The Rub at 15041 Calvert Street. Steve Sander’s bus stop from the “Chuckie’s Back” episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 was built on the west side of that same warehouse. You can read my post on those locations here and here.

July 27, 2012July 26, 2012

The Rub from “The Client List”

Another The Client List location that fellow stalker Owen (aka Jennifer Love Hewitt’s biggest fan), from the When Write Is Wrong blog, tracked down recently was The Rub – the supposed Sugar Land, Texas-area massage parlor where JLove’s character, Riley Parks, works on the series. Owen had actually been looking for the locale for quite some time and when he finally found it and sent me the address I literally just about fell off my chair! As it turns out, The Rub is the exterior of Calvert Studios in Van Nuys, the very same studio where Beverly Hills, 90210, my favorite show of all time, was filmed! How I did not recognize it while watching The Client List is absolutely BEYOND me. In my defense, though, at the time that Owen gave me the address, I had only seen one episode of the series. Anyway, once I found out about the location, I added it to my Re-Stalk list and Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I headed right on over there while in the area two months ago.

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The two warehouses pictured below were both formerly a part of the Calvert Studios complex and the interior of each was used in the filming of Beverly Hills, 90210. As you’ll notice, the place does not look anything at all like a typical movie studio. That is because Calvert Studios was originally a light manufacturing facility located at the end of a cul-de-sac in a small industrial area of Van Nuys. In 1989, Aaron Spelling purchased the site to film his new television series Beverly Hills, 90210 and transformed the two warehouses, which comprised 45,000 square feet of space, into sound studios and production offices. And for the next ten years magic happened inside of those walls. Well, for the next four years – we can all attest to the fact that the show went seriously downhill after Shannen Doherty left. But I digress. Anyway, after 90210 went off the air in 2000, Spelling Productions continued to do filming at the site. Then, when Aaron passed away in 2005, CBS took over the property and used the studio to shoot such shows as Jericho, Heist, Harper’s Island, and the ill-fated 2009 Melrose Place re-boot.

Then, sometime last year, CBS sold off one of the warehouses to Genie Air Conditioning & Heating Inc., cutting Calvert Studios in half. And sadly, the warehouse sold was the most recognizable one, the one that was used regularly as the back of the Peach Pit and the famous entrance to the Peach Pit After Dark on 90210.

Sadder still is the fact that Genie has since painted over the warehouse’s legendary red brick exterior and the building is now a drab blue and grey color and is virtually unrecognizable. GAH!

Unfortunately, while the After Dark door – which, in reality, is one of the warehouse’s side doors – is typically visible from the street, it was covered over by a huge tower of wooden crates on the day that Mike and I stalked the place. Its location is denoted with a pink arrow in the photograph below. You can check out some pictures that I took of that door on my first visit to Calvert Studios – during which Mike and I were invited onto the lot – here.

The side of the Genie warehouse was also used as other locations besides the Peach Pit during 90210’s ten-year run. Most prominently, it doubled as the rave where Emily Valentine (Christine Elise) slipped Ecstasy into Brandon Walsh’s (Jason Priestley’s) drink in the Season 2 episode titled “U4EA”. The white door visible in the screen captures pictured below is actually the famous After Dark door. The camera was just facing the opposite angle from which the After Dark scenes were usually shot.

And the opposite (west) side of the warehouse was used as the bus station where Steve Sanders (Ian Ziering) caught a bus to Albuquerque, New Mexico in the Season 2 episode titled “Chuckie’s Back”.

The bus depot, which was, of course, just a fake, was set up in front of the first window pictured below.

And although they can’t be seen in the episode, when Steve’s bus drives off in the scene, it passes right through the Calvert Studios gates.

Those gates are pictured below.

One of the Genie warehouse employees was nice enough to let us onto the property while we were there, so I, of course, just had to pose for a pic in the spot where the gang was standing in the episode.

While the Genie warehouse is no longer used for production, the other warehouse still is. And not only does the front exterior of it stand in for the entrance to The Rub on The Client List, but the interior is actually comprised of the soundstages where the series is filmed.

In The Client List, The Rub is the not-so-above-board strip-mall massage parlor where Riley Parks gives massages . . . among other things. As you can see below, it looks pretty much exactly the same in person as it does onscreen, minus a few potted plants and some retro light fixtures.

As I mentioned in my post about the house where Riley lives on the series, The Client List is actually based upon the true story of The Healing Touch massage parlor, which got raided by the police in a huge prostitution scandal in May 2004. In real life, The Healing Touch was located at 3631 North Dixie Boulevard in Odessa, Texas.

Ironically enough, in the Season 1 finale of The Client List, which was titled “Past Is Prologue”, the back (north) side of the Genie warehouse was featured in the scene in which The Rub’s owner, Georgia (Loretta Devine), took Riley “next door” to “Bucky’s Appliances” and suggested that she relieve some of her anger at her ex-husband by hitting washing machines with a baseball bat.

It absolutely cracked me up to see those washing machines because, as I mentioned back in December 2009 in my post about the “Keep It Together” park from Season 1 of Beverly Hills, 90210, Calvert Studios is surrounded by appliance warehouses and washing machines were visible in the background of more than a few episodes of the series.

Big THANK YOU to Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for finding this location and to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for figuring out Steve’s bus stop location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Rub from The Client List is located at 15001 Calvert Street in Van Nuys. The back of the Peach Pit and the door to the After Dark from Beverly Hills, 90210 is actually the east side of the warehouse located right next door at 15041 Calvert Street. Steve’s bus stop from the “Chuckie’s Back” episode of 90210 was built on the west side of that same warehouse.

July 16, 2012July 15, 2012

Riley’s House from “The Client List”

As I have mentioned many times before on this site, fellow stalker Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, is the biggest Jennifer Love Hewitt fan this side of the Atlantic. So when the actress’ new show, The Client List, premiered in April, he, of course, immediately set about searching for locations from it. He managed to track down quite a few of them, too, including “The Rub” massage parlor (which, ironically enough, has a significant Beverly Hills, 90210-connection, but I’ll save that information for a future post) and the supposed Beaumont, Texas-area home where JLH’s character, Riley Parks, lives with her two children, Travis Parks (Tyler Champagne – um, LOVE that last name!) and Katie Parks (Cassidy Guetersloh). So while out doing some stalking with Mike, from MovieShotsLA, a few weeks back, the two of us dropped by to stalk the abode.

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Riley’s one-story, ranch-style house appears regularly each week on The Client List. Quite a few areas of the home are featured on the series, including the front exterior . . .

. . . and the backyard.

If I had to guess, I would say that the real life interior of the home was used in the pilot episode of the series, which was titled “The Rub of Sugarland”, and was then recreated on a soundstage for the episodes that followed. Unfortunately though, I could not find any interior shots of the property with which to verify that hunch.

I absolutely LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Riley’s kitchen, by the way. Drool!

In real life, the abode, which was built in 1946, boasts two bedrooms, two baths, 1,836 square feet, and 0.36 acres of land. And, as you can see below, it looks pretty much exactly the same in person as it does onscreen – minus the Parks family’s white mailbox, which was just a prop brought in for the filming.

We happened to meet a super-nice neighbor while we were stalking the place and he told us that the white fence in the home’s front yard was installed specifically for the show to make the property appear more “Texas-like”. The owners ended up liking it, though, and decided to leave it up after filming for the season had been completed.

Before doing research for today’s post, I had no idea that The Client List was based upon a true story about an actual mom named Crystal Burchett and an actual prostitution scandal that rocked the small town of Odessa, Texas. In January 2005, Texas Monthly magazine published an expose on the scandal titled “She Had Brains, a Body, and the Ability To Make Men Love Her”, which Jennifer Love Hewitt’s production company, Fedora Films, later purchased the rights to. The article was then turned into the hit Lifetime Television Movie The Client List, which premiered in July 2010. A little over a year later, Lifetime greenlit a television series based upon that movie and the rest, as they say, is history. I highly recommend checking out the Texas Monthly article as it is an absolutely fascinating read! I tried to dig up some photographs of Crystal Burchett, whom Jennifer Love’s character is based upon, but I could not find any anywhere. And while the article describes the former homecoming-queen-turned-prostitute as not a “run-of-the-mill whore” (LOL) and having a “bubbly personality” and “girlish looks that made her irresistible” (which could very well be a description of JLH), I am going to go out on a limb and guess that the real life Crystal was nowhere near as good-looking.

I have to admit that I actually really like The Client List. It is a sweet show and Colin Egglesfield is not hard to look at, either. Winking smile I do have to say, though, that JLH’s eyelashes in the series are completely distracting! She looks like she could take flight with those things! Ridic!

Be sure to “Like” IAMNOTASTALKER on Facebook here and “Friend” me on my personal page here. You can also check out the IAMNOTASTALKER About Me page here and you can follow me on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And don’t forget to take a look at my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Big THANK YOU to Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Riley’s house from The Client List is located at 6619 Peach Avenue in Van Nuys.