Windsor Square – IAMNOTASTALKER

August 10, 2020August 10, 2020

Ace and Avis Amberg’s House from “Hollywood”

There’s something about filming at a real place instead of a set that lends authenticity to a production, especially a period piece. As Jon Favreau said on the subject, “I came up through independent film, where you’re usually shooting on location. I hate when it looks like you shot on a set instead of on location.” Director Ryan Murphy must ascribe to the same filmmaking style as he chose to lens much of Hollywood at real spots. Doing so gave the Netflix miniseries a richness that otherwise would have been lacking. From Golden Tip Gasoline to the Deco Building to Henry Willson’s (Jim Parsons) office, the show truly brought Old Hollywood to Technicolor life, despite being shot in 2020. Nowhere was this more apparent than at the stately mansion belonging to Ace Studios head Ace Amberg (Rob Reiner), his wife, Avis (Patti LuPone), and their daughter, Claire Wood (Samara Weaving).

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The handsome estate, which sits on a tree-lined street in Windsor Square, was designed in 1921 by architect Frank Meline, who also gave us the Ruskin Art Club, aka Chief Irving’s (Lance Reddick) residence from the Amazon series Bosch.

Though it looks considerable in size from the street, it is actually much larger than the sprawling exterior would have you believe.

The massive pad boasts 6 bedrooms, 4 baths, an incredible 7,310 square feet (!), a marble entry canopied by a 2-story skylight, multiple fireplaces, painted ceilings, stained glass pieces, a detached 2-car garage, a pool, a 0.41-acre lot, and what a 1991 real estate listing described as a “Sistine Chapel-like ballroom.” You can check out some early photographs of the interior here.

In 1923, original owner Jefferson L. Byrne sold the property to prominent developer/theatre magnate Joseph Toplitzky. He promptly hired Morgan, Walls & Clements (who were behind the aforementioned Deco Building, also featured in Hollywood) to do some renovations, including adding a bath and enclosing a porch. Toplitzky commissioned the firm once again in 1927, this time to add a bedroom, bathroom, and dressing room to the home.

The exterior of the mansion is actually only featured once on Hollywood and very briefly at that. In the episode titled “Meg,” Avis and Claire wake up to a burning cross in their front yard, put there in protest of the controversial movie Ace Studios is producing.

Outside of the opulently-framed front door, we don’t get a very good look at the place. So how did I find it, you ask? Thanks to a page on OnLocationVacations detailing a January 14th, 2020 shoot for Hollywood at 415 South Windsor Boulevard, which I came across while researching the show’s various locales. One look at the address on Google Street View told me it was the Amberg residence.

The exterior may have been neglected a bit onscreen, but the breathtaking interior appeared numerous times throughout the limited series’ 7-episode run. I was stunned at the intricacy of it all. Every inch of the place seemed prettier than the last. They just don’t make houses like that anymore!

Shooting inside the palatial estate must have transported LuPone and her costars straight back to the 1940s, the period in which Hollywood was set. Being on location, in general, inspired the actress, whose Avis character was loosely based upon Irene Selznick, daughter of MGM co-founder Louis B. Mayer. In a move highly unconventional for the time, Irene separated from her husband, Selznick International Pictures head David O. Selznick, in 1945 and relocated to New York, where she went on to become a successful theatre producer. She even gave Marlon Brando his big break in A Streetcar Named Desire! Irene, like Avis, was a definite trailblazer. As part of her research, LuPone read Selznick’s 1983 autobiography, A Private View, which served to further immerse her in the world of historic Tinseltown. As she told Entertainment Weekly, “I became obsessed with Old Hollywood having read that book. Every time we were someplace, I’m looking around for what is left. And we were shooting at Paramount one day and the driver took us from Paramount back to our studio and I passed the Hollywood Dream apartments and just the idea of people’s lives . . . Now when I look at the old movies and I see the girls that are, you know, sort of the t*ts and a** in the background, what was their life? Was their life what we’ve heard their life was? Or, you know, was it legitimate? I mean, I’m still blown away!” Oh yes, the magic of Hollywood can definitely do that to you!

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Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Amberg residence from Hollywood is located at 415 South Windsor Boulevard in Windsor Square. Judge Crawford’s (Bob Gunton) house from Fracture is two doors down at 435 South Windsor.

July 22, 2020July 22, 2020

The “Gimme a Break!” House

Though I definitely consider myself a child of the ‘80s, somehow I never watched Gimme a Break!, which aired on NBC from 1981 to 1987. So when my friend Owen emailed in April asking if I had any intel on the supposed Glenlawn, California residence where widowed police chief Carl Kanisky (Dolph Sweet) lived with his three daughters, Katie (Kari Michaelsen), Sam (Lara Jill Miller) and Julie (Lauri Hendler), and their housekeeper, Nell Harper (Nell Carter), on the series, I was at a loss. Owen isn’t actually a huge Gimme a Break! fan either, but bored during quarantine, caught an episode on YouTube and quickly zeroed in on the traditional-style pad shown in the opening credits. As he wrote to me, “I’m guessing this is one of the few remaining popular ’80s sitcom houses that has yet to be found.” I was, of course, intrigued. One look at its stately architecture told me the property was likely in Hancock Park. I did some digging in the area, but came up empty. It was not until the end of May that the home was finally identified thanks to fellow stalker Chas, of the It’s Filmed There website. As it turns out, my hunch about Hancock Park was right on the money! The Kanisky residence can be found at 515 South Norton Avenue in Windsor Square, looking pretty much exactly as it did during the Gimme a Break! days almost four decades ago!

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In real life, the 1910 home boasts 4 bedrooms, 3 baths, 3,022 square feet, a fireplace, a 0.16-acre lot, and a detached 2-car garage with what appears to be an in-law unit upstairs.

It really is a handsome property, with plenty of Anywhere, U.S.A. appeal. So it’s no surprise it found its way to the screen.

Said to be at 2938 Wells Drive in the fictional town of Glenlawn, the pad popped up in Gimme a Break!’s Season 1 and 2 opening credits, which you can watch here. Like me, Chas had a feeling the property was most likely located in Hancock Park and its environs. He began his search at Beverly Boulevard and Manhattan Place at the very eastern edge of Windsor Square and, using Street View, worked his way south on Manhattan until he hit Wilshire Boulevard. He then ventured back toward Beverly on North St. Andrews Place and continued on that way in a grid-like fashion, moving west. And there, on the sixth street he searched, was the Kanisky house. Thank you, Chas!

It truly is a feat that so little of the property has been changed considering 39 years have passed since Gimme a Break! first hit the screen, not to mention how prevalent remodels are in L.A.

Only the exterior of 515 South Norton appeared on the series. The interior of the Kanisky house was just a set located on a soundstage at the now-defunct Metromedia Square in Hollywood, where Helen Bernstein High School now stands.

Gimme a Break! is not the pad’s only claim to fame!

Thanks to On Location Vacations, I learned that Jack Pearson (Milo Ventimiglia) took Rebecca (Mandy Moore) to an open house there in the Season 3 episode of This Is Us titled “A Philadelphia Story,” which aired in 2018. Only the interior of the property was shown in the episode.

On Location Vacations also tipped me off to the residence’s stint as the home of Marisol (Veronica Osorio) and Richard Onsted (Peter Mark Kendall) on the television series Strange Angel, which aired from 2018 to 2019.

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

Big THANK YOU to Chas, from the It’s Filmed There website, for finding this location and to Owen for initiating the hunt!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Kanisky house from Gimme a Break! is located at 515 South Norton Avenue in Windsor Square.

May 18, 2020May 31, 2020

The Petitfils-Boos Residence from “Hollywood”

My stalking backlog is ridiculously large, so much so that I often forget places I’ve been. Case in point? The Petitfils-Boos Residence. (With a name like that, you’d think I would have remembered it, right?) I stalked the historic Windsor Square mansion way back in November 2012 (which is crazy to me – looking at the photos, I feel as if it was just yesterday!) after it made a brief appearance on Dexter and then it promptly slipped my mind. Though I was reminded of the place when I saw it pop up on Feud: Bette and Joan in 2017, I somehow quickly forgot about it again. It was not until I spotted the pad in an episode of the new Netflix miniseries Hollywood recently that I decided it was finally time for a post! So here goes!

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The Italian Renaissance Revival-style mansion was designed in 1922 by architect Charles F. Plummer for Walter M. Petitfils, one of the confectioners behind the gorgeous Dutch Chocolate Shop in downtown L.A. Walter didn’t stay on the premises long – in 1927 he sold the pad to his friends Henry and Cassie Boos, hence its hyphenated, hard-to-pronounce name.

Not only is the property absolutely HUGE – between the main house and the guest house, it measures a total of 10,120 square feet! – but it looks even bigger than it actually is thanks to its V-shape and diagonal placement on a corner lot.

The 2-story estate boasts an 8,594-square-foot main house with 4 bedrooms, 5 baths, walnut paneling, stained glass windows, archways, murals hand-painted by Dutch artist Anthony Heinsbergen, and a Gladding, McBean terra cotta tile façade. There’s also a 1,526-square-foot guest house, a 0.74-acre lot, a pool, a hot tub, a BBQ, multiple gardens, a loggia, a courtyard, and a detached 2-car garage. You can check out some interior images of it here.

Every square inch of the place is stunning – even the front gate! With those dripping topiaries, the residence looks straight out of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.

Not only is the property listed on the National Register of Historic Places, but the Los Angeles Conservancy procured an easement on the entire frontage, assuring no alterations can ever be made to the exterior.

Considering the manse’s Old Hollywood feel, its appearance on the 1940s-set Hollywood must have been a no-brainer for producers. The residence pops up in the episode titled “Hooray for Hollywood: Part 2” as the supposed former Beverly Hills home of Bugsy Siegel – “Might even be the house he got shot in!” according to Ernie West (Dylan McDermott) – where Jack Castello (David Corenswet) escorts Avis Amberg (Patti LuPone) to an estate sale of the slain gangster’s belongings.

While there Avis bids on – and wins – a soup tureen that she says Bugsy borrowed from her and never returned.

Hollywood is hardly the Petitfils-Boos Residence’s first rodeo.

As I mentioned, the estate was featured on Dexter in 2012. In the Season 7 episode titled “Are You . . . ?”, it masks as the Ukrainian mansion of Isaak Sirko (Ray Stevenson).

In 2014, it portrayed the home of Governor Paul Lane (Joel Gretsch) and his family in the Season 1 episode of Scorpion titled ‘”Single Point of Failure.”

Jennifer Aniston posed there for People magazine’s 2016 World’s Most Beautiful issue. You can see some video clips of the shoot here.

Jennifer Garner also posed at the mansion in 2016 for the March issue of Vanity Fair. You can watch a behind-the-scenes video of the shoot here.

Exclusive: Jennifer Garner's Frank Talk About Kids, Men, and Ben ...

The Petitfils-Boos Residence played Hedda Hopper’s (Judy Davis) home – or as she calls it, “the house that fear built” – in the pilot episode of Feud: Bette and Joan, which aired in 2017.

And it popped up several times as the dwelling of Police Commission President Bradley Walker (John Getz) during the fourth season of Bosch, which aired in 2018.

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 Petitfils-Boos Residence, aka Bugsy Siegel’s house from the “Hooray for Hollywood: Part 2” episode of Hollywood, is located at 545 South Plymouth Boulevard in Windsor Square.

November 18, 2019November 17, 2019

“The Unicorn” House

The Fall 2019 television season is chock full of fabulous new series! The Grim Cheaper says the deluge brings him right back to the Must-See TV days of the ‘90s. A few of our favorites include The Morning Show (as mentioned here), All Rise, Bluff City Law, Prodigal Son, and The Unicorn. The latter, based on a true story, centers around widower Wade Felton (Walton Goggins) and his attempts to move on with life a year after his wife’s death via a little help from his friends. While it doesn’t sound like it’d be a great premise for a comedy, I find myself laughing throughout each episode. And bonus – though set in Raleigh, North Carolina, it’s shot in Los Angeles! So I, of course, set out to find the home where Wade lives with his two young daughters, Grace (Ruby Jay) and Natalie (Makenzie Moss), on the show. (Pardon the selfie above – I stalked the house while by myself on a quick visit to L.A. last week.)

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I had seen the trailer for The Unicorn months before the series’ debut in September and immediately recognized the residence that appeared in it as the Partridge House, located at Warner Bros. Ranch in Burbank. The picturesque Colonial, a practical set situated on the backlot’s Blondie Street, has appeared in countless productions over the years, as I detailed in this 2016 post for Mike the Fanboy. So named thanks to its regular appearance as the Partridge residence on The Partridge Family, it also portrayed the Thatcher home on Life Goes On and the Kravitz pad on Bewitched and is currently where MeeMaw (Annie Potts) lives on Young Sheldon.

By the time the pilot of The Unicorn aired, though, a different property had been selected to portray the home of the Felton family. When I first laid eyes on the Craftsman-style pad, I was convinced it was located in Pasadena, but searching around Crown City and its environs yielded nothing that matched.

Episode 2, titled “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do,” thankfully provided additional clarity via an address number of “138” visible on the house next door to the Felton’s. That number gibed more with the Hancock Park area than Pasadena, so I started searching there and found the Felton home within minutes at 132 Wilton Drive in Windsor Square.

The exterior of the handsome home appears regularly in establishing shots of the Felton residence, as well as in some on location filming of outdoor scenes.

Only the exterior of the property is featured on The Unicorn. The interior of the Felton pad – described by Wade’s friend Delia (Michaela Watkins) as being “like the Disney Channel version of Grey Gardens” in the first episode – is just a set that exists inside of a soundstage at Paramount Studios where the series is lensed. It looks nothing like the actual inside of 132 Wilton Drive, which you can check out some photos of here. Interiors for the pilot episode (pictured below), though, were shot at the Partridge House at Warner Ranch, which, as I mentioned above, is a practical set meaning that both the inside and outside of it can be utilized for filming.

I’ve been fortunate enough to tour the Partridge House a few times, which is where the photos above and below come from. Unfortunately, my angles are just slightly off from what was shown in The Unicorn’s pilot.

The inside of the Partridge House is basically just an empty shell that productions can come in and change or outfit as needed. As you can see below, the kitchen area does not even have cabinets when not being used for a shoot.

Again, my angle is a bit off, but pictured below is the kitchen nook that served as the Felton’s dining area in the pilot. You can just see the Partridge House’s living room fireplace through the opening in the wall in my photo.

A full view of the living room is below. The kitchen stands just behind the “built-in bookcases,” which were removed for The Unicorn pilot in order to make the space more open.

Though I did not snap a photo of the living room area looking out toward the staircase, I did capture the stairs themselves during my visits to the Partridge House.

The Partridge House also boasts a functional backyard and The Unicorn producers made use of it in the pilot.

The alcove where Wade keeps his freezer – a focal point of the episode – is an actual element of the house, situated between the rear door and the detached garage, as you can see below.

When The Unicorn got picked up, filming moved to Paramount Studios, where the Felton residence interior set was then built from scratch. It looks virtually nothing like the interior from the pilot, though Wade’s freezer alcove was a holdover. You can just see it outside of the door to the left of the stairs in the lower screen capture below.

While I initially assumed that the show made use of 132 Wilton Drive’s backyard for all episodes beyond the pilot, that turns out to be incorrect. The Feltons’ backyard is actually part of the Paramount set, situated inside of a soundstage on the lot.

In real life, the Wilton Drive house, which was built in 1917, boasts 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, 2,200 square feet of living space, and a 0.13-acre lot.

The property last sold in 2011 and looked quite different at the time, with a rounded Colonial-inspired portico attached to its façade, as you can see below. In recent years, the new owners widened the steps leading down to the sidewalk, swapped out the lower-level windows and front door, and removed the portico, adding a large porch in its place. The result is a home that is much more Craftsman in style.

Not to mention much more photogenic! As such, it is no surprise that it wound up onscreen as the residence of the Felton family.

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 Felton home from The Unicorn is located at 132 Wilton Drive in Windsor Square.

March 17, 2017March 13, 2017

The “Last Man Standing” House

The Grim Cheaper and I watch a lot of TV. Like a lot. So I am always surprised when I receive an email from a reader asking about a location from a show I am not familiar with. Such was the case in January, when fellow stalker Marjorie reached out to ask for my assistance in tracking down the house where the Baxter family lives on Last Man Standing. Though I had never seen even one episode of the CBS series, I am always up for a good hunt, so I asked Marjorie to send me some screen captures of the residence. When she did, I was shocked to see that it was a virtual carbon copy of a home that has been featured on The Goldbergs numerous times – one that I will be blogging about soon. I had tracked down that pad – it’s at 2822 Forrester Drive in Cheviot Hills – just a few weeks prior and, due to the similarities, figured the Last Man Standing dwelling had to be located nearby. So I began poking around the area. After a few hours of futile searching, I decided to set my sights on Hancock Park and its environs instead, and hit pay dirt rather quickly.

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Said to be located at 9504 Dublin Street in downtown Denver on the series, the Baxter family home can actually be found at 611 Lorraine Boulevard in Windsor Square.

In real life, the 1923 Tudor boasts 5 bedrooms, 4 baths, 4,680 square feet, a library, several fireplaces, a butler’s pantry, a formal dining room, a breakfast room, a detached garage, a covered patio, maid’s quarters, and a 0.33-acre lot.

Per real estate website Zillow, the two-story residence, which was designed by architect Preston Wright, last sold in October 2013 for $2.7 million.

As you can see, the property looks much the same in person as it does on Last Man Standing.

At some point, a flagpole with a brick base was added to the home’s front yard on the show.

The flagpole is not there in real life, though, and I am guessing it is not a set piece, but something that is superimposed digitally into each image of the house featured on the series.

The handsome brick pad appears regularly each week in establishing shots on Last Man Standing, though no actual filming takes place there.

The series is instead lensed on a set constructed on Stage 9 at CBS Studio Center in Studio City.

The set of the Baxter family’s home does not resemble the interior of the actual residence, which is much larger and much more grand. You can check out what the real inside of the property looks like here.

During my search for the Last Man Standing house, I came across a 2011 Inland Valley Daily Bulletin article that mentioned the series’ regular use of the Bass Pro Shops in Rancho Cucamonga. I was thrilled upon learning the news being that the massive sporting goods emporium is one of my dad’s favorite places in the entire world. I’m not kidding – when we lived in Pasadena and friends would visit from out of town, he would invariably drive them the 35 miles to Rancho Cucamonga to see Bass Pro. Not that I blame him. The 180,000-square-foot site, which boasts waterfalls, an 8,000-gallon fish tank, a shooting gallery, a 2-story lobby with a fireplace and a 60-foot clerestory, murals, museum-like dioramas, and a restaurant (yes, a restaurant!), is not your average sporting goods store. It’s pretty darn unique. You can check out some photos of it here. On Last Man Standing, Bass Pro, which is located at 7777 Victoria Gardens Lane, masks as Outdoor Man, where Baxter patriarch Mike (Tim Allen) works as a marketing director. Only the exterior of the shop is utilized on the series. The inside of Outdoor Man is a set that exists at CBS Studio Center and, unlike the Baxter house, it was closely modeled after Bass Pro’s real life interior. In an interesting twist, as the Daily Bulletin points out, a green truck is visible parked outside of the store in the establishing shots featured on the show. That truck is an actual décor fixture of Bass Pro. Producers must have liked the look of it because it somehow made its way on to Last Man Standing as Mike’s car. If you scroll up, you can see an identical green pick-up parked in the driveway in several establishing shots of the Baxter home.

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

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Marjorie for asking me to find this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Baxter residence from Last Man Standing is located at 611 Lorraine Boulevard in Windsor Square. Bass Pro Shops, aka Outdoor Man from the series, is located at 7777 Victoria Gardens Lane in Rancho Cucamonga.

December 11, 2015December 11, 2015

Diane’s House from “Say Anything . . . “

I have been on a major Say Anything . . . kick lately thanks to a soon-to-be published post I recently wrote for Discover Los Angeles. While doing research for the article, I became a bit fixated on tracking down an unknown location from the 1989 romcom (one that I still have yet to find, darn it!) and in the process watched countless behind-the-scenes vignettes. Thanks to those viewings, not only did I learn an interesting fact about the movie, but I also wound up finally finding the house where Diane Court (Ione Skye) lived with her dad, James Court (John Mahoney), in the flick.

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Oddly, while Diane’s home was featured several times in Say Anything . . ., a full exterior view of it was never shown – nor were any background clues that could help aid in locating it. No street signs, no address numbers, no nothing.

But thanks to the steps leading up from the street to the front doors of the neighboring homes and the extensive amount of trees, I had a hunch that the residence was most likely located in or around the Hancock Park/Windsor Square area. Other than that small inkling, though, with this one I was at a loss. Until a couple of weeks ago, that is.

The most famous scene from Say Anything . . . is easily the iconic boom box scene in which lovelorn Lloyd Dobler (John Cusack) stands outside of Diane’s window with a large boom box playing Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes” held high atop his head. Oddly, the segment was not lensed near Diane’s house, or any house at all, but on a tree-lined stretch of North Hollywood Park, which I blogged about back in August 2012. I had never heard any sort of explanation for the weird location choice until watching “An Iconic Film Revisited: Say Anything . . . 20 Years Later,” a special feature included on the Say Anything . . . (20th Anniversary Edition) Blu-ray DVD. In it, director Cameron Crowe mentions that the boom box segment had actually been shot several different ways in the street in front of Diane’s house, but that none of the takes had really worked for him. Then, on the last day of filming, while shooting the movie’s other iconic scene, in which Lloyd brushes glass out of Diane’s path at a 7-Eleven, cinematographer László Kovács noticed that there was a park across the street that might be perfect for the boom box segment. With only a few minutes of daylight remaining, cast and crew rushed over to the spot that Kovács had selected and re-shot the scene. Cameron loved the way it turned out and that was the footage that made it into the final cut. So there you have it – the reasoning behind the boom box scene’s unconventional locale.

While Crowe was talking about the scene in “An Iconic Film Revisited,” some footage of the original takes were shown.

I was absolutely floored when I noticed that a “135” address number was visible on the curb in front of the house located across the street from Diane’s in the footage. So with that address number in hand, I began searching all of the 100 blocks of Hancock Park using Google Street View and, sure enough, found the place almost immediately.

In real life, the residence, which was built in 1913, features 5 bedrooms, 4 baths, 2,867 square feet of living space, 3 fire places, leaded glass windows, countless built-ins, a separate in-law unit, and 0.23 acres of land.

Though said to be located in Seattle, Washington in Say Anything . . . , in actuality the home can be found right where I thought it would be, on a tree-lined street in Windsor Square.

The residence’s front walkway is the only real portion of the exterior that made it onto the screen in Say Anything . . .

The walkway was featured in the beginning of the movie, in the scene in which Lloyd drops Diane off after attending the graduation party together.

The home’s front porch was originally intended to appear in a scene, as well, but it wound up on the cutting room floor. In the scene, which is included along with several other deleted/alternate/extended scenes on the Say Anything . . . (20th Anniversary Edition) Blu-ray DVD, Lloyd goes outside to smoke while at a dinner party at Diane’s house.

While doing research for this post, I came across a real estate listing for the home and was floored to see that the real life interior of it was also used in Say Anything . . .

Though there have been some changes (which is to be expected, being that filming took place 26 years ago), much of the abode still looks the same today as it did onscreen! As you can see below, the dining room is a direct match to what was shown in Say Anything . . .

As is the kitchen . . .

. . . living room . . .

. . . and stairs.

I absolutely love that little details, like the ceiling trim, have also remained unchanged.

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: Diane’s house from Say Anything . . . is located at 140 South Norton Avenue in Windsor Square.

October 2, 2015September 29, 2017

Louise’s House from “Teen Witch”

It is finally that time of year again, my favorite time of year – October! And you know what that means – it is the start of my annual Haunted Hollywood postings! What better way to kick things off than with a location from the much-loved movie Teen Witch? Somehow I only just discovered the 1989 flick, which is shocking being that I am nothing if not an ‘80s child. I wound up absolutely LOVING it, though. I mean, what’s not to love? Teen Witch, which centers around teenager Louise Miller (Robyn Lively, older sister of Gossip Girl’s Blake Lively) who finds out she has magical powers on her 16th birthday, has all of the elements that make ‘80s movies so great – just the right amount of cheesiness, a love story in which the underdog lands the cute guy, epically loud clothing, and several kickin’ musical montages. It also boasts some rad (see what I did there?) locations. After finally watching it for the first time last month, I became a bit obsessed with tracking down the large colonial-style house where Louise lived and was floored to discover the address on the the 80s Film Locations website.

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Louise’s picturesque house was used extensively throughout Teen Witch.

As you can see below, though the shutters and front door have since been painted a different color and a fence has been added to the perimeter, the residence still looks very much the same today as it did in when the movie was filmed 26 years ago.

In real life, the 1921 pad boasts 3,821 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, and a 0.23-acre plot of land. You can check out some interior photographs of the place from a 2011 real estate listing here. According to the description that runs along with the images, the home has appeared in several movies, though I am unsure of which movies in particular.

I was floored to discover upon looking at the real estate photographs that the interior of the property had been used in Teen Witch. As you can see in the screen capture as compared to the MLS image below, though the kitchen has since been updated, it is still laid out in the exact same way that it was in the movie.

Another view of the kitchen.

And another.

The ornate stone fireplace in Louise’s living room also matches the home’s real life fireplace.

The built-in bookcases visible in the background of the screen capture below match the family room’s actual built-ins.

And the stairs, though now lacking paint, also match what appeared onscreen.

Popular girl Randa (Lisa Fuller) lived directly across the street from Louise in the movie, though very little of her house was ever shown.

I absolutely love that the “244” address number painted on the steps leading up to Randa’s house is still in the same spot today!

Interesting tidbit about Lisa Fuller – she wound up marrying Dan Gauthier, who played her onscreen boyfriend, Brad Powell, in Teen Witch. They met during the filming of the movie, tied the knot shortly thereafter and remain married to this day. Robyn Lively talks about the couple in an interview she did with BuzzFeed Entertainment in honor of the film’s 25th anniversary last year.

Don’t forget to tune into The Daily Share on HLN today between 10 and 10:30 a.m. PST to watch the segment I recently taped about Beverly Hills, 90210 filming locations. For those who don’t get HLN, you can also watch it here.

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

Big THANK YOU to the 80s Film Locations website for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Louise’s house from Teen Witch is located at 245 South Irving Boulevard in Windsor Square. Randa’s house is located across the street at 244 South Irving Boulevard.

January 22, 2015January 19, 2015

New “L.A.” Mag Post – About the Los Altos Apartments

Be sure to check out my new Los Angeles magazine post here – about the Los Altos Apartments from Transparent. My articles typically get published in the late morning/early afternoon hours.

December 7, 2011December 11, 2011

Judge Crawford’s House from “Fracture”

After tracking down the hilltop abode Willy Beachum (aka cutie Ryan Gosling) called home in fave movie Fracture, which I blogged about last Tuesday, I became just a wee bit obsessed with finding the large brick mansion where Judge Gardner (aka Bob Gunton) lived in the flick. Even though the dwelling showed up only briefly in the movie, because it was pretty much the only location I had yet to track down, I was absolutely itching to find it. The fabulously extensive Fracture production notes stated that some filming had taken place “at a private residence in Hancock Park” and I assumed that the private residence that was referred to had to be Judge Crawford’s. So I started searching aerial views of the area and after about 45 minutes stumbled upon the right property. YAY! And while out and about running some errands in Santa Monica yesterday, I took a little detour through Hancock Park so that I could stalk the place.

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In Fracture, Willy’s love interest, Nikki Gardner (aka Rosamund Pike), invites him to her parent’s home on Thanksgiving to eat dinner with her family.

Later on in the flick, Willie returns to the house to ask Nikki’s father, who is a judge, to sign a court order prohibiting Ted Crawford (aka Anthony Hopkins) from pulling the plug on his comatose wife, Jennifer Crawford (aka Embeth Davidtz).

In real life, the Georgian-Revival-style mansion, which was originally built in 1914, boasts 6 bedrooms, 5 baths, 6,175 square feet of living space, and almost half an acre of land. The house was designed by Meyer & Holler, the noted Los-Angeles-based architecture firm that was responsible for the Alex Theatre in Glendale, Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, Culver Studios in Culver City, and the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood. Thanks to the fabulous The Houses of Hancock Park and JCB blogs, I discovered that the property is currently owned by famed Los Angeles interior designer Suzanne Rheinstein and her husband, Fred. The Rheinsteins purchased the dwelling over thirty years ago and immediately began an extensive redesign of the interior, a lengthy process that was reported on by several home magazines. The residence is nothing short of GORGEOUS in person and is, ironically enough, exactly the type of spot that my mom and I refer to as a “Thanksgiving House” – an idyllic and picturesque dwelling that makes one think of coming home for the holidays. I mean, the place could not look any more like it came out of a Folgers Coffee Christmas commercial if it tried! Winking smile

The interior of the abode, which is BEAUTIFUL, was featured prominently in Suzanne’s 2010 book At Home: A Style for Today with Things from the Past. (The pictures featured above remain the sole and private property of Suzanne Rheinstein and photographer Pieter Estersohn.)

As you can see above, the photographs featured in Suzanne’s book match up to what appeared onscreen, which means that the real life interior of the home, along with some of the furniture, was also used in the filming.

On a side-note that falls into the obscenely-cool category – yesterday I dropped by my very favorite store, Lula Mae in Old Town Pasadena, and just about died when Marci, the adorable owner who has come to be my good friend, informed me that she had just named me the shop’s very first “Customer of the Month”. Um, LOVE IT! For those who have never been there, LA Weekly recently awarded Lula “Best One-Stop Gift Shopping 2011” and in their write-up said, “You know that friend of yours who always upstages the $10 bottle of wine you pull out of your purse when she shows up at parties with the most adorable, clever little trinket wrapped perfectly in a colorful vintage bag? Well that smug b*tch probably has been shopping at Lula Mae for years now.” LOL Couldn’t have said it better myself! The store is so insanely cute, colorful, and fun that I find myself dropping in at least five times a week. It has become an addiction! Lula Mae is the first place I head whenever I am depressed, have writer’s block, or just need a good giggle! So to be named their Customer of the Month was just about the best honor I could have received! Thank you, Marci, Julia, Alison, and Lula Mae! <3

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Judge Crawford’s house from Fracture is located at 435 South Windsor Boulevard in the Windsor Square section of Hancock Park. Lula Mae is located at 100 North Fair Oaks Avenue in Old Town Pasadena.