September 2010 – Page 2 – IAMNOTASTALKER

September 16, 2010September 15, 2010

The “E.T.” House

Although I consider myself somewhat of a master stalker (not as good as fellow stalkers Owen, Mike, from MovieshotsLA, or Chas, from ItsFilmedThere, of course), for whatever reason, up until this past weekend I had yet to visit one of the most famous movie locations of them all – the home where Mary (aka Dee Wallace), Elliot (aka Henry Thomas), Michael (aka Robert MacNaughton), and Gertie (aka Drew Barrymore) lived in the 1982 classic film E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial. I am not sure how, or even why, I avoided the location for as long as I did, but my best guess is that it is due to the fact that it is located in Tujunga, which is kind of out in the middle of nowhere, far from the areas I usually drag my husband out to stalk. In fact, up until this past Saturday afternoon, I had never actually set foot in the Crescenta Valley suburb, which is situated just north of Glendale and just east of Sunland. But, this weekend, while on our way home from doing some stalking in the Valley, a light bulb went off in my head and I asked my fiancé to take a little detour on the 210 Freeway so that I could finally, finally stalk the E.T. house.

It is absolutely amazing to me how iconic the E.T. home still is – almost thirty years after the movie was filmed! As the Grim Cheaper and I drove up the hill where the residence is located and the property came into view, we both immediately recognized not only the actual house, but the cul-de-sac and neighboring residences which surround it. Being that I haven’t seen E.T. in almost three decades (I only watched it once, when it first came out, and I became so hysterical when E.T. left Elliot that my parents had to drag me out of the auditorium kicking and screaming and I’ve never been able to re-watch it since), I find that to be absolutely amazing! The long, sloped driveway, the cul-de-sac, the mountains in the background – for better or for worse, those images of the house are indelibly engraved in my memories.

[ad]

Thankfully, the residence still looks extremely similar today to how it appeared back in 1982 when E.T. was filmed. The only real difference I noticed was the fact that the property is now dotted with large trees and shrubs, which wasn’t the case thirty years ago. At the time of the filming, the house was newly-built and therefore had very little foliage surrounding it. I cannot tell you how awesome it was for me to stalk a place I haven’t laid eyes on since 1982 and have it still look almost exactly the same now as it did then. Love it!

According to director McG’s DVD commentary, the house was also used in another Drew Barrymore flick – 2000’s Charlie’s Angels, as the residence where the character of Dylan Sanders falls after being shot by Eric Knox (aka Sam Rockwell). I find it incredibly cool that McG decided to shoot a scene at this location! Such a nice nod to the home’s iconic cinematic history.

The sliding glass door that Dylan knocks on in Charlie’s Angels can also be seen in several scenes in E.T.

For those who haven’t seen the above YouTube video, which chronicles most of E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial’s filming locations, you really need to check it out! The video, which was put together by fellow stalker/filmmaker Herve Attia, artfully morphs clips of the movie with footage of how the locations look today. It is simply amazing to watch!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The E.T. house is located at 7121 Lonzo Street in Tujunga.

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! 🙂

[ad]

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.

[ad]

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.

ScreenShot5422

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 13, 2010September 12, 2010

The “10 Things I Hate About You” House

As I was going through my stalking archives today, I realized that there are countless Seattle-area locations that I stalked during my recent trip up to the Pacific Northwest that I still have yet to blog about. I figure it’s better to be late than never, though, right? One of the locations was the house where the Stratford family – sisters Kat (aka Julia Stiles) and Bianca (aka Larisa Oleynik) and their father, Walter (aka Larry Miller) – lived in the movie 10 Things I Hate About You. I found this location, as usual, thanks to fellow stalker Owen who somehow managed to track down a whole slew of locales from the 1999 romantic comedy, which was billed as a modern adaptation of the William Shakespeare classic Taming of the Shrew. Ironically enough, I didn’t remember liking the movie all that much when I first saw it in theatres a little over a decade ago, but after Owen emailed me the list of the flick’s many filming locales, I decided to give it a re-watch and ended up really enjoying it. And my favorite part about it was, of course, the Stratford’s beautiful Victorian-style home.

The 10 Things I Hate About You house is actually even more gorgeous in person than it appeared in the movie, if that is at all possible. Part of what makes the residence so magnificent is its setting. The home is situated high up on a large, corner lot of a grassy, little knoll overlooking the clear blue waters of Puget Sound.

We were lucky enough to visit the residence during the one very brief moment of sunshine we experienced while in Seattle and the blue skies coupled with the blue of the water made for a striking view. In fact, the setting was so incredibly picturesque it didn’t seem real. I definitely felt as if I was standing right in the middle of a movie set. So, it is not at all hard to see why filmmakers chose the property to be featured in the flick. Ironically enough, though, 10 Things wasn’t the first time Hollywood location scouts came a’knockin’ on the home’s front door. According to an article which appeared in the May 31, 1998 edition of Seattle-Tacoma’s local News Tribune newspaper (which I can’t link to because there is a fee to access it), William and Joan McGovern, the owners of the 10 Things house, were approached by location scouts in 1991 about their residence being used as the main home in The Hand That Rocks The Cradle. The McGoverns ultimately turned down the proposal after finding out that filmmakers wanted to cut holes in several interior walls, paint over some of their interior woodwork, and move out all of their furniture and other personal effects. But when 10 Things producers scouted the house seven years later, in May of 1998, they told the McGoverns that they wanted to use the premises exactly as-is. The couple agreed and filming began a few weeks later on June 9, 1998. The shoot lasted a mere eight days before moving on to nearby Stadium High School, which I also stalked and will be blogging about in the coming weeks.

[ad]

The 10 Things house, which was originally built in 1906 and boasts 5 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and 4,330 square feet of living space, was used quite extensively in 10 Things I Hate About You. The exterior appeared numerous times;

as did the property’s real life interior along with the homeowners’ actual furniture.

The back balcony . . .

. . . and the front porch area were also used in the flick.

The house is absolutely beautiful in person and I honestly can’t recommend stalking it enough. Even if you weren’t a fan of the movie, the residence is worth a drive-by.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Owen for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The 10 Things I Hate About You house is located at 2715 North Junett Street, at the corner of 28th Street, in Tacoma, Washington.

September 10, 2010September 9, 2010

Pueblo Bonito Pacifica Holistic Resort & Spa

During our recent Cabo San Lucas honeymoon, the Grim Cheaper and I stayed at the Pueblo Bonito Pacifica Holistic Resort & Spa. And while I knew from looking at the property’s website that it was a beautiful place, at the time I made our reservation I had absolutely NO idea that it was also a celebrity destination AND a filming location! They say that you attract those things to you that you think about the most, and in this case, that was most definitely true! But more on that later.

Before arriving in Cabo, I was a little apprehensive that it might be a somewhat dangerous place. As it turns out, though, I don’t think I’ve ever felt more safe. The city is beautiful, the people are some of the friendliest I’ve ever encountered, and the Cabo way of life is extremely laidback. And while people generally refer to the entire area as being called Cabo San Lucas, it is actually known as Los Cabos and is made up of three different sections which span the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula. The sections include San Jose Del Cabo, The Corridor, and Cabo San Lucas. Long before I had planned our honeymoon, I had heard Jennifer Aniston and Jennifer Love Hewitt describe Cabo as a “sleepy, little fishing town”. As it turns out, though, Jen and Love were not speaking about Cabo San Lucas proper, which is a major party city, but rather about San Jose Del Cabo, which is located about fifteen miles north. Most celebrities choose to stay in one of the many five-star resorts located along The Corridor, the most popular of which are the Esperanza, the One&Only Palmilla, and Las Ventanas Al Paraiso. Because The Corridor hotels are exorbitantly expensive, though, the Grim Cheaper and I chose instead to stay at a resort in Cabo San Lucas, but thankfully it was far removed from the whole party scene.

The 154-room Pueblo Bonito Pacifica Holistic Resort & Spa first opened in 2005 and is located inside of a gated community about five miles north of town. Thanks to the hotel’s strict adults-only policy and its remote location, it is an EXTREMELY quiet destination and has been billed as one of Cabo’s most romantic locales. And let me tell you, the GC and I absolutely LOVED the place. The resort is so quiet that we often looked around and asked ourselves if we were the only two people staying there. It was without a doubt the most relaxing, quiet vacation I have ever been on. In fact, outside of wanting to do a little stalking, neither of us found any reason whatsoever to leave the resort during our entire nine day stay. It was the perfect place to spend our honeymoon and, because it is so reasonably priced, we are already making plans for a return visit. 🙂

Upon first arriving at the resort, the Grim Cheaper and I were greeted with cool, wet towels infused with lavender oil with which to wash our hands.

The lobby, which overlooks the ocean, was also infused with a lavender scent, which made the experience of entering the hotel seem like walking into a spa. Love it!

The Pacifica features two pools, both of which overlook the ocean . . .

. . . and one of which features a swim-up bar.

The property is situated on a beautiful, private beach . . .

. . . where outdoor beds can be rented during the day and for overnight stays. The beds can also be rented for an ultra-romantic dinner under the stars, which we unfortunately didn’t find out about until the very last night we were there. Ugh! I so would have loved to have done that!

Our room was absolutely beautiful . . .

. . . and featured a private balcony . . .

. . . with a stunning view of the ocean and pool area.

And at night the view only got more spectacular. Sigh! Oh, how I wish I was still there!

The Pacifica features four different restaurants and bars, all of which serve up SEPCTACULAR food – especially the nachos, which were some of the best I’ve ever had in my entire life. In fact, I’d book a stay at the hotel just for those nachos – that’s how good they were. Best of all, the Pacifica also offers 24-hour room service, which the Grim Cheaper and I partook of virtually every single night.

Because the resort is so remote and so private, numerous celebrities have checked in there over the years, including John Travolta and Kelly Preston, Lindsay Lohan, Cindy Crawford, Dolph Lundgren, and a bunch of sports stars, including a few Olympic gold medal winners, whose names I didn’t recognize. And, let me tell you, I just about died when I found out that my girl Jen had once visited the hotel’s spa! My Spanish isn’t all that great, so when I was speaking to the woman at the spa, I originally thought she said that Jen had stayed at the hotel on one occasion, but after talking with the concierge it turns out that Jen was only on the premises for a spa appointment. It was still very exciting for me, nonetheless.

[ad]

Even more exciting, though, was when one of the Pacifica’s bartenders informed me that all three fantasy dates from Brad Womack’s season of The Bachelor had been filmed at the resort. In the fantasy date episode, which aired on November 5, 2007, Brad flew his top three Bachelorettes – DeAnna Pappas, Jenni Croft, and Bettina Bell – down to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. And not only were all three overnight stays filmed at the resort, but according to this press release, the entire cast and crew also stayed on the premises. ABC.com even sponsored a Bachelor contest, where viewers at home could win their own 4-day, 3-night fantasy vacation at the Pacifica. Sadly, Season 11 of The Bachelor does not seem to be available for purchase anywhere and because I didn’t watch the show that year, I am not sure which parts of the resort were featured in the fantasy date episode. I was able to find the above clip of DeAnna Pappas’ date on YouTube, in which one of the resort’s timeshare villas, named the Montecristo Estates, is briefly shown.

As you can see in the above pictures, which I got off of the Montecristo Estates Website, the entrance, bedroom, and private pool terrace are exact matches to the fantasy suite where DeAnna and Brad spent the night.

Supposedly, the hotel’s main restaurant, Siempre, also appeared on The Bachelor.

I honestly can’t recommend stalking the Pueblo Bonito Pacifica Holistic Resort & Spa enough! My honeymoon was truly one of the best vacations of my life!

On a side note – For those who are planning a trip to the Cabo area, rest assured – the city does have a Starbucks. 🙂

And it looks pretty much like any other Starbucks one might find in America . . .

. . . except that the menu is, of course, in Spanish. So darn cool!

When I asked the baristas to pose for the above photograph, they wrongly assumed that I had never before been to a Starbucks, which prompted them to ask, “Don’t you have a Starbucks where you come from?” LOL LOL LOL Oh, if they only knew!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Pueblo Bonito Pacifica Holistic Resort & Spa is located at Cabo Pacifica S/N, 23450 Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. You can visit the hotel’s official website here. The resort is located inside of a gated community and I believe you have to have a dining reservation at one of the Pacifica’s restaurants or at one of the restaurants located inside of its sister hotel, Pueblo Bonito Sunset Beach Resort & Spa, to be admitted entrance.

September 9, 2010June 16, 2011

The Rocks from Jennifer Aniston’s Perfume Ad

This past April, the ad campaign for my girl Jen’s newly-released fragrance, which is named “Jennifer Aniston”, was revealed. The ads showed the actress, wrapped solely in a towel, sitting on a very rocky beach somewhere in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Well, let me tell you, once I saw those photographs, I became extremely hell-bent on finding the exact spot where they had been taken, especially since around that very same time my fiancé and I had just not-so-coincidentally finalized our Cabo San Lucas honeymoon plans. I say “not-so-coincidentally” because the only reason we even looked at honeymooning in Cabo in the first place was because of how often Jen vacations there. My now-husband originally wanted to spend the honeymoon in Hawaii, but I am EXTREMELY afraid to fly and suffer from terrible anxiety days, and sometimes weeks, before venturing on a long flight. I really didn’t want to be nervous or stressed about flying the day of my wedding, so I suggested we travel instead to a place a little closer to home. I started looking at Cabo, mostly because it is Jen’s favorite getaway spot, and when I discovered that it was a short one-hour-and-fifty minute plane ride from LAX I was sold! And then when the Grim Cheaper found out that we could book round-trip airfare to the Mexican city for a scant $150 each, it was pretty much “Cabo, here we come!” So, a few weeks later when fellow stalker Owen sent me Jen’s new perfume ad, I just about fell over. I mean, could it have been any more perfect? Here I was about to head to the very city where the photographs had just been taken! Yay!

I half-jokingly asked Owen if he could track down the rocks for me prior to our trip, and even though I figured it would pretty much be like trying to find a needle in a haystack, about an hour later there was an email from him in my inbox along with a six-page attachment. The email stated, “It’s pretty much impossible to find a couple of rocks without being there in Cabo, but I think I’ve got a good idea where you should look.” Amazingly enough, even though Owen was not familiar with the area, he had figured out that the rock formation which can be seen in the distance behind Jen was the famous Land’s End (pictured above), which is located at the very southern tip of the Baja peninsula. He also figured out that Jen’s head was blocking the three mountainous formations which can be seen at the far left of the above image. Sure enough, when I looked at the above photograph compared with Jen’s advertisement, the two backgrounds matched perfectly. From there, Owen scanned through aerial views of Cabo San Lucas to determine the exact location where Jen was sitting in the photograph. His best guess was that the rocks were located somewhere on the far east end of Medano Beach, between Riu Palace and Missiones Del Cabo. The six-page attachment he had included with his email provided detailed photographs, maps, and aerial views of the Cabo area, and, let me tell you, I printed that thing out and carried it with me EVERYWHERE I went in Mexico so that I could ask anyone and everyone who would talk to me where those rocks were located.

One of the very first people I asked was our airport shuttle driver, whom we met immediately upon landing at Los Cabos International Airport. The driver took one look at Jen’s picture and told us that it had been taken at the beach at Esperanza Resort, which I blogged about on Friday. Turns out our shuttle driver used to be a paparazzi and not only recognized the beach from the many times he had gone there to photograph celebrities, but also informed us that Jen had stayed at the hotel countless times over the years, so it was a place she would have been familiar with. He also pointed out that the structure visible in the background of the right-hand side of the picture (denoted with a blue arrow above) was the Sunset Da Mona Lisa Restaurant – a very popular Cabo San Lucas dining spot. Even though the shuttle driver seemed to really know what he was talking about, I continued showing Jen’s picture to everyone I encountered on the trip to see if they might know for sure where it had been taken. And it was mind-boggling how many different answers I received! One bartender I spoke with even went so far as to hypothesize that the photograph had been taken at Chileno Beach and that the Land’s End rock formation had been digitally added to the background of the picture while it was being edited – which I guess is possible, but not very likely. The answer we heard most often, though, was that the picture had been taken at the Esperanza Resort beach – which is pretty much the exact spot where Owen had originally told me to look. So, one day the Grim Cheaper and I rented a car and headed north to try to find Jen’s rocks.

And, let me tell you, it was quite the stalk! Definitely different than any of the other stalks I’ve experienced in my lifetime. Esperanza’s beach is extremely rocky, and when I say rocky, I mean ROCKY. The GC and I had to traipse over three, four, and five-foot tall boulders while making our way north. It was more of a mountain climb than anything else, actually. Oh, and did I mention that it was about 110 degrees at the time? I can only imagine what the people who saw us during our hike were thinking. Probably something along the lines of “Stupid-*ss gringos!” 😉 The GC and I walked about a kilometer north of the resort, which took us around ninety minutes, and examined every square inch of the beach. Finding Jen’s exact rocks proved to be rather difficult, though, as we had arrived at the Esperanza in the late afternoon during high-tide and I am almost certain that Jen was photographed in the early morning hours when the tide was much, much lower. Adding to the difficulty was the fact that Jen’s photograph had been taken with a wide-angle lens, which distorted the background of the image.

What we finally determined, without being able to find the actual rocks, was that Jen was photographed about five hundred feet north of Esperanza Resort. As you can see in the above photograph as compared with Jen’s advertisement, while it’s not the exact spot where Jen sat, I think we got pretty darn close. I am fairly certain that Jen’s photo was taken on the same rock formation where I am sitting in the above picture, but a bit farther out towards the sea. Because the tide was high while we were there, though, we unfortunately couldn’t venture out any farther into the water.

ScreenShot5326

As you can see above, numerous photographs were taken for the Jennifer Aniston Perfume advertising campaign. My favorite, though, was definitely the one featuring Land’s End in the background. But truth be told, she looks amazing in all of them! Can you even imagine being 41 years old and having a body like that? Who am I kidding – can you even imagine being 21 years old and having a body like that??? Sigh! The photographs were all shot by renowned Italian photographer Mario Sorrenti and I honestly think that they are some of the best photos that Jen has ever taken.

[ad]

The perfume, which was originally called Lolavie (which some have reported as being a rough French translation for “laughing at life”), took 18 months to create and the actress made herself a part of every minute detail of the development process. Of the creation, Jen said, “It wasn’t just about showing up for a shoot and putting my name on the bottle. I felt like a little chemist. It’s turned out to be an extension of myself as opposed to slapping my name on something.” The perfume is supposed to smell clean and beachy, but unfortunately, because, it is only available at Harrods Department Store in London (and for whatever reason it cannot be shipped outside of the UK), I have yet to be able to catch a sniff of it. 🙁 But thankfully, my good friend and fellow stalker Kerry has a daughter, Jen, who has a friend who lives in London who is going to purchase a bottle for me and bring it with her to the states when she comes to visit next month. And, let me tell you, I cannot wait to get my hands on it! Of the scent, Jen said, “I am not a big perfume-y fragrance fan. I want people to go ‘What is that? You smell great!’” I have never been a perfume-fragrance fan, either, but if I did wear a scent, that is EXACTLY what I would want people to say about it, so I have a feeling I am going to LOVE Jen’s perfume. 🙂

Jen was recently on fave show Chelsea Lately where she spoke about her perfume, of which Chelsea said, “Oh, that smells EXACTLY like I think you would smell!” LOVE IT! LOVE IT! LOVE IT! And being that I would like nothing more than to smell like Jen, I am pretty sure Jennifer Aniston is going to become my signature scent. 😉 You can watch a clip of Jen’s Chelsea Lately appearance by clicking above.

Big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: I am fairly certain that the rocks from Jennifer Aniston’s perfume advertisements are located about 500 feet north of the Esperanza Resort, which is located at Carretera Transpeninsular KM 7 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. I would recommend parking your car at the Esperanza and using their beach access. From there, walk due north to the rock formation denoted with the pink arrow above. Be forewarned, though, the beach north of the Esperanza is extremely rocky and makes for quite a precarious walk. Be extremely cautious and wear shoes with good tread. I’d also recommend stalking the beach early in the morning, during low tide.

September 8, 2010September 8, 2010

The “Thirteen Days” House

While I mentioned last week that today’s blog would be most likely be about the Cabo San Lucas rocks where Jennifer Aniston posed for her recent Jennifer Aniston Perfume advertisement, I’ve actually decided to postpone that post until a later date and instead write about a location that can be found right here in Los Angeles – the supposed Washington, DC-area home where top presidential aide Kenny O’Donnell (aka Kevin Costner) lived with his family in the 2000 movie Thirteen Days. I found this location thanks to my one of my mom’s co-workers, Teresa, who attended last year’s Alhambra Historic Home tour, which is put on annually by the Alhambra Preservation Group. One of the stops on the tour just so happened to be the residence located at 504 North Almansor Street, and when the tour guide mentioned the property’s cinematic history, Teresa wrote down the address so that my mom could pass it along to me. The place has been on my ever-growing To-Stalk list ever since. So, when Mike, from MovieShotsLA, mentioned that he wanted to do some stalking in the Pasadena-area this past Tuesday, I told him that we first had to head over to Alhambra so that I could finally stalk the Thirteen Days house.

The Thirteen Days house was originally built in 1924 and boasts 5 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, and 3,383 square feet of living space. Because of its distinct “All-American” feel, it’s not very hard to see why producers chose to use it as the Washington D.C.-area residence of one of John F. Kennedy’s top-ranking aides.

Even though Thirteen Days was set in 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, not much of the residence was changed for the filming. In fact, it looks pretty much exactly the same in person as it did in the flick. Love it! 🙂

And, as you can see in the above photographs, which I got off of the home’s real estate website, the real life interior of the residence, right down to the window curtains hanging in the kitchen, were also used in the flick. So darn cool!

And, as you can see in the above photograph of the real life bedroom which stood in for the Connelly’s master bedroom in the flick, the owners even have a Thirteen Days poster out on prominent display. Love it!

[ad]

The very same residence also appeared in the 2006 made-for-television movie Though None Go With Me, where it was used as Will Bishop’s (aka David Norona’s) home.

Ironically enough, the Thirteen Days house is located right next door to the residence where Percy Jones (aka Bernie Mac) and his family lived in Guess Who, which just so happens to be the very same residence where the backyard scenes from both Father of the Bride movies were also filmed. So darn cool!

Big THANK YOU to Teresa for finding this location for me!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Thirteen Days house is located at 504 North Almansor Street in Alhambra, directly next door to the Guess Who/Father of the Bride house, which is located at 500 North Almansor.

September 7, 2010September 8, 2010

Moving Day!

Unfortunately, as I mentioned would most likely be the case yesterday, because I helped my parents move all weekend I do not have a new blog to post for today. I was really hoping to return home from my Cabo honeymoon with a few days to relax and regroup after the chaos that is planning a wedding, but, alas, that was not to be. I do apologize, though, and will hopefully be back tomorrow with a whole new post. 🙂

In the meantime, please enjoy the above HILARIOUS clips of Ross, Rachel, and the gang trying to move a couch up a flight of stairs from fave show Friends! PIVOT! PIVOT! PIVOT! If someone had taken a video of me and my family yesterday, it pretty much would have looked exactly like that! Especially the “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” part! 😉

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

September 6, 2010September 7, 2010

Happy Labor Day!

I will be taking today off to celebrate Labor Day with my family. And because I spent this past weekend helping my parents move, I most likely won’t have a new post to publish for tomorrow either. 🙁 But I promise to be back on Wednesday with a whole new blog, so stay tuned! Until that time, I’d like to wish all of my fellow stalkers a very happy Labor Day!

September 3, 2010September 2, 2010

Esperanza Resort

Another celebrity hot spot that my husband and I stalked while honeymooning in Cabo San Lucas last week was the world-famous Esperanza Resort hotel – a place my girl Jen A. has checked into frequently over the years. The 17-acre property, which is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World, is consistently referred to as Cabo’s most luxurious and exclusive resort. The hotel is made up of only 57 rooms – fifty individual casitas and seven over-sized suites – so it truly offers its guests, many of whom are movie stars, the ultimate in privacy – and service. Just a few of the amenities offered at the resort include a private beach, an award-winning spa with steam caves and waterfalls, an infinity pool overlooking the ocean, a yoga and Pilates studio where the classes are free, an art gallery, loaner iPods, and coconut-milk popsicles which are doled out regularly to those guests lying poolside. Needless to say, the hotel, which is part of the exclusive Auberge Resort chain, has won countless awards over the years, including three of Travel + Leisure Magazine’s 2010 “World’s Best Awards” – #1 Resort, #1 Spa, and #1 Service for their Best in Mexico section. It truly is a remarkable and absolutely beautiful place!

I absolutely fell in love with Esperanza’s The Signature Restaurant, which is pictured above. The restaurant is composed of three different levels of terraces, all of which overlook both the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Cortez, and is breathtakingly beautiful. I SO wanted to grab dinner there during our stay in Cabo, but the Grim Cheaper was having none of that. 🙁

Esperanza’s extensive celebrity guest list reads like a Who’s Who of Hollywood. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted there include Fergie and Josh Duhamel (the Esperanza was where the famous 2008 picture of Josh D. painting on the beach was taken), Chelsea Handler, Debra Messing, Courteney Cox and David Arquette, Sheryl Crow, Ashley Simpson and Pete Wentz, Jennie Garth, Usher, Owen Wilson, and Will and Jada Pinkett Smith. In 2003, Elizabeth Berkley married Ralph Lauren’s nephew, Greg, at the Esperanza. That same year Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin honeymooned there, as did Katherine Heigl and Josh Kelley in 2007. And according to this Forbes.com article, the Esperanza gifted a free weekend stay to all of the 2002 Academy Award winners.

And as proof that visiting the hotel almost guarantees one a celeb sighting, while we were there my husband and I spotted LeAnn Rimes and Eddie Cibrian, who were in town to celebrate LeAnn’s 28th birthday. To clarify, I should say that I actually spotted the two stars – the Grim Cheaper was absolutely clueless. He had gone to the restroom immediately upon our arrival at the hotel, while I grabbed a seat in the resort’s outdoor lounge. Shortly after I sat down, who should walk into the bar area but LeAnn Rimes followed by Eddie C. I recognized the two of them immediately and just about had a heart attack I was so excited! When the GC returned from the restroom, he told me that he wanted to head down to the beach right away to search for the rocks where Jennifer Aniston recently posed for the ad for her newly released perfume (the rocks were our sole reason for visiting the Esperanza and I will be blogging about them on Monday) and grab a drink afterwards. I started making faces at him to alert him to the fact that we were in the presence of celebrities, but he remained clueless. I finally grabbed some paper out of my purse and wrote the above-pictured note. GC took one look at the note, glanced over towards LeAnn, and then said, “Oh OK. Well, come on, let’s go down to the beach.” LOL Needless to say he was not at all impressed. We stayed at the bar for a few more minutes while I debated about going up to LeAnn and Eddie to ask for a photograph, but I ultimately decided against it. They were on vacation at an ultra-exclusive and ultra-private resort and I felt that it would be inappropriate to bother them. And I was happy enough just to have seen them in person, anyway. 🙂 When we returned from the beach about an hour and a half later, we again spotted LeAnn and Eddie swimming and eating nachos at the resort’s pool. And I have to say that while I’ve never thought LeAnn was especially attractive in photographs, she is absolutely GORGEOUS in person. I’d even go so far as to say that she was luminous. Needless to say, seeing her was one of the highlights of my honeymoon. 🙂

And, of course, the Esperanza is also a filming location! The hotel stood in for the Cabo San Lucas resort where Eddie (aka Ben Stiller) and Lila (aka Malin Ackerman) honeymooned in the 2007 movie The Heartbreak Kid.

On a side note, one of my former acting teachers, Roy Jenkins (pictured above), played the role of Buzz in The Heartbreak Kid. So darn cool!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Esperanza: An Auberge Resort is located at Carretera Transpeninsular KM 7 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. You can visit the hotel’s official website here.