Janine and Ben’s House(s) from “He’s Just Not That Into You”

You know those crime novels where a main character is trying to solve a case and there is some niggling clue that tugs at them throughout the story – an important piece of evidence that would solve the whole mystery, but which remains elusive until the final pages? That was how I felt while trying to track down the Baltimore row house where Janine (Jennifer Connelly) and Ben (Bradley Cooper) lived in He’s Just Not that Into You. Though the 2009 film was largely panned by critics, it is one of my favorite romcoms of all time and prior to our recent trip to Charm City, I set out to track down its locations, namely Janine and Ben’s handsome brick townhome. Try as I might, though, I could just not locate it. During the tail end of my search, I found myself sitting at my computer staring at a screen capture of the residence for what seemed like hours, aware of the fact that I was missing something, but unsure of exactly what. Then finally, something clicked!

All of a sudden, I noticed that a fire hydrant was visible on the street corner next to Janine and Ben’s pad. I swear, I started to hear angels sing when I realized that said hydrant was painted red, white, and green. That could only mean one thing – the house had to be located in Little Italy! Not being familiar with Baltimore, I wasn’t even sure if the city had a Little Italy neighborhood, but a quick Google search told me that it does. So I started searching the area via Street View and found the place within minutes.

Throughout He’s Just Not That Into You, Janine and Ben’s dwelling is under extensive renovation.

Because of the work being done, it is not until the end of the movie that we actually get a clear view of the property’s exterior. Aside from the front door being changed, the structure looks much the same in person as it did onscreen.

Something I did not notice until making screen captures for this post (despite my many viewings of the movie) is that Janine and Ben actually owned two neighboring townhomes that were being combined into one, hence the scaffolding on the two residences you see below. (And yes, I realize how blonde that makes me sound being that, as stated earlier, I spent a considerable amount of time staring at a screen capture of the house during my search for it. In my defense, though, I was looking at the grab pictured above, which is from the scene in which the remodel has already been completed.)

Because I did not realize that both properties were used in He’s Just Not That Into You, I only shot photographs of the residence that Janine walked into towards the end of the flick.

Per Zillow, that handsome pad, located at 226 South Exeter Street, boasts 1,508 square feet of living space, 2 bathrooms, a 0.02-acre lot, a fireplace, and a 325-square-foot finished basement.

The property, which was built in 1860 (yes, 1860!), last sold in December 2002 for $135,000.

While the exterior of Janine and Ben’s residence is quite stately, it is the interior that I fell in love with. I mean, #housegoals, right? All of the exposed brick, built-in shelving, and woodwork had me drooling.

Sadly, I am fairly certain that it was all a set built on a soundstage in Los Angeles, where the majority of the movie was lensed. Only two weeks of filming took place in Baltimore, which is far too short a time for the interior house sequences to have been shot at the actual residence. Add to that the fact that, from most of the articles I’ve read, it does not seem that Bradley Cooper, who was present in many of the home scenes, traveled to Baltimore for any filming. I believe Kevin Connolly, Scarlett Johansson, Ginnifer Goodwin, and Jennifer Connelly were the only cast members who were in Charm City for the on-location portion of the shoot.

I have to give major props to the production team for their seriously keen eye for detail. In the scene at the end of the movie in which Ben comes home and discovers (spoiler alert!) that Janine is divorcing him, a panoramic photo of the actual houses located across the street from 226 South Exeter was displayed as a backdrop outside of the set windows. As you can see below, the residences visible through the windows of Janine and Ben’s dwelling match perfectly to the properties located across the street in real life! A generic backdrop featuring random homes could just as easily have been used in the scene, so I am extremely impressed that the production team went to such trouble to be authentic.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Janine and Ben’s houses from He’s Just Not That Into You are located at 224 and 226 South Exeter Street in Baltimore’s Little Italy neighborhood.

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