Du-par’s Restaurant and Bakery from “Christmas with the Kranks”

I don’t know what it is about Christmas movies, but I cannot watch them without crying.  Even the not-so-great ones make me bawl.  Case in point – the 2004 comedy Christmas with the Kranks.  While admittedly not one of the best Yuletide films, the Grim Cheaper and I watch it each year and I cry every.single.time.  After our recent annual watch, I decided to attempt to track down some of the flick’s unknown locales.  The spot at the top of my list was the Irish pub where Nora Krank (Jamie Lee Curtis) ate with her husband, Luther Krank (Tim Allen).  Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be a place I have dined at many times!

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In Christmas with the Kranks, upon facing the prospect of spending the holidays without their daughter who has just joined the Peace Corps, Luther convinces Nora to skip Christmas.  Their friends and neighbors don’t take the decision lightly.  While dining at an Irish pub towards the beginning of the movie, Nora complains to Luther that she is the one having to deal with the fallout.  As she explains, “It’s us women who handle Christmas, not men.  I am the one taking the brunt for your harebrained scheme!  I am the one on the front lines!”

Besides the fact that the pub looked incredibly cozy in the scene, there’s pretty much nothing I love more than dining at movie restaurants, so it was a no-brainer that I wanted to track this spot down.  Unfortunately, I had a little trouble doing so due to the fact that not much of the eatery was shown onscreen and no notable clues were visible in the background.

The more I re-watched the scene, though, the more I had a sense that the restaurant was familiar to me – that I had been there before.  Then, all of a sudden, the green-hued bar-top visible behind Nora jumped out at me and I immediately knew where filming had taken place – the Hamburger Hamlet located at 214 South Lake Avenue in Pasadena.

I have dined at the Hamlet countless times over the years.  In fact, ironically enough, when I lived in Pasadena the eatery was a regular pit stop during the holidays.  Every December, my mom and I would inevitably pop in for a bite to eat while out Christmas shopping in the area.  Even more ironic, we would invariably sit in the bar, the exact area where Christmas with the Kranks was filmed!

Why I had such a tough time identifying the place is beyond me, but I am guessing it is because Hamburger Hamlet is not actually an Irish pub as was depicted in the movie and therefore is not decorated as such, it is not nearly as dark as it was portrayed to be onscreen, and only a tight shot of it was ever shown.  I really should have recognized the restaurant’s unique back room, though, which is visible behind Luther in the screen capture below.

Hamburger Hamlet’s rear room, which is strewn with spacious red leather arm chairs, is situated around a large central brick fire pit, made complete with a metal hood affixed to the ceiling.  As I said, it’s unique.  Being that the chains that anchor the hood to the ceiling were visible in the background of Christmas with the Kranks, this one really should have been an easy find.

Now you’re probably saying, “Wait a minute, the title of this post is ‘Du-par’s Restaurant and Bakery’ not ‘Hamburger Hamlet!’”  Sadly, the Pasadena Hamlet, which was originally established in 1967, shut its doors after almost fifty years in business on January 3rd, 2014.  A Du-par’s outpost was opened at the site the following morning.

I had yet to visit the location since Du-par’s took over and assumed that all of the décor had been changed.  I was thrilled to see, via the hundreds of photographs on Yelp, that that was not the case!  The eatery still looks exactly as it did during its Hamburger Hamlet days, i.e. wood paneling and red leather galore!

The GC and I headed over there to grab a bite a few days later and I am happy to report that the restaurant looks just as great in person as it did in the Yelp images.  And the food is darn good, too, though that did not come as a surprise being that I’ve always been a big fan of Du-par’s fare.  Any eatery that serves a hot turkey meal with all the fixings on a daily basis is A-ok in my book!

As I mentioned earlier, in Christmas with the Kranks, Nora and Luther sat in the restaurant’s bar area, pretty much in the exact spot where the pub table is situated in the images below.

I would like to wish a VERY happy birthday to my dad (and my uncle – his twin) – today!  Thank you for all the light and laughter you bring us on a daily basis (as evidenced by the photo below – I remember exactly what you said to me in that moment and still crack up whenever I think about it!), despite all your suffering!  I love you!

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Until next time, Happy Stalking! 

Stalk It: Du-par’s Restaurant and Bakery, aka the former Hamburger Hamlet, aka the Irish pub from Christmas with the Kranks, is located at 214 South Lake Avenue in Pasadena.