Bess Armstrong – IAMNOTASTALKER

March 14, 2011March 13, 2011

Rickie’s Alley from the “So-Called Angels” Episode of “My So-Called Life”

As I have mentioned quite a few times in recent months, I just finished re-watching fave television series My So-Called Life from the beginning. And I have to say that when I came to the final episode, it was a very bittersweet moment for me as it brought up all of the same sad emotions I experienced back in 1995 when the show was first cancelled. Sigh. The only bright spot in coming to the end of my re-watching of the series was the fact that I could then begin to watch the countless special features on the My So-Called Life: The Complete Series DVDs, including – count ‘em! – seven full-length commentaries of six different episodes. And those commentaries did NOT disappoint. There were two commentaries included on the Christmas-themed “So-Called Angels” episode – one with series creator Winnie Holzman and actor Wilson Cruz and a second with the episode’s director Scott Winant. Thankfully, both Wilson and Scott dished the dirt on a few of the episode’s locations – most notably the alley featured in the opening scene, which I ran right out to stalk early last week.

In the opening scene of “So-Called Angels”, Rickie Vasquez (aka Wilson Cruz) is shown beaten and bloody, struggling to stand near the end of a snow-covered brick alley.

The camera then pans over to Angel (aka special guest star, singer Juliana Hatfield) who is sitting on the sidewalk out in front of the alley. According to Scott Winant, a snow machine had to be brought in for the filming of the scene and, at the time, the weather outside was a whopping eighty degrees despite the fact that the episode was filmed in late October.

Later on in the episode, Patty Chase (aka Bess Armstrong) follows Angel down that exact same alley while looking for her daughter, Angela Chase (aka Claire Danes), who has gone missing.

Wilson Cruz mentioned in his commentary of the episode that the alley was located on Bagley Avenue in Culver City, just down the street from Sony Pictures Studios, so I immediately started searching aerial views of Bagley to see if I could find it. As it turns out, though, Bagley is a residential street made up almost entirely of private homes – until it reaches Venice Boulevard, that is, where it turns into Main Street, a short one-block-long road with commercial businesses located on either side of it. And, sure enough, right in the middle of Main Street was Rickie’s alley! And while the shops located on either side of it (a pizza restaurant named LaRocco’s Pizzeria and a storefront that is currently vacant) have changed slightly over the years, the alley is still very recognizable from the episode. Love it!

I just about died when I saw that the yellow fire hydrant which was visible in the background behind Juliana Hatfield in the opening scene was STILL there almost two full decades later! So incredibly cool!

Scott Winant also mentioned in his commentary that the grocery store where Jordan Catalano (aka Jared Leto) ran into Rickie and offered him a ride was located right through the alley. Sadly though, that grocery store is no longer.

A SUPER nice neighborhood business owner, who gave me all sorts of scoop on filming in the area, informed me that the former Balian Market was converted into a renal dialysis center a few years back.

Thankfully though, the shop-owner also informed me that very little had been done to alter the exterior of the grocery store building since the dialysis center purchased it. Yay! The area which appeared in the “So-Called Angels” episode of My So-Called Life was the former market’s back entrance, the doors of which have since been changed.

But, as you can see in the above photographs and screen captures, everything else matches up perfectly, including the cut-out decor elements of the cement wall located next to the door and the iron beams which hold up the awning.

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The buildings which appear in the background behind Jordan’s car in the scene also look very much the same today as they did when filming took place over seventeen years ago.

The super nice business owner also informed me that Rickie’s alley appeared in episodes of the television series Boomtown and Bones and in the yet-to-released music video for Kim Kardashian’s new single featuring Kayne West.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Rickie’s alley, from the “So-Called Angels” episode of My So-Called Life, can be found directly north of LaRocco’s Pizzeria, which is located at 3819 Main Street in Culver City. The former Balian’s Market, the grocery store where Jordan ran into Rickie, can be found just through the alley at 9432 Venice Boulevard in Culver City. My So-Called Life was filmed in the market’s back entrance area, which is denoted with a pink arrow in the above aerial view. Jordan’s car was parked in the spot that is marked with a pink “X”.

January 5, 2011January 6, 2011

The Chase House from the Pilot Episode of “My So-Called Life”

Ever since fellow stalker Andrew tracked down the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles from the “So-Called Angels” episode of fave show My So-Called Life, I have been itching to re-watch the entire series from beginning to end as I have not seen it in years. So, I immediately went out and purchased the most recently-released boxed set of the show and finally sat down to start watching it last night. While doing so, I became a bit obsessed with locating the house where the Chase family – Graham (aka Tom Irwin), Patty (aka Bess Armstrong), Angela (aka Claire Danes), and Danielle (aka Lisa Wilhoit) – lived, because, as an astute fellow stalker named Somerset pointed out to me a while back, it was not the same property that was used for the other 18 episodes of the show.

Unfortunately though, there was virtually nothing for me to go on for this particular stalk – no house number, no visible street signs, not even a full view of the exterior of the property. But then, all of a sudden, like a lightning bolt from the sky, I spotted a clue – a very important clue. In the scene in which Angela waits for Rickie Vasquez (aka Wilson Cruz) to pick her up to go to Let’s Bolt nightclub, I noticed that the streetlights on Angela’s street were round. And while I had seen those streetlights (pictured above) before, I had only ever seen them in one place – in one very small section of Pasadena. The trees that lined Angela’s street also looked very familiar to me and I had an inkling that they might be the very trees that are located along Pasadena’s oft-filmed Madison Avenue.

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So, I began my search for the Chase home on Madison Avenue and, using Google Street View, found the property almost immediately! YAY! And I ran right out to stalk the place first thing yesterday morning.

And while the full exterior of the house is never actually shown in the pilot episode of My So-Called Life, as you can see in the above screen captures and photographs, the location of the window to the right of the front door and the roof lines of the front porch match up perfectly to what appeared onscreen.

The house across the street matches up perfectly, as well.

As does the house that is located at the end of Angela’s street.

The tree that is visible in the background of the scene in which Brian Krakow (aka Devon Gummersall) and Angela are shown arguing also looks exactly the same today as it did onscreen.

And amazingly enough, the tree that Brian sits in at the end of the episode is actually there in real life and still looks EXACTLY the same today as it did in March of 1993 when the pilot was filmed! SO INCREDIBLY COOL!

When Angela gets dropped off by the police at the end of the episode, instead of going directly home, she and Brian walk north on Madison Avenue to the corner of Madison and Alpine Street, where Angela spots her father talking to a woman who is not her mother. That area also looks much the same today as it did during the filming.

And, according to the DVD commentary by series creator Winnie Holzman, director Scott Winant, and executive producer Marshall Hershkovitz, the interior of the property was also used in the filming of the episode. Oh, what I wouldn’t give to see the inside of that house!

After the Grim Cheaper got off work yesterday evening, I dragged him back out to the house so that he could snap a picture of me reenacting that famous shot of Angela and Brian standing in the middle of the street. Oh, I cannot tell you how long I have wanted to take that picture! I was literally skipping to the car on the way there. Sigh!

On a side note – the creators of My So-Called Life, whose production company is named “The Bedford Falls Company”, threw in quite a few references to their favorite film It’s A Wonderful Life in the pilot episode of the series – including the scene in which Angela changes her clothes behind a bush a la Mary Hatch (aka Donna Reed) and a scene in which Brian wears a shirt with the number “3” on it, a la George Bailey (aka James Stewart). Love it, love it, love it!

It’s A Wonderful Life is also playing in the background of the scene in which Angela apologizes to her mother.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Chase house from the pilot episode of My So-Called Life is located at 1025 South Madison Avenue in Pasadena. The tree Brian sat in at the end of the episode is located in front of the house at 1014 South Madison Avenue. Angela spots her father talking to the mysterious woman at the southeast corner of South Madison Avenue and Alpine Street. And, finally, the famous shot of Angela and Brian standing in the middle of the street was filmed in front of 1014 and 1025 South Madison Avenue with the camera looking north on Madison towards Alpine Street. The Mr. Deeds house is located just three doors down from the MSCL pilot house at 989 South Madison Avenue. The house that was used as the Chase home in the other 18 episodes of the series is located at 1110 Glendon Way in South Pasadena.

December 23, 2010December 23, 2010

The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles from “My So-Called Life”

Fellow stalker/My So-Called Life aficionado Andrew recently went on a mission to try to track down the church that was used in the Season 1 Christmas-themed episode of fave show My So-Called Life titled “So-Called Angels”. He had just picked up the most-recently released boxed set of the series, which came out in 2007, and was floored to discover that actor Wilson Cruz, who played Ricky Vasquez on the show, had recorded a commentary for the “So-Called Angels” episode and had described the location of the church as being on 6th Street close to Downtown Los Angeles. Even with that detailed information, though, this locale proved to be a tough one to track down. Thankfully, Andrew hit a stroke of luck, though, when he noticed that the doors of the church in the episode featured very intricate carvings. He figured those doors had to be unique and, sure enough, they were! Just type the words “carved doors”, “church”, and “Los Angeles” into Google and the very first entry that appears is for the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, located on the corner of South Commonwealth Avenue and West 6th Street, about a mile from Downtown Los Angeles, right where Wilson Cruz had said it would be. Yay! So, once Andrew told me the good news, I immediately dragged my dad right on out to stalk the place – just in time for Christmas, too!

The Gothic revival-style First Congregational Church of Los Angeles was constructed in 1932 by brothers James Edward Allison and David Clark Allison, the same architecture team that designed the Beverly Hills Post Office and UCLA’s Royce Hall. Both the exterior . . .

. . . and the interior of the property are absolutely gorgeous in person. In fact, I think it is safe to say that I have never seen a more beautiful place of worship in my entire life! The church is literally breathtaking – especially decked out in all of its Christmas glory!

The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles’ main sanctuary, which stretches 198 feet in length and reaches 76 feet in height, is home to the world’s largest pipe organ, features carved oak pews, and is dotted with countless stained glass windows which were designed by Judson Studios in Pasadena.

The bronze doors that Andrew noticed in the “So-Called Angels” episode were designed in 1946 by artist Albert Gilles and, unbelievably, they measure three inches thick and weigh in at a whopping one thousand pounds apiece! The doors were so heavy, in fact, that I could hardly open them when we went to leave!

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In the “So-Called Angels” episode of My So-Called Life, the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles was the spot where Angela Chase (aka Claire Danes), along with the rest of the Chase family, and her friends Brian Krakow (aka Devon Gummersall) and Ricky wind up on Christmas Eve night after a heartbreaking course of events during which Ricky gets beaten up by his father and ends up first living on the streets and then in an abandoned warehouse. I had actually forgotten how very heartbreaking the episode was until I re-watched it last week. So incredibly sad!

The area where Patty Chase (aka Bess Armstrong) found Ricky lighting candles is located just to the left of the church’s main altar, although that area looks a bit different today. There are no candles located in that particular alcove (which I was seriously bummed about as I had planned on lighting one), nor is there a visible stained glass window. The red carpet has also since been removed.

The pew where Patty and Ricky sat in the scene is located just to the left of the alcove.

The exterior of the church looks a bit different today than it did during the filming, as well. The large potted plants which flanked the front of the church in the episode are no longer there, but I have a hunch that those trees were actually props brought in specifically for the filming and were never actually there in real life.

The street lamp that was pictured at the very end of the episode is actually there in real life, though, which I thought was just about the coolest thing ever! Smile

My So-Called Life is not the only production to have filmed at First Congregational. The church also stood in for New York’s St. Thomas Episcopal where Wilhelmina Slater (aka Vanessa Williams) almost married Bradford Meade (aka Alan Dale’s) in the Season 2 episode of Ugly Betty titled “A Nice Day for a Posh Wedding”.

First Congregational was also where the funeral for Preston Blake (aka Harve Presnell) was held in the 2002 Adam Sandler comedy Mr. Deeds.

It was also used as the church where Mary Jane Watson (aka Kristen Dunst) almost married John Jameson (aka Daniel Gillies) in Spiderman 2.

And it stood in for New York’s Trinity Church where the climactic final scene of 2004’s National Treasure took place.

Both the opening and one of the closing scenes from 2003’s Daredevil were also filmed at the church.

The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles has also appeared in episodes of Californication, The Riches, The West Wing, Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Shark, The Closer, Bones, The Practice, Cold Case, Joan of Arcadia, Six Feet Under, Jag, and The X-Files and in the movies Nancy Drew and Into the Wild. The church even has a page on its website which chronicles the many productions that have been filmed on the premises over the years (although My So-Called Life is ostensibly missing from the list). So love it!

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Andrew for finding this location! Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, from the “So-Called Angels” episode of My So-Called Life, is located at 540 South Commonwealth Avenue in Los Angeles. You can visit the church’s official website here and you can check out its extensive filming resume here.