Jack’s House from “Wicked City”

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Some locations are so arresting they almost become a character in a production.  Such was the case with the spectacular mid-century modern pad where LAPD detective Jack Roth (Jeremy Sisto) lived with his wife, Allison (Jaime Ray Newman), and daughter, Vicki (Anne Winters), on the 2015 ABC series Wicked City.  Though its exterior was only featured once on the short-lived show, the interior seriously made an impression!  I found myself looking forward to its appearance week after week, even more so than I did any of the actors.  So I was thoroughly bummed to discover said interior was just a set that only ever existed on a soundstage and was dismantled after filming wrapped.  Regardless, I figured the residence used in the lone exterior shot of Jack’s home was still worthy of a stalk.  Thankfully, I didn’t have to look far for it.

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The sole exterior shot of the house popped up in Wicked City’s seventh episode, “Destroyer,” in the scene in which Jack moves out after disclosing to Allison that he has been having an affair.  Its mid-century architecture and large, flat front yard led me to believe the property was likely located deep in the San Fernando Valley.  After initially searching Granada Hills, I remembered coming across a smattering of unique MCM homes near Shoup Park in Woodland Hills years prior while stalking the neighboring residences where Ryden Malby (Alexis Bledel) and David Santiago (Rodrigo Santoro) lived in the 2009 romcom Post Grad.  So I headed over to the area via Google Maps and, wouldn’t you know it, right next door to Ryden’s house at 22210 Tiara Street was Jack’s pad!

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It truly is a shame the exterior wasn’t featured more prominently on Wicked City because it.is.fabulous.

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The mid-century stunner was designed by architect Charles DuBois in 1960.

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In real life, it boasts 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, 2,084 square feet, a double fireplace, a vaulted ceiling, a 0.37-acre lot, a large pool, a spa, and a fire pit.

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It also features incredible mid-century detailing including a low gabled roofline;

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a tiered front walkway;

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large bright double doors;

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and a stone and wood façade.

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The property last sold in 2009 and, per the MLS images featured on Realtor.com, looked extremely different at the time.  Kudos to the new owners and their superb exterior renovation!

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Sadly, the MLS photos did not include any inside shots aside from the rather murky one below.

22210 Tiara St, Woodland Hills, CA 91367

The interior as it was imagined by production designer Craig Stearns for Wicked City, though, was spectacular!  I fell in love with the clean lines, beamed ceiling, and 1960s feel.  That screened entry, amirite?  You can check out some more images of it here.

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Interestingly, the ceiling of the set, which slopes toward the front and back of the house, doesn’t match the roofline of the Tiara Street residence, which peaks above the front door and slopes to the sides.  The discrepancy, coupled with the fact that an exterior is not shown until the series’ seventh episode, leads me to believe that Wicked City producers never intended to feature the outside of Jack’s home.  Then when a scene unexpectedly came up requiring an exterior shot, location scouts had to scramble to find a dwelling that matched the set, eventually settling on 22210 Tiara Street even though it didn’t entirely line up with Stearns’ design.  That is just a hunch, though.

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While the pad’s exterior didn’t get much love on Wicked City, it did pop up fairly regularly as the residence of Sabrina (Shannon Woodward) and Jimmy Chance (Lucas Neff) on the Fox sitcom Raising Hope.

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The interior of Sabrina and Jimmy’s place was also just a set, but a gorgeous one at that!

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Jack Roth’s house from Wicked City is located at 22210 Tiara Street in Woodland Hills.

The “Wicked City” Library

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I have one more Wicked City location up my sleeve (for the time being, at least – I did track down a couple of others after watching the recently-released final five episodes, but have yet to stalk them) – the former Second Church of Christ, Scientist in West Adams, which masked as an L.A. library in “Should I Stay or Should I Go.”  I have long been familiar with the stately, domed structure thanks to my many area stalkings (Fatty Arbuckle’s former house is located on the same street, as is the oft-filmed St. Vincent de Paul Church) and recognized it immediately upon viewing the episode.  I had never done a proper stalking of it, though, and promptly dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over there to remedy that a couple of weeks ago.

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Second Church of Christ, Scientist was designed by architect Alfred H. Rosenheim, who also designed the American Horror Story house.  The prolific Albert C. Martin, Sr. (of Million Dollar Theatre, Los Angeles City Hall and Thomas Higgins Building fame) acted as the engineer.  The massive Italian Renaissance-style structure, which was modeled after the First Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, aka the “Mother Church,” took more than two years to complete at a cost of $318,000.  Its doors were opened to the public on January 23rd, 1910.

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The property, which was built out of terracotta, brick, stucco and granite, was so grand that, according to the Big Orange Landmarks website, a 1908 Los Angeles Times article deemed it “the largest and most elaborate church west of Chicago.”

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At the time of its completion, the interior featured a pipe organ, mahogany woodwork, stained glass windows, wainscoting throughout, and seating for 1,200 churchgoers.

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The site’s most impressive feature, though, was – and still is – its 130-foot tall copper-clad, poured-concrete dome, which according to Big Orange Landmarks, measures 70 feet in diameter and weighs 1,400 tons.

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The green-tinted dome seems to sparkle in the sunlight and only adds to the grandeur and beauty of the already picturesque church, which was named a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument in 1968.

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Due to declining membership and the high cost of maintaining the property, Christian Science Church vacated the building in 2008.  The empty structure proved attractive to vandals, who spray painted the once stately structure with graffiti and broke many of its stained glass windows.

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In December 2009, the site was sold to The Art of Living Foundation, a non-profit organization that teaches meditation, yoga, breathing, and emotional balance.  The group lovingly repaired the damage done to the property and today use it as their main headquarters.

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The former Second Church of Christ, Scientist played a significant role in Wicked City’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go.”

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Masking as a local library, it is there that Kent Grainger (Ed Westwick) leaves the head of one of his murder victims among the stacks of books for detectives Jack Roth (Jeremy Sisto) and Paco Contreras (Gabriel Luna) to find.

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I initially thought that the actual inside of the former church had also been used in the filming of the library scenes, but as soon as I looked through these interior photographs of the place I realized that was not the case.

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As it turns out, interior filming took place at DC Stages, a downtown Los Angeles studio that has been around since 1988.  The facility, which was originally called Dos Carlos Stages, is situated inside of a a former perishable food storage center and boasts several standing sets including that of a police station, a city hall, a courthouse, political offices, a hospital, a jail, apartments, hotel rooms, a restaurant, and, of course, a library.  You can check out a drone video shot of the various sets here and some some photographs here.  What I wouldn’t give to see the inside of that place in person!

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Many sources state that the Second Church of Christ, Scientist was used regularly as the Fulton County Courthouse on the television series Matlock, but I have not been able to verify that.  I downloaded a couple of episodes to scan through and in each of them a different building masked as the courthouse, neither of which was the Second Church of Christ, Scientist, as you can see below.  The series aired for nine seasons, though, so it is quite possible the West Adams church did make an appearance (or several appearances) at some point during that run.

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The locale also pops up as the Radiant Assembly of God church on the HBO series Perry Mason.

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Only the exterior of the building is utilized on the series.  Interior church scenes were shot at the Trinity Auditorium, located at 851 South Grand Avenue in downtown Los Angeles.

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Second Church of Christ, Scientist, aka the Wicked City library, is located at 948 West Adams Boulevard in University ParkDC Stages, which was used for the interior library scenes, is located at 1360 East 6th Street in downtown L.A.  Be advised that the studio facility is not open to the public.