Dr. Daniel Pierce’s House from “Perception”

Daniel's House Perception (2 of 12)

For nearly two years now, I have been on the hunt for the house where Dr. Daniel Pierce (Eric McCormack) lives with his long-suffering assistant, Max Lewicki (Arjay Smith), on the TNT series Perception.  Due to the fact that the residence is typically only ever shown at night in rather tight establishing shots, with no clues such as street signs or address numbers visible in the background, I had a tough time tracking it down.  While I did have an inkling that, thanks to its Craftsman-style architecture, the dwelling was most likely located somewhere in Pasadena, my numerous searches of the Crown City left me empty-handed.

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It wasn’t until I recently re-watched the Season 2 episode titled “Brotherhood” that I realized my mistake.  Several scenes from “Brotherhood” were actually shot on location at the home and a view of the neighborhood was briefly shown – a neighborhood that looked decidedly South Pasadenan.  So I did some online sleuthing for Perception filming in SP and eventually came across this South Pasadena Patch article which stated that the show had done some filming on the 1800 block of Diamond Avenue.   Sure enough, I would up finding the house right where the article said it would be – 1800 Diamond Ave.

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Daniel’s house pops up regularly on Perception, typically in tightly-angled or dimly-lit night shots, as I mentioned above.

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Only rarely is a full or semi-full view of the exterior shown.

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I was shocked to discover how different the residence looks in person.  As you can see in the screen capture as compared to the photograph pictured below, the house currently has much more foliage surrounding it than what is depicted on Perception.  In real life, the dwelling is almost completely shielded by trees.  In fact, when I first showed up to stalk it, I drove right by the place, missing it completely!

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The trees are so abundant that they even hide the fact that the home has a second story!

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In real life, the 1919 residence features four bedrooms, two baths, 1,866 square feet, and 0.17 acres of land.  The pad last sold in August 1991 for $326,000.

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I am absolutely in LOVE with the covered patio.  How great would it be to sit out there, sipping on a Starbucks iced latte?

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Daniel's House Perception (7 of 12)

Only the exterior of the home is used on Perception.  The interior of Dr. Pierce’s house exists on a soundstage at Los Angeles Center Studios where the series is lensed.  Because the pilot was shot on location in Toronto, a different interior was shown in that particular episode – the interior of what I believe is an actual residence in Canada.  As you can in the screen captures below (taken from the pilot and the second episode titled “Faces”), the two residences are quite a bit different.

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I would guess that the set of Daniel’s home was based on the real life interior of the Diamond Avenue house, but, try as I might, I could not find any photographs with which to verify that hunch.

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For more stalking fun, be sure to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Los Angeles magazine online.  And you can check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Dr. Daniel Pierce’s house from Perception is located at 1800 Diamond Avenue in South Pasadena.

The Manhattan Beach Marriott Hotel from “90210”

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Another location that the Grim Cheaper and I stopped by a couple of weeks ago while doing some stalking in the South Bay was the Manhattan Beach Marriott, which stood in for the supposed-Beverly-Hills-area hotel where the West Beverly High Senior Prom was held in the Season 3 episode of fave show 90210 titled “The Prom Before the Storm”.  I found this location thanks to fellow stalker Geoff, from the 90210Locations website, who was kind enough to put together an entire 90210-themed South Bay stalking list for me as soon as he found out that I was heading down that way.  Sadly, due to some major traffic that the GC and I encountered on our way down there (darn you, 405!), we were not able to spend as much time in the area as I had hoped and only managed to hit up a couple of locations, one of which was the prom hotel.  Ironically enough, not only had the GC and I actually stayed at the Manhattan Beach Marriott a few years back, but thanks to its appearance in an early episode of The O.C., I had even blogged about it.  So the fact that I did not recognize it when it appeared in “The Prom Before the Storm” episode is highly embarrassing!  I mean, what kind of a stalker am I???  Winking smile

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Only the exterior of the Manhattan Beach Marriott Hotel was featured in the episode, in the scene in which Liam Court (aka cutie Matt Lanter – sigh!), Annie Wilson (aka Shenae Grimes), Naomi Clark (aka AnnaLynne McCord) and the rest of the West Beverly High gang arrive at their Senior Prom.  As you can see in the screen capture located on the bottom right above, producers put up curtains to block the interior of the hotel in the scene as it did not match up with the interior set that they had created at Manhattan Beach Studios where the series is lensed.

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That set, which was centered around Silver’s (aka Jessica Stroup’s) half-baked Cirque du Soleil prom theme, is pictured above.

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I am very happy to report that the hotel looks exactly the same in person as it did in the episode.  Ironically enough, the Manhattan Beach Marriott is eerily similar in appearance to the Universal Sheraton, where Brenda Walsh (aka Shannen Doherty), Dylan McKay (aka Luke Perry), Donna Martin (aka Tori Spelling) and the rest of the original West Bev gang attended the spring dance in the Season 1 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 aptly titled “Spring Dance”.

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The exterior staircase located just east of the hotel’s front entrance also made an appearance in the episode as the spot where Ivy Sullivan (aka Gillian Zinser) caught her then-boyfriend, now-husband Raj Kher (aka Manish Dayal) drinking.

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As I mentioned above, the Manhattan Beach Marriott Hotel was also featured in the Season 1 episode of The O.C. titled “The Debut”.  In the episode, the interior of the hotel masqueraded as the interior of Newport Beach’s Pelican Hill Country Club where the dance rehearsals for Marissa Cooper (aka Mischa Barton) and Summer Roberts’s (aka Rachel Bilson’s) Debutante Ball were held.

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Both the hotel’s Grand Lobby, which as you can see above has changed its color scheme drastically since the episode was filmed;

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and the Manhattan Ballroom, which was unfortunately closed when we showed up to stalk the place but which you can see photographs of here, were featured in the episode.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Geoff, from the 90210Locations website, for finding this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

90210 Prom Marriott stairwell

Stalk It: The Manhattan Beach Marriott Hotel, from “The Prom Before the Storm” episode of 90210, is located at 1400 Parkview Avenue in Manhattan Beach.  The hotel’s main entrance and the exterior stairwell, which is denoted with a pink arrow in the above aerial view and is located just east of the main entrance, appeared in the episode.  In “The Debut” episode of The O.C., the hotel’s front lobby and Manhattan Ballroom were featured.  You can visit the Manhattan Beach Marriott’s official website here.