Sara’s Apartment Building from “L.A. Story”

Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (14 of 19)

After tracking down the location of the “talking” freeway sign and Now! clothing store from fave movie L.A. Story (which I blogged about here and here, respectively) a couple of weeks ago, I embarked upon a mission to uncover all of the unknown locales from the 1991 flick.  And with a lot of help from the usual suspects – fellow stalkers Mike, from MovieShotsLA, Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, and Geoff, from the 90210Locations website – I managed to do just that!  One location that I actually found all on my own, though, was the unique sloped-roof building where Londoner Sara McDowel (Victoria Tennant) stayed while visiting Los Angeles in the movie.  So I ran right out to stalk it while in SoCal this past weekend.

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Thankfully, this one was quite the easy find.  I had an inkling that Sara’s building was located in the West Hollywood area, where a considerable amount of L.A. Story was lensed.  So I did a Google search for “West Hollywood apartment building” and “butterfly roof” and, sure enough, one of the results was a WeHo.org page that included a write-up about the historic Hollywood Riviera building located at 1400 North Hayworth Avenue, which turned out to be the right spot.  (Although it actually houses condominiums, not apartments.)  Woot woot!

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Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (17 of 19)

The Hollywood Riviera was designed by prolific Los Angeles-based architect Edward H. Fickett in 1954.  The extremely unique, 38-unit, post-war-modern-style building features a sloped butterfly roofline, louvered windows, floating exterior staircases, canted (yeah, I had to look that one up, too) balconies, and a central courtyard with a swimming pool.

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It also has a pretty cool retro-style sign.

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Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (4 of 19)

Incredibly, of the 37 West Hollywood apartment buildings that Fickett designed during his lifetime, only five are known to remain standing to this day.  Most were demolished to make way for larger, more modern structures.  Due to this sad fact and the building’s unique architecture, the West Hollywood Historic Preservation Commission designated the Hollywood Riviera a Historic Cultural Resource in 2010.

Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (11 of 19)

Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (1 of 19)

In L.A. Story, Sara, the love interest of Harris K. Telemacher (Steve Martin), stays at the Hollywood Riviera while in town to write an article about Los Angeles for The London Times.  The building shows up numerous times throughout the movie.

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The areas of the Riviera that appeared in the flick include the front exterior;

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the front door of one of the units (I am guessing that the unit’s real life apartment number was used in the filming);

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and the courtyard and pool.

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I am fairly certain that the real life interior of one of the units was utilized in the shoot as well, although Sara’s homestead was two stories, while all of the Hollywood Riviera condos that I have found real estate listings for online consist of only one story, so who knows.  You can check out a real estate listing for an actual unit here to see how it compares.

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I am also fairly certain that Sara’s balcony was a real Hollywood Riviera balcony.

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The Hollywood Riviera was also where Elaine (Lesley Ann Warren) lived in 1999’s The Limey.

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And while several websites (including this one and this one) state that the building has appeared in numerous movies and television shows, I could not find the names of any of the other productions that filmed on the premises.

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Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (18 of 19)

You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER.  And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Sara's Apartment Building L.A. Story (9 of 19)

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Sara’s apartment building from L.A. Story, aka the Hollywood Riviera, is located at 1400 North Hayworth Avenue in West Hollywood.

Now! Clothing from “L.A. Story”

Now Clothing L.A. Story (11 of 21)

My second most-wanted location from the 1991 classic comedy L.A. Story was Now!, the ultra-hip clothing store with unisex dressing rooms where SanDeE* (my girl Sarah Jessica Parker) worked.  (My first most-wanted was, of course, the iconic freeway sign that I blogged about last Thursday.)  So I was floored to see that the locale was included in “The L.A. of L.A. Story” special feature on the movie’s 15th Anniversary Edition DVD.  In the feature, which was lensed in 2006, production designer Lawrence Miller said, “This was a clothing store at the intersection of La Cienega and Santa Monica Boulevard and is now, regrettably, a Sav-on drug store.”  I was shocked to learn this information as Now! had always looked like a Venice Beach-type shop to me and I had even spent quite a bit of time looking for it in that area.  D’oh!  Well, believe you me, once I had the correct address, I immediately added it to my To-Stalk list and ran right out there just a few days later, while in L.A. for a brief visit.  It was not until I started doing research for today’s post, though, that I discovered what a ridiculously vast history the place has – such a vast history, in fact, that while I had intended on publishing this column last Friday, I was still compiling information at 8 p.m. on Thursday night and had to postpone it until today.

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Now! clothing is currently a CVS pharmacy.  (CVS Caremark acquired all Southern California Sav-on drug stores in 2006.)  Amazingly enough, though, it still looks almost exactly the same today as it did 22 years ago when L.A. Story was filmed!  But more on that later.

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The location has gone through many different incarnations during its lifetime, each of them quite unique and notable.  It was originally constructed in 1940 as a 22-lane bowling alley named La Cienega Lanes, which you can see a photograph of here.

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La Cienega Lanes, which was owned at one point by Art Linkletter, was featured numerous times in the 1956 thriller Man in the Vault, as the hangout of locksmith Tommy Dancer (William Campbell).  Both the exterior . . .

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. . . and the interior of the alley appeared in the movie.

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La Cienega Lanes closed sometime in the late 1970s.  In July 1979, music producer Denny Cordell opened a private, members-only “roller boogie palace” named Flippers at the site.  The exclusive club, which had a cap of 1,000 members who paid $200 annually plus a $7 entrance fee for each visit, boasted a bar, a restaurant, a custom skate shop, and a skating floor made of polyurethane.   You can check out a photograph of the exterior of the rink in all of its bright blue and purple glory here.  By February 1980, the tropical-themed club ceased being a members-only institution and was opened to the public.  It also became a popular concert venue at that time, with such legends as The Go-Go’s, John Cougar, The Ramones, and Prince on the line-up.  The band Cerrone even featured the exterior of the rink on the cover of their 1984 album Club Underworld.  Flippers was also a major celebrity hot spot and in its heyday such stars as Cher (who was rumored to be part-owner of the place), Olivia Newton-John, Cheryl Ladd, Loni Anderson, Robin Williams, Jane Fonda, Aretha Franklin, Jacqueline Bisset, Patrick Swayze, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar all got their skate on there.

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Flippers has a bit of a filming history, as well.  The club was featured in the Season 4 episode of Charlie’s Angels titled “Angels on Skates”, in which the Angels – Kelly Garrett (Jaclyn Smith), Kris Munroe (Cheryl Ladd), and Tiffany Welles (Shelley Hack) – investigated the kidnapping of a young skater named Rita Morgan (Lory Walsh).

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The interior of the roller disco was also used in the episode.

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Fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, let me know that Flippers was also featured in the Season 3 episodes of CHiPs titled “Roller Disco: Part 1” and “Roller Disco: Part II”.  Unfortunately, Season 3 of CHiPs has not yet been released on DVD, nor is it available for streaming on iTunes, Amazon, or Netflix, but I was able to make the grabs below thanks to the Melissa Sue Anderson Fan website.

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According to both Wikipedia and IMDB, the roller disco set from Skatetown, U.S.A. (which was built inside of the Hollywood Palladium) was based on the real life interior of Flippers, but I think that information is actually incorrect.  Flippers opened its doors in July 1979 and Skatetown was released just a mere three months later, in October 1979.  Being that movies typically take at least eight months to edit, even if they had done a rush job on the flick, the timing simply does not add up.  Not to mention that the Skatetown set looks nothing at all like Flippers.

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And while a few websites have stated that 1979’s Roller Boogie was filmed at Flippers, that information is also incorrect.  The exterior roller rink scenes from the movie were shot at at Moonlight Rollerway in Glendale, which I blogged about back in October 2010.

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I am unsure of where the interior scenes were filmed, but, as you can see below, it was not Flippers.  According to a poster named “Wanda Pr of Arlington” on Flickr, who was in the movie, the interiors were shot at “an old dance hall on Sunset.”

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For whatever reason, Flippers did not last long.  In 1983, the space was purchased by Doug and Susie Tompkins, owners of the popular San Francisco-based Esprit de Corp. clothing brand.  The site was to become the company’s first freestanding retail store.  The couple quickly began a $15-million, 15-month renovation of the building and hired famed designer Joseph D’Urso to carry it out.  He remodeled both the interior and the exterior of the property and added a three-story, 150-space parking lot (pictured below).  The 32,000-square foot store, which became Esprit’s flagship, opened in December 1984.

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Now Clothing L.A. Story (21 of 21)

According to a 1985 Milwaukee Journal article, D’Urso designed a swirling ramp at Esprit’s entrance to provide handicapped access as well as a “ceremonial route” to the double front doors.

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He also designed a small “tree-shaded plaza” in the hopes that “people would feel more protected from the traffic” cruising by on the busy Santa Monica and La Cienega Boulevards.

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It was during its time as an Esprit store that the building was used in L.A. Story.  The location popped up twice in the movie, first in the scene in which Harris K. Telemacher (Steve Martin) went shopping with his girlfriend, Trudi (Marliu Henner), and wound up meeting SanDeE*, who sold him a pair of white pants.  Only the interior of the store was shown in that scene.

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In “The L.A. of L.A. Story”, Lawrence Miller stated that the interior, which featured Zolatone walls, metal catwalks, and black waxed cement, was left pretty much as-is for the shoot.  He also said they were “blessed” to such a find such a perfect interior in which to film and that it worked perfectly as “part of the build-up” to Harris and SanDeE* meeting in an environment that “shows how inappropriate she is”.  Man, what I wouldn’t give to have seen that interior!

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Harris later returns to Now! to pick up his pants, which were being altered, and it is in that scene that the exterior of the building is shown.  As you can see below, aside from a few very minor changes, the site stills looks exactly the same today as it did then!

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As you can imagine, I could hardly contain myself when I arrived at CVS and saw how much it still looked like Now!  SO INCREDIBLY COOL!  It was all I could do not to start spinning out in front of the store like SJP did in the flick.  Winking smile

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Despite immense popularity among the teen set, Esprit de Corp. suffered a major downfall in the late ‘80s, due in large part to Doug and Susie’s messy divorce, and the flagship store closed its doors in 1994.  The site sat vacant for a decade, despite talks of the city of West Hollywood purchasing it to use as their City Council chambers and a library.  Sometime in 2004 or 2005, the building was turned into a Sav-on.  Thankfully, though, the exterior was left intact for all of us stalkers to appreciate.  And, according to this April 2013 article on the WeHoVille blog, the shadow of the Esprit sign is STILL visible on the side of the building!  I so wish I had known that before stalking the place!  For those who are interested, the shadow is located on the eastern-most side of the parking structure.  You can just barely see it in the Google Street View image below.

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You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER.  And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Now! Clothing from L.A. Story, aka CVS pharmacy, is located at 8491 West Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood.

The “L.A. Story” Freeway Sign

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One locale that the Grim Cheaper suggested I track down a few years back – and that I have wondered about ever since – was the spot where the freeway sign from the 1991 classic comedy L.A. Story once stood.  Because it was a prop sign that was situated on a long expanse of a non-descript Southern California road, though, I figured that, short of getting ahold of a crew member, it would be a virtually impossible find.  Cut to two weeks ago when, while doing research on the O’Neil house from Beverly Hills, 90210, I came across this Wikimapia page which stated that the L.A. Story freeway condition sign had been located on Burbank Boulevard in Encino.  I just about fell out of my chair upon learning this news because I had never before seen it mentioned anywhere.  And while I tried to find other articles that backed up the claim, I came up empty-handed.  I knew that the information had to have come from somewhere, though, so I searched Amazon to see if a DVD commentary for the movie was available.  While no such commentary exists (how is that possible?!?!), I did come across a listing for the 15th Anniversary Edition of L.A. Story which included – are you ready for this? – a vignette titled “The L.A. of L.A. Story: An Interactive Map of the Popular Sites Filmed for L.A. Story”.  Um, yes, please!  The DVD is sadly out of print, but I did find a used copy of it on eBay for $5 and, let me tell you, it was the best $5 I ever spent – although I am sure the GC would disagree.  Winking smile

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The L.A. of L.A. Story, which was shot in 2006 and is absolutely amazeballs, features production designer Lawrence Miller (who sadly passed away in 2009) returning to ten of the movie’s most iconic locations to tell the stories behind them.  LOVE IT!  One of the locales visited was, of course, the famous freeway sign.  In the piece, Lawrence describes shooting on Burbank Boulevard, just east of Hayvenhurst Avenue, but never specifies the exact spot where the sign stood.  I was having a heck of a time pinpointing the location via Google Street View, so I enlisted the help of Mike, from MovieShotsLA, who found the right area almost immediately.  Thank you, Mike!  As you can see below, the two double-pronged trees visible behind Lawrence in the feature match up perfectly to the spot that Mike found on Burbank Boulevard.  So the two of us ran right out to stalk the site this past Sunday afternoon while I was in town for a couple of days.

LA Story Freeway Sign

In L.A. Story, wacky weatherman Harris K. Telemacher (Steve Martin – who also wrote the screenplay!) encounters a rather cheeky freeway condition road sign that instead of foretelling traffic statuses, predicts the future of his life.  According to Lawrence, the sign was custom-built and was programmed to “talk” to Harris in several different languages so that its lines would not need to later be dubbed when shown in foreign countries.  So interesting!

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As you can see below, the Los Angeles cityscape was digitally added to the background of the road sign scenes.

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In real life, the area behind where the sign once stood is comprised of a massive amount of foliage.

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In The L.A. of L.A. Story, Lawrence also states that Burbank Boulevard was chosen as the sign site because it is a “freeway lookalike” that is easy to close down, and that he was the person who actually chose the exact spot where the sign would be installed on the day of the shoot.

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As you can see below, the area still looks very much the same today as it did in 2006 when the special was filmed.

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Unfortunately though, there is currently quite a bit more plant growth than there was when Lawrence visited the site seven years ago.

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Which is especially upsetting because when The L.A. of L.A. Story was filmed, he was actually able to find the hole where the sign once stood, which I just about lost my mind over!  And while Mike and I ferociously dug through the underbrush looking for that hole (we were pretty much on our hands and knees pulling back weeds – I can only imagine what passersby were thinking!), we were unable to uncover it.  I did vow to go back with a rake and a shovel one day, though, so have no fear!  I will locate that darn hole if it’s the last thing I do!  Winking smile

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You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER.  And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for finding this location!  Smile

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The L.A. Story freeway sign was located on eastbound Burbank Boulevard, just east of Hayvenhurst Avenue at what Google Maps lists as 16388 Burbank Boulevard, in Encino.

El Pollo del Mar from “L.A. Story”

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One location that I had been dying to find for years was El Pollo del Mar (yes, that translates to The Chicken of the Sea LOL), aka the supposed Santa Barbara-area resort featured in the 1991 flick L.A. Story.  Try as I might, though, I just could not seem to track the place down.  So, when a fellow stalker named Scott wrote a comment on my L.A. Story gas station post informing me of the site’s location, my head just about exploded from excitement!  In reality, the Mediterranean-style hotel is an absolutely gargantuan private residence that overlooks the Pacific Ocean in Long Beach.  Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined that El Pollo del Mar was a) someone’s home (!!!) and b) located in the LBC.  I honestly would have bet money on the fact that it was an actual hotel in Santa Barbara.  Mind officially blown!  And while I was chomping at the bit to stalk the locale just as soon as Scott told me about it, because I do not get down to the Long Beach area very often, I was not able to do so until this past December.

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Sadly, the El Pollo del Mar house is located on a gated street, so only a small portion of it is visible to the public.  Man, what I wouldn’t give to see the inside of that thing!

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In real life, the gargantuan residence, which was originally built in 1926 and is named Casa Oceana, boasts three bedrooms, five baths, 7,576 square feet of living space, and a 1.28-acre plot of seaside land.

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El Pollo del Mar pops up towards the end of L.A. Story as the charming resort where disgruntled weatherman Harris K. Telemacher (Steve Martin) takes his girlfriend SanDeE* (my girl Sarah Jessica Parker) for the weekend.  While there he runs into his dream girl, Sara McDowel (Victoria Tennant), who is on a reconciliation trip with her ex-husband, Roland Mackey (Richard E. Grant).  Drama, of course, ensues.  As you can see below, the property is absolutely huge and can easily masquerade as a hotel.  In fact, I am surprised that it hasn’t been used more frequently in productions.

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And, as I mentioned, while the majority of the residence cannot be seen from the road, I was BEYOND floored to discover that the front gate . . .

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. . . and archway that appeared in the movie were visible.  Yay!

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And for the rest, there’s always Bing Aerial Views!  I still can’t believe the place is a private house!  I mean, look at that thing!

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I am kicking myself for not having walked down to the beachside of the property while we were there because it, too, appeared in L.A. Story, in the scene in which Harris and Sara get into a fight over their respective significant others.

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All of the interior El Pollo del Mar scenes were filmed (I believe) twenty miles north of Long Beach at the now-defunct Ambassador Hotel, which used to stand at 3400 Wilshire Boulevard in Koreatown.

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You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER.  And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The El Pollo del Mar hotel from L.A. Story is actually a private home located at 20 37th Place in Long Beach.

The Venice Beach Cotel – aka SanDeE*’s Apartment from “L.A. Story”

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One location that I have been dying to track down ever since first moving to Southern California in 2000 was the apartment building where SanDeE* (my girl Sarah Jessica Parker) lived in the 1991 classic comedy L.A. Story. (And yes, that is the correct spelling of her name – as she says in the movie, “Big s, small a, small n, big d, small e, big e, and there’s a little star at the end”.  LOL)  I knew that the building was located somewhere in Venice, but because I do not know the area very well and rarely venture out there, I had a hard time tracking it down.  So imagine my excitement when, a couple of years ago, I came across a blurb about the place in fave stalking book Hollywood Escapes: The Moviegoer’s Guide to Exploring Southern California’s Great Outdoors.  As it turns out, SanDeE*’s apartment building is none other than the Venice Beach Cotel on Windward Avenue.  And while I immediately added the address to my To-Stalk list, I was not able to get out there until this past Saturday afternoon when Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I were doing some stalking in the area.

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Venice Beach actually has a very interesting history – one which involves the Cotel.  The city was dreamed up by a wealthy tobacco heir/real estate developer named Abbot Kinney, who wanted to establish “The Venice of America” right here in Los Angeles.  In the early 1900’s, he purchased some coastal acreage, most of it marshland, south of Santa Monica and proceeded to create a replica of the Italian city.  The marshes were drained and transformed into eight miles of canals (a popular filming location, which I will be blogging about soon), complete with imported gondolas and singing gondoliers.  A 1600-foot fishing pier was also constructed, along with carnival rides, a large beachside pool, and an indoor saltwater pool known as “The Venice Hot Saltwater Plunge”.  The focal point of Kinney’s city, which was opened to the public in 1905 and was nicknamed “The Playland of the Pacific”, was Windward Avenue, a main street lined with beautiful neo-Italianate, columned buildings and sweeping archways as far as the eye could see.  The buildings housed everything from luxury restaurants and shops to hotels, one of which was the ritzy St. Charles.  Today, that site is known as the Venice Beach Cotel and it is the city’s oldest hotel.

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Sadly, while St. Charles was once luxurious and upscale, it fell into decline, along with the rest of the city, shortly after Abbot Kinney’s death in 1920.  And while Venice Beach has experienced a resurgence of sorts in recent years, the property is still a bit seedy.  And what does the word “Cotel” mean, you ask?  According to the hostel’s website, “The name Cotel comes from the prefix ‘co’, meaning getting together (people), which is what we are all about!”

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The infamous mural that dominates the west side of the Cotel is named “Venice Reconstituted” and it was originally painted in 1989 by muralist Rip Cronk.  It looks quite a bit different today than it did in L.A. Story, though, because in 2010, Cronk restored the huge painting, renamed it “Venice Kinesis”, added and deleted a few figures, and moved it up an entire story in a futile attempt to keep it out of reach of taggers.

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There is also a 102-foot by 50-foot mural that covers the east side of the Venice Beach Cotel, but it, too, has been re-visioned.  The piece was originally painted in the early 1900s by Terry Schoonhoven and was a view of what Windward Avenue looked like at the time.  You can see a historic photograph of it here.  Sadly, the work deteriorated and faded considerably over the years, so, in early 2012, artist Jonas Never covered over it with a new mural named “Touch of Venice” that was inspired by Touch of Evil, Orson Welles’ 1958 film which was shot in its entirety in the beachside city.

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In L.A. Story, the Venice Beach Cotel is where SanDeE*, the dimwitted, colonic-loving girlfriend of wacky weatherman Harris K. Telemacher (Steve Martin), lived.  The building and Rip Cronk’s mural popped up a few times in the flick.

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I cannot tell you how absolutely devastated I was when I saw that SanDeE*’s front doorway had since been removed, as I had so wanted to reenact the image below.  Sad smile

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As I later discovered, though, SanDeE*’s (and I cannot express what a pain in the a** it is to type that name out repeatedly! Winking smile) doorway was never actually there, but was a façade that was added solely for the movie.  You can check out some pictures of the building from the same time period that L.A. Story was filmed here, here, and here, which show that the doorway never actually existed.  BOO!

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L.A. Story was hardly the first film to shoot at the Cotel.  In 1958’s Touch of Evil, which as I mentioned above, was shot in its entirety in Venice, the building stood in for the Ritz Hotel in the fictional border town of Los Robles, where Susan Vargas (Janet Leigh) was threatened by drug kingpin “Uncle” Joe Grandi (Akim Tamiroff) while on her honeymoon.

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As an homage to Touch of Evil, the Cotel doubled as The Ritz Hotel once again in the opening scene of the 2001 flick Double Take.

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As you can see below, an exact replica of the “Ritz Hotel” sign from Touch of Evil was created for Double Take.  So cool!

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In 1968’s I Love You, Alice B. Toklas!, Harold (Peter Sellers) shops at what he calls a “hippy supermarket” set up in front of the Venice Beach Cotel.

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In the opening scene of 1992’s White Men Can’t Jump, Billy Hoyle (Woody Harrelson) parks in front of the hotel and then throws his basketball up against Rip Cronk’s mural as he walks by.

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In 1993’s Point of No Return, Maggie Hayward (Bridget Fonda) walks by the building upon first arriving in Venice.

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Rip’s mural showed up very briefly in an establishing shot in 1992’s Venice/Venice . . .

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. . . which starred a very young David Duchovny.

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According to Hollywood Escapes, the Venice Beach Cotel is also visible in the 1983 remake of Breathless, but, unfortunately, I could not find any copies of it with which to make screen captures for this post.

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And on a Sarah Jessica Parker side-note – My good friend Steffi, who lives in Switzerland and is even more Sex-and-the-City-obsessed than I am (if that’s possible), texted me the below picture yesterday.  Um, LOVE IT, LOVE IT, LOVE IT!

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Be sure to “Like” IAMNOTASTALKER on Facebook here and “Friend” me on my personal page here.  You can also check out the IAMNOTASTALKER About Me page here and you can follow me on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER.  And don’t forget to take a look at my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Venice Beach Cotel, aka SanDeE*’s apartment building from L.A. Story, is located at 25 Windward Avenue in Venice.  You can visit the hostel’s official website here.

The “L.A. Story” Gas Station

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Last week, while doing research for my post on L’Orangerie, aka Chez Quis restaurant from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, I came across some information on The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations website about the Gilmore Gasoline Service Station on Highland Avenue in Hollywood – a very cool-looking, old-time gas station that appeared in the 1991 movie L.A. Story.  Thanks to the place’s unique, Art Deco architecture and historic feel, I became just a wee-bit obsessed with it and immediately added the address to my ever-growing “To-Stalk” list.

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I think part of the reason that I became so enamored with the Gilmore Gasoline Service Station is that it reminded me of the circular, 50s-style drive-in restaurant that was used in Britney Spears’ “For Those Who Think Young” Pepsi commercial – which was sadly just a set that was built inside of a soundstage.  For reasons that are beyond my comprehension, I have long been obsessed with all of the Pepsi ads featuring Britney.  I honestly cannot get enough of ‘em.  In fact, I just watched about twelve different versions of both “The Joy of Pepsi” and “For Those Who Thing Young” videos.  But I digress.  Anyway, because he has an affinity for all things historic, I figured that the Gilmore Gasoline Service Station was one location that the Grim Cheaper would actually not mind being dragged to.  Sadly though, when we arrived, we found the structure to be in a pretty pitiful state.  Such a shame!

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The Gilmore Gasoline Service Station has an absolutely fascinating backstory.  The structure was originally built for the Gilmore Oil Company, which was founded by one of the most influential and prominent families in Los Angeles history.  Arthur Freemont “A.F.” Gilmore, a dairy business owner from Illinois who migrated to Southern California during the 1880s, found fortune in 1903 when he accidentally struck oil while drilling a water well on some property that he owned in the Rancho La Brea area.  In 1919, after A.F. had passed away, his son, Earl, founded the Gilmore Petroleum Company, which later became the Gilmore Oil Company.  Their Red Line service stations, which bore the motto “Someday you will own a horseless carriage.  Our gasoline will run it.”, soon became common fixtures across all of Los Angeles.  The Gilmore family is most famous, though, for founding the Gilmore Bank and the world-famous Farmers Market at 3rd & Fairfax, and for building Gilmore Field – the now-defunct minor league baseball park that was once home to the Hollywood Stars baseball team.

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The double-canopied Gilmore Gasoline Service Station was designed in 1935 by an engineer named R.J. Kadow.  It was one of the first Gilmore stations to be constructed and is now, sadly, one of the last remaining of its kind.  After the Gilmore Oil Company was sold in 1945, the station went through a succession of different owners and, in early 1990, after the then-tenant decided not to renew his lease, there was talk of possibly tearing the structure down.  Thankfully, the Melrose Neighborhood Association stepped in and, on March 23rd, 1992, the building was declared a Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument.  Despite the station’s historic status, though, it has somehow been allowed to fall into disarray in recent years.  According to a November 1990 Los Angeles Times article, there were once plans to restore the building and open a snack shop/gas station/classic car rental on the site, but I am not sure if those plans ever came to fruition and, as you can see above, the place is currently in dire straights.  You can check out some photographs of the station taken during better days here.

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In L.A. Story, Harris K. Telemacher (Steve Martin) and Sara McDowel (Victoria Tennant) stop at the Gilmore Gasoline Service Station, where they ask for a “full service” treatment – their tank filled, car washed, and all four tires removed and exchanged LOL – before heading to a fund-raising dinner.  As you can see in the screen captures pictured above, at the time that the movie was filmed in 1991, the gas station was an incredibly cool little place.  I cannot express how disheartening it was to discover that a unique piece of Southern California’s history – one with historic cultural status, no less – has been allowed to deteriorate in such a way.  As I said earlier, what a shame!

Fellow stalker Chas, of the It’sFilmedThere website, also let me know that the station was featured in the 1982 movie 48 Hours as the supposed San-Francisco-area gas station where parolee Reggie Hammond (Eddie Murphy) told detective Jack Cates (Nick Nolte) where he had hidden the stolen money.

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On an L.A. Story side-note – I would so love to find the supposed-Santa-Barbara-area El Pollo del Mar (the Chicken of the Sea – LOL) motel that appeared in the flick.  I know that the interior scenes were filmed at the since-demolished Ambassador Hotel, but I am interested in tracking down the exterior.  Does anyone happen to know where it is?

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The former Gilmore Gasoline Service Station, from L.A. Story, is located at 859 North Highland Avenue in Hollywood.

Los Angeles County Museum of Art from “My So-Called Life”

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Since I spend the majority of my weekends dragging the Grim Cheaper out on various stalking adventures, this past Saturday, in honor of our first Valentine’s Day together as a married couple, I decided to create a scavenger hunt for him based on his many likes and hobbies.  I do have to admit that while most of our destinations were places that I had little to no interest in visiting, the hunt was not entirely an un-selfish endeavor on my part.  A few of our stops were, in fact, stalking locations – most notably the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, aka LACMA, which was featured in an episode of fave show My So-Called Life.  As I mentioned a few weeks back, I just recently started re-watching My So-Called Life from the beginning and I became just a bit obsessed with tracking down the museum where Angela Chase (aka Claire Danes) and the gang go on a field trip in the episode titled “Why Jordan Can’t Read”.  Because the series was filmed so prominently in the Pasadena area, I had a hunch that the museum used was the Huntington Library – a place where I just so happen to have a filming contact.  So, I emailed a few screen captures from the episode over to Dinah, my contact, to see if she could confirm or deny my suspicion.  As it turns out, though, my hunch was wrong – hey, it does happen!  Winking smile – Huntington was not the museum which appeared in the episode.  Thankfully though, Dinah knows her museums!  She informed me that she was 99.9% certain that filming had taken place at LACMA.  So, because the GC absolutely LOVES visiting museums, while I typically do not, I immediately added the place to his Valentine’s Day scavenger hunt and we headed out there this past Saturday morning.  And, let me tell you, once he found out that we would spending the day at a museum, he could NOT have been more excited.

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In the “Why Jordan Can’t Read” episode of My So-Called Life, Angela and her classmates, Jordan Catalano (aka Jared Leto), Rayanne Graff (aka A.J. Langer), Rickie Vasquez (aka Wilson Cruz), and Brian Krakow (aka Devon Gummersall), spend the morning on a field trip at a supposed Three Rivers, Pennsylvania-area museum, during which Jordan is nice to Angela, as she says, “like out of nowhere!”

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Because the museum has been remodeled in recent years and various artworks relocated to different galleries, it was quite difficult to pinpoint the exact spot where filming had taken place.  I had a few clues to help me out on my quest, though, most notably a set of numbers that was visible in the background of several scenes.  As you can see in the above screen captures, those numbers were all in the 200 range.

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Oddly enough, though, I could only find numbers like that in one area of the museum – on the third floor of the Hammer Building in the Art of the Ancient World section – yet those numbers were all in the 300 range, which left me completely puzzled.  As fate would have it, though, I happened to run into an EXTREMELY helpful and EXTREMELY friendly museum docent who became determined to assist me with my quest.  I had downloaded twenty or so screen captures from the “Why Jordan Can’t Read” episode onto the GC’s iPad – which he was gifted for Christmas from his boss and which is an absolutely AMAZING stalking tool – which I proceeded to show to my new friend.  After seeing those 200 numbers, he informed me that the third level of the Hammer building was actually known as the second level back in the ‘90s when My So-Called Life was filmed, and had only be re-numbered in recent years during the remodel.  Which meant that I was in the right spot!  Yay!

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By looking at the screen captures, the docent and I were able to determine that all of the filming of the episode had taken place on the now third floor (former second floor) of the museum’s Hammer Building in the Charles E. and Flora L. Thornton Gallery and a few of the smaller galleries which surround it.

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As you can see in the above screen capture and photograph, the wainscoting on the gallery walls and the molding on the gallery entrances match up perfectly to what appeared onscreen.

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Once I figured out that I was in the right place, I then proceeded to go on a scavenger hunt of my very own to track down a few of the specific works of art that had appeared in the episode.  And, let me tell you, I had an absolute blast doing so!  In fact, it was quite possibly the most fun that I have had at a museum in my entire life!  A few of the works that I was able to locate include a Rembrandt portrait;

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a painting titled “Portrait of Cardinal Roberto Ubaldino” by Guido Reni;

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the sculptures that Angela, Jordan, and Brian looked at;

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the portrait that Angela and Jordan were standing in front of when he invited her to watch his band, the Frozen Embryos, rehearse;

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and the scary-looking sculpture that the camera panned in on towards the end of the museum scene.

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I was most excited, though, to spot the statute where Jordan and Angela first started talking in the episode.

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And I, of course, just had to re-create Jordan’s pensive stare after I found it, which the GC was NOT at all happy about.  Winking smile The statue is currently displayed on a much shorter base than it was when My So-Called Life was filmed, which is why it appears to be so much lower to the ground in my photograph than it appeared onscreen.

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Sadly, the sculpture room where Sharon Cherski (aka Devon Odessa) and her boyfriend Kyle Vinnovich (aka Johnny Green) spent the majority of the field trip has since been dismantled.  Although I did manage to locate one of the sculptures which appeared in that scene.

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Even sadder still was the fact that I could not for the life of me track down the display case where Rayanne inadvertently left Angela’s love letter to Jordan.

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The very same area of LACMA also appears briefly in the 1991 comedy L.A. Story, in the scene in which Harris K. Telemacher (aka Steve Martin) roller-skates through a museum while his friend Ariel (aka Susan Forristal) video-tapes his exploits.

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The “Portrait of Cardinal Roberto Ubaldino”, which appeared in My So-Called Life, was also featured in L.A. Story.

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As was Jordan and Angela’s statue.  Love it!

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LACMA was also the site of the black-and-white ball, to which superstar Cher wore red, in 1992’s The Player.

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In the Season 4 episode of Melrose Place titled “Drawing Henry”, Brooke Armstrong (aka Kristin Davis) and Jack Parezi (aka Antonio Sabato Jr.) meet up at LACMA to discuss their burgeoning affair and wind up being spotted by Billy Campbell (aka Andrew Shue).

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Located in front of LACMA’s main entrance is the famous Urban Light display, which I blogged about back in April of last year after its appearance in a Vanity Fair photo shoot featuring the male members of the cast of Glee.  That very same light instillation was also used in the recently-released No Strings Attached, in the scene in which Adam (aka Ashton Kutcher) takes Emma (aka Natalie Portman) out on a Valentine’s Day date.  LACMA was also featured in Breaking All The Rules, Strong Medicine, Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles, Born Yesterday, The Rockford Files, From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and Now You See It, Now You Don’t.

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LACMA also has a few celebrity connections, as well.  There is a statue titled “Michael Jackson and Bubbles”, which was designed by artist Jeff Koons in 1988, on display in the Broad Contemporary Art Museum building.

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I so love that Mr. Koons captured MJ’s ever-present loafer-and-white-sock-combination so perfectly!

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And there is also a Tiffany lamp from Barbra Streisand’s personal collection on display in the Ahmanson Building.

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Also in the Ahmanson Building is an extremely ornate rosewood mirror which boasts an intriguing history.  The massive mirror, which was designed by New York’s Herter Brothers interior design firm in 1873, originally belonged to Milton Slocum Latham, a former U.S. senator and governor of California, and was on display in his 50-room Menlo Park mansion, Thurlow Lodge.  Slocum went bankrupt shortly after construction on his mansion was completed and then passed away in 1882.  His former home was demolished in 1942 and the mirror was subsequently transferred to none other than the prop department of a Hollywood movie studio – although I am unsure of which one – where it remained until 1991, at which time it became the property of LACMA.   So incredibly interesting!  I am going to have to keep my eyes peeled from now on to see if that mirror pops up in any movies that were made between 1942 and 1991!

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For those fellow stalkers who are also interested in seeing works of art as well as filming locations Winking smile, the museum features some amazing pieces, including paintings by both Monet and Picasso.

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There is also a great view of the Hollywood sign which can be seen from the top of the Broad Contemporary Art Museum building.

Big THANK YOU to Dinah, from the Huntington Library, for finding this location for me!  Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from My So-Called Life and L.A. Story, is located at 5905 Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles.  You can visit the museum’s official website here.  Both My So-Called Life and L.A. Story were filmed in the museum’s Art of the Ancient World section, which can be found on the third floor of the Hammer Building, in the Charles E. and Flora L. Thornton Gallery.   The works of art that appeared in MSCL are spread out among the different galleries located on the third floor of the Hammer Building.

The “13 Going On 30” Thriller Dance Location

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A few months ago, I enlisted the help of fellow stalker Owen in tracking down the location from fave movie 13 Going On 30 where Jenna Rink (aka Jennifer Garner) saved the Poise Magazine  party by performing her rendition of the Zombie Dance from Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”, which, not surprisingly,  just so happens to be my very favorite scene in the flick.  From the beginning, I was absolutely convinced that the “Thriller” scene had been filmed in a building located somewhere in New York, but Owen had a hunch that it had actually taken place right here in Los Angeles.  And, as usual, Owen was right.  After doing a bit of cyber-stalking, he somehow managed to track down one of the movie’s location managers who told him that Jenna’s “Thriller” dance had actually been performed inside of an oft-used filming location in Downtown Los Angeles, one that I am ashamed to admit I was already very familiar with – the former Bank of American building located on the corner of 7th and South Spring Streets.  The building has been used in COUNTLESS productions over the years, but I am sad to say that, for whatever reason, I somehow failed to recognize it.

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Being that the former bank’s big ol’ safe is clearly visible in the background of the “Thriller” scene, I really should have figured this one out.  Man, I’m such a blonde sometimes! 

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Once Owen had tracked down the location for me, I put the former bank building on my very long “To-Stalk” list and finally managed to visit the place in person while out doing some stalking in the Downtown Los Angeles area a couple of weeks ago.  The Spring Street Tower, as it is sometimes called, which was built in 1912 by the architectural firm of Schultze and Weaver, served as the Los Angeles headquarters for the Bank of America Corporation from 1930 to 1972.  After Bank of America vacated the twelve story high Beaux Arts style building, the upper floors served as offices for various companies throughout the years, while the marble clad lobby became an extremely popular filming location.  In recent years, SB Properties, a building development company, took over the building and converted the former offices into lofts.  And while the lobby area still looks much the same as it did during the time when it was operating as a bank, there are currently plans in the works for a restaurant and club to open up in that space, which is both good news and bad news.  Bad news because I am guessing that once the space becomes a restaurant, it will cease to be a filming location and will most likely be heavily remodeled and good news because if it does eventually become a restaurant that means that someday in the near future I will be able to stalk the area where Jennifer Garner danced, a place which is currently off limits to the public.  YAY!  🙂 

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When we first arrived to stalk the former Bank of America building, I did not actually have high hopes that I would be able to see any of the interior.  So, let me tell you, I just about passed out from excitement when I discovered that the lobby area, where the “Thriller” dance scene took place, was thoroughly visible through the former bank’s front windows.  From the windows you can see the vault;

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the main staircase;

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the second floor balcony;

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and several of the wood-paneled main offices.  You can also see some fabulous interior photographs of the bank building here.

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In 13 Going On 30, the former Bank of America building was the location of the Poise Magazine “Girls Night Out” party, during which Jenna’s boss, Richard (aka Andy Serkis) complains that the guests are leaving far too early and if someone doesn’t do something to liven up the joint – and quick – then the entire magazine might go down the drain.  So, Jenna immediately heads over to the DJ booth where she requests Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” and then proceeds to lead the entire party in the famous Zombie Dance.  Oh, how I would love to do that dance at my wedding!  😉

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So I, of course, just had to imitate Jenna doing the “Thriller” dance while I was at the building.  🙂  I think it goes without saying that my fiancé was HIGHLY embarrassed while taking the above photographs of me. 

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The former bank is also where Robbie (aka Adam Sandler) tries to get a job to impress Julia (aka Drew Barrymore) in 1998’s The Wedding Singer.  When the bank’s manager, who was played by Kevin Nealon, turns him down, Robbie says, “You don’t even have to give me the job.  If you could just give me some business cards with my name on it, I think that might help.  How ‘bout this – I’ll give you ten singing lessons for one business card.  Please?”  LOL 

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In 1995’s Se7en, the bank building was dressed to look like a library and appeared in the scene in which Detective Lt. William Somerset (aka Morgan Freeman) researches the Seven Deadly Sins.

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In L.A. Story, the bank stood in for the Fourth Reich Bank of Hamburg where Steve Martin is forced to show his financial records to the owner of the impossible-to-get-into L’Idiot Restaurant in order to secure a dinner reservation there. 

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In 1994’s The Mask, the bank was used as Edge City Savings and Loan where Stanley Ipkiss (aka Jim Carrey) worked.

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In Spiderman 2, the bank appeared up as the spot where Peter Parker (aka Tobey Maguire) takes his Aunt May (aka Rosemary Harris) to apply for a loan from a bank teller played by none other than The Soup’s Joel McHale.  🙂  While the two are in the bank, Doc Ock shows up to rob the place and almost succeeds until Spiderman steps in and, of course, saves the day. 

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In Ghost, the bank was used as the place where Sam Wheat (aka Patrick Swayze) takes Oda Mae Brown (aka Whoopi Goldberg) to fill out a signature card under the false name of Rita Miller.

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In Blow, the former Bank of America building stood in for the Bank of Panama in one very brief scene.

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In The Prestige, the building shows up twice.  First, the bank lobby appeared as the courtroom where Alfred Borden’s (aka Christian Bale’s) murder trial is held.

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And second, the bank’s second floor mezzanine area stood in for the bar where Robert Angier (aka Hugh Jackman) shared a drink with Cutter (aka Michael Caine).

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The bank also appeared in the movies Marathon Man, Traffic, Fatal Vision, Prizzi’s Honor, St. Elmo’s Fire, All of Me, and in episodes of 24, Cagney & Lacey, Hill Street Blues, Matlock, and Hardcastle & McCormick.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  🙂

Stalk It: The old Bank of America building is located at 650 South Spring Street in Downtown Los Angeles.  The best place to catch a glimpse of the interior of the property is through the windows located on either side of the building’s front doors, which are pictured above.