The “Some Kind of Wonderful” Party House

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While I was stalking Steff’s mansion from Pretty in Pink, which I blogged about last Thursday, fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, texted me to let me know that the party house from another classic John Hughes-penned ‘80s movie, 1987’s Some Kind of Wonderful, was located literally just around the corner on Hudson Avenue.  So I, of course, dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over there to stalk the place.  I have to admit that I had actually not seen Some Kind of Wonderful in years, so as soon as the GC and I got home that evening, I popped in my DVD of the flick and was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it.  I had completely forgotten what a cute movie it is.  Smile

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In Some Kind of Wonderful, Keith Nelson (Eric Stoltz) takes his dream girl, Amanda Jones (Lea Thompson), on an uber-date all over the city of Los Angeles.  One of their stops is the mansion belonging to Amanda’s former boyfriend, mean-boy Hardy Jenns (Craig Sheffer), where a high school party is being held.

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I am fairly certain that the real life interior of the home was used in the filming of the party scene, as well, but I was unable to find any photographs of the place online with which to verify that hunch.

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In real life, the Some Kind of Wonderful party house, which was originally built in 1925, boasts seven bedrooms, six baths, 6,488 square feet, and almost half an acre of land.  As you can see below, the Tudor-style mansion is quite spectacular in person.  While the GC and I were outside snapping pics of the place, the owners happened to pull out of their driveway and, when they saw us, they waved with a look on their face which suggested that fans stalking their home was a regular occurrence.  Love it!  Smile

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As it turns out, Some Kind of Wonderful and Pretty in Pink share more in common than their writer, director (Howard Deutch), and Hancock Park filming locations.  According to IMDB’s Pretty in Pink trivia page, the original ending of the flick had Andie Walsh (Molly Ringwald) and Duckie (Jon Cryer) winding up together.  After a poor reaction from test audiences, though, the studio forced John Hughes to write a new ending in which Andie would choose Blaine McDonnagh (Andrew McCarthy).  Hughes never apparently liked the way the flick turned out and, in response, wrote an almost identical story the following year, but with the ending he wanted.  That story turned out to be Some Kind of Wonderful.  While re-watching the flick, I was amazed at the many similarities it had to Pretty in Pink.  Excluding the ending, the two movies are virtually one and the same.  In another interesting twist, Hughes wanted Molly Ringwald to play Amanda Jones in Some Kind of Wonderful (a role that ultimately went to Lea Thompson), but, hoping to branch out from her teen princess roles, she turned down the part and Molly and Hughes did not speak for the next twenty years.

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My friend Owen let me know that the very same pad also portrayed the residence of Dr. Russell Oakes (Jason Robards) in the 1983 made-for-television movie The Day After.

On a stalking side-note – my good friend Nat set up an IAMNOTASTALKER Facebook page for me a few years back, but, for whatever reason, I never really did anything with it.  Well, all that is about to change!  I finally added a cover photo and will be regularly updating my News Feed.  So, if you get a chance, be sure to head on over there and gimme a “Like”.  Smile You can also “friend” me on Facebook page here.  I just created an IAMNOTASTALKER About Me page, as well, which you can check out here.  And if you are not already following me on Twitter, you can do so here.  Yes, my fellow stalkers, IAMNOTASTALKER is finally taking it to the next level!  Woot woot!  Winking smile

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And on another stalking side-note – while watching Extra being taped last Thursday afternoon at The Grove, I got picked to ask actor Colin Egglesfield an on-air question.  That is me with host Renee Bargh and Colin below.  Big THANK YOU to my girl, Miss  Pinky Lovejoy, of the Thinking Pink blog, for snapping the pics!  The episode should be airing sometime this week, so keep your eyes peeled!  I have been watching Extra over the past couple of days, though, and it does not seem as if the fan questions ever actually air, but fingers crossed that mine will!

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Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for telling me about this location!  Smile

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: The Some Kind of Wonderful party house is located at 516 South Hudson Avenue in Hancock ParkLiam Court’s (cutie Matt Lanter – sigh!) house from fave show 90210 is located just up the street at 401 South Hudson AvenueSteff’s mansion from Pretty in Pink is located right around the corner at 366 South June Street in Hancock Park.  The Erle M. Leaf House, aka the Residence of the Los Angeles British Consuls-General where Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, stayed in July 2011, is also located right around the corner at 450 South June Street.

The “Jack and Jill” House

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This past Sunday afternoon, while doing some stalking in the Pacific Palisades area, I dragged the Grim Cheaper over to Amalfi Drive to stalk the main house used in the 2011 movie Jack and Jill.  And I should mention here that while I did not have very high hopes for Jack and Jill before watching it a couple of weeks ago, both the GC and I ended up really enjoying it.  Granted, it is by no means a classic, nor will it be winning any major awards any time soon, but it is sweet and funny and I found myself laughing out loud on more than one occasion.  I also absolutely fell in love with the uh-ma-zing Mediterranean-style mansion where advertising executive Jack Sadelstein (Adam Sandler) lived in the flick and became just a wee-bit obsessed with stalking it.  Thankfully, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, was able to track it down for me.

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While watching Jack and Jill, Mike had noticed an address number of “343” visible on the curb in the background of the scene in which gardener Felipe (Eugenio Derbez) drove Jack’s visiting twin sister, Jill Sadelstein (who was also played by Adam Sandler), home from a party.  Mike knew that the residence was located somewhere in Pacific Palisades thanks to an article on the Gambino Landscape Lighting blog and began searching aerial views of the area for Mediterranean mansions with a “343” in their number.  Amazingly, it was not long before he found the right one.  So I immediately added the address to my “To-Stalk” list and headed on over there on what turned out to be a very dreary and dismal afternoon, one which I did not dress at all appropriately for.  I am surprised my lips are not blue in the first picture on this post.  Winking smile

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The Jack and Jill house was just recently built in 2005 and boasts 8 bedrooms, 8 baths, 10,160 square feet of living space, and 0.64 acres of land.  As you can see on this Estately.com listing, a completely different residence once stood on the site, one that was built in 1948 and measured 3 bedrooms, 3 baths and 3,686 square feet, but it was sold in July 2002 (for a whopping $4 million, mind you) and subsequently torn down to make way for the Mediterranean manse pictured above.

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Aerial views of the home show that there used to be a residence located next door, as well.

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But that property has also since been leveled and its land now makes up the backyard of the Jack and Jill house;

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as you can see above.

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While we were stalking the house, a woman who lives in the area walked by and asked why we were taking pictures.  When I told her that the home was where Adam Sandler lived in Jack and Jill, she got very excited and said she could not wait to tell her nieces and nephews the next time they came to visit.  I SO love it when I inform random strangers about filming locations and they actually get excited, ‘cause, let me tell you, most of the time people (from L.A., at least) could care less.  I am definitely an anomaly in this city.  Winking smile

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In Jack and Jill, the Mediterranean-style mansion was where Jack lived with his family – wife Erin (Katie Holmes), daughter Sofia (Elodie Tougne) and son Gary (Rohan Chand).  The exterior of the residence was shown repeatedly throughout the movie.

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Al Pacino, who played a crazy version of himself in the flick, even filmed a scene outside of the home’s front gate, which I somehow did not get a picture of.  Fail!

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The property’s real life backyard and pool area also appeared in the flick.

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The interior of the Sadelstein house was just a set, though.  You can check out some photographs of the property’s real life interior here and, as you can see, it does not match up at all to what appeared onscreen.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Jack and Jill house is located at 1343 Amalfi Drive in Pacific Palisades.

The “Teen Wolf” Liquor Store

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While out stalking in the San Gabriel Valley three Thursdays ago, on our way to visit Clark Magnet High School where Kris Witherspoon (my girl Shannen Doherty) went to school in the 1986 television series Our House (which I have yet to blog about), Mike, from MovieShotsLA, made a quick (pardon the pun) detour to Quick Stop Liquor, the very same liquor store that appeared in 1985’s Teen Wolf.  Mike had found this location years beforehand, while searching for locales from the 1986 thriller River’s Edge, which was also filmed in the area.  And even though I live fairly close to Tujunga, where the liquor store is located, for whatever reason I had never ventured out to stalk it.  So, since we were just around the corner, Mike insisted we stop by.  (On a side-note – I have been playing around with the colors and sizes of my photographs lately.  Would love to hear what my fellow stalkers think! Smile)

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Quick Stop Liquor, which was named Tony’s Liquor in the flick, shows up twice in Teen Wolf.  It first pops up in the scene in which Stiles (Jerry Levine), donning a trucker hat, sunglasses and a shirt that says “Obnoxious: The Movie”, tries to purchase a keg of beer from the store’s curmudgeonly owner (Harvey Vernon) before heading to a house party, the location of which I blogged about here.

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The liquor store’s real life interior also appeared in that scene.

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Quick Stop Liquor shows up once again a few scenes later when Stiles convinces his best friend/teen werewolf, Scott Howard (Michael J. Fox), to attempt to buy a keg, using a water gun as intimidation, from the same curmudgeonly shop owner.

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The shop’s real life interior was also used in that scene, as well.

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It is while there that Scott has one of his very first experiences as a werewolf.  After being denied the keg and being chewed out by the shop owner, Scott gets just a wee bit angry, his eyes turn red, his voice deepens quite a few octaves, and he utters the film’s famous line, “GIVE ME.  A KEG.  OF BEER!”

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While the exterior of Quick Stop Liquor is now pink (although I am not typically a fan of change, pink is my favorite color, so I have to say, “Yay!”) and the sign and store name have since been altered, the place looks pretty much the same as it did in Teen Wolf, despite the fact that almost three full decades have since passed.   So incredibly cool!

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Sadly though, a building has since been constructed in the area directly next to the liquor store, where Stiles and Scott parked their cars in Teen Wolf.

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While stalking the place, Mike and I ventured inside to ask the woman working if we could snap some pictures.  And while she was reticent at first, once Mike showed her his Teen Wolf page on MovieShotsLA and she realized that Quick Stop had appeared in a film, she got pretty excited.  I so love it when that happens!  Smile As you can see above, while the interior of the store has changed a bit over the years, it is still pretty recognizable from the movie.

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The woman also confirmed for us that the store’s front counter had been shortened in recent years, which is such a shame!  I so would have loved to have seen the place in its original form!

“Teen Wolf” Liquor Store Scene Filmed at Quick Stop Liquor in Tujunga

You can watch the Teen Wolf “GIVE ME A KEG OF BEER” scene by clicking above.

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On a stalking side-note – fellow stalker Allen Fuqua, of the Movie Mimic website, recently contacted me to ask if I would like to reenact a scene from Fast Times at Ridgemont High with him.  I, of course, readily agreed and this past Sunday afternoon, the two of us, Grim Cheaper in tow, ventured out to Van Nuys High School to attempt a Movie Mimic.  The result is pictured above.  I had an absolute blast movie-mimicking and getting to meet Allen and the photograph he created far exceeded my expectations.  I highly recommend checking out Allen’s fabulous site, in which he travels to places ALL OVER THE WORLD (the guy has been EVERYWHERE, including London where he reenacted stills from my favorite movie of all time, Love Actually) and recreates iconic scenes from iconic movies.  Love it!  And, in an AMAZING twist, this past weekend The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences/The Oscars posted our Fast Times pic on their Facebook page.  PINCH ME!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Quick Stop Liquor, aka the Teen Wolf liquor store, is located at 6670 Foothill Boulevard in Tujunga.

The Historic Mayfair Hotel from “The Office”

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Fellow stalker John Bengtson, from the SIlent Locations blog, sent me an email last week after reading my post on Red Studios Hollywood from The Artist (a location that I had learned about from his website) informing me that he had tracked down some locales from Season 7’s “The Search” episode of The Office that I might be interested in stalking, most notably The Historic Mayfair Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles where Michael Scott (Steve Carell) and Holly Flax (Amy Ryan) shared a rooftop kiss.  Ironically enough, my good friend, fellow stalker Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, had also sent me this location on February 4th of last year, the day after the episode had originally aired, along with a list of all of the other places featured in “The Search”.  And while I did stalk a few of them – Kung Pao China Bistro and Larry’s Chili Dog – for whatever reason, I never made it out to The Mayfair.  So, this past weekend, I decided to change that and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over there.  (I am not sure what happened with the above photograph, but somehow it turned out a bit wonky and neither the GC nor I realized it at the time.)

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The Historic Mayfair Hotel was originally designed in 1927 by Alexander E. Curlett and Claud W. Beelman, the same architecture team who gave us the Park Plaza Hotel near MacArthur Park (an extremely popular filming location that I have stalked, but have yet to blog about), the Cooper Arms condominium building in Long Beach, and the Los Angeles Board of Trade Building in Downtown L.A.  The 13-story hotel, which at the time was named simply The Mayfair, was commissioned by Texas oil tycoons and was constructed at a cost of $1.5 million – and we’re talking 1920’s dollars!  In its heyday, the luxury property hosted such luminaries as Mary Pickford and John Barrymore.  Raymond Chandler even wrote and set his 1939 short story “I’ll Be Waiting” at The Mayfair, although he dubbed the place the “Windermere Hotel” in the tale.

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The property, which originally boasted 350 rooms, but now has just 304, was the largest hotel west of the Mississippi at one time and featured an immensely popular supper and dance club known as the Rainbow Isle Room, from which George Eckhardts, Jr. and the Rainbow Isle Orchestra would broadcast a live radio show each night.  In 2004, after suffering from a long period of neglect, the structure underwent a massive and much-needed $40 million renovation, at which point it was renamed The Historic Mayfair Hotel.  You can check out some great photographs of the place during its early days on The Mayfair’s Facebook page here.

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In “The Search” episode of The Office, after being stranded at a supposed Scranton, Pennsylvania-area gas station, Michael Scott goes on a walkabout which ends on the rooftop of The Historic Mayfair Hotel.  When Holly finds him there and Michael tells her how much he has missed her, the two finally kiss, ending several years worth of will-they-or-won’t-they-get-together storylines and allowing  audiences to finally breath a long-overdue sigh of relief.  Not surprisingly, the roof area of The Mayfair is closed to the public, so I was unable to snap any pictures of it.

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Mike, from MovieShotsLA, figured out that The Mayfair stood in for the supposed Chicago, Illinois-area The Addison Hotel where Beth Cappadora (Michelle Pfeiffer) attended her 15-year high school reunion in 1999’s The Deep End of the Ocean.

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It was from the lobby of The Mayfair that Beth’s 3-year-old son, Ben Cappadora (Michael McElroy), was kidnapped.

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As you can see above, despite the renovation, the lobby still looks very much the same today as it did back in 1998 when The Deep End of the Ocean was filmed.

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The super-nice front desk clerk that we spoke with while we were there informed us that both the interior and the exterior of the property had also appeared in 1994’s True Lies, as the supposed Washington, D.C.-area Washington Mayfair Hotel where Harry Tasker (Arnold Schwarzenegger), on horseback, chased motor-cycle-riding religious zealot Salim Abu Aziz (Art Malik) through a lobby.

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The Mayfair lobby was actually one of three different lobbies used in that particular scene.  Harry is first shown chasing Salim across the length of The Mayfair’s lobby.

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The two then turn a corner and are magically transported to the now-defunct The Ambassador hotel, the same lobby of which was used as the Regent Beverly Wilshire in 1990’s Pretty Woman.

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The duo then heads outside, “across the street” and into The Westin Bonaventure Hotel.  In reality, when the Ambassador was still standing, it was located a good two miles away from The Bonaventure.  Ah, the magic of Hollywood!

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Thanks to the Richard Dean Anderson Website, I learned that The Historic Mayfair Hotel was also used in the 1986 Season 1 episode of MacGyver titled “The Assassin”.

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I am fairly certain that only the exterior of the property appeared in the episode, though, and that all of the interior hotel scenes were filmed on a set.  And while IMDB states that The Mayfair was also featured in 2009’s Don’t Look Up, I scanned through the flick yesterday while doing research for this post and did not see it pop up anywhere.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalkers John Bengtson, from the SIlent Locations blog, and Owen, from the When Write Is Wrong blog, for telling me about this location and to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for informing me of its appearance in The Deep End of the OceanSmile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Historic Mayfair Hotel, from “The Search” episode of The Office, is located at 1256 West 7th Street in Downtown Los Angeles.  You can visit the hotel’s official website here.

“The Bodyguard” Mansion – aka The Beverly House Compound

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After the sad passing of singer Whitney Houston last month, I mentioned to fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, that we should try to track down the mansion where one of Whitney’s most legendary characters, pop star Rachel Marron, lived in 1992’s The Bodyguard. For some very odd reason, I thought that the place had yet to be found, but Mike told me that way back in 2007 he had come across an article on fave website The Real Estalker about “The Beverly House Compound”, the most expensive home then for sale in the United States.  In the comments section of the post, someone had reported that the very same mansion had been used as Rachel’s residence in The Bodyguard.  How I had not previously come across that information in all my years of stalking is absolutely beyond me, especially considering that the location is one that I have long been itching to stalk.  Well, believe you me, once Mike gave me the address, I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to Beverly Hills to see the place for myself.

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The Beverly House Compound has a vast and storied Hollywood history.  It was originally designed by Gordon B. Kaufmann, the very same architect who also designed the Hoover Dam, the Los Angeles Times Building, Scripps College, and the Athenaeum at the California Institute of Technology, a very popular filming location that I have yet to blog about.  The Compound was commissioned by banker Milton Gerz in 1927 and cost over $1 million to construct – and we’re talking 1920’s money!  In 1947, William Randolph Hearst and his mistress Marion Davies purchased the lavish three-story, 27-room estate, which sat on over 7 acres of land, for $120,000.  Hearst died at the residence in 1951, as did Davies in 1961.  Legend has it that John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier spent part of their 1953 honeymoon at the property and supposedly the mansion was also used as the West Coast headquarters for the Kennedy Presidential Campaign in 1960.

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In 2007, financier Leonard Ross, who purchased The Compound in 1976, put it up for sale for a whopping $165 million, making it the most expensive home on the market in the entire country at the time.  In 2010, the estate, minus three acres of land, was re-listed at the reduced price of $95 million.  According to several articles, the lavish property, which has been expanded over the years, currently boasts four separate houses, a cottage, an apartment, 72,000 square feet of living space, 29 bedrooms, a two-story library, two movie projection rooms, a living room with a 22-foot arched ceiling, two tennis courts, a tennis pavilion, staff accommodations, a 50-foot entry hall, an 82-foot cascading waterfall, a disco, and three separate pools.  You can check out some fabulous interior photographs of the mansion on the This and That and More of the Same blog here.

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In The Bodyguard, the exterior of The Beverly House Compound stood in for the exterior of the palatial home where Rachel Marron lived.

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All of the interiors of Rachel’s estate were filmed at the nearby Greystone Mansion, though.  You can see photographs of the room that was used as Rachel’s fake bedroom here and here.

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And you can see a photograph of the Greystone Mansion kitchen here

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And for the gate to Rachel’s home a third location was used!  The gate actually belongs to the mansion located at 10231 Charing Cross Road in Beverly Hills, which just so happens to be the very same residence where Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston) lived in The Big Lebowski.

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A current Google Street View image of that gate is pictured above.  And while it looks considerably different today than it did in The Bodyguard, you can see that the basic positioning remains the same.

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I tracked down the location of Rachel’s gate thanks to an address number of “10224” that was visible in the background of the scene in which Frank Farmer (Kevin Costner) first arrived at Rachel’s mansion.

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That gate also looks considerably different today, but, as you can see above, much like was the case with Rachel’s gate, the basic positioning remains the same.

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The Beverly House Compound has been the site of constant filming over the years.  In The Godfather, it was used as the mansion where movie producer Jack Woltz (John Marley) lived.  Yes, that mansion.

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According to The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations website, only the exterior of The Compound was used in the filming, though.  All of the interior scenes – including the infamous horse head scene – were shot at an estate located at 95 Middleneck Road on Long Island.

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In the Season 1 episode of The Colbys titled “The Turning Point”, the residence stood in for the supposed Rome mansion where Francesca “Frankie”Colby (Katharine Ross) vacationed with Lord Roger Langdon (David Hedison).

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Ironically enough, though, in the following episode, which was titled “Thursday’s Child”, Greystone Mansion stood in for that same Rome mansion.

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In the 1979 movie The Jerk, the grounds of The Compound were used as the backyard of the home where Navin (Steve Martin) lived after he became rich.

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As you can see above, though, the front of Navin’s home was a different location entirely.

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In 1985’s Fletch, The Compound was where Alan Stanwyk (Tim Matheson) lived.

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The real life interior of the property was also used in the filming.

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In 1985’s Into the Night, the mansion was where Jack Caper (Richard Farnsworth) lived.

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The real life interior of The Compound was used in the filming of that movie, as well.

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Way back in 1966, The Compound was used as the home of Mrs. Sampson (Lauren Bacall) in the thriller Harper.

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At that time, the backyard and pool area of the property looked considerably different than they do today.

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In the Season 3 episode of Charlie’s Angels titled “Rosemary, for Remembrance”, the mansion was where Jake Garfield (Ramon Bieri) lived.

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The real life interior of the mansion was also used in the filming of that episode.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for telling me about this location!  Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Beverly House Compound, aka Rachel Marron’s mansion from The Bodyguard, is located at 1011 North Beverly Drive in Beverly HillsGreystone Mansion, which was used as the interior of Rachel’s home, is located at 905 Loma Vista Drive in Beverly Hills.  The gate to Rachel’s mansion, which looks considerably different today, is located at 10231 Charing Cross Road in Beverly Hills.

AFI’s Warner Bros. Building – aka the Hospital from “The Artist”

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Another locale from The Artist that I found thanks to John Bengtson’s fabulous Silent Locations blog was the Warner Bros. Building on the American Film Institute campus in Los Feliz, which stood in for the exterior of the hospital where George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) was admitted after being injured in a fire towards the end of the Academy Award-winning flick.  Amazingly enough, despite the fact that I have lived in Southern California for over twelve years now, for whatever reason, while I had heard of the legendary film school, I had never before visited it.  So I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out there to stalk the place two weekends ago, shortly after we stopped by Red Studios Hollywood, aka Kinograph Studios from The Artist which I blogged about yesterday.

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The American Film Institute, or “AFI” as it is more commonly known, was founded in 1967 by the National Endowment for the Arts in order to “preserve the history of the motion picture, to honor the artists and their work and to educate the next generation of storytellers.”  Such luminaries as actor Gregory Peck, director Francis Ford Coppola, historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., actor Sidney Poitier, and longtime Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) president Jack Valenti sat on the organization’s original Board of Trustees.  The institute was first headquartered inside of the famous Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills, but moved to its current location, an eight-acre property which formerly housed Immaculate Heart College, in 1983.  AFI Conservatory, the establishment’s fully accredited graduate film school which, in 2011, was named the #1 film school in the world by The Hollywood Reporter, boasts such notable alumni as David Lynch, Edward James Olmos, Darren Aronofsky, Terrence Malick, Amy Heckerling (the writer/director of fave movie Clueless!), Marshall Herskovitz (one of the Executive Producers of fave show My So-Called Life!), Edward Zwick (another of My So-Called Life’s Executive Producers!), and Gary Winick (the director of fave movie 13 Going on 30!).  Talk about a Who’s Who of the film industry!  The Warner Bros. Building (pictured above) is AFI’s main facility and houses classrooms, a soundstage, screening rooms, computer labs, and production offices.

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Thanks to AFI’s hilltop location, the place boasts some rather incredible views of Downtown Los Angeles, as you can see above!

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The Warner Bros. Building only shows up once in The Artist – in the scene in which Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo) arrives at the hospital to check on George.  According to the Los Feliz Ledger website, the short, one-day shoot took place on November 14th, 2010.

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The Artist - The Ebell of Los Angeles filming The Artist 2 - The Ebell of Los Angeles filming

Only the exterior of the Warner Bros. Building was used in the filming.  All of the interior hospital scenes were shot about four miles away at The Ebell of Los Angeles, a private women’s club that I have stalked twice, but have yet to blog about.  And while hundreds upon hundreds of movies have been filmed at the historic property over the years, for today’s post I would like to concentrate on The Artist.  A few different areas of The Ebell appeared in the flick.  When Peppy runs through the hospital hallway and asks a nurse where she can find George’s room, she is actually running through the site’s Garden Arcade.  And while I do not have a photograph of the actual Arcade, the area where it is located is denoted with a pink arrow above.  (You may recognize the courtyard pictured above from the prom scene in fave movie Never Been Kissed.)

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Peppy is then shown running through The Ebell’s Solarium Hallway into the 3rd Floor Terrace (both of which were also used prominently in Forrest Gump).

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John at Silent Locations was lucky enough to speak with Carol Kiefer, the Art Department Coordinator for The Artist, who informed him that The Ebell had also appeared in several other scenes in the movie.  The club’s Art Salon was used as the auction house where George sold all of his belongings after his career took a downturn.

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When leaving the auction, George is shown walking down The Ebell’s Lounge Stairway, followed by his loyal chauffer, Clifton (James Cromwell).

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The club’s Dining Room masqueraded as the storage room in Peppy’s mansion where George discovered all of his former possessions.

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And while the Dining Room was made to appear much smaller than it actually is for the filming and is virtually unrecognizable from its appearance onscreen, I recognized this location thanks to the unique circular-shaped decoration above the window that was visible in the background of the scene.

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Supposedly, the Kinograph Studios office of director Al Zimmer (John Goodman) was also located somewhere inside of The Ebell, but I did not see any areas of the property on either tour that looked even remotely like the screen captures pictured above.  So I am guessing that a room of the property was either completely redone for the filming or that that information is incorrect.

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The anteroom to Zimmer’s office is located at The Ebell, though.  In actuality, it is a small room located on the building’s third floor.

Big THANK YOU to John Bengtson, from the Silent Locations blog, for finding these locations!  Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Warner Bros. Building at the American Film Institute, aka the exterior of the hospital from The Artist, is located at 2021 North Western Avenue in Los Feliz.  You can visit the official AFI website here.  The Ebell of Los Angeles is located at 743 South Lucerne Boulevard in Hancock Park.  Sadly, The Ebell is not currently open to the public, but you can visit the property’s official website here.

Red Studios Hollywood – aka Kinograph Studios from “The Artist”

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In early March, my friend Tony, the fellow stalker who has the amazeballs On Location in Los Angeles Flickr photostream, wrote a comment on my post about the duplex where George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) lived in The Artist alerting me to a blog named Silent Locations.  The blog, which is authored by business lawyer/film historian John Bengtson, features a six-part column chronicling several locales that appeared in The Artist and their connection with various silent films made during Hollywood’s heyday.  I highly recommend checking out the feature and the site in general.  It is fabulous!  Anyway, one of the places mentioned in the column was Red Studios Hollywood, the exterior of which stood in for both the exterior of Kinograph Studios in The Artist and Maroon Cartoons in 1988’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit.  So I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out to stalk the place on a very windy Sunday afternoon two weekends ago.

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The site where Red Studios Hollywood now stands was originally founded as Metro Pictures Back Lot #3 in 1915, long before the company joined forces with Goldwyn Pictures and became Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.  During its Metro heyday, such films as Scaramouche, Little Robinson Crusoe and The Champ were filmed on the premises.  Beginning in May 1946, the lot went through a series of different owners, the most prominent of whom were Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.  The showbiz powerhouse couple leased the property in 1953 and turned it into the very first Desilu Studios, where they shot seasons 3 through 6 of I Love Lucy.  In 1974, the lot became known as Ren-Mar Studios, an independently owned and operated facility where various production companies were able to rent out studio space.  Legendary television producer David E. Kelley made his home there in the 80s and shot Picket Fences (one of my faves!), Chicago Hope, The Practice and the first two seasons of Ally McBeal.  In January 2010, the lot was sold yet again, this time to Red Digital Camera Company, who renamed the place Red Studios Hollywood.

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A few of the countless other productions that have been filmed on the premises over the years include The Golden Girls, The Dick Van Dyke Show, the first four episodes of Seinfeld, The Andy Griffith Show, Make Room for Daddy, Lizzie McGuire, NewsRadio, Empty Nest, Monk, and, most recently, True Blood. The series Weeds was also filmed on the lot, back when it was Ren-Mar, and during Season 4, after Agrestic burned down, producers had Nancy Botwin (Mary-Louise Parker) move to a fictional seaside town named “Ren Mar” in honor of the historic studio.  Love it!

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In The Artist, the back entrance of Red was used as the main entrance of Kinograph Studios, where George Valentin worked at the beginning of the flick.

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As you can see above, that area was changed drastically for the movie – so much so that it is virtually unrecognizable today.  A huge false front was built over the actual studio entrance for the filming and the Hollywood Rounder blog was lucky enough to get to watch it being constructed.  You can check out some very cool pics of the construction here and here, the fake security guard kiosk here, and the finished product here.

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Interestingly enough, when Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo) is shown being dropped off at a location that is supposedly directly across the street from the Kinograph entrance, she is actually on New York Street at Paramount Studios, in front of the building that is used regularly as the Boston police station on Rizzoli & Isles.

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At one point in The Artist, George is also shown walking in between some of the Red Studios Hollywood soundstages.

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The area where he walked is denoted with a pink circle above.

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In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Red’s main entrance on Cahuenga Boulevard stood in for the entrance to Maroon Cartoons, where the famous animated hare worked.

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The courtyard just beyond that entrance was also used in the filming.

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That area is denoted with a pink circle above.

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On a Who Framed Roger Rabbit side-note – while doing research prior to writing this post, I came across a blurb in The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations book which, in reference to the flick’s title, stated, “No, there is no question mark, as it’s considered bad luck in a film title.”  I had never before heard that bit of trivia and found it interesting, especially since my good friend Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong grammatical errors blog, had recently written a post which mentioned WFRR’s punctuation error.  Superstition or not, I think the flick really needed the mark in its title and I found myself inadvertently adding one each time I typed “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” in this post.  I guess some habits are hard to break.

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The music video for Britney Spears’ hit 2000 song “Lucky” was also shot at Ren-Mar and the exterior of the studio is visible in the MTV Making the Video special about the production.

You can watch Part I of the Making the Video of “Lucky” by clicking above.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker John Bengtson, from the Silent Locations blog, for finding this location and to fellow stalker Tony, from the fantastic On Location in Los Angeles Flickr photostream, for pointing me to John’s site!  Smile

Stalk It: Red Studios Hollywood, aka Kinograph Studios from The Artist, is located at 846 North Cahuenga Boulevard in Hollywood.  You can visit the official Red Studios Hollywood website here.  The area of the studio used in The Artist can be found on Lillian Way, in between Willoughby and Waring Avenues.  The studio’s main entrance on Cahuenga Boulevard is the entrance that stood in for Maroon Cartoons in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.  Red Studios Hollywood is not open to the public and does not currently offer a tour.

Runyon Canyon Park from “The Hills”

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A few years ago, after my good friend Nat happened to spot Runyon Canyon Park pop up in an episode of fave reality series The Hills, she sent me an email asking if I had ever stalked the place.  And while I had long known that the locale was not only a big-time celebrity hangout, but also a popular filming location, because I am not a fan of hiking (or working out in general, if we are really being honest here), I had never added it to my “To-Stalk” list.  But I assured Nat, who is very much into calisthenic-type activity and who, unlike me does not actually consider walking to Starbucks a form of exercise, that the next time she came to visit, we would definitely hit the place up.  Which is how, bright and early a few Sundays ago, the Grim Cheaper, Nat and I found ourselves in Hollywood about to embark upon a morning hike at Runyon Canyon Park.  I even bought some new workout pants for the occasion!  (Now, shopping – that is definitely a type of exercise that I can get behind!)  Unfortunately for Nat, though, because there did not seem to be any restrooms on the trail and because I had downed a Venti iced latte shortly before arriving there, our trek was pretty short-lived.  See what I mean?  I was just not made for the outdoors.  The GC made fun of me relentlessly while we were hiking, by the way, due to the fact that I was carrying my Louis Vuitton purse.  Men!  I mean, what the heck else was I supposed to do with it?  Leave it in the car?  As if!

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The 160-acre parcel of land that now makes up Runyon Canyon Park was originally named “No Man’s Canyon”.  It came to be known by its current moniker thanks to one of its early owners, coal baron Carman Runyon, who used the sprawling site as a hunting and riding venue.  In 1929, the grounds were purchased by Irish tenor John McCormack, who had a large mansion built on the premises which he dubbed “San Patrizio”, in honor of St. Patrick.  When A&P Supermarket heir Huntington Hartford bought the estate in 1942, he renamed it “The Pines” and commissioned architect Frank Lloyd Wright to build a pool house on the site.  Hartford’s friend Errol Flynn was a frequent guest at the pool house and is rumored to have thrown some wild parties there.  Sadly, when Jules Berman, a wealthy liquor importer, purchased the property in the late 1960s, he demolished “The Pines”.  The Lloyd Wright-designed pool house was subsequently destroyed by a fire in 1972.  All that remains of the two historic structures are some ruins located near the Fuller Avenue entrance to the park.  So incredibly sad!  In 1984, the City of Los Angeles stepped in and acquired the vacant acreage, subsequently turning it into a public park, as it remains to this day.

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Thanks to Runyon Canyon Park’s proximity to Hollywood and the stunning views that it boasts (which you can see above), the place has long been a stomping ground of the rich and famous.  Just a few of the stars who have been spotted working out there include Gilles Marini, Famke Janssen, Eriq La Salle, Josh Hartnett, Hayden Panettiere, Justin Timberlake, Jessica Biel, Matthew McConaughey, Jake Gyllenhaal, Kathy Griffin, Scarlett Johansson, Josh Duhamel, Kellan Lutz, Ryan Gosling, Dane Cook, Orlando Bloom, Sheryl Crow, Ashley Tisdale, Haylie Duff, Anne Hathaway, Ali Fedotowsky, Amanda Bynes, Matthew Perry, Ali Larter, Joe Jonas, Amanda Seyfried,  Adrian Grenier, Natalie Portman, and Chris Pine.  And while we did not see any celebs during our hike, when fellow stalker Lavonna was in town this past November, she spotted B.J.Novak, aka Ryan Howard from The Office, walking the trails.

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In the Season 3 episode of The Hills titled “With This Ring . . .”, Whitney Port had a one-on-one training session/date with her personal trainer, Jarett Del Bene, at Runyon Canyon Park.

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And in the Season 4 episode of The Hills titled “Who To Choose?”, Lauren Conrad and Audrina Patridge discussed Audrina’s love life while on a hike at Runyon Canyon.  And I could swear that the park showed up in yet another episode of the series in which Lauren and Whitney were shown working out, but I cannot seem to find it anywhere.

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In the Season 4 episode of Seinfeld titled “The Trip, Part 2”, Jerry Seinfeld (who played himself), George Costanza (Jason Alexander), and Kramer (Michael Richards) visited Runyon Canyon Park immediately after Kramer was released from jail, where he was being held as the supposed “The Fog Strangler” serial killer.

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In the 2009 flick Funny People, Runyon Canyon Park was where Ira Wright (Seth Rogan), Leo Koenig (Jonah Hill) and Mark Taylor Jackson (Jason Schwartzman) discussed the illness of fellow comedian George Simmons (Adam Sandler).

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Thanks to fave book Hollywood Escapes: The Moviegoer’s Guide to Exploring Southern California’s Great Outdoors (and I just figured out how to write in color on my blog, by the way!  In heaven!!!!), I also learned that in the ultra-weird 2001 flick The Anniversary Party, Runyon Canyon was where Joe Therrian (Alan Cumming) and his wife Sally (Jennifer Jason Leigh), along with their friends Skye Davidson (Gwyneth Paltrow) and Levi Panes (Michael Panes), searched for their missing dog, Otis.

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Hollywood Escapes also states that 1983’s Breathless and 2005’s Undiscovered were filmed at Runyon Canyon Park, but, unfortunately, I could not find copies of either movie with which to make screen captures for this post.

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Some filming locations are also visible from the various Runyon Canyon trails, including the abandoned Solar Drive mansion from Law & Order: Los Angeles that I blogged about last December;

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and the John Lautner-designed Garcia House from Lethal Weapon 2, which I blogged about way back in February of 2008.  And there is a also private home known as Runyon Ranch located inside of the park that has been featured in countless movies and television shows over the years, including my fave, Beverly Hills, 90210, but I am saving that location for a different post.

Big THANK YOU to my good friend Nat for forcing me to suggesting that I stalk this location.  Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Runyon Canyon Park from The Hills is located at 2001 North Fuller Avenue in Hollywood.  You can visit the park’s official website here.

The “Rain Man” Convenience Store

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Back in February, while doing research on the Hollywood Hills apartment building where Charlie Babbitt (Tom Cruise) lived in 1988’s Rain Man, I came across a September 2004 article on the Palm Springs Life website titled “Quiet on the Set” about filming in the Coachella Valley.  And, let me tell you, I just about fell out of my chair when I read the (rather poorly written) words, “The wind energy farms on Interstate 10 are another popular attraction.  Tom Cruise and Valeria Golino drove past the Palm Springs windmills in the opening minutes of Rain Man.  Cruise exits from a convenience store at Windy Point on Highway 111 and puts sun block on the nose of his autistic brother, Dustin Hoffman.”  Prior to reading the article, I had no idea whatsoever that any Rain Man filming had taken place in the area.  So I, of course, immediately started searching through aerial views of Windy Point trying to locate the convenience store and, amazingly enough, it was not long before I found it!  Yay!  So I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out there to stalk the place two weekends ago while on our way to visit my parents in the Desert.

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In Rain Man, Charlie and his brother, Raymond Babbitt (Dustin Hoffman), stop at the convenience store towards the end of their long cross-country road trip.  It is there that Charlie puts sunscreen on Raymond’s nose causing Raymond to say that his face feels “very slippery”.  LOL

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Remarkably, the convenience store still looks very much the same today as it did when the movie was filmed way back in 1988.

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I absolutely LOVE that the two poles which appeared in the background of the Rain Man scene are still there in real life, almost two and a half decades later!  SO INCREDIBLY COOL!

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While we were stalking the place, the GC and I ventured inside to see if any of the employees happened to know about the filming and, amazingly enough, the woman behind the counter did!  She informed us that the signs that were posted on the store back in 1988 when Rain Man was filmed were still there until just recently, when the property’s new owner had them replaced with the “Food Shop” sign pictured above.  Oh, why, oh why did I not know about this location sooner?  Ugh!

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On a Rain Man side-note – I am itching to track down the laundromat where Charlie made a phone call to his business partner, Lenny (Ralph Seymour), and learned that the four Lamborghinis he was trying to sell had all been repossessed.  The GC has a hunch that it is located in Nevada, somewhere near Red Rock Canyon, and I think he might be right.  I have not had time to do any research on it, though, but thought I would put it out there to my fellow stalkers.  Does the location look familiar to anyone?

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And on a Palm Springs side-note – while in the Desert last week, fellow stalker Kim informed me that a celebrity golf tournament was going to be taking place on Sunday, March 4th.  So, much to the GC’s chagrin, I, of course, just had to stalk it.  I ended up having an AMAZING time and really cannot thank Kim enough!  The stars (all of whom were incredibly nice) that I met while there were scratch golfer Oliver Hudson (Kate Hudson’s brother and Goldie Hawn’s son), from Dawson’s Creek and Rules of Engagement;

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Sam Page, from Shark (such a cutie!);

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Patrick Warburton, aka “David Puddy” from Seinfeld;

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Rob Morrow, from Numb3rs and Northern Exposure (SO amazingly nice – LOVE HIM!);

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Richard Karn, aka “Al Borland” from Home Improvement;

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Mike Inez, from Alice in Chains;

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Christopher McDonald, aka “Shooter McGavin” from Happy Gilmore (it was so incredibly cool to see “Shooter” play golf in person!);

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guitarist/songwriter/music producer Steve “The Colonel” Cropper (he was also a member of The Blue Brothers band in both the 1980 and 2000 movies of the same name);

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Cheech Marin;

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and Alice Cooper.  Such a fabulous day!  Thank you, Kim!  Smile

You can check out a great article about several Midwest Rain Man filming locations that I stumbled upon yesterday while doing research for this post on the Road Trip Memories blog here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The convenience store from Rain Man is located at 60490 Overture Drive, about two miles south of where State Route 111 meets the Interstate 10 Freeway, in Palm Springs.

George Valentin’s Duplex from “The Artist”

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As I mentioned way back in early 2010 in my post about Julia Child’s childhood home, one of the best parts about being in the Screen Actors Guild is the fact that all Guild members are sent several “For Your Consideration” DVDs just prior to the SAG Awards each year.  One of the DVDs that I received this particular year was The Artist and I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Out of all of the movies nominated, I definitely think it deserved to win the Best Picture Oscar for 2012.  The concept was completely novel, the cinematography beautiful, the acting stellar, and best of all, in my opinion at least, was the fact that it featured numerous Los Angeles-area locations.  It was actually My Week with Marilyn, though, that knocked my socks off and won my SAG vote for “Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role”.  Michelle Williams was absolutely PHENOMENAL in it and not only managed to capture Marilyn’s walk, voice and mannerisms, but also that quality that MM had of not being able to take your eyes off of her.  How that characteristic can be acted is absolutely beyond me, but Michelle did it, and seamlessly at that.  I honestly cannot say enough good things about My Week with Marilyn or Michelle’s performance in it and I am beyond saddened that she did not take home the Academy Award!  I mean, honestly, how many does Meryl Streep really need?  But I digress.  Anyway, as soon as I finished watching The Artist, I, of course, immediately started searching for the many locales featured in it, the most important of which was the duplex where silent film actor George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) lived towards the end of the flick.  Thankfully, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, was able to track it down fairly quickly for me, and the two of us dropped by to stalk it while in the area a couple of weeks ago.

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In The Artist, George Valentin sees his career falter during the advance of “talking” pictures, much like real-life silent film actor Douglas Fairbanks, on whom the character of George seems to be loosely based.  After divorcing his wife Doris (Penelope Ann Miller), George is forced to move out of his ornate Hollywood estate – which is located inside of the gated Fremont Place neighborhood in Hancock Park, just a few doors down from the Taken mansion, which just so happens to be where Peppy Miller (the absolutely adorable Berenice Bejo) lived in The Artist – and into the duplex pictured above.  It is while living in the duplex that George (SPOILER ALERT) burns copies of his former films, accidentally setting fire to the property and almost killing himself in the process.

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I sent screen captures of George’s duplex to Mike shortly after I first watched The Artist and, like me, he was convinced that the property was located somewhere in Hancock Park.  And while we spent more than a few fruitless hours looking for it there, we both came up completely empty-handed.  It was not until Mike expanded his search a couple of miles to the south that he finally found the right place, just a few blocks north of the 10 Freeway.  And I am very happy to report that the building, which in real life was originally built in 1924, looks exactly the same in person as it did onscreen.

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As does the sidewalk in front of the duplex, which also appeared in the movie.

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Because the interior of George’s residence was very non-descript and because the ceilings were abnormally high, I am fairly certain that a set was used and not the actual duplex.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: George Valentin’s duplex from The Artist is located at 4056 West 21st Street in the Mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles.