The “Scream” Grocery Store

The Scream Grocery Store (29 of 34)

I love a good grocery store locale (as evidenced here, here, here and here)!  My dad worked in markets throughout my childhood and I spent a lot of time with him at “the office,” which is where my affinity stems from.  So even though I had already blogged about Pacific Market, the Santa Rosa bodega that cameoed in horror favorite Scream (which my aunt and uncle, who live in the area, stalked on my behalf back in 2008), I still had to hit the place up when I traveled to Sonoma County in October 2016.  Going through my photos from that trip in preparation for this post made me a bit misty-eyed.  While in town, I dragged my mom, aunt, two uncles, longtime BFF, and her boyfriend to every.single.locale. featured in the 1996 flick.  Oh, how I wish I could do it all over again – especially the visit to Pacific Market, where my stalking resulted in a free bottle of champagne!  But more on that in a bit.

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Per newspaper ads, the property that currently houses Pacific Market has been a grocery store since at least as far back as 1950, at which time it was known as Pohley’s Market.

 The Scream Grocery Store (33 of 34)

It has gone through several different grocer iterations in the years since – as well as a few renovations, I’m sure.  When the Scream cast and crew descended upon the area in the spring of 1996, the shop was known as Town and Country Market.

The Scream Grocery Store (1 of 34)

The upscale store was known for its fine wines, gourmet foods, and other specialty items.  A former ad for the place I found on Newspapers.com touted Town and Country as a spot “Where old-fashioned courtesy and relaxed shopping are yours at supermarket prices.”

The Scream Grocery Store (10 of 34)

Town and Country became the third store in the Pacific Market chain when it was acquired by the Mohar family in 1997, a year after Scream was filmed on the premises.  Initially established in 1948 by Stan and Mary Mohar, the grocery company was light years ahead of its time as far as healthful eating was concerned, dedicating an entire section of each outpost to organic produce from the start!  Unfortunately, with the purchase came some renovations, which I’ll cover further down.

The Scream Grocery Store (16 of 34)

The Santa Rosa outpost was subsequently sold on two more occasions (first in 2012 and then again in 2016), each time retaining the Pacific Market name.  The latter sale occurred just prior to my visit, during which I had the good fortune of meeting the new owner, who could not have been nicer!  Turns out, he had no idea of his store’s cinematic history and was thrilled to learn about it!  As I filled him in on Pacific Market’s role in Scream and where filming had taken place, I couldn’t help but relish in his enthusiasm over the cameo and had to throw out a few suggestions to honor it, such as stationing a Ghostface mask in the freezer aisle so that its reflection could forever be visible in the glass doors.  I am unsure if he implemented the idea, but it’s genius, right?  As our chat wound down, he asked me what I like to drink.  I told him champagne (of course) and he promptly grabbed a very nice bottle off the shelf and gifted it to me – which was the first time any of my stalkings ever resulted in free bubbly!

The Scream Grocery Store (22 of 34)

In Scream, Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) and Tatum Riley (Rose McGowan) head to what was then Town and Country Market to buy party supplies for the soiree Stuart Macher (Matthew Lillard) is hosting to celebrate classes being canceled due to the murder of two fellow Woodsboro High students.  Sadly, the part of the store the girls walk by at the top of the scene was extensively remolded after filming took place, with the side window and wooden patio railing removed, as you can see below.

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The Scream Grocery Store (1 of 4)

This was done to allow for a new entrance (pictured below) to be built at the corner of the market, one that would be more accessible to the surrounding wraparound parking lot.

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As such, the southeast tip of the building was essentially blown out and diagonally-situated doors installed in its place.  (The support beam visible below marks exactly where the demolished corner used to come out to.)

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The store’s original main entrance, which was situated on the south side of the market and which Sidney and Tatum walked through in Scream, is just a set of windows today.

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The Scream Grocery Store (1 of 1)

Completely framed in, the windows are situated behind seasonal displays and grocery cart storage and semi-obscured from view.

The Scream Grocery Store (1 of 3)

The Scream Grocery Store (3 of 3)

The bulk of the Scream scene takes place inside Pacific Market, in aisle 5 to be precise – the freezer aisle (dun dun dun!) – which Tatum and Sidney walk the length of.

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The Scream Grocery Store (4 of 4)

It, too, has been remodeled, unfortunately.  The freezer aisle used to be zigzag in shape.  It was in the shorter section, where the aisle zagged off toward the front of the store, that Sidney grabbed popsicles and ice cream and announced she was “sexually anorexic.”

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Today, the freezer section is one straight line with an open refrigerated display case situated in the spot where Sidney and Tatum perused frozen desserts.  Though I don’t have a photo taken from the same angle shown in Scream, the area where the girls were positioned is pretty much right where the woman in blue is standing below.  Because the freezer aisle pretty much ends where the new front doors stand, I believe the alteration was made to accommodate for their construction.

The Scream Grocery Store (1 of 1)

It is as the girls leave the aisle that Ghostface’s reflection becomes visible in a freezer case door – as I said, dun dun dun!  (I accidentally took the photo below from the wrong angle, but as you can see the freezer doors have also since been swapped out for new ones.)

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The Scream Grocery Store (3 of 3)

It is not at all hard to see why Wes Craven and the rest of the production team landed on the store as a location for Scream.  Pacific Market is the perfect little neighborhood grocer.  And while the segment shot there is short, it is significant as it not only encapsulates the idyllic small town nature of Woodsboro, but the naivete of the teens at the center of the story who are out buying ice cream and Tostitos for a party celebrating school being cancelled due to the murder spree ravaging their town!  Talk about a juxtaposition!  (The song that plays at the top of the scene is also perfection, btw.)

The Scream Grocery Store (9 of 34)

I really could not have timed my visit to Pacific Market better as the fall decorations adorning the store only added to its homey feel.  I mean, if that’s not the perfect slice of Americana pictured below, I don’t know what is!

The Scream Grocery Store (3 of 34)

And yeah, had to do it!

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Even my aunt got in on the fun!

The Scream Grocery Store (13 of 34)

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

Big THANK YOU to my aunt and uncle for originally stalking this location for me back in 2008, taking me to stalk it myself in 2016, and then re-stalking it for me again this past weekend.  When I sat down to edit my photos for this post, I realized I hadn’t taken any that matched what was shown in Scream, so I asked if they might head out there to snap better comparison shots.  They happily obliged and sent me all that appear in this post.  (For those counting, that’s their third stalk of the place – and no, they’re not fans of the movie in the slightest.)  I honestly can’t thank them enough!  Smile

The Scream Grocery Store (15 of 34)

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Pacific Market, aka the former Town and Country Market from Scream, is located at 1465 Town and Country Drive in Santa Rosa.  You can visit the store’s official website here.

The “Scream” Video Store

Bradley Video from Scream (22 of 24)

Extremely nostalgic by nature, I was recently thinking about the demise of video stores and how many movies would suffer if made today because of it – movies like The Holiday, Clerks and, of course, Scream.  Without the scene set at Woodsboro’s local VHS rental spot in the latter, in which Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy) schools buddy Stuart Macher (Matthew Lillard) on the “very specific formula” followed by slasher flicks, much of the tongue-in-cheek nature of the storyline would have been tragically lost.  I blogged about Santa Rosa’s Bradley Video, where the segment was shot, back in 2008, though I had never actually stalked it myself, instead sending my aunt Lea, who lives in the area, to do so on my behalf.  By the time I next made it up to Sonoma County in 2016, the shop had long since shut down, but I still included it in my Scream stalking itinerary, which encompassed every.single.location featured in the 1996 horror classic down to the hotel where the cast and crew stayed during the 55-day shoot, as well as the warehouse that served as the production’s soundstage.  The vast majority of those sites remain on my To-Blog List and I figured today was the perfect time to get to posting about them, starting with Bradley Video.

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When Lea stalked Bradley Video for me in 2008, the store was still in operation.  In fact, it was her local rental place and she and her husband would visit it regularly.  Sadly, it went the way of most VHS leasing establishments, initially closing its doors in 2005 after its owner, William Bradley, filed for bankruptcy.  There were 11 shops in the chain at the time, all of which shuttered that same year.  In a fitting twist, the majority of the company’s outposts, including the one from Scream (located on Marlow Road) were curtained on October 31st!  As The Press Democrat reported a few days later, calls to the Sebastopol outlet were met with a message stating, “Bradley Video is closing its stores for good, and this store is closed.  Happy Halloween.”  Though I am sad it is no longer open, if a horror movie location has to shutter, I can think of no better day to do it than Halloween!

Bradley Video Collage 1

That wasn’t the end of the Marlow Road store, though.  In January 2006, the shop was was re-opened by West Coast Video, along with 6 others in the Bradley chain.

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The rebirth was short-lived, however, and the Marlow Road BV closed once again in early 2009, shortly after my aunt’s stalk of it.

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Amazingly, the space has remained vacant ever since, which is great news for us Scream aficionados as it has resulted in very few changes to the exterior.

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The same goes for the interior, which I was thrilled to discover as I peeked through the windows!  Despite the passage of 23 years, two separate closures, an ownership change, and an almost-decade long vacancy, the Bradley Video site still looks exactly as it did onscreen!

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I cannot express how thrilled I was to see the very same muted fuchsia carpeting that Stu and Randy walked upon still lining the floor of the space!  Also visible?  Faded markings surrounding the areas where the shelving used to stand!

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Bradley Video from Scream (9 of 24)

The rectangular pillar stationed behind Randy throughout the scene also remains intact, though today it is mirrored.

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Bradley Video from Scream (10 of 24)

Per Scream’s production notes, Sonoma County was chosen as a backdrop for the lurid tale thanks to its “innocent, familiar” locales which provided the perfect setting for the movie’s more macabre sequences.  And no site is more innocent or familiar than a local video store!  It is at Bradley Video that Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich), Stu, and several other Woodsboro High students head to rent movies after classes are cancelled due to the murder spree taking place in town.  While there, we get these choice words from video store employee/resident slasher flick expert Randy, “See, the police are always off track with this sh*t.  If they watched Prom Night, they’d save time.  There’s a formula to it – a very simple formula!  EVERYBODY’S A SUSPECT!”  As I was not able to venture inside the former Bradley Video space, my photographs were, obviously, not taken from an angle matching that of the movie, but I believe the image below shows basically the same vantage point, minus the anteroom visible in the foreground.

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Bradley Video from Scream (19 of 24)

As for the detritus strewn about, per a commenter named Rich Brasil on the Bloody Disgusting website, the location is currently used to house supplies for a neighboring Chinese restaurant.

Bradley Video from Scream (12 of 24)

Bradley Video from Scream (15 of 24)

Filming of the Bradley Video scene took place on Monday, May 6th, 1996 (the 16th day of production) according to the Scream call sheets, which my friend Ashley of The Drewseum was kind enough to give me copies of.  Actors were required to report to the locale at 9:15 a.m. and the weather was “sunny and cloudy, dry, breezy at times” with highs in the mid-60s.  There were a total of 40 extras on set (including “2 babes for Billy”) and the shoot was scheduled to wrap at 6 p.m.

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Bradley Video from Scream (11 of 24)

And while I am thrilled the Bradley Video space remains so unchanged from that 1996 cameo, at the same time it is a bit disheartening that the site of such a famous cinematic moment exists in such a sad state.  I would love to see the place re-open, but with the interior left intact, of course.  Scream video store pop-up, anyone?

Bradley Video from Scream (7 of 24)

Bradley Video from Scream (1 of 24)

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

Big THANK YOU to my aunt Lea for initially stalking Bradley Video for me and taking the images dated 2008 that appear in this post.  Smile

Bradley Video from Scream (23 of 24)

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Bradley Video, from Scream, was formerly located in the Rosewood Village shopping center at 3080 Marlow Road in Santa Rosa.  Its former storefront, Unit A19, is denoted with an orange arrow below and its onetime frontage marked by orange lines.

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Hilton Sonoma Wine Country – Where the Cast of “Scream” Stayed During Filming

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I typically begin compiling notes on a location and roughly outlining a post weeks before I hit publish.  Today’s article, about the Hilton Sonoma Wine Country, where the cast and crew of Scream stayed during the 1996 film’s 55-day shoot, is no different.  Sadly though, devastation struck shortly after I penned that preliminary edit.  I am extremely sorry to report that the Santa Rosa-area hotel was destroyed by the Tubbs Fire in the early morning hours of October 9th.  When I learned the news last Friday morning, just as I was sitting down to write this post, I felt like I had been punched in the gut.  I could not – and still cannot – believe the Scream hotel is gone.  I am heartbroken.  And yes, I do realize it is a bit silly to be heartbroken over the loss considering the fact that the property didn’t even appear in the movie, but, at the same time, it was such an important part of the production and has been talked about by the cast in so many interviews that it honestly feels as if a piece of history has been lost.  I am so thankful that I was able to stalk the Hilton last October during a trip up north and, even though it is no longer, figured I should still continue on with the post and share the many images I took of it for posterity.

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I learned about the Hilton and its role in the production of Scream from my friend Ashley, of The Drewseum website, who (as I’ve mentioned previously) was kind enough to share with me some call sheets from the flick that she has managed to get her hands on over the years.  Besides detailing scene, wardrobe, and prop information for a particular date, each sheet also notes both the pickup time and location of the various actors scheduled to work that day.  As indicated in the sheets, Neve Campbell, Drew Barrymore, Matthew Lillard, and the rest of the cast were picked up in the lobby of the DoubleTree Hotel located at 3555 Round Barn Boulevard in Santa Rosa prior to each shoot.

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Hilton Sonoma Wine Country from Scream-1190389

At some point after Scream was filmed in 1996, the property was transitioned to a Hilton, though, according to my aunt who lives in the area, not much of it was altered during the changeover and, up until the fire, it still looked much the same as it did in the ‘90s.

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Hilton Sonoma Wine Country from Scream-1190375

Typically, a hotel where a cast and crew stayed during the filming of a movie wouldn’t have that much meaning to me, but, in this case, because of Santa Rosa’s small-town vibe, the Scream team spent much of their free time together on the property.  Unlike New York or L.A. or any other metropolis, where actors can step outside of their lodging and find a wide array of nightlife and activities at their fingertips, Sonoma County is a rather sleepy area.  So the group hung out together, entertaining themselves on the hotel grounds, which created a tight-knit family atmosphere that I doubt would have occurred (at least not to the same degree) had Scream been shot elsewhere.

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The Hilton was actually the location I was most excited about seeing during my NorCal trip, mainly because of an interview with Matthew Lillard that I watched years prior.  Unfortunately, I can’t find a clip of the interview anywhere online, but, in it, the actor talked about holing up with the rest of the cast in Neve Campbell’s hotel room after filming wrapped each day or night and watching horror flicks.  I love any and all behind-the-scenes tidbits like that and the thought of the cast huddled up watching scary movies together, while in the midst of shooting what turned out to be one of the most influential scary movies of all time, is pretty incredible.

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Matthew is hardly the only Scream cast member to have mentioned the hotel in interviews over the years.  In fact, I’ve found that, more than any other location associated with the movie, the Hilton is the one talked about the most.  In the 2011 documentary Still Screaming: The Ultimate Scary Movie Retrospective, Neve Campbell reminisces, “We were all staying in the hotel – in like a little motel – the whole crew and cast.  And we were just having a great time.  I think we kind of couldn’t believe we were getting paid to have fun like that.”  (Though the Hilton was actually quite large, because of the way it was laid out, with outcroppings of two- and three-story buildings dotted around the premises, it did have the feel of a small motel.)

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Hilton Sonoma Wine Country from Scream-1190379

 That same year, in an Entertainment Weekly article, Jamie Kennedy also reminisced about the property, saying “We’d go home at night to the DoubleTree Hotel, and it was the first hotel I ever went to that gave you a cookie at night.”

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Neve spoke of the Hilton again in a 2016 Entertainment Tonight exclusive, stating, “The cast would hang out in the mornings because we would shoot all night.  We would get in cars and go back to our hotel and we would be covered in blood and there would be people going to work at 6 or 7 a.m. and they’d see me covered in corn syrup.  The look on those peoples’ faces was always humorous.  We would close all the curtains and hang out and have a drink.  We were sitting in one of our bedrooms and we were like, ‘Could you imagine if this was good enough that there might be a Halloween costume?’  And we were like, ‘No, that couldn’t possibly happen!’  And now it’s 20 years later and I still see the Halloween costume every year in all the shops.  It’s pretty amazing.”

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Just this past July, Skeet Ulrich, who played killer Billy Loomis, gave an interview to The AV Club in which he mentioned the Hilton.  He said, “I was fortunate in that the hotel suite they gave me had two rooms, so I used one just to sleep, and the other one . . . I was 26, I think, when I made it, and I was playing a 17- or 18-year-old, so I went straight to the mall and bought every hard-rock poster and black lights and everything, and I turned the other room into Billy’s room.  And I’d sit in there and just read about John Wayne Gacy and play the most satanic music I could find and just try and find him rather quickly in that environment.”

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All the anecdotes and tidbits I had heard about the hotel over the years enveloped me as I walked around the property.  I couldn’t help but wonder which room each cast member stayed in;

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if they were all grouped in the same area or spread apart;

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if they checked in themselves;

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did they walk down this hall;

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or that one;

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if they swam in the pool during their off-time;

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if they sat by the fire;

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hung out in the lobby;

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ate at the on-site restaurant – etc., etc., etc.

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Needless to say, my mind was buzzing.  And yes, I am fully aware that I have an unnatural obsession with anything and everything related to Scream.

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You can see some photographs of what the property looks like post-fire here, here, and here.  And you can read an interview with a man who was staying at the Hilton when the inferno struck here.  The hotel was actually one of the first places hit by the Tubbs blaze and, because it broke out so quickly, guests had virtually no warning.  Most were awakened by a knock on the door from security guards at around 3 a.m. on October 9th and told to evacuate immediately.  The man in the interview did not even have time to put on shoes.  I can’t imagine how scary that must have been.

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Hilton Sonoma Wine Country from Scream-1190382

In watching this drone footage of the Hilton site, it seems that the three buildings surrounding the pool, on the western edge of the property, remain intact.  So at least a part of the location still stands.  A word of warning – watching the video clip is extremely disheartening.  The devastation that citizens of Sonoma County are facing is unfathomable.  My thoughts and prayers are with them.

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Big THANK YOU to my friends Ashley, from the Drewseum, for telling me about this location and Katie, from Matthew Lillard Online, for trying to help me pinpoint the interview in which Matthew talked about the hotel !  Smile

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

Hilton Sonoma Wine Country from Scream-1190376

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Hilton Sonoma Wine Country, where the cast of Scream stayed during filming, was formerly located at 3555 Round Barn Boulevard in Santa Rosa.  Sadly, the property was destroyed by the Tubbs Fire and no longer stands.

The “Scream” Warehouse

The Warehouse from Scream-1190142

There has been so much tragedy in the world as of late.  I’ve always avoided watching the news, but recently I feel like not even turning on my TV at all.  Between the heartbreaking massacre in Las Vegas, the multitude of hurricanes plummeting the Eastern seaboard, and the fires ravaging both Orange and Sonoma Counties, devastation seems to be everywhere.  My mom and I were actually in Santa Rosa visiting my aunt and uncle last year at this exact time.  Hearing reports of the blaze desolating the area has been particularly saddening as I can’t help but think of the incredibly happy time we spent there, traversing pretty much all of Wine Country to stalk film locations, mainly from my favorite scary movie Scream, which was shot in its entirety in the region.  (Thankfully, my aunt and uncle are both safe, as is their house.)  I have yet to blog about the vast majority of the locales we visited during that fabulous trip and thought covering one today would be especially poignant.

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Scream is a bit of an anomaly in the motion picture world being that it was lensed almost exclusively at actual locations.  Very few sets were utilized in the shoot, which took place over the course of eight weeks beginning in April 1996.  During my visit to Northern California, I dragged my mom, aunt and uncle (as well as another uncle, my longtime BFF, Nat, and her boyfriend, Tony – there was literally an entire squad of us!) to every single site featured in the flick – every. single. one.  I was so fixated on being thorough that we even stalked the warehouse that served as a soundstage during the production.  Though the building is completely non-descript with absolutely no recognizable elements tying it to the film – not to mention it was either largely remodeled or demolished with a new structure now standing in its place (I’ll extrapolate on that a bit later in the post) – I was thrilled to be seeing it in person.

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The Warehouse from Scream-1190143

As I detailed in last year’s post about the Sonoma Community Center, a portion of Scream was originally set to be shot at Santa Rosa High School.   The school board wound up vetoing the plan at the very last minute, though, leaving director Wes Craven and the rest of the production team scrambling to find a suitable replacement to mask as Woodsboro High.  Enter the Sonoma Community Center, whose then manager offered up the site for use.  Though the center did serve as a school up until 1948, it lacked several spaces detailed in the Scream script.  So a couple of sets were built at a Santa Rosa warehouse to accommodate for the missing spots.

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The Warehouse from Scream-1190145

I learned of the warehouse’s existence and location thanks to my friend/Drew Barrymore aficionado Ashley, who runs The Drewseum website.  As I mentioned in my October 2016 post about the Shadow of a Doubt house (which also appeared in Scream), over the years Ashley has managed to get her hands on a few Scream call sheets and she was kind enough to share them with me.  Let me tell you, reading through them is like a dream!  I mean, the location information alone is enough to make my head spin!  One of the coveted pages details Day 9 of production (April 25th, 1996), during which several scenes taking place in Woodsboro High’s school office were lensed.  The sheet lists the location of the shoot as a “warehouse stage” at 2875 Santa Rosa Avenue.  Ashley also shared with me the image below (a screen capture from Scream: The Inside Story), which shows the office set as it existed inside of the warehouse.

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The Woodsboro High office set – which consisted of Principal Arthur Himbry’s (Henry Winkler) office, a small hallway and an anteroom – as it appeared in Scream can be seen below.

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I am fairly certain that the Woodsboro High School girls’ restroom, where Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) encountered the Ghostface killer for the second time, was also a set built at the warehouse.  Though I originally assumed the segment was shot at the Sonoma Community Center, when I stalked the building, I could not find a bathroom even remotely similar to the Scream bathroom anywhere.  I showed the employee who took us on a tour of the place the screen captures below and he informed me that he was fairly certain a restroom of that size and shape had never existed on the premises.  Upon arriving home, I contacted a Scream crew member who got back to me immediately saying that the bathroom was indeed a set.  Since crew member recollections are not always reliable, though, I wanted more confirmation.  So I reached out to Leonora Scelfo and Nancy Anne Ridder, the two actresses who appeared alongside Neve in the scene.  They both could not have been nicer, but had different memories of where filming took place.  Leonora recalled shooting the bathroom scene on location at “the school” (I’m assuming she means the community center), while Nancy informed me that the bit was lensed on a set.  As I said, cast and crew recollections can’t always be trusted.  I am fairly certain, though, that Nancy was correct and that the Woodsboro High girls’ restroom was a set that existed inside of the Santa Rosa warehouse.

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Ashley also has a hunch that a very tiny portion of the infamous opening scene was lensed at the warehouse, as well, though she is not certain of that fact.  Scream’s opening, which took place at the residence of Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore), was actually the first part of the movie to be shot.  At the time, Craven had not yet secured the rights from Fun World for the use of their “Peanut-Eyed Ghost” mask, which executive producer Marianne Maddalena had spotted while scouting the home that was ultimately used as Tatum Riley’s (Rose McGowan) in the flick and which Wes wanted to utilize to shroud Ghostface.  Time running out, Craven had KNB EFX Group re-create the mask with just enough subtle changes so as not to infringe upon Fun World’s copyrighted design.  KNB’s re-creation was used in the first two segments of Scream that were shot – the opening and the scenes in the Woodsboro High School office.  After those bits were lensed, the rights to the Fun World mask were secured and for the rest of the shoot, the Peanut-Eyed Ghost was used.  Both masks are pictured below.  As you’ll notice, the differences between them are rather inconspicuous.  The KNB version has a much sharper triangular nose than its Fun World counterpart.  The KNB mouth boasts an upside-down tear-drop shape, while the Fun World mouth is more of an oval.  And the eyes of the KNB ghost are thinner and more symmetrical than that of Fun World.  Other than those small differences, though, it is pretty hard to tell them apart.

KNB vs Fun World Scream Mask

At some point after the rights were secured, Wes decided to reshoot the brief portion of the opening in which Ghostface is seen through Casey’s back window using the Fun World mask.  Ashley has an inkling that the reshoot (stills of which are pictured below) was done at the warehouse and I think she’s right.  That is just a hunch, though.  While it makes sense that filming of the short, tightly-shot segment would have taken place at the warehouse, it is also entirely possibly producers constructed a tiny window set to shoot the bit at one of the other locales utilized in the production.

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  If you watch the Scream opening carefully, the two different masks are apparent.  The sharp nose of the KNB version (which is pictured in the caps below) is the most noticeable giveaway.

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I also have a hunch that the window portion of Sidney’s bedroom may have been a set.  Though Craven states in Scream’s DVD commentary that filming of the bedroom scenes took place at the actual Santa Rosa residence utilized as Sidney’s in the shoot, as you can see in the image of the warehouse below, some sort of set boasting three single-hung windows is visible to the right of the high school office set.

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Those windows are a darn close match to Sidney’s.  Even her white lace curtains seem to be visible.  In Scream, Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) climbs through Sidney’s window, located on the Prescott home’s second floor, on two different occasions.  To quote Bruce Willis, it seems doubtful, due to liability issues, that Wes would have Skeet clambering onto a roof and through a second-story window not once, but twice during production.  It is much more likely that a small portion of the bedroom with more accessible windows was re-created at the warehouse for the scenes.  Who knows, though?

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When I arrived at 2875 Santa Rosa Avenue last October, I was shocked to find a strip mall that looked to be of rather new construction standing on the premises.  Walking around the center, which is home to a flooring store, a La-Z-Boy outpost and a sports shop, among others, I started to have doubts that the Scream warehouse was still standing.

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Upon arriving home, I looked into the matter further and was dismayed at what I found.  In comparing the 1993 overhead view of the site to the 2009 view via Historic Aerials, it is clear that the warehouse was either razed and completely rebuilt at some point during the interim or remodeled and expanded extensively before being transformed into the strip mall it is now.  My guess is the former, which would mean that the Scream warehouse is no longer.  Try as I might, though, I could not find any confirmation of my hunch or any information on the warehouse or the strip mall whatsoever.  Even searching Santa Rosa building permits provided no clarification.  Regardless, to me the site will always be hallowed ground and I was thrilled that I got to stalk it.

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

Big THANK YOU to Ashley, from The Drewseum, for telling me about this location and for providing so much of the information included in this post!  Smile

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Scream warehouse is/was located at 2875 Santa Rosa Avenue in Santa Rosa.

The Marsh House from “Happy Land”

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Since we’re on the subject of McDonald Avenue (you can read Wednesday’s post about the McDonald Mansion from Pollyanna here), I figured I should write about another of its famous homes.  While doing research on the picturesque Santa Rosa street, one of the area’s most oft-filmed spots, prior to my trip up to Northern California last October, I came across a post on the Dear Old Hollywood website about Happy Land filming locations.  I had never heard of the 1943 drama prior to reading the post, but was immediately taken with one of the locales mentioned – a gorgeous Victorian dwelling that portrayed the Marsh family residence in the film.  So I made sure to add it to my NorCal Must-Stalk List.

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In person, the house did not disappoint.  I mean, look at the place!  It’s stunning!

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All that detailing is sublime!

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The 2-story pad, which was originally built in 1890, is much larger than it appears to be from the street, boasting 5 bedrooms, 4 baths, and a whopping 3,594 square feet of living space.

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Amazingly, the dwelling still looks pretty much exactly the same today as it did when Happy Land was shot 74 years ago.

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I finally sat down to watch the movie earlier this week.  While a sweet film, Happy Land is, ironically enough, extremely sad.  The storyline centers around Lew (Don Ameche) and Agnes Marsh (Frances Dee), a couple trying to come to grips with the death of their son, Rusty (Richard Crane), who was killed in World War II.  Told via flashbacks, Happy Land reminds me a bit of A Christmas Carol, but without the Christmas theme.

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The Marsh’s idyllic home, said to be located at 1127 Willson Avenue in Hartfield, Iowa, was featured throughout the film.

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I absolutely love that the property’s real life address number was visible in the movie.  The address placard that appeared in Happy Land even looks to be the same one that is still installed above the front door today!

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Dear Old Hollywood founder Robby Cress set about tracking down the Happy Land house prior to a 2013 trip to Northern California. Though he had heard that the movie was shot in Santa Rosa, he had no idea how to begin searching the area for the Marsh’s stately Victorian.  It was none other than Alfred Hitchcock who wound up giving him an assist.  The Master of Suspense filmed his famed 1943 thriller Shadow of a Doubt on McDonald Avenue and Robby figured Happy Land might have done the same.  So he began searching the street and, sure enough, found the pad just three blocks north of the property Hitch used.

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While the exterior of the residence was utilized extensively in Happy Land, I do not believe that the interior made an appearance onscreen.  I cannot find any interior photographs of the actual dwelling to compare to what was shown in the movie, but it is my hunch that inside of the Marsh home was a set built on a soundstage.

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

Big THANK YOU to the Dear Old Hollywood website for finding this location!  Smile

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Marsh family home from Happy Land is located at 1127 McDonald Avenue in Santa Rosa.  Many famous movie houses can be found on the same street.  The McDonald Mansion, aka Mableton, from Pollyanna is located one block south at 1015 McDonaldThe Newton home from the 1943 Alfred Hitchcock thriller Shadow of a Doubt can be found three blocks south at 904 McDonald Avenue.  [The kitchen of that residence was also used as Tatum Riley’s (Rose McGowan) kitchen in Scream.]  And the Newton house from the 1991 made-for-television Shadow of a Doubt remake is located at 815 McDonald.

The McDonald Mansion from “Pollyanna”

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I am fully aware that I have a hyperbolic nature.  I use words like “favorite,” “best,” and “most” a LOT.  Caps, too, for that matter.  I wouldn’t say that I am an exaggerator, though.  I just happen to like a lot of things.  Case in point, I have more “all-time favorite” movies than I can count on one hand.  Incredibly, two of them were shot on the same street – the idyllic McDonald Avenue in Santa Rosa.  The flicks, Disney’s 1960 family drama Pollyanna and the 1996 Wes Craven-directed horror film Scream, could not be more different, but I love them both equally – and am rather obsessed with their locations.  Though I grew up in Northern California, I somehow never stalked McDonald Avenue – until this past October, that is.  While visiting my aunt who lives in the area, I dragged practically my entire family out to see both the house where Tatum Riley (Rose McGowan) lived in Scream (a locale I will be blogging about as part of my Haunted Hollywood postings this year) and the legendary McDonald Mansion, which portrayed Aunt Polly’s (Jane Wyman) estate in Pollyanna. As you can see above, I was just a wee bit excited about the latter.

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The McDonald Mansion was originally built by San Francisco-based engineer/developer Colonel Mark McDonald in 1879.  During the 1860s, McDonald had purchased 160 acres of land in the heart of Santa Rosa and began subdividing and developing it, naming the new neighborhood “McDonald’s Addition.”  His spectacular 14,000-square-foot Stick/Eastlake-style estate became the cornerstone of the upscale community.  Mark, his wife, Ralphine, and their children utilized the home, which they dubbed “Mableton,” as a summer residence.  You can see what the property looked like in its early days here.

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Mark and Ralphine passed away in 1917 and 1918, respectively, whereupon their oldest son, Mark L. McDonald Jr., and his wife, Isabelle, inherited the manse and set about extensively renovating it to their own style.  Sadly, the exterior was stripped of all of its intricate detailing and became virtually unrecognizable – and rather dull.  You can see what it looked like here.  The couple lived on the premises full time until Mark’s death in 1932, at which point Isabelle moved to an apartment in San Francisco, only spending summers at Mableton.  When she passed away in 1960, the estate was bequeathed to her only surviving child, Marcia, who rarely visited the residence and left it to deteriorate.  Upon her passing in 1971, the property was deeded to both the University of Southern California and Stanford University.  The schools ultimately offered to sell the home to the City of Santa Rosa.

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Shockingly, and with no apparent regard for its history, the city made plans to tear the mansion down and build condominiums in its place.  Thankfully, a pathologist named Dr. Jack Leissring stepped in and purchased the home in 1974, saving it from the wrecking ball.  He immediately began restoring the estate to its original grandeur, but disaster struck in 1977 when, while Jack and fellow workers were stripping paint with a torch, a fire broke out completely gutting the residence.  A stalwart Leissring decided to rebuild and ultimately spent the next 19 months doing so.  You can read about his painstaking efforts here and here.   Of the process, he says, “The house was completely stripped of its plaster and lath, all of the bricks from the four chimneys were removed and re-used for walkways and pillars, the redwood sheathing was made into the molding for the house – I designed the knives for the molding cutter.  Thus, the crown molding, base molding, casing molding was made entirely of the original materials of the house.  Most of the dentil details were rotted or broken.  During a rainy winter, I cut-out every one of those pieces that decorate the house.  I reconstructed the railings as well, also using the materials native to the house.  This reconstruction was completely, or almost completely a work both of love and of homage to the historic nature of the materials.  This is my understanding of what historic restoration means.”  I wholeheartedly agree, Jack!  You can see the result of his work here.

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Though the exterior of Mableton is ornate and lavish, its original interior was rather drab.  As Jack explains on his website, “I wish to point out just how ugly this house was inside.  To call this house a mansion was a misnomer.  It had been the summer residence of the McDonalds and was very meanly built – the second story was made of single board walls.  The only graceful aspect of the house was the exterior.”  You can check out some photographs of the property’s interior, with it’s “dark, over-bearing walls and décor,” here.  Jack was not being demeaning in his description – the original inside of the dwelling looked more like a barn than a home!

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In 2005, Leissring sold the McDonald Mansion to Telecom Valley entrepreneur John Webley and his wife, Jennifer.  The couple decided to take Jack’s work even further and spent the next five years renovating the property, along with architect Stephen Rynerson and design historian Paul Duchscherer.  During the restoration, the exterior of the home was brought back to its 1879 self and the interior was completely gutted and re-designed in a Victorian style.  Sadly, Leissring is not a fan of the final product.  On his website, he states, “The subsequent buyers, to whom I sold the house in 2005, who had much too much money, completely remade the house with new materials, and it now looks like a Disneyland display.  Sigh.”  I think it is gorgeous, though.  The interior is now everything one would expect the inside of a grand Victorian mansion to be – stained glass ceilings, inlaid flooring, rich woodwork, and a library befitting the Beast from Beauty and the Beast.  (In Jack’s defense, the Main Hall is very Tower-of-Terror-esque.  But I love it.)  You can see some photographs of the finished home here, here, and here.

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The McDonald Mansion was used extensively in Pollyanna.  As you can see below, though, the dwelling looked quite a bit different in the movie due to the fact that a matte painting was added to the roofline in order to make the property appear larger than it actually is.

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Despite the matte painting and the many renovations that have taken place since Pollyanna was shot in 1960, the McDonald Mansion is still recognizable from its onscreen appearance.

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Only the exterior of the home and its extensive grounds were used in the filming.

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The inside of Polly’s mansion was an elaborately-built studio set.  Ironically – and in a case of life imitating art – it very much resembles the current, rebuilt interior of the McDonald Mansion.  So I guess the property has truly come full circle.

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The McDonald Mansion from Pollyanna is located at 1015 McDonald Avenue in Santa RosaThe Newton home from the 1943 Alfred Hitchcock thriller Shadow of a Doubt is located a block away at 904 McDonald Avenue.  [The kitchen of that residence was also used as Tatum Riley’s (Rose McGowan) kitchen in Scream.]  And the Newton house from the 1991 made-for-television Shadow of a Doubt remake is located across the street from the property used in the original at 815 McDonald Avenue.

The Trenton Family Home from “Cujo”

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Cujo is regularly hailed as one of the best cult horror movies of all time.  I never actually saw the 1983 flick until just prior to writing this post, but I came across some information about the main house – or, more accurately, houses – used in it while researching filming locations in Sonoma County in preparation for my recent trip up north.  What I read fascinated me and I became obsessed with tracking the residences down.  Thanks to a major assist from my aunt Lea, who lives in the area, I was able to do so!

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The article that piqued my interest was originally published by Fort Bragg Advocate-News in 1982 and was then reprinted by the newspaper as part of a “Glance at the Past” series in 2012.  According to the blurb, a façade based upon a real life home in Santa Rosa was constructed around a mansion in Mendocino for the Cujo shoot.  As you can imagine, this information had me practically foaming at the mouth (see what I did there?) to locate both properties.

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I headed right on over to Netflix to scan through Cujo and fairly quickly discerned that the façade referenced in the newspaper article was built to represent the sprawling home where the Trenton family – Donna (Dee Wallace), Vic (Daniel Hugh Kelly), and their son, Tad (Danny Pintauro, in his first movie role) – lived in the flick.  Yes, as shocking as it may seem, the dwelling pictured below is not real, but a false front constructed around an actual residence!

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My first move was to track down the Mendocino property where the façade was built.  Fort Bragg Advocate-News had referenced the home as the “Mullner Mansion” and noted that it overlooked Mendocino Bay.  A Google search of “Mullner Mansion” and “Mendocino” did not yield as much as I had expected in the way of information, but it did kick back a PDF of a pamphlet published by the Mendocino Coast Chamber of Commerce titled Mendocino Coast & Beyond.  The pamphlet contained a four-page section on films made in the area and Cujo was one of the movies detailed.  In it, the Mullner Mansion was said to be located on Crestwood Drive.  Thank you, Chamber of Commerce!

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I immediately opened up Google Street View and was thankful to see that Crestwood Drive was a short road with only a few residences situated on it.  After lining up the houses visible across the street from the Trenton home in Cujo (those houses are pictured below via Street View), I quickly discerned that the façade was constructed around the property located at 44777 Crestwood Drive.

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A view of the real home (via Google Street View) as compared to the Cujo façade is pictured below.

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I was thrilled to see that the fencing visible in Cujo is still intact today, more than three decades after filming took place!

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I was also thrilled to spot what I believe is the top of the actual home’s turret in a shot.  You can check out some additional photos of the real life dwelling here.

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Next up, I was desperate to locate the property that the façade was based upon, which is also where interiors were filmed.  That hunt proved easier said than done.  As noted in the Fort Bragg Advocate-News article, the Santa Rosa pad was known as the “Nielson Mansion.”  A Google search of “Nielson Mansion” and “Santa Rosa” yielded nothing, though.  At what seemed to be a dead end, I called for reinforcements!  My aunt Lea lives in the Santa Rosa area and I asked if she wouldn’t mind going to her local library to search through some 1980s phone books to see if there was a listing for a Nielson family.  She did me one better and called the library to inquire if they had any information on Cujo filming in the area.  A very nice woman ended up returning Lea’s call and provided her with a wealth of info!  As it turns out, Fort Bragg Advocate-News made an error in their reporting.  The librarian explained to my aunt that filming had actually taken place at the Nielsen (not Nielson) Mansion located at 3415 Nielsen Road.  The 1933 dwelling was named for Mrs. Francis Nielsen, who lived on the premises until her death in 1980.

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While the librarian was not sure if the home was still standing, Lea ran right out to stalk the place for me and reported back that it was, indeed, still intact.  I then headed over to stalk it for myself during my trip up north earlier this month.  Unfortunately, as you can see below, the residence is gated and not much is visible from the road.

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Though some portions of it can be seen through the fencing.

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Thankfully, aerial views provide us with much better imagery.  As you can see below, the property is an exact match to the Trenton home from Cujo.

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In real life, the pad boasts 5 bedrooms, 4.5 baths, 4,438 square feet of living space, a 2.03-acre lot, and a 600-square-foot attached garage.

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As mentioned in the Fort Bragg Advocate-News article, most scenes involving the interior of the Trenton home were shot at the property.

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The story behind the Trenton house begs the question, if producers liked the look of the Nielsen Mansion exterior (not to mention the interior) that much, then why not just film at the home?  Why did they instead go to all of the trouble of building an exact replica of the place around another residence in a different city?  My guess is that they wanted to make use of the fabulous views the Mullner Mansion had to offer.  But yikes, it sure does seem like a heck of a lot of effort to go to just to showcase a pretty view.  Either way, I cannot imagine how cool it must have been for the Nielsen family.  I would absolutely love it if an exact replica of the exterior of my home was re-created in another location for a movie shoot!

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A big THANK YOU to my aunt Lea for tracking down this location for me!  Smile

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The façade of the Trenton family home from Cujo was built at 44777 Crestwood Drive in Mendocino.  The façade was modeled after the Nielsen Mansion located at 3415 Nielsen Road in Santa Rosa, where interiors were also filmed.

The “Shadow of a Doubt” Remake House

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Let’s be honest – remakes are rarely, if ever, good.  Especially if they’re of the made-for-television movie variety.  Despite that fact, when I heard that the house from the 1991 made-for-television remake of Shadow of a Doubt was located right across the street from the pad featured in the 1943 original, I just had to stalk it.  (I blogged about the residence from the original film. located at 904 McDonald Avenue in Santa Rosa, yesterday, for those who are interested.)   As you can see above, the property is currently undergoing a major renovation, but, in the interest of being thorough, I figured it was worthy of a post.

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The 6-bedroom, 2-bath, 5,016-square-foot dwelling was originally built in 1878.

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The two-story Stick Eastlake-style residence, which sits on 0.43 acres, was constructed for Dr. and Mrs. Augustus Wright.  Amazingly, the property has only gone through two ownership changes throughout its 138-year history.

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According to a Historic Resources Inventory performed on the house in 2014 in preparation for the renovation, the site is architecturally significant due to its “wealth of Eastlake detailing,” including a pedimented porch and spindle brackets located near the bay window, front veranda and balcony.

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Per the renovation plans, much of the home’s original detailing will be kept intact.

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In the 1991 Shadow of a Doubt remake, the residence portrayed the home of the Newton family.  Unfortunately (but not surprisingly), I could not find a copy of the flick anywhere.  All I was able to track down was this 14-minute clip of it on YouTube, so the screen captures in this post are limited.  As you can see below, though, the house looks very much the same today as it did onscreen 25 years ago.

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I was rather surprised that producers went to all of the trouble to shoot on the same street as the original film, but did not use the same house.  According to a 2002 SFGate article, though, the production team did, in fact, want to shoot at 904 McDonald Avenue.  Unfortunately, Hitchcock, apparently already foreseeing the possibility of a sequel or remake, had included an exclusivity clause in his agreement with the homeowners, which, almost fifty years later, barred the 1991 movie from doing any filming on the premises.  Producers of the remake liked the look of the neighborhood from the original so much, though, that they found a similar-looking property located on the same street and lensed the flick there instead.

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Per the SFGate article, the home’s real life interior was also used in the filming.  Though, as evidenced by my photos, that interior is currently being drastically changed and will likely be completely unrecognizable when renovations are complete.

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As I learned from the Dear Old Hollywood website, the dwelling also made an appearance in the 1948 noir All My Sons as the residence of Jim Bayliss (Lloyd Gough) and Sue Bayliss (Arlene Francis).

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I absolutely love that you can see the home’s 815 address number in the film.

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Though the number placards are no longer in the same position, they look to be the exact ones that were in place in 1948 when the movie was filmed!

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Newton home from the 1991 Shadow of a Doubt remake can be found at 815 McDonald Avenue in Santa Rosa.

The “Shadow of a Doubt” House

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Sitting on a quiet corner on an idyllic street in Santa Rosa is a home with quite a scary movie pedigree.  Not only did the Italianate Victorian-style abode appear in a Hitchcock classic, the 1943 thriller Shadow of a Doubt, but in my favorite horror flick of all time, Scream!  (While the residence has also been credited with bringing about one of the best known horror movie costumes of all time, that information is actually incorrect, as I learned while writing this post.  More on that later.)

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Shadow of a Doubt, which is reported to be Hitchcock’s favorite of all his films, tells the story of a young girl named Charlie Newton (Teresa Wright) whose favorite relative/namesake, Uncle Charlie (Joseph Cotton), comes to stay with her family in their picturesque Santa Rosa home.  Despite the younger Charlie’s initial excitement over the visit, she soon begins to suspect her uncle of being a serial killer whom the police and media have dubbed the “Merry Widow Murderer.”

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According to IMDB, when scouting Santa Rosa for a location to portray the Newton home, Hitchcock advised his production team to find a pretty residence that was a bit worn down, so as to portray the family’s normalcy and middle-class stature.  The group found exactly what they were looking for at 904 McDonald Avenue.  Photos of the house were sent to The Master of Suspense and he gave the go-ahead to secure the location.  When cast and crew showed up a few weeks later to begin filming, Hitch was shocked and dismayed to discover that the homeowners, ecstatic over their dwelling’s big screen debut, had repainted the exterior and made several repairs.  Set designers had to subsequently come in and add effects to the property to reverse the improvements the owners had made and return the site to its former aged and slightly weathered state.

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Amazingly, little of the home has been altered in the 73 years since filming took place.

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The front doors even appear to be the same ones that were in place when the movie was shot in 1943!

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I was especially enamored of the wraparound porch, which made several appearances in Shadow of a Doubt.  I think I need a front porch in my life!

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You can check out some photographs of the cast filming outside of the home here.

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The stately residence was originally built way back in 1876.  You read that right – the home celebrated it 140th birthday this year!  It also has the distinction of being the oldest house on the street.

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The 2-story pad boasts 6 bedrooms, 2 baths, 3,272 square feet, and a detached garage.

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According to a 2002 SF Gate article, the inside of the home was also used in Shadow of a DoubtA 2009 The Press Democrat column disputes that claim, though, as do Turner Classic Movies’ notes on the film.  The latter both contend that all interiors were shot on a soundstage in Hollywood.  Honestly, I am not sure who to believe and unfortunately I could not find any interior photos of the residence to compare to what appeared onscreen.  I was leaning toward sets being used until I read The Press Democrat’s mention that there was a $5,000 ceiling in place on all set building at the time per the War Production Board, so I’m really unsure.  I’ll let my fellow stalkers be the judge.  Areas of the house that were utilized per SF Gate include the bedroom;

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the stairway;

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the parlor (though it has since been remodeled);

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and the dining room (also since remodeled).

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The Newton’s kitchen also made several appearances in Shadow of a Doubt, though SF Gate does not specify if what appeared onscreen was the home’s actual kitchen.

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The room was featured in Scream, though!  In the 1996 flick, it masked as the kitchen in Tatum Riley’s (Rose McGowan) house.  The residence used for exterior shots of Tatum’s home can be found next door at 824 McDonald Avenue (a locale I will be blogging about soon).  The scene in her bedroom was also shot at that property.

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I was hoping that in comparing screen captures from Scream and Shadow of a Doubt, I could discern if filming of the Hitchcock thriller did indeed take place inside 904 McDonald Avenue.  Per SF Gate, the kitchen was remodeled in the 1970s, so my prospects did not look good.  I still had faith, but, sadly, nothing matched up at all.  While I was thrilled to see that both kitchens boast antique stoves (the Shadow of a Doubt house appears to have two of them, actually) . . .

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. . . outside of pipes running up to the ceiling, the stoves don’t resemble each other in the slightest.

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As I mentioned above, there is some erroneous information about the Shadow of a Doubt house floating around in the media.  As was reported in Scream: The Inside Story (which you can watch here), while scouting locations for the movie, the production team toured 904 McDonald Avenue.  At the time, Wes Craven was struggling to find the perfect scary mask for the Ghostface killer to wear.  Fate stepped in during the location scout when executive producer Marianne Maddalena spotted a mask hanging from a bedpost in one of the residence’s rooms.  She immediately knew it was the perfect Ghostface mask and sent images of it to Wes, who agreed, and (after a bit of wrangling to secure the rights), the rest, as they say, is history.  Only problem is, the mask was not actually found in the Shadow of a Doubt house.

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While taking a closer look at the original location photo shown in Scream: The Inside Story, I noticed that the bedroom where the mask was found bore a strong resemblance to Tatum’s bedroom from Scream.

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Comparing screen captures to the photo proved my hunch correct, as you can see above and below.  The fireplace, slanted walls, positioning of doors, and curved staircase banister visible in the hallway in the original location photo all match Tatum’s room from Scream.  Per some call sheets that the lovely Ashley, of the Drewseum website, shared with me (which I practically drooled all over while reading!) and as mentioned above, the bedroom scene was shot not at 904 McDonald Avenue, but next door at 824 McDonald.  So that is the property we should be crediting for gifting the world with the now infamous Ghostface mask!  As promised, I will be doing a post on that location soon.

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

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Newton home from Shadow of a Doubt is located at 904 McDonald Avenue in Santa Rosa.

Pacific Market – The Grocery Store from “Scream”

To continue with October’s Halloween theme, this weekend I sent my Aunt Lea out once again to do a little Scream stalking. And this one was definitely a collaborative effort. Her mission, and she chose to accept it, was to stalk the grocery store used in my favorite horror movie. There had been some confusion on my part, though, as to what grocery store was actually used. While doing some cyber-stalking, I had read that a store named the Town and Country Market in Santa Rosa was the grocery store featured in Scream, but at the same time I couldn’t seem to find any sort of market in the area that went by that name.

Lea had an inkling, though, that the location used was actually a grocery store called Pacific Market, which happened to be located on a street named Town and Country Road. Turns out she was right, and in fact, what she found out in the course of her stalking is that during the time of filming 13 years ago, the market was actually named Town and Country. A few years ago, though, it was purchased by the family-owned Pacific Market chain and the name was changed. So, on Saturday evening Lea dragged her husband, Steve, out to Santa Rosa’s Pacific Market to do a little stalking for me. And apparently I am teaching Lea well, as after snapping some pics, she went up to one of the checkers to verify that the store was in fact used in Scream. Lea said she looked for the oldest checker on duty as she figured he had the greatest chance of working there at the time of filming. Nice! Anyway, the checker verified that filming did in fact take place at that location back in 1995, but that since it was owned by a different company at the time, no one who worked at Town and Country during the filming was currently employed there. 🙁 Bummer! But the good news is that even though the store was purchased by a new owner, for the most part the exterior looks exactly the same as it did in the Scream days.

Pacific Market is a fairly small, gourmet market specializing in locally-grown fresh produce, fine wine, and organic food. The market is actually only featured in one short scene towards the end of Scream. It is the location where Tatum and Sidney stock up on snacks for the party at Stu’s house after school gets cancelled for the day. In the scene, the girls are first shown entering the grocery store through a side entrance.

A few seconds later we see them walking down the frozen food aisle, while discussing Sidney’s relationship issues. At the very end of that scene, as the girls walk away from the freezer section, a reflection of the killer wearing the ghost mask appears on one of the freezer doors. Love it! I absolutely can’t wait to visit the grocery store myself someday. 🙂

Big thank you to my newest stalkers, Lea and Steve!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Pacific Market is located at 1465 Town and Country Drive in Santa Rosa, CA.