The Piru United Methodist Church

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Before the Grim Cheaper and I embarked on our Heritage Valley stalking trip three weekends ago, I did some cyber-stalking of the area and came across this page on fellow stalker Gary’s Seeing Stars website which detailed the Piru United Methodist Church’s appearance in the Season 1 episode of True Blood titled “Sparks Fly Out”.  Now I have never seen even one episode of the vampire series, but while I was looking through the screen captures Gary had posted on his site, I realized that the very same church had also been featured in the Season 7 episode of Desperate Housewives titled “Farewell Letter”.  So, because I do love me some Desperate Housewives, I immediately added the place to my Piru Stalking List and dragged the GC right on over there while we were in the area.

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The Piru United Methodist Church, which was designed in the Carpenter-Gothic-style, was originally built in 1888 by David Caleb Cook, the man who founded the town of Piru.  When Cook first moved to the Santa Clara Valley in 1887, after migrating from Illinois due to health reasons, he purchased a 12,000-acre plot of land, which was then known as Rancho Temescal, and began to set up a community there.  In 1888, he built a railroad depot, a school, a fruit packing house, and the United Methodist Church.  Cook’s father had been a Methodist minister and Cook himself had made his fortune publishing religious books, so his faith was extremely important to him.   And while it does seem that the parish is still in operation today, it was sadly closed when we showed up to stalk it, so we were not able to venture inside.

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I did sure love the sign out front, though.  Winking smile

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And, amazingly enough, as you can see in the historic photograph pictured above, despite having a different steeple, the structure still looks almost exactly the same today as it did when it was first built over 123 years ago!

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Thanks to the church’s small-town, U.S.A.-feel, it is used quite regularly for filming.  In the Season 7 episode of Desperate Housewives titled “Farewell Letter”, it stood in for the supposed-Las-Colinas, Texas-area parochial school where Gabrielle Solis (aka Eva Longoria) confronted her former teacher, Sister Marta (aka Jill Larson), for not believing her when she told her she was being abused as a child.  While there, Gabrielle also gave a few high school students this sage piece of advice, “Now girls, if it were up to me, I’d say avoid math and science.  They cause serious frown lines.”  When her husband, Carlos (aka Ricardo Chavira), suggests that she is just kidding, Gabrielle says, “No!  Young girls today need to know the dangers of long division.”  LOL

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In the Season 1 episode of True Blood titled “Sparks Fly Out”, the United Methodist Church stood in for the supposed-Bon-Temps, Louisiana-area church where Bill Compton (aka Stephen Moyer) spoke to a group of Civil War enthusiasts, including Sookie Stackhouse (aka Anna Paquin) and Sam Merlotte (aka Sam Trammell), about his life as a vampire.

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The church also popped up in the 2000 comedy Space Cowboys as the supposed-Oklahoma-City-area parish where Tank Sullivan (aka James Garner) was a minister.

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In the Season 2 episode of Justified titled “The Spoil”, the church was the site of the town hall meeting during which the citizens of Harlan, Kentucky, including U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens (aka Timothy Olyphant), discussed the pros and cons of allowing Black Pike Coal Company to mine in their area.

Big THANK YOU to Gary, from the Seeing Stars website, for finding this location!

Stalk It: The Piru United Methodist Church, from the “Farewell Letter”episode of Desperate Housewives, is located at 3875 Center Street in Piru.

Dwight’s Bar from “Burlesque”

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One Burlesque filming location that I had been trying to track down for what seems like forever now was Dwight’s Bar, which was featured in the movie’s opening scene as the supposed small-town, Iowa-area watering hole where Ali (aka Christina Aguilera) worked.  Even though the bar only appeared in one very brief, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it establishing shot, I was absolutely obsessed with stalking the place.  For whatever reason, though, I just could not seem to find it.  Then, like magic, just a couple of weeks ago fellow stalker Gary, from the Seeing Stars website, added the location to his Burlesque filming locations page and I just about died of excitement.  The place was, of course, immediately added to the top of my To-Stalk list and I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out there this past weekend. 

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As it turns out, Dwight’s Bar is actually a vacant storefront located in Piru, California, a small town (according to Wikipedia its population was only 1,196 as of a 2000 census!) situated about 50 miles north of Los Angeles in the Santa Clara River Valley.   Piru (pronounced Pie-Roo) was originally founded in 1887 by a wealthy religious book publisher named David C. Cook.  Thanks to its Anytown, U.S.A.-look and proximity to L.A., Piru is an oft-used filming locale and has appeared in hundreds upon hundreds of productions over the years, including Melrose Place, Charmed, Murder, She Wrote, Desert Fury, A Star is Born, Enough, The Dukes of Hazzard, The California Kid, Twilight Zone: The Movie, Torque, Van Helsing, Happy, Texas, Reno 911!, and Race to Witch Mountain.  Piru’s historic downtown area, which consists of a tiny, one-and-a-half-block stretch of small brick buildings and which is the area of town most often seen onscreen, was reconstructed after being largely destroyed during the 1994 Northridge Earthquake.  Since that time, many of the downtown storefronts have remained vacant, which only adds to the appeal of the place for location scouts as the area can be dressed to fit any sort of production. 

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Which was exactly what happened with Burlesque.  For the opening scene of the movie, Downtown Piru was dressed to look like a small farming town in rural Iowa where Ali lives.  And even though its appearance onscreen was brief, I cannot tell you how cool it was to see this location in person!

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Amazingly enough, according to the DVD commentary with Burlesque director/writer Steve Antin, the interior of Dwight’s Bar, where Ali sang “Something’s Got A Hold On Me”, was actually a set created inside of a soundstage at Sony Studios in Culver City and was not built inside of the vacant Piru storefront as I had originally believed.

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Because I had spent so many hours searching for Dwight’s Bar, I immediately recognized the place when it popped up recently in the Season 7 episode of Desperate Housewives titled “Farewell Letter”, in the scene in which Gaby (aka Eva Longoria) and Carlos Solis (aka Ricardo Chavira) return to Gaby’s hometown of Las Colinas, Texas.  In the episode, the two pull up in a taxi directly in front of the storefront that was used in Burlesque.

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Later on in that same episode, Gaby and Carlos venture out to a restaurant where Gaby is fawned over as the local girl who made good.

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In real life, that restaurant is known as the Railway Café and it has appeared in quite a few movies over the years, including 1984’s Rhinestone.

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The actual interior of the Railway Café also appeared in the episode.

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Sadly though, the place was closed when we showed up to stalk it, so I was only able to snap a few pictures of the interior through the front windows.

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The Railway Café can also be seen in the background of Alicia Keys’ “Un-thinkable (I’m Ready)” music video, which starred cutie actor Chad Michael Murray.

Un-thinkable (I’m Ready) video–Piru

You can watch that video by clicking above.

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And, thanks to the Seeing Stars website, I learned that just across the street from Dwight’s Bar is Poncho’s Place, the eatery which stood in for the supposed Bon Temps, Louisiana-area Crawdad’s Family Style Restaurant where Sam Merlotte (aka Sam Trammell) took Sookie Stackhouse (aka Anna Paquin) for a slice of pie in the Season 1 episode of True Blood titled “Sparks Fly Out”. 

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And even though I have never seen even one episode of True Blood, since we were right there I just had to stalk it.

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The real life interior of Poncho’s Place also appeared in the episode.

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Although, as you can see in the above photographs, it was decorated rather differently for the filming.

Big THANK YOU to Gary, from the Seeing Stars website, for finding this location! 

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Dwight’s Bar from Burlesque is located at 3951 East Center Street in Piru.  Poncho’s Place, aka Crawdad’s Restaurant from the “Sparks Fly Out” episode of True Blood, is located just across the street at 3944 Center Street in Piru.  And the Railway Café from the “Farewell Letter” episode of Desperate Housewives is located half a block down the road at 3989 Center Street in Piru.

Watching the Filming of “True Blood”

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Last Wednesday evening I got a text from the owner of POP Champagne & Dessert Bar – my very favorite restaurant and the spot where the Grim Cheaper and I held the rehearsal dinner for our wedding last August – alerting me to the fact that the hit HBO television series True Blood would be filming at his eatery the following evening beginning at 9 p.m.  He invited me to come down to watch and even though I’ve never seen even one episode of the vampire series, I was beyond excited!  I immediately called up Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and asked him to join me as True Blood is his very favorite show.  So, the next night at around 8 p.m. the two of us headed out to POP and were floored to see those ubiquitous yellow filming signs that I so love on the streets surrounding the restaurant.

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True Blood was actually first being shot inside of The Old Towne Pub, a bar that is located right next door to POP, and when filming wrapped there, the production was then set to move outside, to POP’s back entrance, which, oddly enough, was standing in for the front entrance to The Old Towne Pub.  Confused?  I was.  For whatever reason though, even though the two doors look very similar (POP’s back entrance is pictured above left and The Old Towne Pub’s entrance is pictured above right), producers had decided that POP’s back door suited their filming needs better than The Old Towne Pub’s actual entrance.  

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And even though only POP’s back door and the alleyway directly outside of it would be appearing in the episode and none of the restaurant’s actual interiors would be seen, the eatery was required to close its doors during the shoot.  So, I ,of course, just had to take a picture standing in front of the sign announcing that POP would be closing early that evening.  Love it!

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According to one of the crew members that we spoke with, the Old Towne Pub and POP Champagne Bar were being used for a flashback scene that was taking place in a punk bar in 1980’s London.  The courtyard outside of the two bars and the alleyway were dressed to look like 1980’s London for the shoot and there were several British cars parked there, which was very cool to see. 

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The sides of the alley were also packed to the brim with all sorts of filming equipment and props.

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According to one of the security guards that we spoke with, actors Stephen Moyer, who plays Bill Compton on the series, and Ryan Kwanten, who plays Sookie Stackhouse’s brother Jason, were in attendance that evening (at least I think that is what he said, but again I have never seen the show, so I cannot be positive of who was actually there).  Sadly though, we did not spot either of them.  We first watched the filming from a distance in the courtyard area behind the two bars, but we unfortunately could not see very much from there at all.  Then the owner of The Old Towne Pub, who had been standing with us, informed us that we should venture upstairs to the courtyard’s outdoor patio where we would have a much better vantage point.  Well, wouldn’t you know it, just as we made our way up to the second story patio, both Stephen and Ryan were wrapped for the night and walked off of the set.  Apparently they took photographs with several fans who were also watching the filming on their way out, too, so Mike and I majorly lost out!!!  While we were on the patio, we did get to watch a scene being filmed with some of the episode’s guest stars, though, which I was floored about.  Even though I do not watch the show, as you all know I LOVE to watch filming of any sort, so I was in absolute heaven.  And the crew truly (pun intended!) could NOT have been nicer, either.  The first crew member that we spoke with upon arriving at POP was actually a real a-hole and I was fearful that they all might be unfriendly towards us.  But, as it turned out, I really needn’t have worried as the rest of the crew was INCREDIBLY friendly and answered all of our questions about the filming and allowed us to take as many pictures as we wanted.  YAY!  One of them even came up to me to chat about the jacket I was wearing as he had just bought the exact same jacket for his girlfriend for Christmas.  LOVE IT! 

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The following evening, I dragged the GC out to stalk the The Old Towne Pub so that I could snap some picture of the restaurant’s interior where filming had taken place.  Our original plan was to grab a bite to eat there, but unfortunately the restaurant does not serve food and the two of us were absolutely starving, so we did not end up staying.  The server on duty was super nice, though, and let us take all of the photographs of the place that we wanted even though we were not actually eating there.  I definitely plan on re-stalking this location after the True Blood episode airs and doing a more in-depth post on it as an episode of the HBO series Hung was filmed there as was the 2000 movie Bedazzled.

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Mike took the above video on his iPhone of the two guest stars rehearsing the scene that we watched being filmed.  He also took all of the photographs which appear in this post, so, a big THANK YOU goes out to him for allowing me to share them all on my site.  THANK YOU, Mike, from MovieShotsLASmile 

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

POP's back door

Stalk It: POP Champagne and Dessert Bar is located at 33 East Union Street in Old Town Pasadena.  You can visit the restaurant’s official website hereTrue Blood was filmed at POP’s back entrance on Aayes Alley, which is denoted with the pink arrow in the above aerial view and which can be reached from East Holly Street.  The episode was also filmed inside of The Old Towne Pub, which is located at 66 North Fair Oaks Avenue, directly behind the Container Store, in Old Town Pasadena.  You can visit that restaurant’s official website here.