Taking the Week Off!

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I will be spending the upcoming week in the Desert visiting my parents, so I will be taking the next five days off from blogging.  But I did have a fabulous pre-Oscar week during which I finally got a picture with my “unicorn”, Miss Kristin Cavallari, who, I am very happy to report, was a complete and total sweetheart!  Sigh!  LOVE her!!!  Anyway, I promise to be back next Monday (March 5th) with a whole new location.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Barb’s Quickie Grill from “Pretty Woman”

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Another Pretty Woman location that I spent countless hours trying to track down recently was the tiny café where Vivian Ward (Julia Roberts) and Edward Lewis (Richard Gere) had dinner towards the end of the classic 1990 flick.  And while the name of the establishment – “Barb’s Quickie Grill” – and a street number – “7006” – were clearly visible in the scene, and a quick Google search had provided me with an address – 7006 Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood – this particular locale actually turned out to be quite the difficult find.  Thanks to a January 2008 Los Angeles Times article, I knew that the restaurant had closed its doors in 1999, but was shocked to discover, when searching on Google Street View, that the structure that had once housed it was nowhere to be found.  The place had seemingly just disappeared right off the sidewalk.  So I immediately dragged the GC right on out to Hollywood to do some in-person investigating, but when we got there, the mystery only deepened.

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In Pretty Woman, Barb’s Quickie Grill did not appear to be flush with the gray façade seemingly located behind it, so I made the assumption that the eatery was a small structure situated in the space in front of it.

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As you can see above, the vertical grooves running down the orange building currently located at 7006 Santa Monica Boulevard clearly match up to those of the gray building visible behind Barb’s Quickie Grill in Pretty Woman.  But, as you can also see above, the sidewalk in front of the orange building is nowhere near big enough to have once housed a restaurant, even one as tiny as Barb’s.

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Perplexed, I returned home, whereupon I enlisted the help of fellow stalkers Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and Scott, from the FindaDeath website, and for the next few days the three of us put in quite a bit of elbow grease doing research on the former eatery.  I even purchased a copy of the book Fantastic Dives, in which the diner had been featured, hoping it would provide some clarity.  Sadly, it did not.  It was not until Mike found this image on the Scotty Moore website that we realized that the lighting and camera angles of Pretty Woman had created an optical illusion and that Barb’s was not a structure that had been located in front of the orange building, but that it actually was the orange building!  Doh!  You can check out some fabulous historic pictures of the eatery that were just added to The Bruce Torrence Hollywood Photograph Collection website here, here, and here.

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The history behind the eatery is almost as heart-warming as the movie in which it once appeared and was actually the main reason I was so darn intent on finding the place.  The establishment was originally founded as “Lou’s Quickie Grill” by Lou Shulkin and his wife, Anita, at a storefront on the corner of Santa Monica Boulevard and Highland Avenue in 1954.  A young L.A.-transplant from Oklahoma City named Barbara Knox started working, first as a dishwasher, then as a waitress, at the short-order café just a short time later.  In 1960, the Grill moved a few blocks west to 7006 Santa Monica Boulevard, directly next door to Radio Recorders (pictured above), the then-largest recording studio in the country.  It did not take long for the legendary vocalists working at RR, as well as countless celebrities filming at other nearby studios, to discover Lou’s.  Just a few of the luminaries who frequented the 12-stool diner throughout its 54-year history include Drew Barrymore, Denzel Washington, James Garner, Ronald Reagan, The Lennon Sisters, Orson Welles, Martin Sheen, Richard Crenna, Bill Cosby, Herb Albert, Buddy Ebsen, Mel Blanc, Jack Benny, and Lawrence Welk.  And while Elvis never actually set foot inside of the establishment, he is said to have ordered deliveries from Lou’s each time he recorded music at RR.

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Amazingly enough, when Lou and Anita decided to retire in August of 1987, they handed the Grill over to Barbara AT NO COST, despite the fact that they had been offered “tremendous” money for the place over the years.  The Shulkins had come to view Barbara as a daughter and, because their own children had established careers in areas outside of the restaurant business, they could think of no better person to endow their beloved café to.  So, in late August, Lou, Anita, and Barbara headed down to the Los Angeles County Hall of Records and Lou signed the restaurant over to his long-time waitress.  The following morning he had the metal “Lou’s Quickie Grill” sign taken off of the roof of the building and replaced with a new neon window sign which read “Barb’s Quickie Grill”.   According to a January 17th, 1988 Lakeland Ledger article, of the incredible gift, Barbara said, “Lou couldn’t give me a gold watch and a handshake and just walk way, like anybody else would.  He’s not that kind of man.”  Barbara continued to run the restaurant successfully, with frequent visits from her benefactors, until 1999, when she regrettably had to close the doors due to an ongoing battle with Alzheimer’s.  She sadly passed away in 2008, at the age of 74.  Sometime after the Grill was closed, the space was taken over by Studio 56, which had replaced Radio Recorders, and was completely remodeled.  You can read an August 18th, 1987 Los Angeles Times article about the Grill here and a January 12, 2008 Los Angeles Time article about Barbara’s passing here.

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In Pretty Woman, Barb’s Quickie Grill appeared very briefly during the montage scene in which Edward takes the day off of work to spend time with Vivian.

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Barbara Knox was even featured in the background of the scene.  So incredibly cool!

Finding this location was definitely a group effort, so a big THANK YOU goes out to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and Scott, from the FindADeath website, for their help.  Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Barb’s Quickie Grill, from Pretty Woman, was formerly located at 7006 Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood.  The location now houses the offices of a CPA and is virtually unrecognizable from its onscreen appearance.

The Milbank Mansion – aka Chapman Academy Preschool from “Daddy Day Care”

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A couple of weeks ago, Tony, my friend and fellow stalker who has the fabulous On Location in Los Angeles Flickr photostream (seriously, it’s amazing – go check it out!), asked me for some help in tracking down the ginormous Mediterranean mansion that stood in for the prestigious Chapman Academy Preschool in the 2003 comedy Daddy Day Care.  Tony had informed me that the residence was used regularly for filming and that it had also been featured recently in the Season 10 episode of fave show CSI: Miami titled “By the Book”.  So I started doing some research on oft-filmed-at Mediterranean estates in Los Angeles and, amazingly, fairly quickly came across a photograph of a gorgeous Country Club Park property named the Milbank Mansion that, sure enough, was the right spot.  So, while Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I were out doing some stalking in the area this past Monday morning, we stopped by the place.  And I have to say that it is pretty darn incredible in person!  Not to mention pretty darn huge!

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The Milbank Mansion was originally built in 1913 for prominent local businessman Isaac Milbank and his wife, Virginia.  The 12-bedroom, 5-bath, 10,059-square-foot home, which sits on 1.79 acres of land, was designed by G. Laurence Stimson, the very same architect who also gave us the legendary Wrigley Mansion, now the Tournament of Roses House, in Pasadena.  The estate is located in the heart of Country Club Park – a historic 250-acre neighborhood situated on the site of the original Los Angeles Country Club, which closed its doors in 1905.  The area was developed and subdivided  by none other than Isaac Milbank himself, along with a business partner named George Chase, beginning in 1906.  The Milbank Mansion, which, according to a June 1988 Los Angeles Times article, is “considered to be the most substantial surviving estate built for a single family in the city of Los Angeles before World War I”, became a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument on December 13, 1989.  You can see some interior photographs of the property here.

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In Daddy Day Care, both the exterior . . .

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. . . and the interior of the Milbank Mansion were used as the Chapman Academy Preschool.

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In the Season 10 Halloween-themed episode of CSI: Miami titled “By the Book”, the mansion stood in for the island estate where a female body that had been entirely drained of blood was found hanging upside down.

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The interior of the estate was also used in the episode.

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In the 1929 silent film Wrong Again, the exterior of the Milbank Mansion was used as the residence where stable hands Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy mistakenly returned a horse named “Blue Boy” thinking they would be able to collect on some reward money being offered for a missing painting also known as “Blue Boy”.

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In the 1975 film noir Farewell, My Lovely, both the interior and the exterior of the Milbank Mansion stood in for the brothel belonging to “L.A.’s famous madam” Francis Amthor (Kate Murtagh).  Of the estate, detective Phillip Marlowe (Robert Mitchum) says, “It was an old house, built as they once built them and don’t build them anymore.  Fitting and proper for housing the world’s oldest profession.”

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In 2006’s Running with Scissors, the interior of the mansion stood in for the home where Dr. Finch (Brian Cox) lived with his crazy family – wife Agnes (Jill Clayburgh) and daughters Hope (Gwyneth Paltrow) and Natalie (Evan Rachel Wood).  The property was dressed rather heavily for the production, though, and is virtually unrecognizable onscreen.

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As you can see above, for the exterior of Dr. Finch’s mansion a different location was used.

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The Milbank Mansion was also supposedly featured in Harold Lloyd’s 1922 silent film Dr. Jack, the 1971 movie Hit Man, and the reality series Beauty and the Geek, but unfortunately I could not find copies of any of those productions to verify that information.  And while several websites have stated that the property also appeared in the 2001 biopic Ali, I scanned through the movie yesterday while making screen captures for this post and did not see it anywhere.

Big THANK YOU to fellow stalker Tony for asking me to find this location!   You can check out Tony’s FANTASTIC On Location in Los Angeles Flickr photostream here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Milbank Mansion, aka the Chapman Academy Preschool from Daddy Day Care, is located at 3340 Country Club Drive in the Country Club Park section of Los Angeles.

The Interior of the “Bruce Almighty” Party House

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In honor of my girl Jen Aniston receiving the 2,642nd star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame today (a ceremony that I will actually not be attending because, after the debacle that was the Horrible Bosses premiere this past summer, I have a severe aversion to any event that has the potential of being too crowded or too chaotic), I thought that I would blog about a location from her 2003 romantic comedy Bruce Almighty.  As I mentioned this past July in my post about the Stern House in Pasadena, which stood in for the exterior of the supposed Buffalo, New York-area Vanderbilt Estate where the Channel 7 news team threw a party in honor of Bruce Nolan (Jim Carrey) in the flick, I was fairly certain that a different property had been used for the interior.  And for the past seven months or so, I had been just a wee-bit obsessed with tracking down that interior.  Unfortunately though, while I searched through countless real estate listings and location websites during my hunt, I had come up completely empty-handed.

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The most memorable aspect of the interior of the Bruce Almighty party house was the two-story front entrance foyer and its dual curving staircases.

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Back in July, while researching the Stern House, I had come across a picture of Jen sitting at the foot of one of those staircases on IMDB’s Bruce Almighty photo page and, it will come as no surprise, that it soon became embedded in my memory.

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So when I spotted that very same staircase pop up in the mansion belonging to wealthy steel businessman Henry Rearden (Grant Bowler) in the 2011 movie Atlas Shrugged: Part I a couple of weeks ago, I just about died!  I, of course, immediately started doing research on Atlas Shrugged filming locations (in fact, I did not even finish watching the film, I became so obsessed!) and fairly quickly found an article in which a commenter had stated that Frank’s residence was located in La Canada Flintridge, across the street from the 2011 Pasadena Showcase House of Design.  And while it would seem that it would be fairly easy to track down the 2011 Showcase House, for whatever maddening reason, I could not find it anywhere!  Fortunately, after spending countless hours searching by myself, I decided to enlist the help of fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, who texted me back a few minutes later with an address.  THANK YOU, Mike!  So, this past Monday afternoon, while the two of us were out doing some stalking in the San Gabriel Valley, we ran right over there to take some pics.

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In real life, the estate, which was originally built in 1993 by architect Wayne Siggard, boasts 5 bedrooms, 7 baths, a whopping 11,700 square feet of living space!!!, and an almost 2-acre plot of land.  The mansion, which, as you can see above, is pretty darn spectacular, is currently listed on MLS for a cool $7,950,000, although it does look like a sale might be pending.  You can visit the home’s real estate website here.  Oh, what I would not give to see the inside of that place in person!

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In Bruce Almighty, the interior of the mansion was used extensively during the party scene and the master bedroom area was where Grace Connelly (Jennifer Aniston) caught Bruce in a passionate embrace with his “Spanish-accented” co-anchor, Susan Ortega (Catherine Bell).

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The estate was also used extensively in Atlas Shrugged: Part I. Both the exterior . . .

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

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And the very same bedroom where Bruce and Susan kissed in Bruce Almighty was also featured as the bedroom of Henry and his wife, Lillian Rearden (Rebecca Wisocky), in Atlas Shrugged.

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Photographs of the magnificent stairwell that I spent over seven months searching for are pictured above.  Sigh!  What I wouldn’t give to sit on them to pose for a photograph like Jen did!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The interior of the Bruce Almighty party house, aka Henry Rearden’s mansion from Atlas Shrugged: Part I, is located at 4158 Commonwealth Avenue in La Canada Flintridge.

The “You, Me and Dupree” House – Revisited

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Today’s location is one that I have actually already once blogged about – way back in April of 2008 – but because it was a fairly short write-up and because I somehow missed one very pertinent detail when reporting on the place, I decided that it was most-definitely worthy of a re-post.  The location?  The adorable Craftsman-style bungalow where newlyweds Carl (Matt Dillon) and Molly (Kate Hudson) lived in the 2006 romantic comedy You, Me and Dupree.  Fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, took me by the property and pointed out the detail that I had inadvertently missed while the two of us were out doing some stalking in the West Adams district a couple of weeks ago and, let me tell you, I just about fell over from shock.  I could hardly believe my eyes when he pointed it out!  What is this detail, you ask?

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As you can see in the screen captures pictured above, in You, Me and Dupree Carl and Molly’s residence appears to be two stories tall.

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In reality, though, and as you can see above, the home, which was built in 1923, is a ONE-story dwelling!  How I missed that fact the first time around is absolutely beyond me, especially being that I usually consider myself to be quite an observant little stalker.  I must have been in the midst of a severe blonde moment when I originally stalked the property!  I am not sure if a fake second level was built on top of the bungalow during the filming or if one was digitally added during post-production, but, either way, I was absolutely gobsmacked (LOVE that word!) when Mike pointed out the discrepancy!

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According to Zillow, in real life the 1,726-square-foot house boasts 2 bedrooms and 2 baths, but Property Shark tracks the place at 4 bedrooms and 3 baths, so someone seems to have gotten their wires crossed with the measurements at some point.

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Being that Carl and Molly’s living room was dominated by a set of stairs that led up to the home’s fake second level, the real life interior of the property was, obviously, not used in the filming.  The inside of their house was, in actuality, just a set that was built on a soundstage at Universal Studios Hollywood.  According to fave website Hooked on Houses, of the set, directors Joe and Anthony Russo said in the movie’s DVD commentary, “We tried to make Carl and Molly’s world sort of warm and accessible and you’ll see that in the choice of their house.  It’s an older home, modest in scale, and the neighborhood feels like it’s been there awhile.”

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Also according to Hooked on Houses, the scene pictured above, in which Carl watches Dupree (Owen Wilson) play baseball with some neighborhood kids, was actually filmed from inside of the real life home, because the directors wanted to “capture the look you can only get through old glass.”  It has been said that “God is in the details” and it is the little details like this that I absolutely LOVE hearing about.

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According to IMDB’s You, Me and Dupree trivia page, the set used for the interior of Molly and Carl’s house was the same one used for the residence of Hope (Mel Harris) and Michael Steadman (Ken Olin) on the 1980s television series thirtysomething. But, as you can see above, while slightly similar, the two are most definitely not one in the same.

Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for pointing out the discrepancy in the number of stories of the You, Me and Dupree house.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The You, Me and Dupree house is located at 2406 Gramercy Park in the West Adams District of Los Angeles.

The Alleyway and The Blue Banana Club from “Pretty Woman”

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As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago in my post about the Pretty Woman party house, fellow stalker Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I have recently been on the hunt for a few of the flick’s more elusive locations – the two most important of which being the alleyway where the body of “Skinny Marie” was found and, across the street from it, The Blue Banana Club where Vivian Ward (Julia Roberts) and Kit De Luca (Laura San Giacomo) hung out in the film.  And, amazingly enough, Mike was able to track down both locales in a relatively short period of time – as were fellow stalkers E.J., from The Movieland Directory website, and Scott Michaels, from the Findadeath website, whom I also enlisted in the hunt.  So, while out doing some stalking in the Hollywood area three weekends ago, I dragged the Grim Cheaper right on over to stalk both spots.

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In one of Pretty Woman’s opening scenes, Vivian is shown walking through an alleyway where the dead body of a fellow prostitute named Skinny Marie has just been pulled out of a garbage dumpster.

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While watching the scene, Mike happened to recognize the unique roofline of the historic Miceli’s Restaurant in the background behind a very young Hank Azaria, who played the role of a nameless homicide detective who laments about tourists taking photographs of Skinny Marie’s body in the flick.  From there, Mike simply used Google Street View to look for an alley in the area half a block west and on the opposite side of the street from Miceli’s.  And voila, it was not long before he found the right spot!  Yay!

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As it turns out, though, the Pretty Woman alleyway is not actually an alleyway at all, as we had originally thought, but the main lobby of The Outpost Building – a Spanish-Colonial-style structure that was commissioned by a Mr. and Mrs. B.C. Donnelly and designed by architect B.B. Horner in 1927.  The historic property, which was fashioned after stores in Madrid, Spain, was originally comprised of apartment units that became home to countless aspiring starlets during the Hollywood heyday, but today is made up solely of offices and retail space.

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Sadly, the building was closed when we showed up to stalk it, but I did manage to snap the above photographs through the glass front doors.  As you can see, the “alley” still looks exactly the same today as it did in Pretty Woman, despite the fact that over twenty-two years have since passed!  Even the shoe shine stand that Vivian walked by is still there!  LOVE IT!

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Amazingly enough, when I showed Mike the photographs I had taken of the lobby of The Outpost Building, he immediately recognized the place as the “Celebrity Apartments” where Tom Turner (Greg Kinnear) lived in the 1996 comedy Dear God. Both the exterior of the property . . .

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. . . and the lobby area were used in the flick.  In an interesting twist, Dear God was directed by none other than Garry Marshall, the very same man who also directed Pretty Woman.  I guess the guy just has a thing for The Outpost Building!

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Thanks to the Lenrek website, I also discovered that in the 1984 cult classic Angel, high school student/prostitute Molly “Angel” Stewart (Donna Wilkes) walked from the rear entrance of The Outpost Building, through the lobby and out the front door while on the search for a serial killer.

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Interestingly enough, according to the GPSMyCity website, The Outpost Building also has a connection to novelist Raymond Chandler.  In his 1939 mystery The Big Sleep, Chandler describes Geiger’s Rare Books and Deluxe Editions as follows: “A. G. Geiger’s place was a store frontage on the north side of the boulevard near Las Palmas.  The entrance door was set far back in the middle and there was a copper trim on the windows, which were backed with Chinese screens, so I couldn’t see into the store.  There was a lot of oriental junk in the windows.  I don’t know whether it was any good, not being a collector of antiques, except unpaid bills.  The entrance door was plate glass, but I couldn’t see much through that either, because the store was very dim.  A building entrance adjoined it on one side and on the other was a glittering credit jewelry establishment.”  Apparently, numerous Chandler aficionados believe that that description was inspired by none other than The Outpost Building.  So incredibly cool!

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Once Mike had located The Outpost Building, tracking down The Blue Banana Club was a snap, since in the movie it was shown to be situated directly across the street from the alleyway where Skinny Marie’s body was found.

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Shockingly enough, The Blue Banana Club was actually a part of the historic Egyptian Theatre!  At the time that the movie was filmed, the property belonged to the United Artists Corporation and it looked considerably different than it does today, but you can see pictures of the place in its Pretty Woman state on The Bruce Torrence Hollywood Photograph Collection website here and here, and on the Gorillas Don’t Blog website here.  Ironically enough, a few minutes after Mike had texted me to let me know that The Blue Banana was actually the Egyptian Theatre, I received an email from both E.J. and Scott telling me the exact same thing.  Great minds . . .

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Today, the storefront that stood in for The Blue Banana houses the newly-opened Maui and Sons Bar & Grill.  I am, unfortunately, unsure of what was in that location at the time of the filming, but back in the 1930s through the 1950s it housed the Larry Dine men’s clothing store and, in more recent years, it was the site of a Lickity Split ice cream shop.

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In his commentary on the Pretty Woman 15th Anniversary Special Edition DVD, Garry Marshall states that, while set dressers had created a fake exterior for the outside of The Blue Banana Club, the interior scenes were filmed at an actual club located somewhere in Hollywood.  Sadly though, as of yet, we have been unable to track down that location.

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The interior looks like it might have been some sort of historic building, though, as it features some fairly ornate detailing, as you can see in the above screen capture.

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On a side-note – My good friend Katie, from the Matthew Lillard Online website, is hosting a contest today to win two tickets to the Hollywood Rush show, in which the cutie actor will be directing a ten-minute play, taking place this Sunday night at 7 p.m. at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre in L.A.  You can enter the contest on Matthew Lillard Online or on twitter at @mattlillardfans.

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Big THANK YOU to fellow stalkers Mike, from MovieShotsLA, E.J., from The Movieland Directory, and Scott, from Findadeath, for finding these locations!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Pretty Woman alleyway is actually the lobby of The Outpost Building, which is located at 6715 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood.  You can visit the property’s official website here.  Maui and Sons Bar & Grill, aka the exterior of The Blue Banana Club from Pretty Woman, is located across the street at 6708 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood.  You can visit the restaurant’s official website here.

The Redbury Hotel from “Entourage”

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Last July, while doing some cyber-stalking, I came across an article on the USA TODAY Travel website about the numerous Southern California hotels and restaurants featured in the eighth and final season of the hit television series Entourage.  One of the spots mentioned in the blurb was Tinseltown’s newly-opened The Redbury Hotel, which appeared in the episode titled “The Big Bang”, and, thanks to its dark crimson walls, unique architecture and old Hollywood vibe, I immediately became enamored of the place.  I, of course, added the locale to my “To-Stalk” list right then and there, but, for whatever reason, did not make it out there to actually do so until three weekends ago.

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And I am very happy to report that the place did not disappoint!  To say that I am in love with The Redbury would be a gross understatement.  The 57-room boutique hotel, which first opened in November of 2010, was the brainchild of sbe Entertainment Group founder/CEO Sam Nazarian and photographer/music video director Matthew Rolston.  The 5-story structure was originally conceived as a high-end, $50 million condominium project by the Palisades Development company, but that venture was forced to be scrapped during the real estate downturn.  In February of 2010, at which time the building was about 80-percent complete, it was purchased by the CIM Group, who re-envisioned the locale as an upscale hotel and hired Nazarian and Rolston to manage and design it, respectively.

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The name Redbury comes from a combination of “red”, the hue that Palisades Development had already painted the building, and “bury”, in honor of San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district.  According to an August 2010 Los Angeles Times article, the hotel’s eclectic style is a mix of “bohemian, 1960s flower power and old Hollywood”.  Apparently, Rolston wanted the locale to feel “’theatrical’, a little bit like actually being in one of my photographs or music videos”.  And, as you can see above, he succeeded with that vision – in spades!  The Redbury is honestly like nothing I have ever seen before and absolutely does feel like a movie set come to life.  I so loved it that I was even tempted to book a room while we were there for a spontaneous little stay-cation, but the Grim Cheaper was, of course, having none of that.

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The Redbury staff was BEYOND friendly and, even though none of the hotel’s restaurants were open while we were stalking the place, I was allowed to go inside to take a peek at each of them and told that I could snap “all of the photographs you want” – six little words that I absolutely LOVE to hear.  The areas of the hotel that we visited included the Library Bar – which honestly feels more like the ultra-cozy living room of a very stylish friend’s house than a public bar;

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The Glade courtyard lounge – a huge terrace garden complete with teak decking, Moorish-style lanterns and outdoor couches and daybeds;

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and Cleo – an ultra-hip Middle-Eastern-style restaurant that is dominated by a large 1917 movie poster of actress Theda Bara dressed as Cleopatra.  The Library Bar, Glade and Cleo are all major celebrity hotspots.  Just a few of the stars who have been spotted at the one of the three watering holes include my girl Kristin Cavallari, my man Matt Lanter (sigh!), Drew Barrymore, Matthew Lillard, Jamie Foxx, Hilary Duff, Joe Jonas, Ashley Greene, Audrina Patridge, Emma Roberts, Hayden Panettiere, Sam Trammell, the entire Kardashian/Jenner family, Courteney Cox, Josh Hopkins, Anna Paquin, Stephen Moyer, Adam Brody, Neve Campbell, Carla Gugino, Nia Vardalos, Jesse Williams, Lauren Conrad, Lo Bosworth, Whitney Port, Busy Phillips, Stacey Keibler, David Beckham, Kirstie Alley, Cheryl Burke, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Jessica Lowndes, Gillian Zinser, Sarah Hyland, Salma Hayek, Mila Kunis, and Ali Fedotowsky.

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In “The Big Bang” episode of Entourage, Cleo restaurant was where Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) ambushed Vanity Fair reporter Sophia Lear (Alice Eve) and tried to convince her that he was not a womanizer.  And while the USA TODAY Travel article stated that the series had filmed scenes “throughout the hotel, including its Library lounge”, I did not spot any other areas of the property in “The Big Bang” or in other episodes from Season 8, so I believe that information is incorrect.

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The yet-to-be released movie Between Us, which stars Julia Stiles, Melissa George and Taye Diggs, also did some filming at The Redbury.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The Redbury Hotel, from “The Big Bang” episode of Entourage, is located at 1717 Vine Street in Hollywood.  You can visit the hotel’s official website here.

Oliver’s Palm Springs House from “The O.C.”

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As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the Grim Cheaper and I have just recently started watching fave series The O.C. over again from the beginning and one location that popped up during the first season that I have been absolutely dying to find and stalk was the supposed-Palm-Springs-area house that belonged to troublemaker Oliver Trask (Taylor Handley) in the episode titled “The Links”.  So imagine my surprise when fellow stalker Geoff, of the 90210Locations website, randomly emailed me last week, after seeing my post on Café-Club Fais Do-Do (which stood in for a Tijuana nightclub in one of The O.C.’s early episodes), to let me know that he had tracked down a few of the show’s more elusive locales, one of which was Oliver’s Palm Springs residence!  I kid you not!  As you can imagine, I was absolutely bowled over by this information and, as I told Geoff, would have run out to stalk the place right then and there had it not been pouring at the time.  When the rain finally did subside the following morning, I, of course, rushed right on over to the house to finally stalk it.  Yay!

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In “The Links” episode of The O.C., Oliver invites the Newport gang – Ryan Atwood (Ben McKenzie), Seth Cohen (Adam Brody), Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton), Luke Ward (Chris Carmack), Summer Roberts (Rachel Bilson), and Anna Stern (Samaire Armstrong) – to spend the weekend with him at his parents’ mid-century-modern-style home in Palm Springs, which he states is located “right on PGA West”.  And while Geoff originally thought that the property was in Huntington Beach, near the Seacliff Country Club where the group played golf in the episode, he came up completely empty-handed after searching the area.  Then, a few months later, while trying to track down a different locale in South Pasadena, he spotted a house on Arroyo Drive that looked vaguely familiar.  He was unsure of where he had seen the residence before, but made a note of the address.  It was not until a couple of weeks afterwards that he happened to re-watch “The Links” episode of The O.C. and realized that the house that had looked so familiar was Oliver’s.  Nicely done, Geoff!

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In real life, the 3-bedroom, 3-bath, 3,032-square-foot home, which was originally built in 1959 and sits on almost half an acre of land, is pretty darn spectacular!  In fact, the main reason that I wanted to stalk the property so badly, besides the fact that it appeared on The O.C. of course, was that I had fallen in love with its mid-century-style architecture pretty much as soon as it had appeared on my TV screen.  And I am very happy to report that, in person, the place did not disappoint.

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As you can see above, the residence most definitely does look like a Palm-Springs-area home, so it is not very hard to see why producers chose to use it in “The Links” episode.

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The real-life interior of the property, and even some of the real-life furniture – both of which you can see photographs of here – were also used in the episode.

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I am fairly certain, though, that the bedrooms where Ryan, Marissa, Seth, and Anna stayed were just sets that were built inside of a soundstage at Raleigh Studios Manhattan Beach where the series was lensed, as they do not seem to match the real-life interior of the house.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Oliver’s Palm Springs house from “The Links” episode of The O.C. is located at 534 Arroyo Drive in South Pasadena.

Robert Reed’s Former Home

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I (along with cutie Matt Lanter – sigh!) would like to start out today by wishing all of my fellow stalkers a very happy Valentine’s Day!  Smile And now, on with the post!

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A couple of weeks ago, while doing research on the Nanny and the Professor house, I happened to stumble upon an article on my friend Scott Michaels’ FindADeath website about Robert Reed, the Shakespearian-trained actor who is most famous for having portrayed architect/patriarch Mike Brady on the 1970s television sitcom The Brady Bunch. And, let me tell you, I almost fell right out of my chair when I read the portion of the article which stated that the star had lived the majority of his later years right here in Pasadena.  Come again, now?  How in the world had I not previously known this information??  Especially considering that The Brady Bunch is one of my favorite shows of all time!  I mean, why on earth is this data not posted right there on the homepage of the official City of Pasadena website, or on a plaque on the walls of City Hall itself??  It is a pretty major claim to fame – in my eyes at least!  Sheesh!  Do I have to think of everything?  Anyway, I was so excited about the news that I ran right out to stalk the place later that same week.

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According to Zillow, Robert Reed’s former home, which was originally built in 1947 and sits on almost half an acre of land, boasts 3 bedrooms, 4 baths, and 4,400 square feet of living space.  There seems to be a bit of a discrepancy somewhere, though, because the Property Shark website has a differing set of statistics which state that the abode measures 4 bedrooms, 5 baths, and 4,010 square feet of living space.  And, unfortunately, I am unsure of which information is correct.  Either way, I cannot express how incredibly cool I think it is that Robert Reed, who was a household name and an instantly recognizable star at the time, lived in a dwelling that was largely visible from the street.  Love it!

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According to his death certificate, which can be viewed on the FindADeath website, Robert Reed passed away at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena on Tuesday, May 12th, 1992, and not at his home as several websites have stated.  The actor was 59 years old at the time.  His funeral was held at All Saints Church in Pasadena, an oft-filmed-at location that I have yet to blog about, and he is buried at Memorial Park Cemetery in Skokie, Illinois.  According to a commenter named Rita on the FindADeath site, the home pictured above was not Robert Reed’s first Pasadena-area residence.  The star, who was born John Robert Rietz, originally purchased a property located at 1210 South Arroyo Boulevard sometime during the mid-sixties.  That gargantuan abode, which boasts 3 bedrooms, 5 baths, a whopping 9,218 square feet, and 0.84 acres of land, is, sadly, not at all visible from the street, though, so I did not attempt to stalk it.  Reed sold his original Pasadena residence sometime around 1985, at which point he moved about a half a mile east, into the sprawling Spanish-style home where he would live out the remainder of his years.

Big THANK YOU to Scott Michaels, from the FindADeath website, for finding this location!  Smile

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: Robert Reed’s former house is located at 980 Stoneridge Drive in PasadenaThe Cravens Estate, from Commander in Chief and JAG, is located right around the corner at 430 Madeline Drive in Pasadena.