Haunted Hollywood – Page 6

October 26, 2016September 29, 2017

The Trenton Family Home from “Cujo”

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.

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!

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!

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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!

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

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

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.

October 25, 2016September 29, 2017

My Experience at Halloween Horror Nights (Hint – It Was Fabulous!)

Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood is something I have wanted to do forever. Considering my obsession with Halloween, all things spooky and movie studios, it’s kind of a shock that I had never been. The rather steep ticket prices – as well as the fact that everyone told me I shouldn’t bother attending unless I was also going to purchase a Front of Line pass – are what deterred me year after year. When my best friends, Robin and Steffi, announced that they were coming to visit us from Switzerland for a week in mid-October, though, I decided that they were not leaving America without a nighttime visit to Universal. Not only is Halloween Horror Nights a perfect way to celebrate my favorite holiday, but Robin is obsessed with The Walking Dead and the park features a maze themed after the AMC series. So we headed right on over there after picking them up from the airport. While this is not my typical Haunted Hollywood column, because I always had so many questions about Halloween Horror Nights (if it was worth the cost, if Front of Line passes were necessary, if the crowds were prohibitive, etc.), I thought a post on our experience would be a good idea. (I do have to apologize for the quality of my photographs – they were all taken on my iPhone and, being that lighting was low at the park, are not the greatest.)

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In short, I loved, loved, LOVED Halloween Horror Nights. The ticket prices may be high (we paid $90 a person, but the rates fluctuate depending upon which night you attend and how far in advance you are purchasing), but they are worth every penny! We opted not to buy Front of Line passes and, as it turns out, we really didn’t need them. For those who have never attended or looked into attending, Front of Line tickets run about $200 a person (that includes admission to the park). Again, the rates fluctuate depending on the date you attend and how far in advance you are purchasing (late in the game, Front of Line passes cost about $260 per guest!). Our group (read: the Grim Cheaper) just wasn’t willing to pay that much, which, in hindsight, was a good decision. While the lines were definitely long (some over 100 minutes), it is my opinion that Front of Line tickets are not at all necessary.

Because Robin and Steffi were extremely tired from their long flight (and had been awake for more than 24 hours straight at that point), we only stayed at Universal for about two and a half hours. During that time, we were able to go through two mazes and grab a bite to eat. While we, admittedly, saw very little of what Horror Nights has to offer, we had a blast and definitely felt that we got our money’s worth. Heck, just being there and walking through all of the Halloween madness was worth it! And had we arrived when the park opened and stayed until closing, we easily could have experienced most of the attractions sans Front of Line tickets – especially considering that early admission (two hours before the park actually opens) is offered every single night for free, during which time a few select mazes are accessible. So my best advice for enjoying Halloween Horror Nights is to skip the pricey Front of Line tickets and instead get to the park right at 5 p.m., when it opens, and stay until closing at 2 a.m.

I would also suggest purchasing a hotel package if you don’t live in the area. We opted to go that route and our package included tickets to the park and a King Bed Corner Room at the Hilton Los Angeles/Universal City.

Our room was large and had a queen-sized sofa-bed, which was perfect for our group. The Hilton is also within walking distance to the park (it’s about a block to the Universal Studios entrance) and shuttle service to CityWalk is provided, as well.

Our room also boasted incredible views of the park!

It happened to be cloudy the night we attended Halloween Horror Nights, which made for the perfect ambiance. Even our hotel looked spooky!

As I said earlier, just being at Universal, seeing all of the frightening décor and witnessing the many masked figures, aka the “scareactors,” who walk around terrorizing guests was an experience in and of itself. Throw in the multitude of chilling attractions and it was pretty much the perfect night for me!

The first maze we hit up was The Walking Dead Attraction (which is now open during the day and year-round).

I have never seen The Walking Dead (I know, I know – I’m missing out), so I did not really know what to expect, but the maze was uh-maz-ing (pun intended!). I honestly felt like I was walking through a live movie set – the decorations were that good. Add to that the fact that scareactors were jumping out at every turn and the whole thing made for an absolutely terrifying experience. We all screamed our heads off the entire way through. (Though photos were allowed inside and I did attempt to take some at the beginning, with scareactors jumping out at us regularly, I became afraid I might drop my phone and opted to put it away rather quickly.)

My favorite portion of the evening, though, was hands-down the Terror Tram! As part of the attraction, guests are not only able to walk right through the Bates Motel set from Psycho . . .

. . . but right up to the Bates house . . .

. . . and onto the front porch to take a photo with Norman Bates himself! The daytime tram ride does not allow visitors to get up-close-and-personal with the Psycho house (heck, guests aren’t even allowed to get off the tram during the daytime ride), so, for me, this felt like a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Y’all better be sitting down for this next part because it’s downright incredible! Following the visit to the Bates home, guests are invited to walk through the War of the Worlds plane crash set! Yes, you read that right – visitors are actually allowed to walk through the plane crash set from the 2005 film.

I’ve talked about the set – which is comprised of an actual commercial 747 jetliner that was chopped up for the movie – numerous times on my blog. Heck, the site – or at least a free view of it – even made it onto My L.A. Must-Stalk List!

During the daytime tram ride, guests are only driven through the set, so being able to walk through it at a slow speed and see every aspect of it so closely was downright remarkable!

All in all, Halloween Horror Nights was an incredible experience and I cannot more highly recommend it! It might be one of my favorite Halloween events ever!

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Halloween Horror Nights takes place annually from mid-September through the beginning of November at Universal Studios theme parks in Universal City, Orlando, Japan, and Singapore. This year, Halloween Horror Nights Universal Studios Hollywood runs through November 5th. You can find out more information about the event and purchase tickets here.

October 24, 2016September 29, 2017

The Filming Locations of “Scream 3”

As promised on Friday, today’s post is dedicated to the filming locations of Scream 3. Though the third installment is not my favorite of the franchise, I love anything and everything having to do with Scream and figured what better way to celebrate Haunted Hollywood month than by putting together a massive two-part article detailing all of the locations featured in both the first and second sequels. (In case you missed my post on Scream 2 locations, you can read it here.)

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1. 101 Freeway (West Shoreline Drive, north of West Ocean Boulevard, Long Beach) – In Scream 3’s opening segment, Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber) receives his first Ghostface phone call while sitting in traffic, thereby setting off the events of the movie. Though he is said to be stuck on the 101 Freeway in Hollywood, filming actually took place on Shoreline Drive in Long Beach, a popular section of road that is often utilized to mask as a thoroughfare onscreen. A nearby stretch of Shoreline was the site of the memorable freeway scene in the 1995 comedy Clueless. After pushing his way through the stopped cars, Cotton is next shown on the actual 101 Freeway– racing down the southbound Vine Street exit, to be exact, before making a right onto Vine, sailing past the Capital Records Building, and darting down Hollywood Boulevard.

2. Harper House (1336 North Harper Avenue, West Hollywood) – Ghostface terrorizes and eventually kills both Cotton and his girlfriend, Christine (Kelly Rutherford), at Cotton’s Spanish Baroque-style West Hollywood apartment complex, Harper House. The 1929 property, designed by Leland Bryant, originally provided housing for show business and studio professionals and has long been a location manager favorite. Besides Scream 3, the building also popped up in Cop, The Big Picture, The Last Boy Scout, and The Big Fix. The four-story, 21-unit, L-shaped structure, as well as the entire block that it is located on, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Though the interior of an actual Harper House unit was initially utilized in the filming of Scream 3, Cotton’s death scene was later rewritten and reshot. Producers were not able to return to the complex for the reshoot, so an exact replica of the original apartment used was built on a soundstage for the segment. (You can read a more thorough post on this location here.)

3. Sidney’s House (21914 Goldstone Road, Topanga) – Sidney Prescott’s (Neve Campbell) remote cabin in Scream 3 is just that – remote. The rustic pad sits on a forty-acre parcel of land located at the end of a long private road in Topanga. Known as Windwalk Ranch, the sprawling property is comprised of a horse corral, a barn, a ranch house, three dwellings, and a water tank. Unfortunately, none of it is visible to the public. (I wrote a more thorough post on this location here.)

4. Gale’s “Faces of Journalism” Lecture (Moore Hall, Moore 100, UCLA, 457 Portola Plaza, Westwood) – Cast and crew returned to UCLA to film a sequence for Scream 3. It is in Moore 100, a large wood-paneled lecture hall, that Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox) addresses a group of young reporters about the cut-throat nature of the business as part of the F.W. Bestor “Faces of Journalism” Lecture Series. As you can see in my photo, the space is currently undergoing renovations.

Immediately following her speech, Gale learns of Cotton’s shocking murder from Detective Mark Kincaid (Patrick Dempsey) while in the hallway just outside of Moore 100.

5. CBS Studio Center (4024 Radford Avenue, Studio City) – CBS Studio Center pulled double duty in Scream 3. Not only did the production film on the premises, utilizing numerous soundstages and exteriors, but the property also portrayed the fictional Sunrise Studios, where the movie-within-the-movie, Stab 3, was being shot. Originally established as Mack Sennett Studios in 1928, the 38-acre site was renamed CBS Studio Center in 1963 when the CBS Television Network became the lot’s largest tenant. The network purchased the property four years later and, though there have been several name and partnership changes since, it is still owned by CBS today. Countless hits have been lensed on the premises including Gilligan’s Island, Big Brother, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Gunsmoke, The Bob Newhart Show, My Three Sons, Roseanne, Falcon Crest, and Seinfeld. Though the lot does not offer tours, CBS’s main gate on Radford Avenue, which was utilized in a scene in Scream 3 and was also where Jimmy Hughes (Mike O’Malley) worked as a studio security guard on the television series Yes, Dear, is visible from the road.

6. Le Pain Quotidien (8607 Melrose Avenue, West Hollywood) – Gale and Deputy Dewey (David Arquette) meet for an off-the-record chat about the recent murders – as well as their failed romance – on the large wraparound porch of former West Hollywood eatery Replay Café. The family-run Italian-style restaurant, situated next door to the Replay vintage clothing store, became an outpost of Le Pain Quotidien in 2002. Despite the change, the café and its porch still look very much the same today as they did onscreen in Scream 3.

7. Runyon Ranch (3050 Runyon Canyon Road, Hollywood Hills West) – After Roman Bridger (Scott Foley) is taken to the police station to be questioned about the murder of Stab 3 actress Sarah Darling (Jenny McCarthy), the remaining cast members, along with Dewey and Gale, gather at the hilltop home of Jennifer Jolie (Parker Posey). Her rustic, barn-like residence is known as Runyon Ranch in real life. Located on a private road inside of Runyon Canyon Park, the site cannot be reached via car, but is accessible to pedestrians via a short five-minute walk. Both the interior and the exterior of Runyon Ranch were utilized in Scream 3. Though the dwelling was eventually blown up and destroyed in the film, a ¼-scale model was built for the filming of that scene. In real life, the property remains intact and is extremely recognizable from its onscreen appearance. Even Dewey’s airstream trailer is still on the premises! Runyon Ranch has been featured in countless productions over the years, most notably as the spot where David Silver (Brian Austin Green) lived during Season 7 of Beverly Hills, 90210. The locale has also been featured in It’s My Party, Crazy in Alabama, and Hollywood Homicide. (You can read my 2011 post on Runyon Ranch here.)

8. North Hollywood Police Station (11480 Tiara Street, North Hollywood) – Though Scream 2 utilized a police station set at the now defunct Lindsay Studios (love the name!) in Valencia, Scream 3 made use of an actual LAPD office. Detective Kincaid investigates the murders – and delves deep into Sidney’s past – while at the former North Hollywood Police Station, which was originally established in 1957. The North Hollywood Division moved to a new, much larger and modernized facility located less than a mile away at 11640 Burbank Boulevard in May 1997. After that time, the Tiara Street site sat vacant, which made it the perfect spot to shoot the police station scenes for Scream 3. Though there were once plans to turn the property into a senior citizen center, they never came to fruition and the former station was razed in the mid-2000s. The land where it once stood now comprises Tiara Street Park. The original North Hollywood Police Station also appeared in the pilot episode of Adam-12.

9. American Cement Building (2404 Wilshire Boulevard, Westlake) – One of Scream 3’s more memorable locations, the American Cement Building in Westlake served as the office of horror movie producer John Milton (Lance Henriksen). When Wes Craven scouted the site and noticed that it offered stunning views of MacArthur Park’s lake, he mentioned that installing a diving board just outside of Milton’s window would add a whimsical touch. The production team made it happen and the result is an understated, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it bit of humor. The architecturally stunning building was originally constructed as the headquarters for the American Cement Company in 1964. Designed by the Daniel, Mann, Johnson & Mendenhall architecture firm, the dramatic 13-story structure was manufactured out of reinforced concrete and boasts striking latticework on its north and south sides. The location underwent a multi-million-dollar renovation in 2002, during which the office spaces were transformed into 71 live/work lofts. Scream 3 is hardly the first production to make use of the site. The American Cement Building has also appeared in Kill Bill: Vol. 1, the 2015 Entourage movie, Pharrell Williams’ “Come Get It Bae” music video, and Get Him to the Greek. (You can check out my post on the American Cement Building here.)

10. Canfield-Moreno Estate (1923 Micheltorena Street, Silver Lake) – A 22,000-square-foot Italianate-style villa that has long been the subject of Hollywood lore masqueraded as John Milton’s sprawling manse, where Scream 3’s gory climax took place. Known as the Canfield-Moreno Estate, as well as The Paramour Mansion and The Crestmont, the massive property was designed by Robert D. Farquhar in 1923 for silent film star Antonio Moreno and his wife, oil heiress Daisy Canfield Danziger. When the couple decided to separate in 1928, they deeded the 22-room property to the Chloe P. Canfield Memorial Home, a finishing school for girls that was established by Daisy and her sisters. Just a few years later, the heiress tragically lost control of her car while driving on Mulholland Drive, plunged off a 300-foot cliff, and died instantly. Her ghost is said to haunt her former residence to this day. The Canfield Memorial Home was dissolved in the 1950s and the estate later became a boarding house for troubled girls. After being damaged in the 1987 Whittier Narrows earthquake, the site was left abandoned for more than a decade. It was finally purchased in 1998 by a developer who set about returning the once-grand home to its original glory. It has since become an onscreen regular, appearing in such productions as Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, Alias, Monk, Britney Spears’ “My Prerogative” music video, and Brothers & Sisters. It is inside the colorful, Moroccan-style residence that Sidney finally puts an end to the killings that have plagued her since high school. That is until Scream 4, which was shot in Michigan, came along in 2011 and re-opened the mystery, proving Randy’s rule from the second movie correct – “Never, ever, under any circumstances, assume the killer is dead.” (You can read a more in-depth post on the property here.) Big THANK YOU to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, for the photograph below.

Well, that’s it! The complete list of locations featured in Scream 3. If you missed Friday’s post on the L.A. locales from Scream 2, be sure to check it out here. I hope you all enjoyed reading these two articles as much I enjoyed putting them together!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

October 21, 2016September 29, 2017

The L.A. Filming Locations of “Scream 2”

“Hello, Sidney.” Two simple words, spoken by a gravelly-voiced serial killer shrouded by a Father Death mask in one of Scream’s early scenes, and the face of the horror movie genre was changed forever. An empty house and a ringing telephone suddenly had a much more sinister meaning. Scream, which will be celebrating its twentieth anniversary on December 20^th, went on to spawn three sequels, a 2015 television series, and countless imitations. Though the original film was shot in its entirety in Northern California and Scream 4 was filmed in Michigan, large portions of 1997’s Scream 2 and all of 2000’s Scream 3 were lensed in Los Angeles. I recently went on a trek to track down all of the franchise’s SoCal locales. Today, I will be covering Scream 2 and on Monday, Scream 3. Enjoy!

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1. Rialto Theatre (1023 Fair Oaks Avenue, South Pasadena) – Scream 2 opens upon a chaotic scene at a sneak preview of Stab – the franchise’s movie-within-a-movie – which is taking place at the supposed Ohio-area Rialto Theatre. The historic 1925 venue is actually located in South Pasadena and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Though the exterior was dressed with an animatronic knife-wielding arm for the shoot, the Rialto is still very recognizable in person. Don’t go hoping to catch a horror movie screening on the premises, though. The 1,200-seat theatre, one of the last single-screen venues in L.A., was closed to the public in 2010. Plans are currently in the works to re-open it, though. In 2015, the Lewis A. Smith-designed property was purchased by a developer who intends to restore the site to its original glory. In the meantime, fans can enjoy the venue via its many onscreen appearances in such productions as A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, Modern Family (Season 6’s “Crying Out Loud”), The Kentucky Fried Movie, and The Player. (You can read a more in-depth post I wrote about the location back in 2008 here.)

2. Vista Theatre (4473 Sunset Drive, Los Feliz) – Though the lobby of the Rialto was utilized in the Stab sneak preview scene, the auditorium where the actual screening took place is located a good twelve miles west. The spot where Maureen (Jada Pinkett Smith) met her rather public untimely end is the Vista Theatre in Los Feliz. Another Lewis A. Smith creation, the single-screen venue features both Spanish and Egyptian detailing. Originally opened to the public as the Lou Bard Playhouse on October 16th, 1923, the Vista still screens films today. An onscreen regular, the theatre has also appeared on 90210 (Season 3’s Women on the Verge”), in the movies True Romance and Get Shorty, and in Pharrell William’s “Happy” music video. [The unusual Egyptian-themed bathroom where Phil (Omar Epps) was stabbed to death is a spot I am still trying to track down. It does not appear to have been a bathroom at either the Vista or the Rialto and, though several crew members have said otherwise, I am leaning towards it having been a set.]

3. Stab Casey’s House (5730 Busch Drive, Malibu) – “You know, I don’t even know you and I dislike you already.” So says Casey (Heather Graham) to the Ghostface killer in Stab’s opening scene, which was shot at a sleek wood and glass house in Malibu Park. The 4-bedroom, 3-bath residence was designed by Doug Rucker in 1961 and then once again renovated by the prolific Malibu architect in 1989. It is in the home’s sprawling manicured backyard, underneath a massive tree, that Stab Casey meets her grizzly end in a sequence that mimics Casey Becker’s (Drew Barrymore) death from the original Scream. Segments of the scene shot at the house also popped up in 2011’s Scream 4. (I covered this location in greater detail and told the story of the hunt to track it down here.)

4. Omega Beta Zeta Sorority House (2186 East Crary Street, Altadena) – While serving as a sober sister for the night (“Drink with your brain! That’s our motto!”), Cici (Sarah Michelle Gellar) finds herself alone in the Omega Beta Zeta sorority house, where she becomes the third victim of the Ghostface killer, who stabs her and throws her off of a third-floor balcony. Both the interior and the exterior of a large Victorian-style estate in Altadena known as the Crank House were used to represent the Omega Beta Zeta pad in the film. Originally constructed in 1882 by a New Yorker named James Crank, the massive 7-bedroom, 4-bath, 6,450-square-foot property, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is not very visible from the road. The stately manse can be viewed in countless productions, though. The Crank House posed as the supposed New Orleans residence belonging to Roger Strong (Martin Sheen) and his family in Catch Me If You Can. The location also served as Martin Sheen’s home in another production – on the television series The West Wing the interior was used as the interior of the Bartlett Family Farm in New Hampshire. The Crank House is also where Donald “Ducky” Mallard (David McCallum) lives on NCIS and it belonged to Trunchbull (Pam Ferris) in the 1996 movie Matilda. (You can read my previous post on this location here.)

5. Delta Lambda Zeta Sorority House (350 South Grand Avenue, Pasadena) – At the beginning of Scream 2, Hallie (Elise Neal) drags Sidney (Neve Campbell) to a “martini mixer” at Windsor College’s Delta Lambda Zeta sorority house. While there, Sorority Sister Lois (Rebecca Gayheart) and Sorority Sister Murphy (Portia de Rossi) try to woo Sidney into joining their ranks by uttering such classic lines as, “Hi. No I really mean that. Hi.” The Delta Lambda Zeta residence clears out once party-goers learn of Cici’s death and Sidney once again finds herself alone in a house, on the receiving end of a “Hello, Sidney” phone call, and eventually face-to-face with a masked killer. Filming of the scene did not take place at a sorority house at all, but at an enormous 8-bedroom, 4-bath, 7,913-square-foot private residence located in Pasadena’s South Arroyo neighborhood.

6. Kerckhoff Coffeehouse (Kerckhoff Hall, Level 2, UCLA, 308 Westwood Plaza, Westwood) – While at a Windsor College coffee shop over a couple of Baskin-Robbins sundaes, Randy schools Dewey Riley (David Arquette) on “the rules” of making a successful movie sequel. “Number 1 – The body count is always bigger. Number 2 – The death scenes are always much more elaborate. More blood. More gore. Carnage candy. Your core audience just expects it. And Number 3 – If you want your sequel to become a franchise, never, ever, under any circumstances, assume the killer is dead.” (The third rule is only heard in its entirety in the Scream 2 trailer.) The rules segment was shot at UCLA’s first coffee shop, Kerckhoff Coffeehouse, originally established in 1976. The charming café, which is open to the public, offers espresso drinks, pastries, soups, and sandwiches. And while it did serve Baskin-Robbins ice cream at the time of the filming, sadly that is no longer the case.

7. Lecture Hall/Hallway (Humanities Building, A51, UCLA, 415 Portola Plaza, Westwood) – It is at a large auditorium inside one of the University of California, Los Angeles’ oldest structures, the Humanities Building, that Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox) and Dewey look through some of Gale’s crowd footage in the hopes of identifying Ghostface. Though the two are first shown walking through a hallway at Agnes Scott College in Georgia (which was largely used to portray Windsor College in Scream 2) while looking for a room with a VCR to play the footage, the scenery then flips to Humanities A51, a vast UCLA lecture hall, where Gale and Dewey wind up rekindling an old flame. It is not long before Ghostface shows up and destroys their rendezvous, though. Gale is subsequently chased by the killer through a Humanities Building hallway and then into a large sound booth that was actually a set built at a recording studio in Burbank.

Originally known as Kinsey Hall, the Humanities Building was shuttered for renovations in 2005 and renamed. The exterior of the site was also utilized in Scream 2, in a later scene in which Gale rushes outside to make a frantic phone call to the police to announce that Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber) is the killer, while Debbie Salt (Laurie Metcalf) looks on.

8. Officer Andrews and Officer Richards Death Scene (Green Street in between South Los Robles Avenue and Madison Avenue, Pasadena) – The harrowing scene in which Officer Andrews (Philip Pavel) and Officer Richards (Christopher Doyle) are murdered, leaving Sidney and Hallie trapped inside of their locked, crashed police car with Ghostface, was lensed on a quiet tree-lined stretch of Green Street in Pasadena’s Playhouse District. After Sidney and Hallie escape from the destroyed cruiser by discreetly crawling over the unconscious masked killer, the two run east on Green towards South Oakland Avenue, whereupon Sidney decides to head back to the car to remove Ghostface’s mask and learn the killer’s true identity. Ghostface has long since made his getaway, though, and as Sidney walks to the accident scene, Hallie is murdered while standing in front of the First Church of Christ Scientist.

9. Exterior of Windsor College Theatre (Kerckhoff Hall, UCLA, 308 Westwood Plaza, Westwood) – It’s back to UCLA for the start of the film’s climactic finale. Kerckhoff Hall, erected in 1931, stands in for the exterior of the Windsor College Theatre, where Agamemnon, the play Sidney is starring in, is set to be staged. In the segment, Sidney rushes through UCLA’s Election Walk . . .

. . . and up the steps of the Collegiate Gothic-style building, though as soon as she steps inside, she is standing about 15 miles away at a theatre in downtown L.A.

The movie’s final scene, in which Gale forgoes her moment in the spotlight in order to accompany Dewey to the hospital, was also shot in front of Kerckhoff Hall. The building is named in honor of William G. Kerckhoff, a businessman/philanthropist who was not only an original founder of Beverly Hills, but was also responsible for helping to develop hydroelectric power and founded the Southern California Gas Corporation in 1910.

10. Variety Arts Theatre (940 South Figueroa Street, downtown L.A.) – The interior of the Windsor College Theatre, where Scream 2’s bloody climax takes place, was portrayed by the Variety Arts Theatre in downtown Los Angeles. It is there, onstage amongst the crumbling Agamemnon scenery, that the Ghostface identities are finally revealed and Sidney and Cotton form an unlikely alliance. The Variety Arts Theatre was originally constructed as part of the headquarters of the Friday Morning Club, an organization for women, in 1924. Designed by Allison and Allison, Architects, the five-story Neo-Italian Renaissance-style property, now known as the Variety Arts Center, is comprised of offices, meeting space, and two theatres. It is the larger, lower-level venue, originally named The Playhouse, that was featured in Scream 2. After remaining largely closed since the late ‘80s, the Variety Arts was leased by the Los Angeles branch of the Hillsong Church in 2015. Renovations are currently underway and the Pentecostal organization is expected to begin holding services on the premises in 2017. Because of the renovation, I was not able to get inside to take photos, but you can see some interior images of it here. The Variety Arts Theatre also made an appearance in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.

The one location I have as yet been unable to track down (aside from the theatre bathroom featured in the opening scene) is the film theory classroom where loveable film geek Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy) discussed the inferiority of sequels with fellow film theory students Cici, Mickey (Timothy Olyphant) and Film Class Guy #1 (Joshua Jackson). (How would Randy make sequels better? He’d “let the geek get the girl!”) Originally lensed at Agnes Scott College’s Winter Theatre in the Dana Fine Arts Building, the segment was later re-shot in Los Angeles in order to give Sarah Michelle Gellar more screen time. While I do know via several cast and crew members that the reshoot took place at UCLA, I have not been able to pinpoint exactly where. One UCLA employee I spoke with thought that filming might have taken place in Moore 1003 in Moore Hall, but I was able to see that room in person a couple of weeks ago and it does not seem to be the correct spot.

As you can see below and above, the two rooms do not appear to be one and the same. Granted, the space could have been remodeled in the 19 years since Scream 2 was filmed, but there is just not enough that matches up structurally for me to believe it is the right spot. I’d welcome any help any of my fellow stalkers can give me with this one.

Stay tuned for Monday’s post on the L.A. locations featured in Scream 3!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

October 20, 2016September 29, 2017

The “Shadow of a Doubt” Remake House

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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).

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

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!

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

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.

October 19, 2016September 29, 2017

The “Shadow of a Doubt” House

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.”

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.

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

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

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!

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

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.

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

According to a 2002 SF Gate article, the inside of the home was also used in Shadow of a Doubt. A 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;

the stairway;

the parlor (though it has since been remodeled);

and the dining room (also since remodeled).

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.

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.

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) . . .

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

October 18, 2016October 6, 2019

Woodsboro High School from “Scream”

Earlier this month, my mom and I flew to Northern California and embarked upon an epic stalking tour of Scream filming locations. And when I say epic, I mean epic! We hit up everything from the grocery store where Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) and Tatum Riley (Rose McGowan) shopped (the owner of the market gifted me with a bottle of champagne!) to the warehouse where the sets were built to the hotel where the cast and crew stayed during the shoot. I don’t think there’s any spot we missed – and we had a blast! It truly was a family affair, too, with my mom, my aunt, two uncles, my longtime bestie Nat, and her boyfriend, Tony (that’s him standing with me above), all along for the ride. Now none of them care at all about stalking, mind you, but it was so much fun being all together and getting to watch them experience firsthand this unique hobby that I love so much. I wish I could go back and do it all over again! The first spot we hit up during our Scream adventure was the Sonoma Community Center, which masked as Woodsboro High School in the 1996 flick.

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Prior to heading up north, I contacted the Sonoma Community Center to ask if it would be alright to come inside the building and snap some photos. The staff there could not have been nicer! I received an email back almost immediately from an employee who offered to accompany me around the property and show me the specific areas that appeared in the movie, which I took him up on. Scream’s use of the center was fairly extensive. Exterior filming included shots of the front of the structure . . .

. . . as well as its west entrance.

Most interior filming took place on the community center’s second floor. The spot I was most interested in seeing was the room that portrayed Sidney’s English class. I had read several differing reports online regarding which room appeared in the scene and I hoped our tour guide could put the mystery to rest. I showed him some screen captures from the movie I had saved on my phone and he pointed us to Room 208. Though he said he couldn’t be 100% sure it was the space where filming had occurred, as you can see below, I am pretty certain he was right on the money.

Today, Room 208 serves as the center’s Print Room.

The hallway located just outside of Room 208 also made an appearance in Scream.

Despite the fact that the walls have since been painted and the lockers that were brought in for the shoot are no longer in place, the hallway is still very recognizable from the movie.

The stairwell where Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) and Sidney had an argument (“Stupid!”) is located at the western end of that same hallway.

I could not have been more excited to see this particular spot.

Amazingly, it looks exactly the same today as it did onscreen in Scream.

What might be my favorite scene from the entire movie took place on the community center’s first level, on the staircase just inside the main entrance. It is there that Deputy Dewey (David Arquette) tells Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), “I’m 25. I was 24 for a whole year!” Their entire exchange during that scene is adorable, especially considering that Courteney and David later fell in love in real life and got married. It hurts my heart a little now each time I watch it thinking about the fact that they are no longer together.

The Sonoma Community Center’s use in Scream came about rather circuitously. In the Spring of 1996, Wes Craven and his production team began looking for places to shoot the then titled Scary Movie. They fairly quickly decided on Wine Country in Northern California, mainly due to the fact that they liked the look of Santa Rosa High School (pictured below – photo via Wikipedia). Not only did it have the aesthetic the group wanted, but the school was film friendly, having appeared in 1986’s Peggy Sue Got Married. The principal and other administrators okayed the plan to shoot on the premises and Wes and his team went into pre-production mode for the next few weeks. Shortly before filming was to take place, though, the school board requested to see the script and apparently didn’t like what they read. According to the 2011 documentary Scream: The Inside Story, board members felt the story glorified violence against children, which they were wary about, especially in light of the fact that the trial of Richard Allen Davis for the kidnapping and murder of 12-year-old Polly Klaas was taking place in the area at the time. A town hall meeting was held in which local citizens gave their various opinions on the filming and the school board ultimately decided that Scream could not shoot at Santa Rosa High.

In Scream: The Inside Story, Wes Craven explained that he understood board members’ trepidation given the violent crime that had rocked the city a few years prior. It was their implementation that angered him, as well as all those involved. At the last minute, scenes had to be rewritten, shooting schedules altered, and sets built to make up for the location loss, all of which cost precious time and money. You can read some articles on the debacle here and here. When the movie wrapped, Wes still wasn’t over the whole thing apparently and decided to put a special note in the “Thanks” section of Scream’s closing credits. It read, “No thanks whatsoever to the Santa Rosa City School District Governing Board.” The situation wasn’t a total loss, though. In fact, I think things worked out for the better.

During the SRHS brouhaha, the Sonoma Community Center’s then director heard about the situation and reached out to the production team to offer up the site as an alternative locale.

The center, which was originally built in 1915, served as Sonoma Grammar School until 1948 and definitely bears the look of a small town learning institution, which is exactly what Wes was going for.

The production team immediately jumped on board with the idea and, as a result, the Sonoma Community Center is now one of the most famous horror movie locations of all time. To me, the Santa Rosa High School debacle was a blessing in disguise as the community center is a much more charming and quaint location that fit in with Scream’s aesthetic better than SRHS ever could. It’s funny how things always seem to have a way of working out.

The change did require a few sets to be built, though, one of which was Principal Arthur Himbry’s (Henry Winkler) office and anteroom.

You can see an image of the set, which was featured in Scream: The Inside Story, below.

I am 99.9% certain that the Woodsboro High School bathroom was also a set as it definitely cannot be found at the Sonoma Community Center. I took a peek at both of the site’s restrooms during our visit and neither even remotely resembles the Scream bathroom. The upstairs restroom is a single stall space and, while the downstairs bathroom does have multiple stalls, it is nowhere near as large as the space that appeared onscreen. I also showed screen captures of the bathroom to our tour guide and he said that he does not believe there was ever a restroom like that on the community center premises. After I returned home, I contacted a crew member who confirmed that the bathroom was a set, as well. I still say I’m only 99.9% certain, though, as crew members have been known to misremember things like this.

Though the movie’s 2011 sequel Scream 4 took place once again in Woodsboro, filming did not return to Northern California. The flick was instead lensed in Michigan, with Woodworth Middle School at 4951 Ternes Street in Dearborn, standing in for Woodsboro High. While much larger in scale, the building does bear a striking resemblance to the Sonoma Community Center.

You can watch Scream: The Inside Story by clicking below. And you can read a great article about the documentary here. As it turns out, the special was produced by screenwriter Daniel Farrands, who not only went to Santa Rosa High School, but also penned Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers the year before Scream was filmed. Apparently, an area paper ran a local-boy-makes-good story on Farrands at the time celebrating his horror movie career. Why locals weren’t as accommodating to Wes just a short time later remains to be seen.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: The Sonoma Community Center, aka Woodsboro High School from Scream, is located at 276 East Napa Street in Sonoma. You can visit the property’s official website here.

October 17, 2016September 29, 2017

Casey’s House from “Scream 2”

“What’s your favorite scary movie?” So asks Ghostface of Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore) at the beginning of Scream. Well, if Ghostface asked me that question, my answer would be Scream everyday of the week and twice on Sunday. I love, love, love that movie! Though I was not as big a fan of the film’s three sequels, I got on a kick recently of tracking down some of their unknown locales. The spot I most wanted to find was the gorgeous peaked-roof house where Casey (Heather Graham) lived in Stab, Scream 2’s movie-within-a-movie. Thanks to a lot of help from my friend Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, I was finally able to locate it!

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I knew from the Scream 2 production notes as well as the movie’s DVD commentary that the opening Stab sequence was shot in Malibu. Though the front exterior of Casey’s residence was never shown in the scene, enough of the backyard and pool area was that I figured tracking the place down via aerial views would be a snap. I was wrong. I cannot tell you the countless hours I spent searching for the pad to no avail.

Enter Owen. On the verge of giving up, I emailed him to ask if he might be willing to help with the hunt and provided him with all of the necessary information. It was not long (minutes, really!) before I received an email back with an address. As Owen discovered, Casey’s house from Scream 2 is located at 5730 Busch Drive in Malibu.

While searching for the home, Owen had come across a mention that during the filming of the Stab scene, neighbors heard Heather Graham’s screams and, not realizing that a film shoot was taking place, called the police. Armed with that information, Owen began looking for more neighborhood-y areas of Malibu via aerial views and fairly quickly spotted the house in Malibu Park. (I should mention here that I had also seen the anecdote about neighbors calling the police during my search for the residence, but I did not think it was pertinent. Malibu is canyon-y and rather silent at night and I figured that the scene could have been shot at a remote property with Heather’s screams still easily heard by people in homes nearby. That was a major fail on my part. D’oh!)

According to a cached Zillow page, Casey’s Stab pad was originally built by architect Doug Rucker in 1961. Rucker also later updated the property in 1989. The contemporary dwelling boasts 10 rooms, 4 bedrooms, 3 baths, 4,148 square feet of living space, a driveway with parking for 8 cars, a swimming pool and spa, a putting green, a 1.01-acre plot of land, a garden, a 400-square-foot garage, vaulted ceilings, and skylights.

Quite a bit of the home was featured in Scream 2. The property’s sprawling backyard is where poor Casey met her grizzly demise in a scene that emulated Drew Barrymore’s death from the original movie.

As you can see in the aerial view below, the backyard still looks much the same today as it did when the flick was filmed in 1997.

Portions of the residence’s interior also appeared onscreen, including a bathroom . . .

. . . and the living room.

It is while standing in the house that Casey utters one of the franchise’s most well-known lines – “You know, I don’t even know you and I dislike you already.”

Thanks to the residence’s wide expanse of sleek glass walls, much of the interior can be spotted in the backyard scenes, as well.

Though not much of the dwelling is visible from the street, especially not the areas used in Scream 2, I was absolutely floored to catch a glimpse from the road of the rear side of the fireplace that Casey walked by in the movie.

The house also made a brief appearance in Scream 4, during the Stab-a-Thon segment in which the opening scene from Stab was shown.

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

Big THANK YOU to my friend Owen, of the When Write Is Wrong blog, for finding this location!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Casey’s house from Scream 2 is located at 5730 Busch Drive in Malibu.

October 14, 2016September 29, 2017

Sarah’s House from “The Craft”

Another day, another request – this one also from my friends Lavonna and Katie regarding The Craft. (You can read yesterday’s post about HarborPlace Tower from the movie here). During a recent group texting session, Katie asked if I knew the location of the home where Sarah Bailey (Robin Tunney) lived with her dad, Mr. Bailey (Cliff De Young), and her step-mom, Jenny (Jeanine Jackson), in the flick. Well, not only did I know the location, but I had actually stalked it! Though I was never a huge fan of The Craft, Sarah’s rambling Spanish-style home made an impression on me when I first watched the film back in 1996. So when I came across its address a couple of months ago thanks to an anonymous commenter on the Movie Locations and More website (who tracked the pad down all the way from Australia!), I immediately jotted it in my stalking notebook and headed on over there a few weeks later.

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At the beginning of The Craft, Sarah and her family move from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Their new home first pops up in one of the film’s opening scenes . . .

. . . and is then seen regularly throughout the rest of the movie.

Thanks to Google Street View, I knew prior to stalking the residence that it was set far back from the road and that virtually none of it was visible.

You can just barely catch a glimpse of the dwelling in the images below.

Thankfully, aerial views provide a better look at the property. As you can see below, the house still looks much the same today as it did back in 1996 when The Craft was filmed.

Per Zillow, the 1927 home boasts 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, 3,429 square feet of living space, and a 0.58-acre plot of land.

Quite a bit of the residence was shown in the movie, including the pool, which was left dry for the shoot.

The property’s extensive driveway also made an appearance, though it looks substantially different today than it did in 1996 due to some massive foliage growth and the addition of a large detached garage.

Though the interior of Sarah’s home is said to have been built on a soundstage, I am guessing that it was closely modeled after the property’s real life interior. Unfortunately, I could not find any photographs of the inside of the residence with which to verify that hunch.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Sarah’s house from The Craft is located at 8330 McGroarty Street in Sunland.

October 13, 2016September 29, 2017

HarborPlace Tower from “The Craft”

Today’s location is a special request from my good friends Katie and Lavonna, who, in a group text, both suggested I blog about some sites from The Craft as part of my Haunted Hollywood postings. Now the 1996 horror flick is not one of my favorites and its locales have been pretty well documented elsewhere online, but I am never one to turn down a stalking plea from friends. So Katie and Lavonna, this one’s for you! Thankfully, I already had a few sites from the film stockpiled, ahem, stalkpiled. Back in May 2015, a fellow stalker named Nathan wrote to me asking for some help in tracking down two locales from the movie, the occult shop (I told the story behind that search here) and the building where Nancy Downs (Fairuza Balk) lived with her mom, Grace Downs (Helen Shaver). Lucky for me, that spot was an easy find thanks to a notation on IMDB which stated that The Craft had done some filming at Long Beach’s HarborPlace Tower. Though Nathan didn’t think that was the right place, one look around the property on Google Street View told me it was. I finally made it out to see the structure in person this past May.

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Construction on HarborPlace Tower (and no, that’s not a typo – per the building’s official website, the name is spelled “HarborPlace” with no spacing) began in 1990 and was completed in September 1992.

The modern, Art Deco-ish building is comprised of 225 luxury condos.

The structure boasts 22 floors, though there is no 13th, which I thought was quite fitting being that I am covering HarborPlace as a Haunted Hollywood locale.

Building amenities include a pool, a spa, his-and-hers saunas, concierge service, a gym, an underground garage with parking for 600 cars, a 24-hour security guard, a sun deck, a park with artwork designed by sculptor Ned Smyth (some of those pieces are pictured in the images above and below), an expansive lobby, ocean views, and meeting rooms.

You can check out a video showing the interior of the building and one of the units here.

In The Craft, teen witch Nancy places a spell on her abusive step-father causing him to have a heart attack and die. Thanks to his extensive life insurance policy, Nancy and her mom are subsequently able to move from the trailer park where they live to more upscale digs at HarborPlace Tower.

In the scene in which Sarah Bailey (Robin Tunney), Bonnie (Neve Campbell), and Rochelle (Rachel True) visit Nancy’s new apartment for the first time, the girls enter the property on its East Ocean Boulevard side. The buildings visible in the background (located at 555 East Ocean and 455 East Ocean) still look much the same today as they did in 1996 when The Craft was filmed.

The interior of one of HarborPlace’s actual units stood in for Nancy’s apartment in the flick.

While it was under construction, the building appeared as itself in the Season 10 episode of Columbo titled “Columbo and the Murder of a Rock Star,” which aired in 1991.

And in the 1995 action flick Heat, Lt. Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino) ambushed Hugh Benny (Henry Rollins) at HarborPlace Tower.

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: HarborPlace Tower, from The Craft, is located at 525 East Seaside Way in Long Beach.