Last Friday, Mike, from MovieShotsLA, and I set out to do a little Pasadena stalking. Who knew that our day would hold the stalking adventure to end all stalking adventures! Even as I sit here, days later, writing these words, I am pinching myself, unsure if the whole thing even really happened. But since I have the photographs, I guess it really did. 🙂
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On Friday afternoon, after stalking a few Pasadena locations, Mike and I stopped off at our old staple, the 90210 house, aka Casa Walsh. Even though Mike and I had stalked this home countless times before, we had to return yet again as it is one location that we just never grow tired of. On this particular trip, though, the stalking gods must have been smiling down on us because the owner of the home pulled up in his car right when we arrived. So of course, we got to talking with him. 🙂
The owner, whose name is Jack, could NOT have been a nicer guy! He stood and talked with us in the Walsh driveway for about 45 minutes, sharing all sorts of 90210 stories and behind the scenes info. For instance, he told us that on one occasion when they filmed at his house, producers cleared out all of his living room furniture and built a soundstage of Kelly’s bedroom in the vacant room! LOL He also told us that some of the camping scenes from the Season 2 episode entitled “Camping Trip” were actually filmed in his backyard! And – my personal favorite story of the many Jack shared with us – one day he got home from work to find a message on his answering machine from a woman who said “Hi this is Emily Valentine and I wanted to let you know that I just got out of the asylum.” LOL Jack even told us of a few other 90210 filming locations that he knew about. 🙂 Now, this is where the story gets REALLY exciting. After talking with us for a bit in his driveway, Jack invited us into his backyard to take some photos.
Numerous events in the Walsh twins’ lives took place in Jack’s backyard, including Cindy and Jim’s 20th wedding anniversary, Jackie Taylor and Mel Silver’s wedding, the painting of the gang’s homecoming float which was later doused with gasoline by Emily Valentine, and – my personal favorite – one of the first times Brenda lays eyes on Dylan.
In that episode, entitled “Isn’t It Romantic”, Dylan and Brandon are working on Brandon’s car Mondale in the Walsh backyard. In the meantime, while speaking with Kelly on the phone, Brenda walks outside onto a little balcony to admire Dylan from afar, but he notices her and turns around to give her that cute Dylan smile that I was so in love with. 🙂 LOVE THAT SHOW! Anyway, Brenda’s balcony is really a part of the Altadena home and I could not have been more excited to see it in person! I believe it was at this point in our Casa Walsh tour, as Mike and I stood there snapping pictures like crazy and screaming like little schoolgirls, that Jack told us we both had way too much time on our hands. LOL 🙂
After seeing us go a bit crazy over being in the actual 90210 backyard, Jack (wait, are you sitting down for this???) INVITED US TO SEE THE INSIDE OF THE HOUSE!!!! Yes, you read that right – HE INVITED US INSIDE THE HOUSE! THE 90210 HOUSE! BRANDON AND BRENDA’S HOUSE! WE GOT TO GO INSIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!! Mike and I both just about keeled over and died at this proposition and I am surprised we didn’t knock poor Jack to the floor as we made a running b-line for the house. 🙂 LOL While inside, Jack first showed us some scrapbooks he had made with photographs and articles from his house’s filming days. The scrapbooks included all sorts of photographs and memorabilia from the 90210 days, including photos of his kids with the stars and the original contract he signed allowing the production company to use his home for filming. I couldn’t help but smile as I read one clause in the contract which stated that a basketball hoop would be added to the exterior of Jack’s garage. 🙂 That basketball hoop is now gone as Jack is in the middle of remodeling his garage (say it ain’t so!). There were actually two different basketball hoops used during the filming of 90210 and when the series ended, Jack got to keep both of them. Many years later he ended up giving both of those hoops away to 90210 fans who had stopped by his house to take pictures. Like I said – what an amazingly nice guy! Mike was extremely bummed that he wasn’t the lucky recipient of one of those basketball hoops, but we should consider ourselves lucky as Jack said that Mike and I were the first two fans he had ever invited inside the house. 🙂
The most surreal moment of the day for me happened when my phone rang while I was standing in the 90210 kitchen (which you can sort of see in the above photograph). You see, my ring tone is, and always has been, the 90210 theme song. I kid you not. So there I was standing in Casa Walsh when the familiar strains of “Duh-nuh-nuh-nuh” came pouring out of my phone. LOL After looking at Jack’s 90210 scrapbooks, he took us on a mini-tour of the downstairs of his home. I was in utter shock not only at the fact that he would invite us into his home, but also that I WAS ACTUALLY STANDING INSIDE THE 90210 HOUSE! I had dreamed of seeing the inside of that home for YEARS and the only thing I can imagine that would have been more satisfying to a stalker like myself would be to have visited the studio set of the Walsh home during filming. I had read that the set of Casa Walsh was based on the real interiors of the Altadena home and on Friday I saw for myself that that was sort of true. While the kitchen area looks nothing like Cindy Walsh’s kitchen, the entryway, living room and dining room are all very similar to what we saw on TV. When walking inside the house it was like worlds were colliding inside my head as the image I knew of the interior sets meshed with reality. It was surreal and almost as if my brain couldn’t accept both images at the same time. LOL
The dining room area, which was just re-painted and therefore has no furniture in it, is very reminiscent of the Walsh dining room.
The living room is also quite similar to its television counterpart, except that it is longer and not quite as deep as the Walsh living room. In real life it is also missing the Walsh’s built-in bookshelves.
The area of the home I was most excited to see was the entryway/stairwell, as the Walsh’s entryway/stairwell was shown so often on the show. In reality, the stairway is situated like a mirrior image of how it appeared on 90210. The stairs run from the left to the right, while the Walsh stairway went from right to left. I asked Jack why he thinks they made this change for the studio set and he said he thinks that it worked better for camera angles that way. Aside from the stairway running the opposite direction, the real entryway looks very similar to the Walsh entryway and I still cannot believe I got to see it with my own two eyes!
Of course, we just had to take a picture with Jack in the entryway to document our time spent at Casa Walsh. On our way out, after giving Jack our phone numbers and telling him that if he ever needed ANYTHING to give us a call :), Mike told him that if he ever decided to sell Casa Walsh he wanted to be the first to know. 🙂
I still can hardly believe this whole thing even happened!! Mike and I seem to have a lot of luck when it comes to stalking 90210 locations, and I think I need to bring him with me on all of my stalking adventures from now on. 🙂
Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂
Stalk It: Casa Walsh is located at 1675 E. Altadena Drive, in Altadena. We got really lucky being let inside the house, but please don’t bother the owner to do this yourself as it is not his common practice.
