Chad Michael Murray – IAMNOTASTALKER

May 20, 2019May 19, 2019

Monrovia High School from “A Cinderella Story”

My taste in movies is about as mature and refined as my palate, which favors chicken strips and ranch dressing above all else. Case in point – I am obsessed with the 2004 tween romance A Cinderella Story. Chad Michael Murray? Hilary Duff on roller skates? A high school love story? A pink ‘50s diner? Yes, yes, yes and yes! I’ve written posts on several of the film’s locations over the years (you can read them here, here and here), but somehow forgot to dedicate one to Monrovia High School, which portrayed North Valley High (home of the Fighting Frogs!) and which I visited way back in 2013. I figure the time to rectify that is now!

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Designed by architect Austin Whittlesey, working under John C. Austin and Frederick M. Ashley, construction on Monrovia High School began in January 1928.

Completed early the following year, the Spanish Colonial Revival-style building, which features Palladian elements, cost $600,000 to erect.

Numerous expansions have taken place in the years since, the most recent from 2009 to 2011.

That project, which totaled a whopping $60 million, included the addition of a 2-story science building, a 30,000-square-foot gym complete with a weight room, and a new football stadium and surrounding track.

Thankfully, all of the additions were designed with the school’s original architecture in mind, ultimately creating a cohesive, striking and picturesque property.

Not only is the school itself beautiful, but the grounds are absolutely bucolic. I was just a wee bit obsessed with the massive tree pictured below.

I mean, just look at it!

Considering its handsome façade, it is no surprise that the place wound up onscreen. In A Cinderella Story, Monrovia High was used extensively. Areas of the school featured include the front exterior;

interior hallways;

the baseball field;

the pool;

the football field (which was, sadly, redone during the 2009 expansion);

and the main quad (it also looks a bit different post-expansion) . . .

. . . where the pep rally took place.

The quad is the spot I was most interested in seeing during my stalk, namely the “Friendship Circle” planter where Sam and Austin regularly sat throughout the movie.

Unfortunately, we stopped by on a Saturday, when Monrovia High was closed, so I wasn’t able to poke around. I was thrilled to see, though, that the quad area is visible through the front gates.

The gates even afford a small glimpse of the planter!

A Cinderella Story is hardly the only production to feature Monrovia High.

Skip Lewis (Chad Lowe) and Ken (Charlie Sheen) go to school there in the 1984 made-for-television movie Silence of the Heart.

In 1985, Monrovia High played itself in another made-for-TV film, Between the Darkness and the Dawn.

The production, which journalist John J. O’Connor deemed “a candidate for the worst television movie of the year,” gave audiences a glimpse at what the interior of the school looked like at the time.

Rocky Dennis (Eric Stoltz) enrolls in Monrovia High at the end of the 1985 drama Mask.

Monrovia High (along with Walter Reed Middle School from License to Drive) appears as Garden City High in the 1988 horror film 976-EVIL.

Brad Kimble (Will Friedle), Leah Jones (Jennifer Love Hewitt) and Brooke Kingsley (Marley Shelton) attend Monrovia High School in the 1997 comedy Trojan War.

The school (along with several others, including Torrance High) was also used to portray John Hughes High School in 2001’s Not Another Teen Movie.

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: Monrovia High School, aka North Valley High from A Cinderella Story, is located at 845 West Colorado Boulevard in Monrovia.

April 26, 2011April 25, 2011

Dwight’s Bar from “Burlesque”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Un-thinkable (I’m Ready) video–Piru

You can watch that video by clicking above.

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

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

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

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

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

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

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

January 15, 2010January 18, 2010

George’s 50’s Diner from “A Cinderella Story”

Another location at the very top of my Long Beach “To Stalk” list was the restaurant where Hilary Duff worked in fave teeny-bopper movie A Cinderella Story. In real life, that restaurant is known as George’s 50’s Diner and it is one of the last remaining diners of its kind in all of California. George’s Diner, which was originally named Grissinger’s Drive-In, first opened up in 1952. It was designed by architect Wayne McAllister, who also designed the famous Sands Casino in Las Vegas. In 1963, the Grissingers sold the drive-in to new owners who expanded and remodeled the place and dubbed it Lyman’s Coffee Shop. Shortly thereafter it was purchased by a woman named Terry, who re-named it Terry’s Coffee Shop and in 1974 made the fortuitous decision to hire as a chef a young man named George Alvarez. George worked at the restaurant for over two decades and then in 1996, decided to buy the place for himself, upon which he restored it back to its original 1952 design. He named the place George’s 50’s Diner, in honor of both himself and the restaurant’s original opening date.

In A Cinderella Story, George’s 50’s Diner stood in for the restaurant first owned by Hilary Duff’s father and then later by her evil step-mother, who was played by Jennifer Coolidge. Both the interior and the exterior of the restaurant were used extensively in the filming.

As you can see in the above photograph and screen captures, though, the place looks very, very different in person than how it appeared onscreen in the movie. In fact, it almost doesn’t even look like the same place. According to George and Helen, the diner’s INCREDIBLY nice owners, the restaurant was COMPELTELY remodeled for the filming.

A few of the changes made for the filming include: the interior walls being removed to make the diner appear much larger than it actually was, the real life counter being replaced with a new, much higher counter, all of the booths being covered over in fake pink and black leather, a false ceiling being installed, the ceiling fans being removed and new light fixtures hung, fake doors being added in numerous places, the entire kitchen being re-painted in a fake stainless steel color, and linoleum being laid over the restaurant’s real life carpet.

According to George and Helen, the interior and the exterior of the diner were actually remodeled TWICE during the filming – first for the scenes in which the restaurant was owned by Hil D’s dad . . .

. . . and then again for the scenes in which it was later owned by her evil step-mother.

Producers also brought in the big pink “Fiona’s” sign that ends up falling on Carter’s dad’s Mercedes towards the end of the movie. Phew! Sure seems like a whole lot of remodeling work to do. You’d think it would have been much easier to built a diner set on a soundstage somewhere in Hollywood for the filming. Which, according to IMDB’s A Cinderella Story trivia page, is exactly what they did. That information, however, is not accurate. According to George and Helen, all of the interior filming of the diner scenes – which took just about two weeks to complete – did indeed take place on location at George’s Diner. I’ll never understand Hollywood, I swear. 😉 Helen even has a scrapbook full of photographs of the filming, but unfortunately she didn’t have it on hand the day I stalked the place. 🙁 Oh well, I guess that just means I’ll have to go back to re-stalk it sometime! 🙂

And a little Cinderella Story trivia for you – not only did the movie star Madeline Zima, who now has a recurring role on Californication . . .

. . . but it also starred Dan Byrd who is currently playing Courteney Cox’s son Travis on Cougartown.

A Cinderella Story is not the only production to have filmed at George’s, though. Back when the restaurant was known as Terry’s Coffee Shop, the 1994 movie Corrina, Corrina filmed on the premises. It is at the drive-in diner that Whoopi Goldberg gets Tina Majorino to communicate with her for the very first time.

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George’s also appeared briefly at the very beginning of the 2007 movie Zodiac, in the scene in which Mike Mageau and his girlfriend Darlene Ferrin drive by a diner, decide it is too crowded to stay, and leave, only to be attacked by the Zodiac killer minutes later.

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George’s 50’s Diner has also been featured in the movie The Real McCoy and in several episodes of the television series Cold Case. And I honestly can’t recommend stalking the place enough!!!! The food was A-MA-ZING – especially the French fries – the retro atmosphere was truly unique, and George and Helen honestly could NOT have been nicer. I absolutely LOVED the place and will DEFINITELY be back!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: George’s 50’s Diner is located at 4390 Atlantic Avenue in Long Beach. You can visit their MySpace page here.

October 2, 2008February 13, 2009

We’ll Always Have Paris

Once again I am indebted to Mike over at MovieShotsLA for finding yet another location that had eluded me – a location I had been searching for for close to 16 years! During Season 3 of the original 90210, Brenda and Donna spend their summer in Paris. In the episode entitled “Shooting Star/An American In Paris” Brenda meets a tall, dark and handsome college student named Rick in a beautiful French garden. Later on in the episode the two walk underneath a curved rose-covered trellis and it is that trellis that I have been searching for ever since that episode aired way back in August of 1992. A few years after that episode aired, my parents took me on a trip to Europe as a present for my high school graduation. Our first stop was France and I remember walking around the streets of Paris carrying a small picture of Brenda and Rick under that trellis, stopping every native French person I could find to ask if they knew where it was located. Yes, I really am that blonde! 🙂 My naive 18 year old self truly believed that Shannen Doherty and Tori Spelling had actually flown to France to film their Paris scenes. That reality was shattered this past summer when I took the Universal Studios tour and discovered that most of “Paris” was actually filmed at the Universal backlot. Not filmed at Universal, though, were the garden scenes. So I still had no idea where Brenda and Rick’s trellis was located. Knowing how obsessed I was with finding Brenda’s garden, Mike stayed up very late one night this week and located it for me and I was able to actually stalk it yesterday!! Let me tell you, I could not have been more excited!!

Mike and I were fairly certain that Brenda’s garden was located in one of the three main botanical gardens in LA, and since I had stalked the Arcadia Arboretum on Sunday without finding it, Mike set his sights on the Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens in San Marino. He stayed up late one night searching Google images until he finally located Brenda’s trellis in the Rose Garden area of the Huntington, a good 5,000 miles from Paris, France. THANKS MIKE!!!! So yesterday, I dragged my dad out to the Huntington, in 103 degree heat no less, to do some 90210 stalking.

The Huntington shows up three times in the “Shooting Star/An American in Paris” episode. We first see it in the scene when Brenda and Rick first meet. In that scene, Brenda is sitting on a circular bench underneath a large oak tree. Sadly, that circular bench was removed long ago and the tree Brenda sat under is now surrounded by foliage, so the area looks very different. But there was a similar bench located just a few yards away, so I had to take a picture sitting on that. 🙂

The area where Brenda actually sat sixteen years ago is located on the very Southeast corner of the North Vista lawn, pictured above. The path Rick walks through when he first comes upon Brenda is now gone and filled in with foliage. Such a bummer!!!!

This same tree and bench area also show up in the episode following “Shooting Star/An American in Paris”, which is entitled “Castles In The Sand”. It is shown in the scene when Brenda dreams about Rick on her plane flight home to LA.

The next location I dragged my dad to stalk was the white flowered trellis Brenda and Rick walk under on their last night in Paris together. This is the location where “Reek” tells Brenda that if she were truly in love with Dylan she wouldn’t be standing there with him and then the two share their final Paris kiss. This particular trellis is located in the Rose Garden area of the Huntington, just off of the Tea Room.

This same location also shows up in the Hil D. movie A Cinderella Story. In the movie Hilary attends a masquerade ball at the Huntington. The exteriors of the ball location were filmed outside of the Huntington Gallery building (the interiors were actually filmed at a theatre in Downtown LA). During the ball, Chad Michael Murray takes Hil on a walk under the same trellises Rick and Brenda walked under 12 years before. After walking under the trellises, Chad leads Hilary to a gazebo where the two share a moonlit dance. That gazebo was brought in by producers and put in the Brown Garden especially for the filming and was removed when the three day shoot was complete.

Next up was the site I was most excited about seeing in person, the location I had wandered the streets of Paris trying to find – the curved rose-covered trellis Brenda and Rick walk beneath during their tour of Paris. Even sixteen years later, I could not have been more excited to see this location in person. 🙂 I truly felt like a high school girl all over again! The trellis appeared in the scene where Brenda takes Rick on a walking tour of Paris and I am happy to report that it looks EXACTLY the same as it did when it appeared on 90210, except that due to the time of year, the flowers usually covering it were not in full bloom yesterday. This trellis is also located in the Huntington’s Rose Garden; it covers the path which leads to the Japanese Garden area.

Interestingly enough, this very same location showed up on 90210 some years later as the location where Steve and Janet tie the knot. Producers added some black street lights to the site which are not normally there. Otherwise it looks much the same as it did when it first appeared on 90210.

The Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens was originally the private home of Central Pacific Railroad owner Henry E. Huntington and his wife Arabella. Originally called the San Marino Ranch, Henry and his wife purchased the property in 1902 and began creating a truly incredible botanical garden in their backyard. Throughout his lifetime, Henry also collected fine art and books and today it is his art, library and gardens that make up the Huntington. The 207 acre property is an absolutely beautiful place to spend an afternoon. I am usually not big on museums, but the Huntington is simply breathtaking. The gardens alone cover over 120 acres and consist of painstakingly maintained landscapes from different areas of the world. It really takes more than one visit to discover all of this amazing place. The grounds are serene and peaceful and when visiting, you will feel a million miles away from Los Angeles. The Rose Garden is exquisite, the Bonzai Court and Zen Garden are truly unique, the Japanese Garden is incredible with its winding koi ponds and bamboo forests, and the newly built Chinese Garden with its enormous lake is absolutely gorgeous. This is one location that is a must-see, not just for stalkers, but for anyone visiting the Los Angeles area.

Besides 90210 and A Cinderella Story, The Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens has appeared in countless movie and television productions, including First Daughter, Be Cool, Legally Blonde 2, The Bachelor reality show, The Wedding Planner, Beverly Hills Ninja, The West Wing, American Wedding, Monster in Law, Charlie’s Angels, as well as hundreds of others. It was also the location of Robert and Anna’s wedding on the soap opera General Hospital. Anytime you see a garden popping up on one of your favorite television shows or movies, chances are it was filmed at the Huntington.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens is located at 1151 Oxford Road in San Marino. You can visit their website here. You can also visit their filming website here.