Los Angeles is the film and television centre of the world. Year after year film fans flock to this glitzy metropolitan city to explore the city’s pop cultural heritage, including scouting out famous film sets.
Anyone visiting Los Angeles to follow in the exact footsteps of their favourite actors and fictional characters will find their itinerary building up quickly. While the amount of films set in Los Angeles is literally into the hundreds, we’ve rounded up 10 to get you started!
Grease
Rydell High School is a combination of Venice High School (exterior shots) and Huntington Park High School (interiors). And even though Grease centres on the gang’s senior year, the characters still get out and about in Los Angeles. The race scene was filmed at the Los Angeles River, between the First and Seventh Street Bridges, the sleepover was shot at a private house in East Hollywood and the drive-in movie scenes were shot at the Burbank Pickwick Drive-In (though it has been replaced by a shopping centre).
City of Angels
Even if the name didn’t give away the primary filming location, the beautifully haunting beach scenes probably did. San Francisco Public Library, Dodger Stadium, Grand Central Public Market, Big Bear Lake and LAX Airport all step in to bring this film to life.
Legally Blonde
While Legally Blonde centred on Elle Woods journey through her first year at Harvard University, most of it was filmed in Los Angeles (aside from a few exterior shots). Most of the California filming took place in Pasadena, ever so slightly north-east of Los Angeles. This includes CalTech Campus (1200 East California Boulevard) that stood in the for the fictional CULA campus and Rose City High School (325 South Oak Knoll Avenue) was used for college’s hallways. The ‘Gamma Theta’ sorority house is also set within CalTech’s campus, and can be found at 345 South Hill Avenue, south of East Del Mar Boulevard.
Terminator 2
Proving that sequels can succeed the original, Terminator 2 was filmed all over this glamorous city. John Connor’s House where he lived with his foster parents can be found at 19828 Valerio Street, while Northridge Mall (exterior) and Santa Monica Place Mall (interior) were used for the mall chase, the payphone that John calls his foster parents from can be found outside Lakeview Terrace Liquor Store and the final scenes were filmed at the Kaiser Steel Plant.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
While this cult vampire favourite took place in the fictional town of Sunnydale, there was no escaping the west-coast Cali girl vibe of the show. Most of the filming took place in LA, though the producers stayed away from iconic landmarks to keep the air of a fictional town. The exterior of Sunnydale High School was Torrance High School at 2200 W. Carson Street, while the college scenes were filmed at University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) campus in Westwood. After Buffy and the Scoobies blew up the original high school, her sister Dawn can be seen attending what is actually California State University, Northridge.
Just three blocks north of Torrance High School lies Buffy’s home that she shared with her mother, Joyce, and in later seasons her sister Dawn. While the mansion that is occupied by vampires Angel, Drusilla and Spike at the end of the second season is Ennis House and stands on a hilltop at 2607 Glendower Avenue in Griffith Park.
And if you’re looking to hunt out some vampires in a graveyard, many of the cemetery scenes were filmed at the Angelus-Rosedale Cemetery at 1831 W. Washington Boulevard, in the West Adams District.
La La Land
La La Land is not only a great film – it’s also an accidental tour of Los Angeles. Head to Griffith Park and re-create the “A Lovely Night” dance or practice your moves to “City of Stars” on Hermosa Pier. Then there’s the opening scene filmed on the Century Freeway – the crew actually shut it down for two days to get the perfectly choreographed routine just right.
Clueless
Fans of this 1995 hit comedy will spot locations everywhere in Los Angeles. Whether it’s her “Beverly Hills mansion” that is actually found in San Fernando Valley, the Westfield Fashion Square where Tai nearly “met her death” or the Shoreline Drive where Dionne, Cher and Murray end up on the freeway, you won’t have to look too hard to find the sets.
Keeping Up With the Kardashians
Whether or not you actually admit to watching this (we know you do) you’ve probably seen the clips where we see the exterior of the house. It’s been well documented that this is not Kris Jenner’s actual house, though the dummy one is still hidden by a gated community (and was on the market for $9 million earlier this year). However, the family boutique DASH can be found on Melrose Avenue in West Hollywood if you fancy a nosey (and you might even bump into one of the older Kardashian sisters).
Reservoir Dogs
When travelling through Los Angeles make sure you stop for breakfast at Pat and Lorraine’s, 4720 Eagle Rock Boulevard, where the Dogs stopped to discuss Madonna lyrics and the ethics of tipping. And later you can visit the jewellery store that they robbed – even though it’s actually a mirror/picture frame supplier (either way, its address is 2612 West Burbank Boulevard at Wyoming Avenue in Burbank).
American Horror Story
Despite dedicating each season to a different story and setting, the producers have kept much of the filming to Los Angeles – even when it’s meant to be set elsewhere. The Harmon’s mansion in Season 1 is in Los Angeles as said so on screen (real address is 1120 Westchester Place, Los Angeles, CA 90019) but the creepy New England Briarcliff Asylum in Season 2 is actually the beautiful Santa Ana Courthouse in Oak View, a small town not far north of Los Angeles.
While we jump to New Orleans for season 3 and 4, the producers went back to Los Angeles Season 5 and scouted out the Oviatt Building (617 S. Olive St.) for its exterior shots of Hotel Cortez. Even Season 6, that follows the disappearance of the Roanoke Colony, which was meant to be set in Virginia used an old ranch mansion in Calabasas, California.
