What do Sarah Jessica Parker, Aretha Franklin, and Gloria Steinem have in common? If you guessed a need for Respect, you’d be right – but, hearkening back to the dreaded LSAT, that’s not the best answer. They were all born on March 25 (the day I initially planned to publish this post). Speaking of Parker, I loved her one-season show, Square Pegs, and it was filmed at my junior high school. The façade and interior of the school has been used in many other shows and films (including Family Matters, Pleasantville, and the Hughes classic, Pretty in Pink), presumably because it’s one of the few brick schools in Los Angeles, and it has the look of “Anywhere, USA.” So, my question of the day is, have you ever worked or lived in a place that also served as the set of a movie, television show, or music video?
I, too, loved SQUARE PEGS!
Posted by: Tim Zinnecker | March 30, 2010 at 07:00 PM
My wife's name is Alene Franklin, and we lived in Birmingham, Michigan for a long time, which is right next door to Bloomfield Hills, where Aretha lives. Our phone number was listed as A Franklin, so we regularly got calls that started "Hello, is this Aretha?"
Posted by: Jeff Lipshaw | March 31, 2010 at 06:29 AM
Now I see your last question. The Suffolk University Law School Reading Room, which faces the State House dome, was used for a scene in Martin Scorsese's The Departed (which I hated by the way).
When we lived in a town called Plymouth, Michigan, Alex Karras and his wife, Susan Clark, used it as location for a movie called Word of Honor starring Karl Malden as a newspaper editor at something called The Daily Tribune (actually in Royal Oak, Michigan).
Posted by: Jeff Lipshaw | March 31, 2010 at 06:34 AM
The Fine Arts Library reading room at Penn was in the movie _Philadelphia_, where it was depicted as, I think, the law school library. The law library at Penn is fine, but no one would call it beautiful, while the Fine Arts Library reading room is really a wonderful piece of work.
Posted by: Matt | March 31, 2010 at 07:22 AM
Thanks for the entertaining responses, guys. I actually chuckled aloud after reading about the listing for "A. Franklin." ;-)
Posted by: Kelly Anders | March 31, 2010 at 10:46 AM
When I was in grad school at University of Chicago, the social science quad was used as the set for a scene in the movie "When Harry Met Sally".
But my brother has a much better story. He once lived in a dark and dismal basement apartment in the West Village of Manhattan. It was used as a set for a Law & Order episode, as the apartment of a serial killer.
Posted by: Eric Fink | April 01, 2010 at 01:26 AM
Very interesting, Eric. Was the quad featured at the beginning of the film, when they were students? As for the dismal digs, how did your brother find out that it was featured on L&O?
Posted by: Anon | April 01, 2010 at 10:44 AM