Your House on Screen

The Post looks at what it's like to have your home co-opted by a film or TV show. With daily rates of $2000 (for posh locations), loads of equipment will be loaded in, your and your neighbors' peace of mind distressed, and strangers will tramp around your place. (Hey, it's almost like a couch surfer - just not the getting money part.) The Post has tips for how you can get your place on screen, with the Mayor's Office of Film & TV Production as the first thing to check out - they have a page on how to make your home a "star." One of Gothamist's all time favorite NYC home locations is the house at Archer Avenue where the Tenenbaums live; the Observer looked at Wes Anderson's and his crew's fastidious attention to the house's detail.

Gothamist will most definitely sign up with the Office of FIlm & TV Production, because we are certain that location scouts are dying to know about another apartment cluttered with too much crap. A.O. Scott called the Panic Room essentially luxury real estate porn and said that the film had "many scenes of graphic violence, some of it directed at the walls and windows of a beautiful old house."

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By Jen Chung in Arts & Entertainment on August 20, 2003 1:45 PM

Comments [rss]

Ben Hines

Panic Room did not use a real location house, i worked on it. The ENTIRE brownstone was built from scratch on a soundstage (Stage 23-24 at Raleigh Studios Manhattan Beach, CA, all 3 stories and basement of it. (they dug a pit for the elevator) It was incredible.

Actually the brownstone (and soundstages) sat there for a few months unused because Nicole Kidman got hurt on her previous movie and (eventually) dropped out of Panic Room. She was replaced with Jodie.

Dahl

That or finagle your way in as the crazy best friend. I'm was always sure that once you met the producers, it'd be easy to be an extra or someone with a line or two, right?

Jen

Dahl, you know how I feel about Law & Order. I'd really like my apartment to be where the victim's crazy best friend lives.

Dahl

When I was growing up, our apartment almost got used in an episode of Law and Order - at the time we thought that was a big deal, but looking back on it, it would have been one of thousands by this time.