Santa_Monica_Lookout_Ready for the Close-up: Filming on the Promenade

Ready for the Close-up

By Mark McGuigan
Staff Writer

July 8 -- It’s a place where the Terminator once rescued a young John Connor from the clutches of a shape-shifting, killer cyborg. A place Crocodile Dundee visits on his trip to Los Angeles. Even Buffy the Vampire Slayer sometimes walks along its streets when not disposing of the undead. It also happens to be a great place to buy a decent sweater.

The Third Street Promenade has always been something of a star attraction. Moonlighting from its regular job as a shopping mecca for locals and tourists alike, the three-block strip has become an increasingly popular backdrop for commercials, television shows and the occasional Hollywood movie.

“We have grown into an internationally recognized filming location,” says Kathleen Rawson, executive director of the Bayside District Corporation, which grants permission to film on Third Street. “The Promenade shoots really, really well. It’s got a lot of light, it doesn’t cast a lot of shadow, it’s a pleasant environment.”

Filming on Third Street has been going on for as long as the Promenade has existed. The pedestrian-only shopping district opened on September 16, 1989, as part of an effort to revitalize the deteriorating downtown area. Fourteen years later, it has become the Cary Grant of street scenery – cool, sophisticated and not too sore on the eye.

There’s good reason for the glare from the lenses of the many production companies that regularly film on the street. More than 3.4 million tourists tread the hexagonal red brick walkway every year, reveling in the open-air fusion of upscale boutiques, eclectic street performers and funky street-side cafes.

“A lot of reality shows and comedy shows film (on Third Street) because of the amount of people that flock there,” says John Wheeler, permit coordinator at Denise Wheeler Film Permits Unlimited, a company that specializes in obtaining permission for the movie industry to film on location in California.

Wheeler’s company has secured location permits on the Promenade for television shows such as Street Smarts, The Tonight Show With Jay Leno, American Idol and The Bachelor.

Such shoots help generate an estimated $40,000 a year for the Bayside District Corporation on permits alone – a respectable figure for a Promenade that’s only a part-time “actor.” While this money is used to fund marketing programs for the district, the real benefit is in the attention the Promenade garners from its dalliance with Hollywood studios.

“The recognition that we get is just priceless to us,” says Rawson. “If a commercial, for example, uses Third Street as a destination and if that’s a national advert, the Promenade is advertised at no cost (to the Bayside District) to millions of people across the country.”

“There’s no way we could pay for that,” adds Rawson. “Ever.”

The Bayside District also works hard to ensure their “star” maintains a clean image, district officials say. As well as having a widespread audience, the diversity of the near-constant crowds along the three-block stretch means that all filming and photography must maintain a strictly “G” (General Audience) rating.

“We don’t allow things that have scenes that are of concern to a visitor,” explains Rawson. “If they were shooting a hold-up at one of the stores, for example, we wouldn’t allow that to happen. We don’t want people to misunderstand that it’s a film shoot.”

“No bikes, no blades, no guns, no nudity, no sex toys,” adds Linn Wile also of Bayside District, citing a list of restrictions that would make many a Hollywood executive consider their options before venturing anywhere near the Promenade with an R-rated script.

But aren’t sex toys a little strange to include on a list of film restrictions? Wile explains that the Bayside District once failed to list certain items as a restriction and a production company took full advantage of the omission.

“We didn’t actually say ‘no sex toys,’” recalls Wile. “The next thing we know, they’re juggling them (on the street).”

Fortunately, such over-reaching behavior is a rarity, officials say. The Bayside District goes to great lengths to ensure that pedestrians and the businesses that rely on them are in no way inconvenienced or embarrassed by the glamour and glitz that blows in from the Hollywood Hills.

“We try and accommodate almost anything without being intrusive to the visitors or the merchants,” says Rawson.

A full day shoot on the Third Street Promenade is $1,500; a half-day is $750; and a man-on-the-street walk and talk is $500. For more information, please contact the Bayside District Corporation at 310.393.8355.