10 Locations from Film and Media on Palos Verdes Drive in Los Angeles
Palos Verdes Drive stretches in all four directions of the compass from north to south to east to west across the Palos Verdes Peninsula in Los Angeles. Given its breathtaking views, good weather, and proximity to Hollywood, Palos Verdes Drive and the surrounding areas are famous for their use in film and media. Let’s look at 10 notable spots:
100 Terranea Way – site of the Terranea Resort, a $480 million award-winning resort built that opened in 2009. Has been featured in 2012’s This Is 40 and Savages. The entrance to the property is connected to Palos Verdes Drive South.
500 W. Paseo del Mar – site of the Sunken City. In 1929, a landslide caused several beachside homes to fall into the Pacific Ocean. Has been featured in films such as 1998’s The Big Lebowski and 2015’s Fear the Walking Dead.
901 Palos Verdes Drive West (also 901 Paseo del Mar) – once the site of The Chasan Villa. This one-of-a-kind oceanfront estate was built to the edge of the bluffs around Malaga Cove in 1981 and its magnificent design was featured in the press in 1982. Less than a year later, the villa was destroyed after water and sewer pipes broke causing a landslide towards the sea. In 1984, Marvell introduced The Avengers Compound into their universe which bears a striking resemblance to The Chasan Villa in design, topography, and storyline. Marvel even uses a broken sewer pipe in an Avengers chronicle as part of the destruction of an Avengers Compound.
4702 Palos Verdes Drive South to 4225 Palos Verdes Drive South – area of the Portuguese Bend. Site of the fictional Santa Rosita Beach State Park in 1963’s It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World. Serves as the background to the Harden Estate Gatehouse.
5500 Palos Verdes Drive South – site of the Harden Estate Gatehouse. The gate was completed in 1929 just before the Great Depression and the main house was never completed. Has been featured in 1963’s It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World.
5755 Palos Verdes Drive South – site of Wayfarers Chapel. Designed by Lloyd Wright, son of Frank Lloyd Wright, and built in 1951. Has been featured in The O.C. Sliders, The Rockford Files, and 1987’s Innerspace.
5970 Palos Verdes Drive South – site of Abalone Cove Park and Reserve. Has been featured in 2010’s Inception.
6610 Palos Verdes Drive South – once the site of Mainland of the Pacific. Built in 1954 as an oceanic amusement park, it was once the world’s largest oceanarium. The property was eventually acquired by the owner of SeaWorld and abruptly closed in 1987. Although the facility has been abandoned since the 1980s, it has remained a popular spot for the film industry including for the first few Pirates of the Caribbean films, 2001’s Pearl Harbor, and 2004’s The Aviator.
31176 Hawthorne Boulevard – site of Golden Cove. Located at the intersection of Palos Verdes Drive West and Hawthorne Boulevard. Has been featured in 2020’s Star Trek: Picard.
31550 Palos Verdes Drive West – location of Point Vicente Lighthouse. Built in 1926 to warn ships about the dangerous coastline and owned by the United States Coast Guard. Has been a popular filming location for decades stretching back to 1958’s Sea Hunt, The A-Team, Emergency!, Fantasy Island, and Wonder Woman in the 1970s and 1980s, 2001’s Pearl Harbor, The Amazing Race, CSI, Doll & Em, Dunkirk and NCIS in the 2010s and 2020s.
One honorable mention that is just a few streets off of West 25th Street, which becomes Palos Verdes Drive as one drives north:
3601 South Gaffey Street – site of Fort MacArthur. Former United States Army Base built in 1888. Has been featured in California’s Gold, The A-Team, 24, and 1976’s Midway.
Image credit: Wikimedia Commons (source)
