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In an interview with the new PBS SoCal digital series Locationland, location manager Danny Finn describes the kismet moment when he discovered that the house used for Freaky Friday in 2003 was still standing and still owned by the same woman. Even better, she was open to allowing it to be used again for Disney’s August 2025 release, Freakier Friday.
“I called and got an old, robotic answering machine, left a Hail Mary voicemail,” Finn recalled. “Two minutes later I got a call from an unknown number and this voice answered, ‘Hi. It’s Me. Yes, I still live here. Same house, new husband, all good.’ So we ended up shooting there, which was wonderful.”
Then, last week, everything changed.
“We’ve since confirmed that that house — along with every house on that block — was lost in the Palisades Fire,” he told Locationland.
In the midst of that life-altering tragedy, Finn was able to offer some solace to the homeowner.
“We were able to furnish the homeowner with our 2024 scout photos of the house for insurance claims and FEMA aid.”
The Freaky Friday homeowner’s dilemma is, unfortunately, not uncommon for those who lost homes in the Palisades and Eaton Fires.
While some people knew to take photos or video of their homes, many didn’t. And given the fast-moving nature of the wind-whipped blazes, many who were aware they should document their possessions for potential claims down the road didn’t have the time to do so between the moment they found out there was a fire and when they needed to evacuate.
Along with Finn, location manager David Flannery has stepped into that breach. Flannery and cohorts Lori Balton, Aaron Cota, Elizabeth Reynolds – all of whom worked on Apple TV+’s Shrinking together – joined with Ian Rutherford – key assistant location manager on Netlix’s Griselda – to create The Eaton and Palisades Fire Photo Project.
They have set up a webpage and a volunteer community at Scoutphotos.org to help victims of the fires find images of their properties. The aim is to connect those who’ve lost their homes with location management professionals and/or art directors who may have photographed those properties. In addition to compensation from insurance, the group also recognizes that some victims may also want the photos for their sentimental value or to help an architect rebuild a structure.
The initiative is co-sponsored by the Location Managers Guild, the Art Director’s Guild and Teamsters Local 399.
Locationland, for its part, has found itself uniquely positioned to document such losses of film and TV history. It offers “first-hand accounts of the creative people who brought cinematic SoCal to the big screen.” The show also looks at the impact that film and TV have on local communities as well as “set-jetting” as a new form of movie tourism. But since the wildfires started on January 7th, the producers have been shooting new interviews in the Palisades and Altadena to document the surviving film landmarks as well as the ones that have been lost.
Among those somewhere in between the two extremes is another Freaky Friday location: Palisades High School. While initial reports had the campus destroyed, officials have indicated that the site, while damaged, is not a total loss. Other projects shot on site include Carrie, MTV’s Teen Wolf, Crazy/Beautiful and Olivia Rodrigo‘s “good 4 u” music video.
Locationland also caught up with Jim Harris, the owner of Gladstones, whose famous eatery has been used in everything from NCIS to The Dating Game. Harris said that while the back half of the building — mostly storage — was “pretty torn up” with some scorched walls and smoke damage, the restaurant itself was relatively unscathed. For that, Harris credited the LAFD, which had a command post in the expansive parking lot just beyond his patio.
Locationland is hosted by author and film historian Harry Medved and co-created by longtime documentary filmmaker and PBS producer Harry Pallenberg, who produced Huell Howser’s California’s Gold series for over a decade. It is a co-production of PBS SoCal and Pallenberg’s Sunny and Mild Media. Pallenberg and Medved are the executive producers of the show.
The first three episodes follow Grease Director Randal Kleiser as he recalls shooting in the L.A. River, at Malibu’s Leo Carrillo State Beach and under the Sixth Street Bridge. Directors Will Gluck and Joe Dante discuss their shoots involving the Hollywood sign. Comedian/superfan Dana Gould visits the forgotten graveyard where Ed Wood filmed Bela Lugosi’s scenes for Plan 9 from Outer Space.
Locationland will stream on the PBS app and pbssocal.org starting at 6 p.m. tonight with new episodes dropping weekly on PBS SoCal’s YouTube Channel.
You can watch the teaser for the first episode, featuring Kleiser, below.
