Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Hollywood & Vines
Although
Sideways
(2004) is considered the quintessential movie about
California winemaking, it was set and shot farther south in the state,
around Santa Barbara. However, the 2008 film
Bottle Shock,
about the
Judgment of Paris in 1976 led by Chateau Montelena, was shot in the
region (mostly, ironically, in Sonoma). It was only the most recent of many
flicks that lensed in the area. Hollywood, and Hollywood types, can't seem
to get enough of Napa and Sonoma. A sampling:
The 1961 Elvis movie
Wild in the Country
(1961) was shot in and around
Calistoga and the Victorian-style
Ink House
hotel (1575 St. Helena Hwy.,
St. Helena;
%
707/963-3890; www.ila-chateau.com/inkhouse; from
$179/night).
Its French Room still has the bed he slept in.
Spring Mountain Vineyard
(2805 Spring Mountain Rd., St. Helena;
%
877/769-4637 or 707/967-4188; www.springmtn.com)
stood in for
Falcon Crest
on the 1980s primetime soap opera of the same name. These
days, it doesn't encourage visits from outsiders, and you have to make
reservations and pony up $25 per person to get in.
You might have seen photos of
Staglin Family Winery
(
%
707/944-0477;
www.staglinfamily.com; reservations required to obtain address; closed
weekends)
in the background at the weddings of both singer Christina
Aguilera and
American Idol
mastermind Simon Fuller. The organic winery's
privacy and its Earth-first principles have made it popular with entertainers.
Petaluma was where the kids trawled Petaluma Boulevard in their cars in
American Graffiti
(1973), and the city's still getting mileage out of the mem-
ories. The
Petaluma Visitor Center
(210 Hwy. 116, Petaluma;
%
707/769-
0429; www.visitpetaluma.com)
provides a tour of the locations on its website.
The idyllic suburbs of the thriller
Scream
(1996) were played by Santa
Rosa, Healdsburg, and Sonoma; the Sonoma Community Center on East
Napa Street played the serial killer-afflicted high school. Hitchcock also
shot in Santa Rosa for
Shadow of a Doubt
(1943) and, more recognizably,
in Bodega Bay for
The Birds
(1963).
In opposition to Francis Ford Coppola's visitor-friendly estate in Sonoma,
he also owns
Rubicon Estate Winery
(1991 St. Helena Hwy., Rutherford;
%
800/782-4266; www.rubiconestate.com),
founded as Inglenook in
1880 and now restored with
Godfather
money to feel like some movie
director's fantasy of what the good life is like. This glorious chateau, the
centerpiece of 235 acres, is a paragon of over-the-top fabulosity—grand
staircase, hardwoods from Belize, and a $25 fee to enter. It's as pompous
and as overblown as, well, a Coppola movie.
