Beverly Hillbillies Mansion
Did anyone notice it was used for the Embassy?
shareIt certainly looked like the same exterior and gate, but is there anyone who knows with certain? The thing is, they say at the start of the film that they used the same exteriors in Turkey as the ones in the actual events. I would guess they had to use this exterior because the real one wasn't available.
share[deleted]
I do not know about places in Ankara but the scenes in Istanbul the German building with the Nazi flag was this:
http://www.seffafgazete.com/site/1/uploads/o/2012/26/812909cfdd2dbbe8cf85bb5be25b3f65.jpg
It's actually old municipality building in Beyoglu.
Following scene with Galata tower at the end of the road is just a little down this building. But they go there by car : ) Knowing the exact places is fun but only this...
The building in the film was in Turkey, but if you look at The Beverly Hillbillies it's obvious that the two buildings and the grounds around them in fact don't look anything like one another.
shareIt's such a rare instance in which a correction can be made to one of your comments, but in this case, the OP is correct: the Kirkeby Mansion was indeed used in the establishing shot for the British Embassy.
The film's up on YouTube (for the time being, anyway):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ArNYrQRRLI
The house appears at about 13:40.
Poe! You are...avenged!
You know, I think you're probably correct (although you're incorrect about it being a "rare" instance regarding me). Studying that portion of the film it does look like the Beverly Hillbillies mansion, though to me it doesn't look precisely the same -- which I put down to an unclear memory of the latter, or more properly, looking at the same site in two different venues.
However, what annoys me is that I should have realized that the mansion seen in that shot could not have been in Turkey, for one obvious fact -- so obvious it escaped me. In that nighttime sequence, we see James Mason returning to the "embassy" -- a distance shot of him approaching it, then a close-up of him going through the gate and shutting that.
Now, all of the scenes filmed on location in Turkey were establishing shots, mostly filmed at a distance, of various Turkish sites. This includes all the shots of the characters actually in the locations shown -- except they weren't the cast, but doubles for the actual actors, none of whom went to Turkey. This was all second-unit stuff. You can see that none of the actors is ever seen in close-up while plainly in Turkey; the close-ups are all studio inserts matching the locales seen in the establishing shots. Therefore, Mason could not possibly have been seen -- as he clearly is, even at a distance -- if that sequence had been filmed in Ankara.
So I guess the OP (and you, as usual) were right. But is that also the BH mansion in the scene (at about 1:17) where, after Diello triggers the alarm and runs out, we see Micheal Rennie look out the window and watch him running away through the garden? It looks like Mason's double, not Mason, running away. Of course, they could have employed the double to do the sprint back in Beverly Hills. We don't see the mansion itself in that shot, and while the grounds look similar, from that p.o.v. I can't be certain that it's the same estate (in America).
But is that also the BH mansion in the scene (at about 1:17) where, after Diello triggers the alarm and runs out, we see Micheal Rennie look out the window and watch him running away through the garden? It looks like Mason's double, not Mason, running away.Can't say whether it's Mason or his double, but it actually is a reverse angle of the same location. Those gateposts with the stone lions (or dogs or whatever animal they are) on top - and the attached gatehouse - are as recognizable as the oppressive "reich nouveau" architecture of the home. There are clearer views of both on this page of frame grabs from TBH, High Society (with a matted-in phony roofline), Cinderfella and Disorderlies:
I've noticed the similarity between the Jed Clampett estate and that in High Society but never realized it was in fact the same place. Highly disappointing, since they shot background plates in Newport, R.I., that they didn't use a genuine Newport mansion for the joint in the movie.
Luckily the film at least featured Louis Armstrong and not Flatt and Scruggs.
Of course you know the story of James Mason's own connection to a legendary westside palazzo not a mile away (as the crow flies) from the Kirkeby estate, and the part he and it played in the resurrection of one of films' comic geniuses.
Luckily the film at least featured Louis Armstrong and not Flatt and Scruggs."Now You Has Bluegrass" hasn't quite the same ring (nor do I know of any Newport Bluegrass Festival). Now, if they'd set in in N.C. and called it The Asheville Story, they could have used not only F&C but Biltmore as well (the roofline of which is suspiciously suggested in that HS frame grab).