NBC's "Heroes": A 2008 TV shoot on the former Iverson Movie Ranch

NBC's "Heroes" (2008)

Iverson Movie Ranch may not exist anymore as a business entity, but various sections of the former location ranch are still used occasionally for movie and TV shoots. The NBC TV show "Heroes" taped there as recently as fall 2008, using part of the Lower Iverson as a stand-in for Africa during season three (2008-09). The Africa story line centered on the character Matt Parkman, played by Greg Grunberg. (That's Greg's ear in the above photo.)

In the screen shot above, Matt has just awakened to find himself in Africa, where he sees a painting depicting the future. The painting appears on the side of Woolly Mammoth, an instantly recognizable Iverson figure that showed up in a number of B-Westerns and other movies as far back as the 1930s. The rock is also known as Vultura's Trail Rock, after an appearance in the 1942 Republic serial "The Perils of Nyoka."


This 2008 photo, taken soon after Woolly Mammoth's "Heroes" shoot, shows the creature unadorned, although it still has a splotch of white paint near its "eye" that is apparently left over from "Heroes." At the time this photo was taken, "Heroes" was still shooting in a nearby area, where an African-style hut was built for the show. You can see a photo of that set here, near the bottom of the post.

Here's a toy version of the woolly mammoth. You may or may not see the similarity, but to my eye the shape of the head and a few other elements make it a pretty good match.

Here's another modern-day photo of Woolly Mammoth, from the other side, closer to the typical movie angle. This shot gives some sense of the scale, although from this angle the rock looks nothing like a Woolly Mammoth. It's not one of the larger landmark rocks at Iverson, but it's fairly substantial.

"The Adventures of Spin and Marty" (1955)

Among the many appearances by Woolly Mammoth/Vultura's Trail Rock in old movies and TV shows, the rock was part of an interesting pan shot in the Disney show "The Adventures of Spin and Marty" — featured on "The Mickey Mouse Club" — in 1955. The above screen shot, taken from Kurt Spitzner's essential "Spin and Marty" site Of Cinch and Set (cinchset.com), shows just a portion of the overall shot, which is much wider. While this shot only includes the bottom half of Woolly Mammoth, it offers an interesting view of a section of Chatsworth below, at the left. Not only does the shot give a sense of Woolly's somewhat precarious perch on the edge of a cliff, it also offers a glimpse of the past — when the San Fernando Valley still had some farmland left.

For anyone who has an interest in "Spin and Marty," you really need to check out Of Cinch and Set if you haven't already. Kurt has done some terrific research, including a ton of location work. For his page on Woolly Mammoth/Vultura's Trail Rock, he put together a beautiful, widescreen photo of the pan shot that you will want to see. The full photo is more than twice as wide as what you see here. Click here to go right to the page with the photo.

Welcome to the obsession: The Iverson Movie Ranch

"Silver Treasure" (Fox Film Corp., 1926)

I discovered it in summer 2008 and have been hooked on it ever since — the rugged landscape in Chatsworth, Calif., that marks the site of the former Iverson Movie Ranch. 

Tower Rock, left, and Sphinx in modern times

With its striking sandstone rock formations, this remote corner of the San Fernando Valley on the outskirts of Los Angeles was an important hub of the movie business from the earliest days of Hollywood well into the 1960s, gaining a reputation as the most widely filmed outdoor location in the world.

"20 Million Miles to Earth" (Columbia, 1957)

An ideal setting for Westerns, the 500-acre Iverson Movie Ranch also found its calling in science-fiction movies, war epics and tales of distant lands such as Africa, India, the South Pacific and the Middle East.
 

The Phantom: Located on public land in the Garden of the Gods

It is the site where Republic Pictures made almost all of its serials and B-Westerns, and where countless outdoor action sequences were filmed by crews from Paramount, Universal, Warner Bros., Columbia, 20th Century-Fox, RKO, Monogram and just about every major production company of Hollywood's Golden Age.
 

"Little Big Horn" (Lloyd Bridges and John Ireland, 1951)

An estimated 3,500 films and TV episodes were filmed on the site, dating back to the 1910s.

"Jaunty Sailor"

While B-Westerns and early TV shows provided much of Iverson's business, the sprawling ranch also took a bow in major features such as John Ford's epic Western "Stagecoach" (1939) and his classic Depression saga "The Grapes of Wrath" (1940). 

"Along Came Jones" (RKO, 1945): Gary Cooper and William Demarest
on Cooper's newly minted Iverson Western street

Gary Cooper was a frequent visitor to the Iverson Ranch and built a Western town on the site for the 1945 RKO Western "Along Came Jones," the only movie Cooper produced himself. 

"The Lives of a Bengal Lancer" (Paramount, 1935): Climactic battle sequence
filmed in the Iverson Gorge

Cooper's "The Lives of a Bengal Lancer" was among the major war movies filmed on the Iverson Ranch, along with John Wayne's "The Fighting Seabees" (1944) and Errol Flynn's "The Charge of the Light Brigade" (1936).

"Chewbacca"

All the cowboy movie heroes worked at Iverson — Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Audie Murphy, Randolph Scott, Tom Mix, William S. Hart and the rest. So did major movie stars from Barbara Stanwyck to James Cagney to Judy Garland to Henry Fonda to Shirley Temple. 

"Three Ages" (Buster Keaton in Bathtub Rock, 1923)

Bob Hope, Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy and the Three Stooges were among the comedy stars to film at Iverson. Pioneering stuntman Yakima Canutt perfected many of his trademark stagecoach stunts on Iverson's well-traveled chase roads, while superheroes including Superman and Batman donned their capes at the ranch. 

Opening to "The Lone Ranger": Clayton Moore on Silver
at the Iverson Ranch's famed "Lone Ranger Rock"

Early TV Westerns such as "The Lone Ranger" and "The Cisco Kid" filmed regularly on the ranch, paving the way for the next generation of bigger, better TV productions — "Bonanza," "Gunsmoke," "The Virginian," "The Big Valley" and many others, all of which shot on the Iverson Ranch.

Woolly Mammoth

Iverson's charismatic rock "characters" — Lone Ranger Rock, Batman Rock, Tower Rock and Sphinx, Nyoka Cliff and hundreds of others — coexist today with the condominiums, mobile homes, mansions and apartments that took over the land as the heyday of the B-Western, the cliffhanger serial and early TV faded into history. 

"The Grapes of Wrath" (1940): The Joad family surveys the San Fernando Valley,
including Chatsworth's Stoney Point, from Iverson's Overlook Point

While a number of Iverson's distinctive and widely filmed movie rocks have been bulldozed or blown up to pave the way for progress, most have survived — even if in many cases they now lie forgotten in back yards, hidden behind locked gates or buried under a half-century of natural overgrowth.

Hangover Rock in 2008: African hut in place for the NBC series "Heroes"

Meanwhile, some Iverson landmarks remain at risk of being demolished for future development, opening the door for debate as to whether these silent stars are cultural artifacts that deserve to be protected.

"Chinless Wonder"

On the screen or in person, Iverson's unique giant boulders have so much personality that they seem to be living creatures. The charismatic stone figures that populate this intriguing corner of the world have become almost like family to me.

"Tarzan the Ape Man" (1932): Iverson's lost, lamented rock feature "The Wall"

I'm learning more about the Iverson Movie Ranch all the time, but it is a rich and complicated place, and one reason I love it is I know it holds mysteries I will never solve. 

Material is being added to the blog on a regular basis, as time permits. If you would like to be placed on my mailing list, to be notified about new entries as they're posted, please send me an email at iversonfilmranch@aol.com.

This blog contains a lot of information and photos. If you need help navigating, I suggest using the links along the right side of the page, especially the super-long "LABELS" section that runs much of the length of the page. The LABELS list indexes blog entries by rock name, movie title, TV show title, actors and actresses, directors and other key elements. The blog's word search feature, which you should be able to find in the top left corner on your browser, also works well and might help you find what you're looking for.

Please leave comments, and please feel free to email me for any reason.

Below are links to DVDs of just a few of the many movies filmed on the Iverson Movie Ranch. Please support efforts to research and preserve the history of the Iverson Ranch by clicking on the links to shop for these DVDs on Amazon ...