Chris Pratt's Michelob Ultra Super Bowl spot, aka "How to do location research without ever leaving your living room"(Off the Beaten Path)

Michelob Ultra — Super Bowl 2018 commercial starring Chris Pratt

I was watching TV recently when a Michelob Ultra commercial made me stop and take notice — not because Chris Pratt had his shirt off, but because of some cool shooting locations. You can watch the 30-second spot above.

Chris Pratt "works out" near the Chatsworth Nature Preserve — 2018 Michelob Ultra ad

The spot is one of this year's batch of much ballyhooed Super Bowl commercials. The thing that first caught my eye was the background at about the 11-second mark, which I recognized as the Chatsworth Nature Preserve.

Pratt in the Fox Residence on Farralone Avenue in Chatsworth

Once I got a chance to go back and examine other parts of the ad, I realized it contains a number of fun shooting locations. It begins inside the Fox Residence, a famous house in Chatsworth that is frequently used for filming.

The Fox Residence (real estate photo)

The shot in the Michelob ad is almost a perfect match for a real estate photo that circulated a few years ago — I'm not sure whether the photo dates back to 2011, when the place was listed for $12 million, or 2015, by which time the asking price had dipped to $7.5 million.

Another shot from the old real estate listing adds some context. It shows the same room where Pratt would later be filmed, but with a better view of the hills to the southwest.

I noticed a particularly bumpy section of the background hills, outlined here in yellow. You should be able to click on the photo to see a larger version.

The same section of hills can be seen in the sequence with Pratt jogging. This establishes that the jogging shot was filmed near the Fox Residence.

Chatsworth's Fox Residence (Google 3D view looking southwest)

We can get a pretty good look at the layout of the residence just by visiting Google Maps.

The location of the swimming pool, which also appears in one of the real estate photos above, pinpoints the corner of the house where Pratt was filmed, confirming that the view outside the windows is toward the southwest.

Wider view of the Fox Residence (Google 3D)

Pulling back for a wider view, we can get an idea where the jogging scene may have been shot.

This row of trees has the right orientation and looks like a prime candidate to be the jogging area.

Michelob Ultra ad: Chris Pratt with the Chatsworth Nature Preserve behind him

The sequence in which Pratt is seen jogging includes a tree with a pronounced lean to the left.

Sure enough, the last tree in the line is prominently angled, just like the tree in the jogging photo. It's not easy to see here in a poorly rendered Google Maps shot, but if you look closely you can see the angled trunk.

Even without proper rendering, a closer view of the tree provides a better look at the angled trunk.

The Fox Residence, looking south (Bing bird's-eye)

In this case a Bing bird's-eye photo offers a somewhat improved view of the heavily leaning tree.

Zooming in on the Bing shot, we get about as good a look at the tree as is possible using widely available aerial photos. The evidence is sufficient to determine that it's the same tree seen in the jogging sequence.

Now we know where the jogging sequence was shot for the Michelob spot.

A much wider Google 3D view, again looking southwest, shows the Fox Residence near the bottom of the frame with its view of the Nature Preserve — the former Chatsworth Reservoir — in the center of the frame.

Chris Pratt and an equestrian policewoman in a street scene from the Michelob commercial

Another interesting sequence in the Michelob commercial is this street scene featuring Pratt, jogging again, along with an equestrian policewoman.

A small local theater can be seen among the storefronts along the street. I couldn't make out the theater's name, but I figured a funky little theater might be easier to find than more generic businesses.

The next shot contains the smoking gun: a street sign. While it's far from crystal clear, it looked to me as though it might say "Tujunga." Just dumb luck, really, but that was the first thing that popped into my head.

Entrance to the Two Roads Theatre in Little Tujunga Village

"Tujunga" turned out to be right. Searching for a little theater on Tujunga, I hit pay dirt: The Two Roads Theatre in Studio City's Little Tujunga Village. I found pictures and other details online — it looks like a cool place.

Street where the equestrian policewoman scene was shot (Google Street View)

Once I had the address of the theater — 4348 Tujunga Ave. — the rest of the sequence fell into place. Here's a Google Street View showing the theater marquee, largely hidden behind a tree, along with some of the other storefronts seen in the Michelob spot.

Google Street View: Limelight store, at Tujunga and Woodbridge

At the corner of Tujunga Avenue and Woodbridge Street we see a store called Limelight — the same building that turns up in the background behind the policewoman in the commercial.

It appears that the store's name, logo and other details were edited out of the shot for the commercial.

Across the street from Limelight, Chris Pratt stays in his "clueless actor" character.

The brick-colored building in the background and the low wall seen behind Pratt are among the features that can be identified in the Google Street View.

Studio lot seen in the Michelob Ultra commercial

The ad also features a studio lot, another interesting location and one that should be relatively easy to match up. I ran out of patience before I managed to track it down — so many filming locations, so little time — but I'm hoping a blog reader will recognize it.

As luck would have it, there's also an extended 1-minute version of the Michelob Ultra spot, with additional scenes filmed at the Fox Residence. Check it out below ...



The "bar" scene where Pratt says "Method," at the 14-second mark, and the poolside sequence leading out from it are shot at the Fox Residence.

"Off the Beaten Path" is a series of posts that stray from the usual subject matter of this blog, which is the Iverson Movie Ranch. Past subjects have included Corriganville, Bell Ranch, Pioneertown, Franklin Canyon, Oak Park, various parts of Chatsworth and other old filming locations. You can see all of the "Off the Beaten Path" posts by clicking on the term "Off the Beaten Path" in the long index of labels at the right of the page, or by clicking here.

Cliff Road, Steep Canyon Road and the "Gate to Nowhere" on the old Iverson Movie Ranch — and something for fans of "The Fugitive"

"Daredevils of the West" (Republic serial, 1943)

One of the many historic movie roads on the former Lower Iverson Ranch appears in this shot from the old Allan "Rocky" Lane serial "Daredevils of the West."

A stagecoach that has lost its team of horses careens out of control toward a cliff — we know it's careening toward a cliff because that's what stagecoaches always did after losing their horses in old movies.

Location of the shot as it appears today (Bing bird's-eye view)

In the real world, the old road does in fact lead to the top of a cliff — Nyoka Cliff. This bird's-eye view of the site shows the approximate position of the stagecoach as it speeds west toward the cliff.

The Iverson family referred to the road as "Cliff Road." Nyoka Cliff and Cliff Road today are situated just east of Redmesa Road in Chatsworth, Calif., a short distance north of Santa Susana Pass Road.

The "road" as it appeared on a visit to the site in 2016

Cliff Road is completely overgrown now — in fact, it would be a stretch to call it a road, as any part of it that may have once been stagecoach-worthy has been lost to time, history and the forces of entropy.

The concept of entropy comes up a lot in movie location research — especially in places like the Iverson Ranch, where much of the site's past glory has been reclaimed by nature.

"Life After People": Hollywood's Cineramadome gets swallowed up

One of the best treatments of entropy is found in the History Channel TV series "Life After People," which depicts what might become of the artifacts of civilization should the human race be wiped out.

Cliff Road in "The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp" (1959) 

Back in the filming days, before entropy set in, Cliff Road was the Autobahn of movie roads: smooth, wide and well-maintained, as seen in this shot from the "Wyatt Earp" episode "Wells Fargo Calling Marshal Earp."

The episode premiered on Dec. 29, 1959. A number of the rocks seen in the "Wyatt Earp" shot can be matched up with more recent photos.

Here are the same rocks noted in the "Wyatt Earp" screen shot, as they appear in the 2016 photo of the road area. To see the background rocks in detail you can click on the photo to enlarge it.

1959 aerial, showing a well-defined Cliff Road

The wide, well-defined Cliff Road really pops out in a 1959 aerial photo. Like most of the roads on the Iverson Ranch, the Cliff Road appeared in its share of movies and TV shows.

"The Fugitive" TV series (January 1965 — filmed in 1964)

Cliff Road had ample room for a sadistic sheriff to kick up dust in his 1964 Ford police wagon as he tormented a fleeing prisoner in "The Fugitive." This shot comes from the episode "The Nicest Fella You'd Ever Want to Meet."

Pat Hingle and worried prisoner Tom Skerritt — "The Nicest Fella You'd Ever Want to Meet"

The sadistic sheriff, Joe Bob Sims, was played with panache by Pat Hingle, and the prisoner he chased in his Ford wagon was Neely Hollister, played by Tom Skerritt. Iverson's Rock Island can be seen in the rear window. 

Sheriff Joe Bob's specially outfitted Ford on Iverson's Steep Canyon Road

Joe Bob's wagon had a set of bull horns installed on the hood to maximize the intimidation factor and make a "point" about who had the upper hand — kind of silly, all things considered.

Iverson's "Steep Canyon" in modern times (2017 Bing bird's-eye view)

The station wagon sequence is stitched together using a couple of different roads on the Lower Iverson: the Cliff Road up above, and a section of Steep Canyon Road below, along the base of Nyoka Cliff.

Joe Iverson builds Steep Canyon Road (ca. early 1930s)

Steep Canyon Road was put in by Joe Iverson back in the early 1930s as the Iverson Movie Ranch adapted to the surge in business that came along with the movie industry's transition to sound films.

Misinformation on the LAMountains.com website

Film historians often call Steep Canyon Road "the Stagecoach Road" — a label that has had unintended consequences by contributing to the false belief that the road was part of an actual stagecoach route into Los Angeles. In reality the road was never anything more than a movie and TV road.

Nyoka Cliff, Steep Canyon Road and the Iverson Gorge in 2018

This photo from a recent visit to the Iverson Ranch, taken looking east from across the Gorge in the Garden of the Gods, shows the area where both Steep Canyon Road and the Cliff Road can still be found.

Some readers will recognize Stoney Point toward the right. The Chatsworth landmark appeared frequently in the background in productions filmed on the Iverson Ranch, but was rarely used as a filming location in its own right.

Prominently featured in the photo are the heavily filmed Nyoka Cliff and Lower Nyoka Cliff.

Running generally north and south along the Iverson Gorge, or Steep Canyon, is the Steep Canyon Road, whose route includes a key section along the base of the scenic cliffs.

This section of the road is reinforced by stone buttressing that was put in place when the road was built. For the most part this buttressing can still be found at the site today.

Here's a closer look at some of the buttressing as it appeared on that same recent visit.

The route of Steep Canyon Road hugs the base of the Lower Nyoka Cliff through this area.

The buttressing in the shot appears in two main segments, each of which remains largely intact.

Promo still for the 1953 Gene Autry movie "Pack Train" (photo from the Jerry England collection)

A promotional photo from 1953 gives an idea of what the road and the buttressing looked like back when the ranch was an active filming location.

Northbound on Steep Canyon Road: "The Millerson Case" (1947)

The well-maintained road was filmed regularly from the '30s into the '60s, and could easily be navigated by auto.

An impassable Steep Canyon Road in modern times

Similar to Cliff Road up above, Steep Canyon Road has been largely reclaimed by nature and today is virtually impassable in places, even on foot.  

High above Steep Canyon Road, Cliff Road runs east from park property above Nyoka Cliff into private property that was once the southeastern corner of the Iverson Ranch.

Cliff Road's "Gate to Nowhere"

There's a no-man's land along Cliff Road where the lines blur between park property and private property. This area is marked by an unusual modern "improvement" I call the "Gate to Nowhere."

As the name suggests, the gate does not appear to lead anywhere. It's just sitting there all by itself — not even attached to a fence. But the "Private Property" sign affixed to the gate makes its intentions clear.

Just behind the Gate to Nowhere is a movie rock. For our purposes we can call it "Gate to Nowhere Rock."

"Daredevils of the West": Gate to Nowhere Rock

Remember the shot at the top of this post from the serial "Daredevils of the West"? That's Gate to Nowhere Rock at the right of the frame — with the runaway stage headed straight for the future site of the Gate to Nowhere.

"The Roy Rogers Show" (1951)

Here's a similar shot from an early episode of "The Roy Rogers Show," with Gate to Nowhere Rock again seen at the right. The episode is "Doc Stevens' Traveling Store" — and that's the store traveling along Cliff Road.

Google aerial showing a portion of the Lower Iverson

This recent aerial photo from Google shows most of the Lower Iverson, including the entire area that has been preserved as public parkland. I've pinpointed where the Gate to Nowhere and its nearby rock can be found.

Google map of the Lower Iverson: The area in green has been preserved as public land

Besides spanning a road that goes nowhere and is both unusable and inaccessible, the gate and its "Private Property" sign are totally in the wrong place. The gate is positioned well within park boundaries, on public land.