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MEDIA/PRESS
August 7, 2003
831 [Tales From the Area Code]
Star Struck: Monterey Movie Tours® cashes in on local Hollywood connections.
By Bob Walch, Coast Weekly
Source: Photo by Randy Tunnell: Movie Madness!: Doug Lumsden motors curious tourists to cinematic hot spots on the Peninsula.
Watching film clips every afternoon may not seem like a very demanding job--more recreation than work. But toss in maneuvering a 32-passenger bus around narrow city streets while sneaking furtive glances at a movie monitor, and the task becomes a little more daunting.
Longtime movie buff Doug Lumsden is the owner/operator of Monterey Movie Tours®, the Peninsula's newest tourist attraction. For three hours a day he treats his customers to a tour that combines on-board movie clips with stops at the actual locations where those film segments were shot. These are the places where Marilyn Monroe, Clint Eastwood, Sandra Dee, Tom Hanks, and teenagers Elizabeth Taylor and Mickey Rooney appeared in some of Hollywood's most memorable films.
Whether it's taking a vacation or just walking into a movie theatre, Lumsden says everyone likes to escape: "When you feel everything is coming down on you, when it's been a bad week, you can crawl off to the movies and relax with a bag of popcorn."
His escape-for-a-day begins with a quick stop at Monterey's Colton Hall, which was transformed into a police station in Doris Day's 1956 film Julie, and then stood in for a school in the 1959 Sandra Dee-Troy Donahue teenage romance A Summer Place. Then it's on to Cannery Row where Marilyn Monroe portrayed a tough-talking cannery worker in Clash by Night and where, 34 years later, William Shatner and the Star Trek crew checked out the whales.
After watching a clip from Play Misty for Me that was shot in front of the Sardine Factory, Lumsden's tour bus rolls by that Cannery Row restaurant while Lumsden explains the film was not only made entirely on the Central Coast but marked Clint Eastwood's debut as a director.
Making a sharp right around the corner into Pacific Grove, it's into Turner & Hooch and Bandits territory, and then on to 17 Mile Drive and Pebble Beach, where more than 40 movies have been shot. From tales of the 1944 Elizabeth Taylor classic National Velvet to One-Eyed Jacks, a cowboy flick starring Marlon Brando, Lumsden keeps up the Hollywood banter.
Lumsden's infatuation with film dates to his youth growing up on the Monterey Peninsula. In the 1960s, he recalls, "I had a lot of fun stopping by filming locations and watching. I remember some night shooting of The Big Bounce with Ryan O'Neal and Lee Grant in Pebble Beach. And I also watched a crew on the 17 Mile Drive shoot scenes for My Blood Runs Cold. I just parked my car, walked right up and was about 15 feet from Joey Heatherton, one of the film's stars."
Lumsden's attraction to the film industry was piqued by his family's fleeting connection with a few stars. At the outset of World War II, Lumsden's father and Jimmy Stewart were roommates when both men started their flight training together in the Army Air Corps. Stewart had just won the Oscar the previous year for The Philadelphia Story. Although his father didn't talk much about his famous "roomie", the entire family took a great interest in the actor's career after the war.
Two years ago the Monterey County Film Commission asked Monterey Bay Scenic Tours, the parent company of Monterey Movie Tours®, to put together a special Play Misty for Me tour to celebrate the film's 30th anniversary. Lumsden was already thinking about developing some type of ongoing movie tour for the area, and the success of that project motivated him to go forward.
Along with obtaining the appropriate licenses and working out tour logistics, Lumsden had to obtain copies of as many as possible of the nearly 200 movies shot in Monterey County since the late 1890s. His personal collection now contains about 120 of these films.
"Unfortunately, many movies just can't be obtained anymore," he says. "These are mainly silent films which are lost forever."
Certain movies seem to be synonymous with the Central Coast, he says. His top five movies with a local connection are Play Misty for Me, Clash by Night, A Summer Place, National Velvet, and The Sandpiper.
"I think various ocean views and certainly the Big Sur coastline are easily recognizable," he says. "Shots taken of the Pebble Beach golf links, or anything with Monterey Cypress trees are a dead giveaway, and a lot of car chases have been filmed on the 17 Mile Drive."
Ironically, although these scenes may shout out "Monterey Peninsula" to those who know the local landscape, Peninsula locations have stood in for everything from the beaches of Normandy to the shores of Corsica. A Summer Place, which was filmed throughout the Peninsula, was meant to be set on Pine Island, off the coast of Maine. The Monterey Bay Aquarium scenes in Star Trek IV supposedly unfold at the fictional "Cetacean Institute" in Sausalito.
With fewer feature-length films being shot in the area nowadays, Lumsden hopes he can "heighten the movie magic" of the Monterey Peninsula. "I want to bring it to the forefront again," he says. "This is movie-making land."
Check available dates and buy tickets online.
To purchase tickets by phone call Zerve at (800) 979-3370 or (212) 209-3370.
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Monterey Bay Scenic Tours, LLC, (parent company of Monterey Movie Tours®) holds a Public Performance Movie License that allows us to show productions onboard our luxury coach. Movie Tours is the trademark of Movie Tours, Inc., a Hawaii Corp. Used by permission. 17-MILE DRIVE®, PEBBLE BEACH, PEBBLE BEACH RESORTS, THE HERITAGE LOGO, THE LONE CYPRESS TREE, and their distinctive images are trademarks, service marks, and trade dress of Pebble Beach Company. Used by permission.
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