101 Miami Squeeze

[airtommy]

20 hours ago, Tom said:

I did some searching yesterday for the plant. „Very unsatisfactory“ Ross would say. All plants that I found from the obvious ones (water plant on Virginia Key and water plant east of North Dade Justice building) to the smaller ones around Miami River where they also filmed for this episode and near the airport turned up nothing despite the unique layout with the two parallel walls as indicated by airtommy further up here.

It's the Alexander Orr Water Treatment Plant ...

[Tom]

vor 4 Stunden schrieb airtommy:

Because of the banyan tree and other heavy vegetation, I think the house is most likely in Coconut Grove or south of there.

The shimmering light reflections mean there must be a swimming pool in front of the house.  That's fairly unique (they're usually in the back) and will help narrow down the search.  Most places won't allow you to build a property wall that tall, I think, but I've seen them in Coconut Grove.  The arched openings in the wall are also fairly unique.

 

Wow I missed the reflections!

and with south of the Grove you wanna say that’s my turf for the search 

Edited April 19, 2020 by Tom

[Tom]

vor 4 Stunden schrieb airtommy:

It's the Alexander Orr Water Treatment Plant ...

Wow that’s the best fitting plant so far! But to be honest at first glance I could not find TWO fitting long parallel walls like in the scene, only one...

after some scrutiny of the scene the only potential match for the shooting location I see in picture 2 (yellow circle with arrow indicating the approaching cars in the beginning). The other alley up does not work as the nature of the right wall in the scene does not fit with no rails, tubes and even with the direction I marked I miss some landmarks on the right wall and most importantly the right wall does not seem to be interrupted by another alley like here in this case. But it’s a 90% match I think as they did some tricky editing especially with the angle of the car of the false Castillo before the attack. Your take on it? Alternate spots in mind?

PS staggering how close the plant is to the Whatever works/Dutch oven house in Glenvar heights!

Edited April 19, 2020 by Tom

[Tom]

Here is proof that confirms we have the right place! 

If we compare the still from the episode with the truck in a corner (pic1 vs. pic2), we can see the big pipe going round the corner in a very specific way -with a double L-shaped bow downwards and a vertical divider behind the white truck. Both is there in the southern corner of my yellow mark! If that´s a coincidence then I am Sonny Crockett himself 

Bottom line: my best guess is (picture 3): 

area with the two trucks standing in the episode - my picture number 2 (green circle)

cars approaching in the beginning of the scene (red arrow)

"Castillo´s" limo parked with false Castillo watching the approaching cars (purple area). This bugged me for some time, as Castillo´s limo seemed to be parked at a 45 degree angle but in fact was parked at a 90 degree angle to the approaching cars but wrong Castillo’s body twisted towards the cars ...

And who is not convinced enough, compare pictures 4 and 5. The stairs, chimneys and vertical pipe on right wall (red circles) match as do the metal guiderails on both walls (in green) and the big containers on the left of the alley (in blue on both pictures).

what do you think? Dissected enough? CASE SOLVED?

Alexander Orr Water Treatment Plant

6825 SW87 Ave

HOORAAY to airtommy! He again found a location nearly impossible to find! Luckily big water plants are rarely demolished or massively changed!

What makes this location even more interesting now is the hint it gives as to other potentially nearby locations in this episode. e.g. Ross´villa!

 

 

 

Edited April 19, 2020 by Tom

[airtommy]

Great work on the details, Tom!  A couple more features that match:

The blue arrow is where I think genuine Castillo drives up at the end:

Edited April 19, 2020 by airtommy

[airtommy]

I think the Castillo imposter is parked here:

[Tom]

vor 12 Stunden schrieb airtommy:

Because of the banyan tree and other heavy vegetation, I think the house is most likely in Coconut Grove or south of there.

The shimmering light reflections mean there must be a swimming pool in front of the house.  That's fairly unique (they're usually in the back) and will help narrow down the search.  Most places won't allow you to build a property wall that tall, I think, but I've seen them in Coconut Grove.  The arched openings in the wall are also fairly unique.

 

Have been searching for 3 hours now for Ross‘ villa around the plant as well as Grove, south of Grove and Key Biscayne. Despite the unique clues: this location is a b.tch! 

Edited April 19, 2020 by Tom

[airtommy]

12 minutes ago, Tom said:

Have been searching for 3 hours now for Ross‘ villa around the plant as well as Grove, south of Grove and Key Biscayne. Despite the unique clues: this location is a b.tch! 

I looked around Brenda's neighborhood (the diagonal grid area) but no luck.

 

[miamijimf]

Great work Tom and airtommy. 

[Matt5]

Really great work both airtommy and Tom - and on the “Jack of all Trades” house too.
 

 

[airtommy]

On 4/18/2020 at 4:21 AM, Tom said:

I watched this ep recently and was „shocked“ how many unknown locations there are: the cafe at the beginning, the small theater, the shooting range, the plant, Ross‘ house at the end.

CGlide speculated earlier about the Cameo Theater in Miami Beach. Too big interior for my taste. What we see in this ep is a very small „underground“ theater with less than 100 seats and no big open area. The Cameo even had a big stage and night club inside.

The cafe interior scene is nearly impossible.  It's probably not even a real cafe.  Don't waste any time on this location.

The shooting range - you could look at shooting ranges on Google Maps and scroll through their pictures.

The theater is interesting.  This is the most important shot we see.  Interesting pattern on the wall on the right side.

[Tom]

vor 7 Stunden schrieb airtommy:

The cafe interior scene is nearly impossible.  It's probably not even a real cafe.  Don't waste any time on this location.

The shooting range - you could look at shooting ranges on Google Maps and scroll through their pictures.

The theater is interesting.  This is the most important shot we see.  Interesting pattern on the wall on the right side.

I already did searches through all shooting range pics but no find.

Theaters the same: I only found one small movie theater pic with a similarly sized viewing room (100 pax) in Cinema Paradiso in Hollywood but it does not fit as the access corridor is in on the side wall and not in the middle as on the pic above. Issue with the movie theaters is also that a lot of these small ones have closed over the years. The theater in the ep looks very basic and run down like it did not exist very long after filming.

by the way: I don’t get the purpose of the hanging net in that theater pic. These nets are where you‘d expect the movie screen to be and it seems that there is a lowered stage area instead that has room enough for a long net (backlight indicates at least another 10 meters!). But maybe the other room is no projection room as we originally thought and this is a normal theater and not used for movies?

the whole look of the theater tells me this was an old run down underground theater with its own little bar with a glass brick window that is long closed.

P.S. the color scheme on the right of the audience room somewhat reminds me of the Paris Theater (Borrasca - see pic 1), but I assume the Paris was not it (2 stories and too large, not run down enough? and the entrance corridor was also on the side and not in the middle as can be seen in this old picture 2 I found from the Paris).

 

Edited April 22, 2020 by Tom

[Matt5]

Great research guys - I looked at The Ace Theatre in Coconut Grove seen briefly in “Child’s Play” (exterior) but couldn’t match up. This was previously a segregated theatre interesting stuff on the net about it.

[C Glide]

Okay, I'm hooked. I will have to watch this episode again and see if I can come up with anything.

[Tom]

So, folks, I have searched around 250 movie theaters in Greater Miami, even the closed and demolished ones. No theater that fits. I found a few that were that size and closed around 1989 or later but could sort them out due to different factors (too big, too fancy, ...)

This website was a great help as it lists information for each theater per section (Miami, Miami Beach, North Beach, Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, Pinecrest, ...) incl. number of seats, when it was opened/closed, pictures, etc.

http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/united-states/florida/miami

Bottom line: the location must have been the most unknown underground theater ever that it was not even listed on this specialist theater site.

 

[C Glide]

Started reviewing this episode again and working on updating my site. Republished the first page but will need to go visit the locations in person to take re-creation shots as I was living in Boston when I originally published this episode. Working on page two now. Stay tuned.

[Tom]

vor 5 Stunden schrieb C Glide:

Started reviewing this episode again and working on updating my site. Republished the first page but will need to go visit the locations in person to take re-creation shots as I was living in Boston when I originally published this episode. Working on page two now. Stay tuned.

I hope that we‘re not gonna find the remaining unknown locations in this ep too fast, otherwise you‘d have to update that page every week !

[Tom]

This is my best candidate for the small movie theater that seems to be run down.

What makes this lead interesting is that it is not far away from the "Plant 31" location in this episode and only few blocks from the Town and Country Mall in Kendall (Down for the count shoot-out). Unfortunately no interior photos found. Also, it was closed in 1989. Coincidence?

 

[C Glide]

Anything is possible but looks too modern to be correct.

[Tom]

vor 3 Stunden schrieb C Glide:

Anything is possible but looks too modern to be correct.

I know that it’s likely not it. But the modernity of the building is my least worry. My concern is that the theater in the episode was not an official theater, but, according to the appearance of the bar, rather an underground place or a youth club sort of establishment that is not listed anywhere.

 

[Tom]

Am 19.4.2020 um 05:23 schrieb airtommy:

Because of the banyan tree and other heavy vegetation, I think the house is most likely in Coconut Grove or south of there.

The shimmering light reflections mean there must be a swimming pool in front of the house.  That's fairly unique (they're usually in the back) and will help narrow down the search.  Most places won't allow you to build a property wall that tall, I think, but I've seen them in Coconut Grove.  The arched openings in the wall are also fairly unique.

 

A very close, but false suspect for the Ross house is 140 Rosales Court, Coral Gables.

It looks good at first sight (arches on the pathway to the house, 45 degree angle of the entrance and look of it, but can be excluded quickly, as there were no steps up to the entrance in the episode, the pool is missing, as is the wall between the house and the street. But most importantly, that house was built just in 2019 and the whole area was completely undeveloped in 1986 as historic aerials shows.

But: it gives a some confirmation that we are on the right track with the assumption to look for it in Coral Gables....

 

[daytona365]

On 4/19/2020 at 9:36 AM, Tom said:

Wow I missed the reflections!

and with south of the Grove you wanna say that’s my turf for the search 

How about this, 3467 Moorings Way. A 1929 Walter De Garmo House

 

[Tom]

vor einer Stunde schrieb daytona365:

How about this, 3467 Moorings Way. A 1929 Walter De Garmo House

Wow, first picture says you got it! Congrats!

ROSS HOUSE FOUND: 3467 N. Moorings Way, Coconut Grove it is!

The pool matches, as do all details around the door, the stucco, the window, etc. I attach pics that I found that confirm that it is the location!

I´m kicking myself that I did not come onto the idea to search for other Ge Garmo houses despite the clear stylistic clues (arches, doorways) like in the house in "Over the line" and "Rock and a hard place"!

We see the arch entrance that Woods used from the street, the side arches where Tubbs and Switek were and the pool (there are two pool, the one that was off screen is the small show pool) that caused the water reflections when Woods entered the house. Also the interior fits with the wooden ceiling bars. Well done!

on Google Earth it´s hard to see anything through the trees from above. Where did you get the pic on the entrance from and how did you find it despite the heavy canopy and no google street view available?

What a hell of a run do we have as a team now since April on location hunting!

P.S. yery disappointing to see that this beautiful house is very run down now on the outside. Tiles replaced,  wall above the door needs repaint, all walls heavily overgrown. In VICE it looked a lot better IMHO.

 

 

 

Edited June 10, 2020 by Tom

[daytona365]

1 hour ago, Tom said:

Wow, first picture says you got it! Congrats!

ROSS HOUSE FOUND: 3467 N. Moorings Way, Coconut Grove it is!

The pool matches, as do all details around the door, the stucco, the window, etc. I attach pics that I found that confirm that it is the location!

We see the arch entrance that Woods used from the street, the side arches where Tubbs and Switek were and the pool (there are two pool, the one that was off screen is the small show pool) that caused the water reflections when Woods entered the house. Also the interior fits with the wooden ceiling bars. Well done!

on Google Earth it´s hard to see anything through the trees from above. Where did you get the pic on the entrance from and how did you find it despite the heavy canopy and no google street view available?

It was actually a quick find, I googled for "Spanish revival coconut grove" pictures and after 10 minutes I found this article: https://thebigbubblemiami.com/2018/02/12/walter-de-garmos-3467-n-moorings-way-at-the-head-of-a-grand-canal-is-on-the-market-for-8-75-million/. This contains a few more pictures which immediately confirmed I had the right one.

Edited June 10, 2020 by daytona365

[Tom]

vor 51 Minuten schrieb daytona365:

It was actually a quick find, I googled for "Spanish revival coconut grove" pictures and after 10 minutes I found this article: https://thebigbubblemiami.com/2018/02/12/walter-de-garmos-3467-n-moorings-way-at-the-head-of-a-grand-canal-is-on-the-market-for-8-75-million/. This contains a few more pictures which immediately confirmed I had the right one.

Thanks! Interesting.Same way I found the consulate in Rites of passage then!

Realtor pictures was the only way to find it as there is no good view from above and no street view. Luckily there was a renovation and this article just 2 years  ago so we have plenty of great pictures with many of them exactly showing and verifying our filming location. 
Great find and thanks  again!

Edited June 10, 2020 by Tom