If there is one thing Hollywood is thoroughly adept at, it is seamlessly faking one city for another. Case in point? “Gaslit,” the 2022 Starz miniseries chronicling boisterous whistleblower Martha Mitchell’s (Julia Roberts) role in exposing the Watergate scandal and the many White House power players brought to their knees in the process, including her husband, Attorney General John Newton Mitchell (Sean Penn). While set in early 1970s Washington, D.C., filming took place in its entirety in present-day Los Angeles, with production designer Daniel Novotny, of “Outer Banks” and “Gotham” fame, and set decorator Jennifer Lukehart, whose deft hands also outfitted such shows as “The White Lotus” and “Hacks,” selling the swap flawlessly, even to this dedicated location hunter’s eye!
To achieve the scenic trickery, the production team trekked across Southern California, utilizing a plethora of retro-looking nooks, crannies, buildings and backdrops. As Lukehart told SetDecor, “We shot for 101 days, with no hiatus. Offices and all of our stage sets were at Universal, with locations from Long Beach to Thousand Oaks, Malibu, Pasadena, Pomona and Hollywood for starters.” Downtown L.A. also played a prominent role, specifically Los Angeles Center Studios, which stood in for the Watergate complex. Paired with some key establishing shots of the actual Luigi Moretti-designed property, the DTLA production facility’s Home Office Building was featured extensively in both interior and exterior scenes involving the spot where D.C.’s most infamous scandal took place, which also served as the Marshalls’ home. (Sadly, the stunning inside of the couple’s two-story penthouse apartment – even the glorious sunken conversation pit – was nothing more than a lavish set crafted by Novotny and Lukehart inside a soundstage at Universal Studios.)
Other SoCal locales that appear in the eight-episode miniseries include the Stuart Building in Pasadena, Hotel Per La in downtown L.A. and The Great Wall Restaurant, an oft-filmed and longtime staple of the San Fernando Valley landscape. Situated mid-block on a busy Reseda street at 18331 Sherman Way, the eatery has become a go-to for movies and television shows in need of a picturesque Chinese food establishment within the Thirty Mile Zone, especially period productions. So its role in “Gaslit” was a no-brainer.
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Image Credit: Lindsay Blake for Dirt The Great Wall is one of those rarest of Los Angeles anomalies – a restaurant that has been in operation for multiple decades. Despite its longevity, though, very little of the place’s history is documented online or in newspaper reports outside of the fact that the Mandarin/Szechuan eatery originally opened its doors in 1984 (just shy of 40 years ago!) at a spacious 4,725-square-foot storefront that previously housed a discount shoe store.
The location’s somewhat nondescript exterior belies little of the grandeur that can be found inside.
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Image Credit: Lindsay Blake for Dirt Outfitted with a gilded ceiling, ornate screens, richly-colored murals and a massive Art Deco-inspired glittering chandelier, The Great Wall is nothing if not opulent!
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Image Credit: Lindsay Blake for Dirt The spacious establishment consists of three areas: a bar situated near the front entrance, a rear banquet room and a main dining room, with most of the gild and glint relegated to the latter.
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Image Credit: Lindsay Blake for Dirt With Lazy Susans in prominent placement on round tables, serving platters featuring blue florals and hot tea offered in ceramic teapots throughout, the place is old school in all the best ways, with the capability of bringing patrons right back to their childhood with just one step inside the front door.
That familiar aesthetic has made the restaurant a stalwart in Hollywood, its unmistakable fretwork paneling popping up in countless productions over the years. In fact, when The Great Wall was last offered for sale in 2017, the listing detailed that the previous year’s film income totaled $38,350.
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Image Credit: Lindsay Blake for Dirt In “Gaslit,” The Great Wall poses as the supposed Manhattan-area China Pearl Cantonese restaurant where a young Martha first meets John while on a blind double date in a flashback scene in the episode titled “Year of the Rat.” Though married to others at the time, the two hit it off immediately, tying the knot themselves soon after, only to be torn apart by the Watergate scandal and John’s role in it 15 years later.
In a case of art imitating life, The Great Wall actually utilizes placemats featuring the Chinese zodiac, much like the one John reads from onscreen, informing his friend Ken Ebbitt (Billy Smith) that he was born in the Year of the Rat and is therefore “bright, patient, inspiring to others” and “can be happy on my own or make an outstanding partner.” I think Martha would beg to differ on that last part!
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Image Credit: Paramount Pictures Other productions to feature the eatery include the 2007 comedy “Norbit,” in which it masks as the interior of the Golden Wonton Restaurant & Orphanage run by Mr. Wong (Eddie Murphy).
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Image Credit: Warner Bros. Pictures Poker player Huck Cheever (Eric Bana) takes singer Billie Offer (Drew Barrymore) for a celebratory dinner at the restaurant in the 2007 box-office bomb “Lucky You.” Although the place is purported to be in Las Vegas in the film, The Great Wall’s name is clearly visible on the menu Huck holds in the scene.
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Image Credit: DreamWorks Peter Klaven (Paul Rudd) and Zooey Rice (Rashida Jones) host an extremely awkward engagement party at The Great Wall in the hit 2009 comedy “I Love You, Man.” The movie extensively utilizes the eatery’s front bar and rear banquet room onscreen, although exteriors were filmed about 30 miles away at the famed Hop Louie restaurant in downtown L.A.’s Chinatown neighborhood.
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Image Credit: FilmDistrict The Driver (Ryan Gosling) meets with mobster Bernie Rose (Albert Brooks) at The Great Wall at the end of the 2011 action hit “Drive.”
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Image Credit: Global 3 Media A drug deal goes awry on the premises in the 2011 crime film “No Saints For Sinners.”
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Image Credit: 20th Century Fox Television Mindy Lahiri’s (Mindy Kaling) disastrous surprise party is held there in the season one episode of “The Mindy Project” titled “Mindy’s Birthday.”
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Image Credit: Paramount Television Kensi Blye (Daniela Ruah), Marty Deeks (Eric Christian Olsen) and Talia Del Campo (Mercedes Mason) orchestrate a massive drug bust at The Great Wall in the season six premiere of “NCIS: Los Angeles” titled “Deep Trouble: Part 2.”
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Image Credit: NBC And Rebecca Pearson (Mandy Moore) dines there – and has a minor meltdown upon losing her wallet and phone – in the season four episode of “This Is Us” titled “So Long, Marianne.”
Talk about some serious screen cred! The Great Wall boasts a resume most actors would give their eyeteeth for!