Rebecca, 1940
Director
Cast
visit the film locations
Los Angeles: Flights: Los Angeles International Airport (LAX)
Rear Window film location: the Paramount lot, Melrose Avenue, Hollywood
Alfred Hitchcock's first US film, adapted from Daphne du Maurier's novel is set in 'Monte Carlo' and 'Cornwall', but made entirely in California.
'Manderley', of course, never existed. The house it was supposedly based on is Menabilly, on the east side of St Austell Bay, close to Fowey, Cornwall.
The set for Hitchcock's Gothic mansion was built at the old Selznick Studios, on the site of the Gone With The Wind sets. The studio still stands, unchanged, but now called Laird International Studios, at 9336 West Washington Boulevard, Culver City.
The estate grounds were in the Del Monte area of California, while beach exteriors used Catalina Island, off the coast of Los Angeles.
The rugged cliffs, where Joan Fontaine first meets Olivier, were filmed, using stand-ins, by a second unit at Point Lobos State Reserve, three miles south of Carmel. The delicate ecology of the area was endangered when the crew entered padlocked areas, bringing imported vines and ivy into contact with the native cypress trees. With poetic justice, most ended up hospitalised with poison ivy.
You can visit the wildly beautiful state park, but the ground cover is still a mat of the very nasty weed. To remove it would upset the environmental balance, so warning notices are posted throughout.
