The Barbary Coast bandleader tells Joey and Linda that they have landed a gig "at a society party on Nob Hill" at the mansion owned by Vera Prentice-Simpson (Rita Hayworth), a wealthy socialite widow. (But as we are about to find out, it wasn't on Nob Hill ...)
Then ... The guests roll up to the mansion by way of a large circular driveway with a grassy knoll in the middle. In the distance off to the right are a cluster of buildings on top of a hill.
... and Now, but this mansion doesn't exist and never has. For the bottom half of the scene above the parking activity was filmed at the Coit Tower parking lot on Telegraph Hill then a sneaky matte painting of the mansion was added in the upper half. The matching recent photo below of Coit Tower shows a statue of Christopher Columbus on the knoll (why? ... he never set foot in North America), erected in 1957 not long after the movie was filmed.
... an aerial view ... this vintage aerial of Pioneer Park shows Coit Tower and the parking lot before the statue was installed. As we will see later in the movie there's a scene on Mrs Simpson's patio that was filmed on the lawn to the right of the tower. So the Coit Tower site itself (map) was the virtual location of Vera Simpson's mansion.
What about those buildings off to the right in the first 'Then' image above? Although they too were part of the painting, they were images of real buildings atop Russian Hill. They can indeed be seen from Telegraph Hill - here they are below in a 1952 photo taken from the top of Coit Tower. The building on the left of the group is the prestigious 945 Green Street Apartments.
... and Now, the same buildings viewed through a gap in the trees from the parking lot today. Newer buildings intrude but the original three (arrowed) are still there.
The society party is a fundraiser and after Joey sings a wonderfully relaxed 'There's A Small Hotel' he persuades Vera to reprise, for a generous donation, an act she used to do in her former life as a striptease performer. In the number, titled 'Zip', Rita Hayworth spoke the lead-in lines but her singing voice was dubbed by Jo Ann Greer.
Sheila's young son Peter tells Cathy that he had been awakened by a gunshot on the night Mason was murdered. Unaware of the affair between her step-mother and Dr. Rivera she goes to Rivera's office and tells him that Sheila must have killed Mason. Rivera tries with increasing desperation to talk her out of it and, confused, she rushes out.
Then ... Rivera is even more confused; he wanders around town with the Hippocratic oath reverberating inside his head - an oath he has twice violated. We see him here in an open park area with a Western Airlines ticket office behind him.
... and Now, this was filmed in Union Square. The view looks from the square to the 200 block of GearyStreet. The square's layout has changed significantly and the Western Airlines office at 287 Geary (map) is now a barber salon, The Art Of Shaving - it's name is inscribed within the yellow oval.
... from the early 1960s ... this vintage postcard image shows the Western Airlines office, at far right, as it was when the movie was filmed. I. Magnin is at the left end of the block with Macy's/Blums and Dohrmanns in the center.
... and Now, here's the same view today. I. Magnin is now part of Macy's and the main Macy's entrance has swallowed up Dohrmanns.
Then ... He wanders up a narrow lane with the banner behind him revealing that this is the two block Maiden Lane that runs between Union Square and Kearny Street. He is walking west towards Union Square - that's Grant Avenue crossing behind him (map).
... and Now, a recent photo from near the same spot. A street tenor was singing to no-one in particular at the end of the lane while CitySleuth was there.
Then ... As he approaches Stockton Street Rivera darts into a doorway when he sees a cop passing by. The entrance to the garage under Union Square is visible across Stockton. Interestingly, this same location was seen ten years earlier in the 1950 movie Woman On The Run.
... and Now, Union Square has undergone extensive changes since the movie was filmed. The underground garage is still there but there's no longer an entrance on this side of the square. The St. Francis hotel faces us from the other side of the square. Note the gate, added to convert the busy shopping lane to a vehicle-free precinct..
Where does an out-of-work, down-on-his-luck singer find a job? Why, the infamous International Settlement, a single block chock full of clubs, bars and restaurants in the Jackson Square neighborhood of San Francisco.
Then ... This is the place, Pacific Avenue between Kearny and Montgomery (map). The camera looks east from Kearny Street and captures several of the red light hotspots. On the left - Arabian Nights cocktail lounge, Gay 'N Frisky club, Hippodrome club, the Bella Pacific and Moulin Rouge. On the right past McKale's 76 service station and the Toast of the Coast club we see the Barbary Coast sign just below the 'TT' on the entrance arch. The director spiffed up the block to look like it was in its heyday, including clubs (Arabian Nights, Hippodrome) that used to be there but were closed by 1957 when the movie was filmed.
... and Now, this block of mostly old brick buildings is today barely recognizable and not only because of the overgrown trees. Many of the buildings have been replaced for seismic safety reasons and the illicit whiff of licentious providers and revelers has dissipated as architects, lawyers and interior designers have taken their place. Look how the sunny side south-facing trees have outstripped their cross-street neighbors.
... from the early 1950s ... This photo from the same spot was taken a few years before Pal Joey was filmed and shows many of the clubs in the movie. An exception is the Bella Pacific whose site is occupied here by Lucca restaurant. We see a better view of McKale's corner gas station and of the leggy Barbary Coast sign up there down the right side. Note too the matching entrance arch at the far (Montgomery Street) end of the block.
Then ... Joey first tries the Bella Pacific club at 560 Pacific, but the owner turns him away, saying ... "I'm running a girl show ... legs, not tonsils".
... and Now, the club site today, offices at 560 and 564 Pacific, has been significantly remodeled in the original building but past it the next door building, with the set-back entrance and fire escape balconies, has retained the original exterior.
Then ... He next tries a club with a middle eastern theme but it has run afoul of the law and has been closed down. This is the Arabian Nights, partially seen at far left in the first 'Then' image at the top of this post.
... from the 1950s ... this mid '50s photo shows the same club, at 592 Pacific on the corner of Kearny. The Gay 'N Frisky club is next to it at 590 Pacific.
... and Now, the same corner building today, now re-addressed as 596 Pacific.
Then ... Finally, he lucks out at the Barbary Coast club at 533 Pacific, hard to miss thanks to its neon sexy-legs sign. The bar next door at 539 Pacific, here called the Toast Of The Coast, was actually vacant when the movie was filmed. It was previously the House Of Blue Lights.
... from the early 1950s ... a photo of this part of the block shows the Barbary Coast and the clubs on either side of it, including the House of Blue Lights. The archway at far left beckoned folks down Jerome Alley to the La Conga cocktail bar.
... and Now, the muraled gable of the Barbary Coast building has been replaced by an extra floor and there's now an iron gate where the archway at Jerome Alley used to be.
In the Barbary Coast Joey takes the stage and seems taken with one of the chorus girls, Linda English (Kim Novak). He then entertains us with the first song of the movie ... "I Didn't Know What Time It Was". Sinatra was at his singing prime back then and delivers superb performances accompanied by terrific Nelson Riddle arrangements.
What to do with Mason's body? Rivera decides to drive south to the rugged Pacific Coast Highway and dump Mason and his car there, feigning an accident. The only problem? He needs a ride back so asks Sheila to follow him in her car. So far so good except ... she can't drive!
Then ... He sits her in her driver's seat then stretches our credulity by giving her a 12 second driving lesson ....
" Now look, Sheila, here's all you have to do. Now, you step on the brake here. You release the emergency. You push this button ... 'D'. This pedal makes the the car go, this one makes it stop. All you have to do is steer it. Sheila, the car practically drives itself ! "
... and Now, the ad hoc instruction takes place in front of Sheila's home at 2898 Broadway at Baker Street.
Then ... With Mason's corpse slumped next to him, Rivera leads the way followed by the tentative herky-jerky student driver. The director oddly first takes us west through Russian Hill, in real life a ridiculously roundabout way to the Pacific Coast Highway destination. Below, Sheila slams on the brakes to avoid colliding with a crossing cable car.
... and Now, this is Hyde Street at the top of the crooked street block of Lombard. In the recent photo below, the Hyde - Powell cable car passes by without incident.
Then ... They head south from San Francisco to a stretch of the Pacific Coast Highway (Highway 1) known as Devil's Slide, so-named because of rock slides that have regularly closed down the highway during winter storms (in 1995 it was closed for 158 days).
... and Now, these days there's a nominal protective road barrier in place. Risk of cars going over the edge will soon be eliminated by the opening of the 4200 feet double-bore tunnel currently under construction beneath San Pedro Mountain between Pacifica and Montara.
The location above is marked in red on the map below, south of Pedro Point.
Rivera pulls over to the edge of a steep precipice and Sheila somehow safely skids to a halt alongside him (at the blue marker on the map above). The composited capture below shows just how close to the road this is (we have to assume they removed some sort of barrier to film the scene).
Then ... Rivera reverses his car behind Mason's and slowly pushes it over the edge. Below, the tail fin and bumper are seen disappearing from view.
... and Now, a recent photo at the same precipice, in the lower foreground.
Then ... The trajectory of Mason's falling car is traced out in this composited image. The cliff edge is high in the upper right corner with Rivera's car headlights just visible - but what's that in front of the car? ... CitySleuth surmises that it was a spacer separating the cars so the pusher didn't get hooked as the pushed reared up and plunged down.
... and Now, the low wall on the right is all that separates passing drivers from the same fate.
This recent aerial view shows how rugged those cliffs are - the arrow points to where the car went over. As an aside, the moviemaker's permit required them to retrieve the car afterwards, which they did. The old Highway 1 Devil's Slide section snakes around the bend at upper left but the 4200 foot twin bore tunnels next to the arrow have since 2013 replaced it, now safe from the ravages of future winter storms.