Portrait In Black - The Cabot Residence
Sheila and Matthew Cabot live in a fine home with sweeping views of the north bay on so-called Billionaires Row in the swanky Pacific Heights neighborhood.
Then ... The home is 2898 Broadway at Baker Street (map). It was built in Dutch Colonial style in 1899 by Walter D. Bliss, the architect who designed several landmark San Francisco buildings including the St. Francis Hotel and the Geary Theater.
... and Now, other than the trees the house has not changed in over fifty years.
Then ... Baker Street from here plunges past the side of the house so steeply that cars are prohibited and pedestrians like this mailman have to deal with an interminably long stairway. Classic San Francisco. The view from here includes the Palace of Fine Arts at far left ... well, it used to ...
... and Now, because unrestrained tree growth has since obliterated the view. CitySleuth wishes he could change this, and not only because it makes his job harder. Check out this other example, just one of many, at Pioneer Park in the 1950 movie Woman On The Run, seen here.
The exterior scenes at the home were real locations but the interiors were filmed on a lavish studio soundstage, as here where Sheila stands at the top of the grand stairway leading up from the foyer ...
Then ... but actual window views were created on the set by use of a painting or photograph for locational verity. Below, Cabot's business associate Howard Mason (Richard Basehart) looks out of a window and across the bay. Can you guess what that thin horizontal line is against the distant hills (no peeking below ...)?
... and Now, CitySleuth was able to access a nearby house and took this matching shot. The eye is swept across the red-roofed buildings of the former Presidio military base and over the bay to the Marin Headlands. The thin line in the Then image above is the roadway of the Golden Gate Bridge! Interesting that the director downplayed its presence.
Then ... There's another window view as Cabot through his binoculars watches one of his ships heading out to sea. His bitter complaints of its delayed passage endears him neither to Mason nor the watching audience.
... and Now, this is the spit of land just west of the Golden Gate Bridge that terminates at the Point Bonita lighthouse (map, wherein the red pin is Point Bonita, the blue one is Cabot's residence).