Los Angeles plays itself

One of the small pleasures of life in Los Angeles comes from watching nearly any film or television show and recognizing some tiny detail in the background of a scene filmed on location and figuring out exactly where it was shot. Despite the fact that Los Angeles locations frequently stand in for some other city, or are geographically inconsistent in any number of ways, it still adds a certain frisson to the movie and television watching experience to imagine that you inhabit the same universe as the characters.

As an example of this, tonight I was watching the first season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, and noticed that Larry David was walking between two restaurants on Brand in Glendale, about two blocks from my office.

He leaves the first restaurant (Byzantine, then Yulie's Taverna, currently the spectacularly named "Fantasia") to avoid someone he doesn't wish to talk to...


...and walks down the street to use the restroom at Don Cuco's. Smart choice. Using the restroom in Don Cuco's is far more pleasant than actually eating there.