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Photos by Vickie Waite, The Sun Runner Magazine, Twentynine Palms, CA.

On location with “At Seventeen” in Twentynine Palms...

The Sun Runner Magazine dropped in on the scene on Sept. 13, as the Disney crew was preparing for the day’s filming at the Harmony Motel.  The movie, AT SEVENTEEN, starring KIRSTEN DUNST and JAY HERNANDEZ, and directed by JOHN STOCKWELL (of the movie Cheaters), is “scheduled for release in March,” Stockwell said.  They chose the Harmony for its remote desert-motel image and spent the night before the shoot getting into the desert mood “at that little country western karaoke bar down the road,” Stockwell said, referring to the Downtown Josh Lounge in Twentynine Palms. “Some of our crew were better singers than the cast!” he added. The day’s heat, with temps over 100 degrees, set the rest of the desert mood for the more than 100 crew members involved in the At Seventeen production. The property was literally surrounded by scores of trucks, vans, buses, cranes, cameras, and several tons of film production equipment.      -VW
Left: Director John Stockwell.
             Right: Stockwell gets ready for the pool scene with stars Kirsten Dunst and Jay Hernandez.
Above: 1st A.D. Rip Murray (left) waits by the pool with Hernandez and Dunst.
A new creation on the property... they built their own motel sign for the filming, renaming our Harmony to the “Palms” Motel.
The Harmony pool (sans fence) becomes the scene for the morning’s shoot.
Production crew members (above) .... and the 2nd Asst. Director Jay Guerra, in the striped shirt.
Thanks for the entertainment! 
While Emma and Sarah, proprietors of the Harmony, were delighted with the exposure for their desert motel... and while the townsfolk were delighted with the influx of movie crews visiting the community... my favorite part of the day was when a crew member came up to Sarah and asked, in a most sincere, albeit rather frantic, voice: “Do you know where I can get another tumbleweed?”   He’s the guy in the hat in the photo directly above, the one adjusting the desert scrub on top of the creosote bush behind pool... ha!
And thanks to John, Kirsten, and Jay, and the whole crew for being so friendly to us all while they were in town.
Come back again!               -VW
Photos by Vickie Waite, Publisher/Editor, The Sun Runner Magazine
P.O. Box 87, Twentynine Palms, CA 92277 - (760)362-5257
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