Most of us have grown up watching at least one or more shows from Warner Brothers Studios no matter what age we are. My parents are in their late fifties and they get a kick out of how they use to watch Looney Toons, then all three of their kids did, and now their grandchildren are too. Still to this day Warner Brothers is making hit movies like the Harry Potter series to Batman Begins and TV shows like ER and Two and a Half Men.
I have enjoyed many of their TV shows like Full House, Family Matters, and Friends. The movies I have enjoyed are Natural Born Killers, the Lethal Weapon movies, Goodfellas and so many others. So when we went to California, I knew I had to take a tour of the Warner Brothers Studios.
The Studio was built in 1927 and is located at 3400 Riverside Drive in Burbank, California. They do a great VIP tour for groups of 12 people at a time. They do recommend that you get your tickets for this tour in advance. It costs about $50 per person but is it worth it for any Warner Brothers Fan.
If you are really interested in how the movies are made and all the work that goes into them, you can take the deluxe tour which lasts around five hours. This one costs $150 per person. Here you get to walk into the craft shops and talk to the creators and some of the other workers in the film industry. Plus at the end of the tour you get to eat at the cafeteria where the stars that are filming in the studio are known to eat at on their breaks.
We would have done this one but we were told by a bartender is Los Angeles to take the VIP tour so we did. We didn’t know there was a deluxe tour. Next time we are definitely choosing this tour. We bought advanced tickets so we couldn’t switch them. They only take a certain amount of people per day for this tour, so get tickets as far in advance as you can.
The tour is given while you sit on an electric cart that drives you through the 110 acres that the studio is situated on. The tour guide is the one driving the cart. You are not allowed to take a video camera with you. You can take your camera, but they only allow you to take pictures of certain things throughout the studio, which kind of sucked, but that was the rules.
We got to go through the area where they kept all the clothes for the studio. The building was 60,000 square feet and it had so much for shoes, clothes, purse, hats and jewelry. Our tour guide told us that there was about 100,000 different items in there in all! It was crazy and all organized very well. I would kill for a closet with half of those items in it.
We also got to watch from afar part of ER being filmed. It was really weird to see. I am a huge ER fan and watching it be filmed was amazing! All of the doctors and nurses were flying around the small set of the hospital and cameras and other behind the scenes people were rushing along right with them.
The tour guide showed us where Desperate Housewives is filmed at and we got to see part of the set. But it was off in the distance, so we didn’t get the best view of it. The tour guide pointed out Teri Hatcher to us, but I didn’t get to see her. Only four out of the twelve caught a quick glimpse of her going into the studio area.
We also got to see the area where Three and a Half Men is being filmed and we actually saw the little boy from the show Angus Jones! The tour guide told us to wave to him and he waved back. It was pretty cool. Someone waving to us that I recognized from television.
We got to see a lot of other movie and films sets too. We also got a behind the scenes look at how the soundstages worked, and how the workers did different kinds of lighting and special effects. It was really cool to see. You know a lot goes into filming a movie, but I don’t think you realize it completely until you see it being done. There is a lot more to filming then I ever thought there was involved.
We drove past the transportation garage which was the home to the General Lee from Dukes of Hazzard, Herby the bug, the Bat mobile and many other famous cars. Usually tourists are allowed in there, but we weren’t allowed to due to repairs being done. I really wanted to go in there, so that was kind of disappointing.
Our tour guide was great also. He explained to us that he thinks he has the best job in the world because he gets to see all the stars. He said the best part about his job is that no two days are the same. You will always run into a different star or something new will happen. He said one time when he was giving a tour; David Spade jumped on the cart and asked for a lift to a different area of the studio. Then when they drop him off, he gave the tourists an inside look of what he was filming. That didn’t happen to us, but it would have been cool if it did!
At the end of the tour we got a chance to go in to the famous Warner Brother’s Museum. Being a long time fan of Warner Brothers, this was a lot of fun for me. The museum has a huge variety of memorabilia from a lot of the different movies and shows that Warner Brothers has produced. It was very interesting looking at and reading everything. We got to look at things like original costumes for movies, scripts, and many other great things!
You also get to stop at the Warner Brothers gift store where you can buy anything from stuffed animals to clothes to jewelry. The items are a little on the expensive side, but you have to buy something for a souvenir.
So if you are a Warner Brothers Fan, this is a great experience to do for you! The tour is well worth it and like I said next time I am going to do the Deluxe Tour instead. So if you get to California or if you live in California, make sure you take a tour of this amazing studio and hopefully you will see some stars! This is definately an experience you don’t want to miss out on.
