What College Was Animal House Filmed At

EUGENE — Forty years subsequently, the signature location is long gone, replaced by a parking lot.

The dilapidated Eugene home on East 11th Avenue that was the namesake for the movie "National Lampoon's Creature House" was torn down in 1986.

Nevertheless, the legacy of "Animal House" remains, as do many of the film's locations around the Eugene area. They are a visual reminder of that frantic fall of 1977 when Hollywood descended on the southern Willamette Valley to make what would become a cult one-act classic.

Eugene is known for track and field, runner Steve Prefontaine and the birth of Nike. But this wild, zany and raunchy movie is another enduring claim to fame.

The movie is fix in 1962 and follows the exploits of Delta Firm, a fraternity of misfits — i of them played by John Belushi, who'south also no longer with us — who battle the dean of fictional Faber College. Director John Landis filmed it in the autumn of 1977 and released it in the summer of 1978. Anyone familiar with the UO, Eugene and Cottage Grove will immediately recognize locations throughout the 109-minute movie.

During UO tours, guides oftentimes betoken out "Creature House" landmarks, said Micah Howe, the university'due south assistant director of visit programs. Johnson Hall, an administration building that'southward home to the UO president's part, is where mischievous fraternity members sneak a horse into the dean'southward role. The Fishbowl, the Erb Memorial Union'due south distinctive cafeteria, is the site of the picture's infamous food fight scene.

But information technology's not prospective students who are starstruck when the guides indicate out the locations.

"They tend to get a great response from parents and family unit members," Howe said. "I feel similar (visitors) in that generation are more than familiar with the pic than today'south high-schoolers."

Asked about the impact of "Animal Firm" on Eugene, Mayor Lucy Vinis has iii reactions.

Get-go, it'south merely a cool piece of history. "It'southward merely a quirky, fun fact that it (was filmed) hither," she said.

Second, she has a connectedness to the house. Before she was mayor, Vinis was development director at ShelterCare, a nonprofit arrangement helping the homeless. And ShelterCare's history intertwines with the motion-picture show, having started in the "creature house" on 11th Avenue before it was torn down.

"When they began every bit an organization (in the 1970s), they housed four homeless families who lived communally in that house," Vinis said. A 15-by-6-inch plaque is on a rock next to the parking lot that now covers the former firm location. It mentions "Animal House" later citing the pioneer history of the home.

Third, the filming of a major movement picture in Eugene sparked a surge in local motion-picture show-making. "And they are all the same at work in Lane Canton," Vinis said.

Independent films dominate local production these days, only major films followed "Fauna House." Lane Canton was the backdrop for "Personal Best" and "Stand past Me" in the 1980s, and "Without Limits," a biopic of Prefontaine, in 1998.

The filming of "Brute House" more than than four decades ago brought an energy to the expanse akin to a big sporting result, said Mike Dilley, executive director of the Eugene International Film Festival and an organizer of the Bohemian Moving picture Festival in Cottage Grove. Locals appeared on camera and helped with the production.

"It gave people some jobs, and gave them opportunities, and they were able to prosper from information technology," Dilley said.

On location

Even if y'all haven't watched "Beast Business firm," you lot've probably heard about the horse scene. In it, two Delta House brothers (one of them Belushi) and a pledge determine to prank the dean of the higher by breaking into his role at night to leave a alive horse behind. (Spoiler alert: The plan goes awry when the equus caballus is literally scared to death.)

The "Beast House" crew shot the scene in a conference room at Johnson Hall. Today, information technology's UO President Michael Schill's conference room, and it looks much like it did in 1977 — minus the horse, of class. The furniture and blinds are unlike, but the wood paneling and bookshelf are the same.

Equally for the EMU Fishbowl, its signature semi-circle of windows remains, and its booths resemble those in the movie. But the red seats in "Fauna House" are now a bright green.

Through the magic of movie-making, the location of the fictional Emily Dickinson Higher in "Brute Business firm" is miles from Faber College in the picture show. In reality, the moving-picture show coiffure used Gerlinger Hall on the UO campus every bit the site of the women's college.

Stepping into Gerlinger Hall's one thousand entrance takes y'all into another classic "Animal House" scene. The main stairs serve every bit the entryway of a sorority in the motion picture. There, Eric "Otter" Stratton (played by Tim Matheson) says he's at that place to pick up a woman who he knows recently died in a kiln explosion — a ploy to secure dates for him and his buddies.

While Otter waits, he says good evening to a pair of young co-eds who pass. The women — just two of the hundreds of local extras who played small roles in the moving-picture show — are Heather Henderson of Eugene and Ellen Hamm of Seattle, and so UO students who answered the casting telephone call in 1977.

"They only shot it once," Hamm said. "I guess we did OK."

The more things change ...

Not all "Fauna Business firm" locations are time capsules.

Just get down the stairs of the onetime Sigma Nu fraternity business firm at 763 E. 11th Ave., next door to the Delta Firm site. The building is now the Schoolhouse of Professional Studies for Northwest Christian University. The interior of the business firm served equally the within of Delta Business firm in the movie.

Katherine Wilson of Blue River was a location scout for "Animal House." She said she recently visited the Sigma Nu basement to verify that'due south where the legendary toga party was filmed. Today, Northwest Christian University keeps the basement locked, and it's stuffed with spare furniture.

The location for the Deltas' rival Omega House in the pic, the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity at 729 E. 11th Ave., however stands and has the same white exterior with green trim. The UO recently shut down the existent-life frat that had resided there, for hazing.

Some lost locations are making a comeback. The Dexter Lake Club, 21 miles southeast of Eugene, is where some Delta House brothers take their dates from Emily Dickinson Higher. In the 40 years since "Creature House" was filmed, the roadhouse off Highway 58 has changed ownership many times. It became a garden supply store at one point.

Recent remodeling has restored its dimly lit, live-music venue. And the zebra stripe design on the wall looks just like in the movie.

Visitors come from near and far to bank check out the bar where Otis Solar day and the Knights play "Shama Lama Ding Dong" in the movie. They come to experience it, said Crystal Holmes, who owns Rattlesnake BBQ at the Dexter Lake Club with her married man, Dustin, a former UO football actor.

"And (to) say that they were at the 'Animal Firm' bar," she said. "It'south like a bucket list thing for people who accept grown up in Oregon."

Why here?

The story of how the UO became the location is almost as legendary every bit the pic itself.

Wilson, the location scout who had worked on previous movies, said Landis and others associated with the film sought permission to shoot at universities around the country, starting with the Ivy League schools, just constitute no takers. The window for getting the film green-lighted past Universal was closing fast.

Wilson'due south telephone rang on a Friday. It was the "Brute House" squad wanting to know if Oregon had a academy that was fit for filming. Wilson needed to find 26 different locations, including one with a rundown frat house adjacent to well-kept ones, and a Main Street suited for a parade. And she needed to practise it fast.

Wilson and her friends collected photos and footage of the site possibilities, including the firm on 11th Avenue and the future parade route on Cottage Grove's Master Street, and got the materials to the filmmakers by Mon, thanks to the help of an airline'southward counter-to-counter courier service.

The motion-picture show producers had found their location. And then-UO President William Beatty Boyd agreed to allow the filming on campus, having not read the screenplay, Wilson said. There was ane condition: The movie-makers couldn't refer to Eugene or the UO in the picture.

Simply Eugene and the UO are oh-so-recognizable and forever linked to the motion-picture show that has been selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

"Locations and landscape are characters themselves," Wilson said. "They really are. It's actually of import. Location, location, location. That'due south why they always had to start with that. That's your foundation."

Source: https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/2018/08/10/legacy-animal-house-remains-eugene-40-years-later/963630002/

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