Listen up, hon. The Baltimore of the 1950s lives, and here's how you can find it.
Today at the Senator Theatre (which harks back to 1930s Baltimore -- talk about nostalgia!), native son Barry Levinson's latest cinematic love letter to Charm City, "Liberty Heights," opens. Set in 1954 and influenced by his own experiences growing up, Levinson's latest recalls a gentler time, when Pennsylvania Avenue was the center of black culture, when The Block was still The Block, and when, for a Jewish kid from Northwest Baltimore, everything east of Falls Road was uncharted territory.
Regardless of what one thinks of the film itself, Baltimoreans of a certain age will find themselves thinking a lot younger during "Liberty Heights." Levinson, in collaboration with ace production designer Vince Peranio, has successfully wiped away the decades. He's brought back the streetcars (at least the old No. 32 line), the Royal Theater and (of course) diners.
Using sites that included the Towson Courthouse, the Maryland Historical Society Library, Mount Vernon, the Weinberg Center for the Performing Arts in Frederick, Druid Hill Park (which plays a golf course) and Baltimore County's Cromwell Valley Park (where an ice skating party was filmed on a pond surface made of Teflon), Levinson and Peranio make like magicians. It's a neat trick and, try as one might to find a seam, it looks pretty seamless -- the look of "Liberty Heights" stays uniformly 1950s.
You could literally spend days driving around metropolitan Baltimore, visiting all the sites where the film was shot. But assuming you've only got one day, or maybe an afternoon, we've picked a half-dozen. And we've asked Peranio himself to serve as tour guide, to comment on why certain places were chosen and how difficult it was to wipe away 45 years.
So, what say we jump in that '54 Cadillac, with the fins and the flying hood ornament, and start driving?
1. The Kurtzman homestead, in the 4100 block of Maine Avenue, Forest Park. This is where the family at the center of "Liberty Heights" lives. The filmmakers don't want to divulge the exact address, since new owners have moved in since shooting ended, but don't worry: Several homes in the block were spruced up during filming, so chances are any house you're looking at appears at some point in the movie. So have fun with your friends debating which one actually played casa Kurtzman.
