Via Curbed LA and the Huffington Post, Patch has learned that former porn star Sasha Grey (she just quit the adult biz in April) was the subject of an artistic short film shot by Richard Phillips at the Chemosphere. The one-of-a-kind home, which looks a bit like a flying saucer, is in the Hollywood Hills on the San Fernando Valley side overlooking Studio City and North Hollywood.
In the film, titled Sasha Grey, the former porn queen is seen riding up the cable railway to the home and also looking out the windows over the San Fernado Valley, the place where most of her adult films were produced. The Venice Biennale will exhibit the film this week, along with Phillips's Lindsay Lohan, which was shot in Malibu.
Grey won several Adult Video News Awards as a performer between 2007 and 2010, but when Academy Award-winning filmmaker Steven Soderbergh cast her in his mainstream 2009 film The Girlfriend Experience, new doors were opened for Grey. She has since appeared in a number of independent films and also on the seventh season of the HBO show Entourage, where she played herself. In April she announced she was quitting pornography to focus on mainstream efforts.
The Chemosphere, built in 1960 by John Lautner, is one of the most famous landmarks in Los Angeles. The octagon house, which is supported by a single concrete pole, has been used as a location for many films and TV shows, including The Outer Limits and Body Double. It has also inspired set locations in numerous other films and TV shows, including Charlie's Angels and The Simpsons (the character Troy McClure lived in a home identical to the Chemosphere.) It is also thought to have inspired the look of the homes in the futuristic cartoon The Jetsons.
The home was also the location of a murder, when it's second owner, Dr. Richard F. Kuhn, was stabbed to death during a robbery in 1976. Oh, and it also made an appearance in Studio City Patch Editor Mike Szymanski's welcome video.