Q. What is it supposed to be on the show?

A. An urban street corner outside a bar, a residential street, and a residential home.

Q. Where is it supposed to be on the show?

A. In Chino, California.

Q. When did we see it on the show?

A. In Episode 23 (of the second season) "The O'Sea", when Ryan goes to Chino, looking for his brother, Trey, after Trey has tried to rape Marissa on the beach.

Ryan finds Trey in a bar, and Trey claims that Marissa came onto him, when she was drunk. Ryan doesn't know what to think.

Back outside on the street, Ryan stops at a corner to make a phone call.  He phones Marissa, and leaves a message saying he won't be going to her prom.

While he's standing at the corner, outside the bar, Ryan bumps into his old Chino girlfriend, Theresa.

As they walk down the street, towards her house, he asks her why she's in town, and she says she's visiting her mom.

They discuss their breakup, then Ryan tells her about Trey & Marissa, and says he doesn't know who to believe.

Theresa assures Ryan that he should believe Marissa, not Trey. Ryan asks why, and Theresa says that Marissa cared enough about him to step aside when she thought he wanted Theresa.

They come to Theresa's old house, and she tells him to call Marissa, and says goodbye.

When she enters the house, out of Ryan's sight, we learn that she has a baby, who (according to her mother) "looks more like his father every day".

Q. What is it actually in real life?

A. A street corner, a residential street, and a house.

Q. Where can I find it in real life?

A. Once again, we venture into Ryan's old neighborhood of Chino, but once again the producers have yet chosen another SoCal community to stand in for the real Chino.

At other times, they have used Sun Valley, East L.A., Lawndale, and even Venice, in the place of Chino.

This time, they opted for the southwest edge Inglewood, California (just north of the city of Hawthorne).

These locations are just southwest of the interchange of the San Diego (405) Freeway & the Century (105) Freeway.


• The "Chino" corner where Ryan meets Theresa (outside the bar) is actually the southeast corner of Imperial Highway & Grevillea Avenue, in Inglewood, CA. (The camera is looking east.)
  

I shot the photos below in 2010







• When Ryan and Theresa walk down the street towards her house in "Chino", they are actually walking south down (the east side of) Grevillea Avenue, in Inglewood.

• When they reach Theresa's home, that house is actually at the northeast corner of Grevillea Avenue & 116th Street. Although the front door faces Grevillea Ave, the address is 4485 116th Street, in Inglewood.

(As you can see in my photos below, the house still sports the distinctive white door seen on the show.)

The OC producers returned to film in this same area in the show's third season.

Ryan's corner is only a few blocks east of the liquor store where Kirstin bought a bottle of booze, and just east of the cheap motel where Kirstin goes after buying the booze (in Episode 3, of season 3).

It's also just two blocks east of the Strip Club where Matt takes Ryan (in Episode 9, of season 3), and is only a few blocks northeast of the Mini-Mart that Johnny tries to rob (in Episode 10, season 3).

Here is an aerial shot of the area, with the locations marked. And here is a map link.

Q. How the heck did you figure out where it was?

A. I didn't. The bar sign was fake, and since it was night, there weren't many other clues to the location of that brief corner scene. And Google StreetView doesn't work on Grevillea Avenue, so I was unable to use it to pinpoint the house.

Finally, in 2010, I got a tip from a fan, Geoff, who had tracked down the locations. (Thanks, Geoff!)