The club itself was filmed at two locations. The exterior was another old LA landmark, the Pan Pacific Auditorium. The Auditorium was built in 1935 and quickly became a popular venue for large concerts and sporting events; it was one of the stopovers utilized by Elvis Presely during his first appearances in LA. The Pan Pacific was closed down in 1972 and was for a moment forgotten. It would be declared a local landmark due largely to its architectural Art Deco design; it was a prime example of Streamline Modern design that was so prevalent though out the 20’s and 30’s, particularly it’s front entrance. For this reason, Xanadu’s producers chose to use the Pan Pacific’s facade as the exterior of Xanadu for the film. This area is located next to LA landmark Farmers Market which is on the corner of Fairfax and Beverly Blvd.
Xanadu’s interior was built in Studio 4 of the Hollywood General Studios (then the home of France Ford Coppola’s Omini Zeotrope); it took roughly three months to build the mammoth two-story set. Its design was in keeping with the architectural look of the Pan Pacific exterior.
Another integral aspect of the film’s design and plot was the mural that the muses first leap out of and danced at the start of the film. Many believed that the mural was actually in Venice Beach. Well, yes...and no. First, the mural was painted and photographed at the studio and was superimposed over still photos of the end of Dudley Avenue facing the Venice Beach Boardwalk.
A last minute re-write suggested an animated sequence depicting the love developing between Kira and Sonny. The job was hastily handed to Don Bluth, an animation producer/director who had made his reputation working for the Disney Studios; among Bluth’s credits were The Rescuers and Pete’s Dragon. By the late 70’s, Bluth had parted company with Disney and was attempting to establish his own studio with a handful of fellow dissident Disney ex-staffers. Xanadu would be the second major undertaking of the small fledgling animation house as they had just started on their first movie, The Secret Of N. I. H. M. In order to save some money for his little studio, Bluth ended up animating the entire scene on tracing paper by himself and had his staff xerox it on plastic animation cells and paint them.
The special effects were handled by R/Greenburg Associates in New York City. Before Xanadu, the company was doing commercial and industrial film work, well as assembling movie commercials and trailers (Alien and Empire Strikes Back being their early clients). Then the company expanded into traditional SFX, bucking the Hollywood tradition of all SFX studios were located in L. A. Their first major SFX break came when they were assigned to design and execute the opening and closing credits of ‘Superman’. From there, they ended up with projects for ‘Flash Gordon’, ‘Altered States’ and ‘Xanadu’. This outfit was the first to develop a ‘slit wipes’ effect that was used to fade in and out between scenes as seen in Xanadu.
