Simi Valley : Film Crew Focuses on Neighborhood

The words “lights, camera, action” send Simi Valley kids on Coldbrook Place scurrying for their positions on the set of an upcoming Walt Disney movie being filmed on their block.

The movie, “Honey, I Blew Up the Baby,” is the sequel to the 1989 Hollywood hit “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids,” which grossed about $130 million at the box office, film publicist Steve Rubin said.

Production of the movie, which stars Rick Moranis as scientist Wayne Szalinski, began in the neighborhood Monday and will continue for another week, he said.

In the film, Simi Valley is a fictional suburb outside Las Vegas, Rubin said.

“The key was to find an upscale neighborhood to show the upward mobility of the Szalinski family,” Rubin said. “Simi Valley also has a desert feel similar to housing tracts in Las Vegas.”

C.C. Steil, who lives on Coldbrook Place, said the film crew used her back yard in one of the scenes and her son, Joshua, 7, is an extra in a birthday party scene.

“He’s very excited about it. He gets to watch all the special effects,” she said.

In the original movie, Szalinski is a small-time inventor, and he becomes a member of a scientific research team in the sequel, Rubin said. Szalinski enlarges his baby to 112 feet tall during one of his scientific experiments, and the baby disappears into the desert, Rubin said.

Pam Carter, a three-year resident of Coldbrook Place, said film equipment has caused a massive traffic jam in the usually quiet neighborhood, but otherwise there have been no problems. Her children, Jamie, 12, and Scott, 15, have been busy getting autographs from the film’s stars, she said.

To accommodate the production, the city granted a temporary no-parking permit in front of the residence where the fictional family lives, Deputy City Manager Bob Heitzman said. The city issues 20 to 50 filming permits each year, he said.