Convent San Tanco
Does anyone know where the Convent of San Tanco is located?
shareI heard from a friend in L.A. that it was shot at a Catholoic school in the L.A. area...
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MovieChat Forums > The Flying Nun (1967) Discussion > Convent San Tanco
In Old San Juan Puerto Rico there is the "EL CONVENTO" Hotel on calle Tanco. It used to be a convent before they turned it to a hotel. In the closing shots of The Flying Nun where sister Bertrille is playing baseball with the children is in front of the building and you could see the church in the background and in the rear of the hotel are the steps you see her walking and waiving hello from.
shareThe other day I stumbled upon a website for Tv shows in the 1960's produced by Screen Gems. The Partridge Family, Flying Nun and Bewitched were all produced by Screen Gems and much of the outdoor filming was done right there in Hollywood. The lot is now owned by the WB. There was a picture of Convent San Tanco, what's left of it, and it looks rather shabby now. The Friends water-fountain is on that lot, just across the "park" from the Partridge house. Interesting!
shareYes, that lot was called "The Columbia Ranch"...in 1977 (I was 16 and drove) I told the guard I was an extra on Bewitched as a kid and he let me drive around the lot. I saw all the old houses, Dennis The Menace, next door to the I dream of Jeannie House (which was Mr. Wilson's on DTM) The Bewitched house which is next door to the Gidget House. The old New York street was still there then, it's gone now, they put a parking lot in. The big park is still there with the fountain in the middle. It was a cool lot, try using that story to get in now and they'd tell you to go f___ off. You could get away with a lot in those days!
shareThe El Convento hotel is in fact a converted 17th century convent, but it is located at 100 Cristo Street, not Calle Tanco. I looked at Google maps and there is no Calle Tanco around the hotel at all.
Hard to say if the El Convento was used for any of the exterior shots of the Convent San Tanco. I just don't see it from the photos on the hotel's website, but maybe I just haven't seen enough episodes of TFN recently to compare the two accurately.
It's only an island if you look at it from the water.
Never existed. And this "San Tanco" has nowhere to be found in the Catholic's list of saints.
shareI was just watching 2 of the early Flying Nun episodes from 1967 on Antenna TV and while I do believe that the Convent San Tanco was a fictional place and some of the scenes are obviously stage sets (complete with artificial grass), they did show the exterior of a building with a tile roof as the camera pulled back from Sister Bertrille speaking to the Mother Superior in a room with large windows or glass doors that definitely looked like a real building somewhere.... the question is, where is that building located? While some or many of the exterior shots were probably on a set, I think that this particular one was a shot of a real building somewhere, perhaps in San Juan.
Incidentally, in one of these two episodes, Sister Bertrille is seen walking in front of the Caribe Hilton (with the sign clearly visible) to speak with Carlos Ramirez. The Caribe Hilton still exists today in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico, which supports my belief that at least some of the filming for the show was done at actual locations in San Juan.
It's only an island if you look at it from the water.
Incidentally, in one of these two episodes, Sister Bertrille is seen walking in front of the Caribe Hilton (with the sign clearly visible) to speak with Carlos Ramirez. The Caribe Hilton still exists today in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico, which supports my belief that at least some of the filming for the show was done at actual locations in San Juan.
That was the first show, the debut episode because I have that one on DVD. I believe the opening and closing credits were filmed in San Juan, and only the first few episodes were film there also, but the rest was filmed in Southern California. share