“Christmas with the Kranks” was filmed primarily in Southern California, even though the story is set in a Chicago suburb.

Main Filming Locations

  • The Kranks’ neighborhood “Hemlock Street” was a large exterior set built at the former Downey Studios in Downey, California, on the site of an old Boeing plant.
  • The neighborhood was designed to look like a snowy Midwestern street in the fictional suburb of Riverside, near Chicago.

Studio Backlots And Sets

  • Many street and shop scenes (like Chip’s Market and Pumpkin Seed Paperie & Press) were shot on New York Street at Universal Studios in Universal City, California.
  • Additional work was done on soundstages and backlots at studios such as Downey Studios and other Los Angeles–area facilities to control snow, lighting, and crowd scenes.

Other Notable Spots In The Movie

  • The frantic ham-shopping scene with Nora was filmed at a former Cordon’s Ranch Market on Honolulu Avenue in Glendale, California.
  • Restaurant/pub scenes were filmed in Pasadena, California, at a location that operated for years as the Pasadena Hamlet and later Du-par’s Restaurant and Bakery.

In short: the movie looks like a cozy Chicago Christmas, but nearly everything you see on screen was actually built or staged in and around Los Angeles.

TL;DR: They filmed “Christmas with the Kranks” mostly on a custom-built suburban street set at Downey Studios in Downey, California, plus various backlots and real locations around the Los Angeles area (Universal City, Glendale, Pasadena).

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.