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Lights! Cameras! Action! on 20th St.

An electrician leaned over the roof of a brick townhouse on 20th Street and, like a proletarian Rapunzel, lowered a cluster of thick black cables to his coworker waiting on the front step.

The filming transforms life on 20th Street between Locust and Spruce — a lighting setup took a corner. (April Saul / Staff Photographer)
The filming transforms life on 20th Street between Locust and Spruce — a lighting setup took a corner. (April Saul / Staff Photographer)Read more

An electrician leaned over the roof of a brick townhouse on 20th Street and, like a proletarian Rapunzel, lowered a cluster of thick black cables to his coworker waiting on the front step.

Across the street, two new park benches and a classy streetlight appeared outside St. Patrick's Church, where two workmen on ladders brushed a fresh coat of something shiny onto the doors.

As Philadelphia is about to tumble into the budgetary pit of despair, one of the city's poshest neighborhoods was treated to a makeover yesterday.

Fear not, ye of little patience for unrepaired potholes and mighty animosity toward the top 1 percent.

These few blocks between Locust and Spruce, just west of Rittenhouse Square, are pretending to be spiffed up until tomorrow. Long enough for a crew to film a scene in a still unnamed major motion picture by the very famous and talented James L. Brooks.

Pedestrians may have been surprised to find the streets taken over by puttering generators and catering-company trailers and portable restrooms and white tents.

But residents who regularly park in the area were warned five days ago that they'd have to move their cars, and the production company sent emissaries to local businesses three months ago, asking for their cooperation.

"It's been great!" said J. Lamancuso, owner of the Hello World gift boutique. "Chaotic. Hectic. But there's a lot of good energy on the street. Let's face it. How often does Jack Nicholson hang out on 20th Street? And Reese Witherspoon? And," he hesitated, "that other guy."

Paul Rudd?

"Yes. Him."

Since most of the filming will take place at night, Lamancuso said, he was asked if he'd mind leaving his store's lights on after closing.

He would be compensated, of course, for a sum he declined to specify other than "generous."

The preliminary crew impressed everyone.

"They were very nice," said Lamancuso's sales associate, Luise Farrell. "They warned us that the street would be busy and that cars might be blocked, but pedestrians could get through."

Farrell (no relation to Will) had one question for the production rep.

"Is anyone famous coming?"

She remembers them mentioning one.

Paul Rudd.

Preparations for Rudd's scene in the neighborhood restaurant, Twenty Manning, required a battalion of workers working steadily throughout the day.

About 1 p.m., a woman knelt at the base of a No Parking sign, slicing through the metal stem. This would be the scene of the worst inconvenience of the day.

Sparks flew. A local resident and her little dog, too, approached. They stopped abruptly, swerved, and - wait for it - walked into the street to avoid getting singed.

OK, there was one more. The woman dressed all in Gucci who loitered on the street for hours, hoping for a celebrity sighting.

And oh. The confusion wrought by the two rows of silver vases filled with fresh bouquets outside Maxx's Produce. They're not for sale. They're part of the movie set.

"Making movies is a tedious, tedious pain," said Ken Oyegin, a 24-year-old film student at Temple University who works freelance as a locations assistant putting film sets together. "But it's awesome."

The movie takes place in Washington, Oyegin said. So the SEPTA stop next to the Dorchester was replaced with a pole carrying a notice advising of changes in the bus route between Union Station and Massachusetts Avenue. And newspaper boxes for the Washington Times and Politico were placed on the corner.

"Any city can be another city," he said, taking the opportunity to rant about the need to resume tax breaks so filmmakers will want to shoot their movies here.

Stopping into Maxx's for sundries (not flowers), Wendy Rosen, president of Friends of Rittenhouse Square, said most of the residents in her building had been keeping an eye out for days, hoping to catch sight of the celebrities.

"I love it," Rosen said. "I think it's exciting. We've seen Jack Nicholson and Reese Witherspoon."

"Really!" another customer gasped. "Where did you see him? I hear they're going to be filming outside my health club."

Perhaps. But the definite spot last night was Twenty Manning. Kiong Banh, executive chef and co-owner of the bistro, said he happily accepted the producers' offer to compensate him for keeping the restaurant closed for two days.

Banh offered to provide the food for the scene, which he'd been told would involve about 70 extras, filling the place and making a lot of noise. "They thanked me, but said they had their own caterers."

He planned to watch from the back while the cameras rolled.

"Paul Rudd will be sitting right there," he said, indicating a table with a wheatgrass centerpiece by an open window. The producers liked the place just the way they found it and didn't change a thing.

"I can't wait to see the movie and say, 'That's my restaurant!' "

Tomorrow, after Hollywood leaves, the perfect faux ivy around trees outside will be gone. The café tables and chairs up the street? Gone. The streetlights and park benches and Maxx's tulips? Gone. Gone. Gone.

Banh's bistro, however, will remain, immortalized in film, like Katz's Deli in When Harry Met Sally. Twenty Manning, the restaurant where "that guy" sat by the window.