For those of you who are coming to the CAPA Summer Movie Series screening of “Rear Window” on June 17th, here are descriptions of the courtyard and L.B. “Jeff” Jeffries apartment.
Most of the action in the movie occurs in various rear-facing apartments and is seen from the window of another rear-facing apartment across a courtyard enclosed by at least six buildings.
The apartment overlooking the courtyard belongs to L.B. “Jeff” Jeffries. It features a large, rectangular bay window that is made up of five tall casement windows: three across and one on either end. Casement windows are attached to the frame on the side and open out like a door. In this case, the three windows across each have two tall, narrow panes that open outward like double doors. The windows on the short sides have a single window that is hinged on the side of the frame that is against the building. The bottoms of the windows are roughly 30” from the floor and rise to the ceiling. This bay projects out from the side of Jeff’s building and allows him to see not just the buildings directly across from him but also the windows on the buildings at either end of the courtyard.
The buildings are like puzzle pieces and fit together to create this contained outdoor space. Looking out the bay window to the left, just beyond a small tree, is a large red brick building with green fire escapes, downspouts, and green wooden trim around the doors and windows. This building extends from the back side of Jeff’s building to the street that fronts the buildings on the other side of the courtyard. A sliver of the street is visible through the alleyway between this building and the small, run-down, two-story grey house directly opposite Jeff’s apartment. The grey house has two apartments: one on the ground floor and another on the second. The second-floor apartment has a glass door, a large square window, and a smaller, higher bathroom window that overlook a wooden balcony with steps on the right that go down to the small yard behind the house. Between the left and middle columns of the balcony, a half-light door gives a glimpse into the downstairs apartment. Two tall double-hung windows are to the right of the door. To the right of the grey house is a larger, more modern red brick apartment house. Four stories of the building and the activity of people in the apartments on the ground and second floors are visible from Jeff’s windows. This building has cream colored trim around the casement windows and the fire escape at the left edge of the building. There is a terrace on the fourth floor, with a ladder extending down between two windows on the third floor to a fire escape landing that is the same width as the terrace. There is another fire escape landing on the second floor. The two landings are wide enough to be accessed by two narrow windows on both the second and third floors. The window to the left is at the end of the hallway inside the building; the one on the right gives a view into the apartment kitchens. There is an open doorway out to the garden on the ground floor. The apartments on the first, second and third floors are identical with rooms that connect like the cars on a train: a door from the hall opens into a small kitchen which opens to the living room which in turn connects to a bedroom and culminates in a bathroom. These are visible through the narrow window to the left of the hallway window, a wide picture window flanked by narrow windows, a smaller double casement window and finally a small, high window. At the right end of the courtyard is a light grey building with blue trim around double hung windows. There is a balcony three stories above the courtyard. Beside it is another red brick building with chartreuse trim around the windows on the third story above a studio apartment with a wall of tall, slanted windows framed in black metal. More chartreuse trim adorns the edge of the balcony outside the studio apartment. The rest of the building is obscured by the light-yellow brick of a wall jutting out beside the right side of Jeff’s bay window. The yards and gardens for the various buildings are at different levels. The grey house and the apartment buildings on either side are on the same level, but the yard behind Jeff’s building is terraced with a basement level and a ground level reached by a flight of stairs. The yard is still close to six feet lower than the gardens of the buildings on the other side of the courtyard. And separated by a tall brick wall.
Jeff’s apartment is a studio with one room serving as bedroom, living room, and office. The front door, which opens out to the hall, is on the wall opposite the window and is at the top of three wide steps set within a niche about half the width of the main room. The wall to the right of the front door juts forward to the depth of the bottom step. The landing serves as a foyer with a low oriental trunk of pale wood with black iron fittings to the left of the front door. A tan runner half the width of the wide steps defines the path of traffic from the front door down into the main room.
The room itself is a good size and is filled with items from Jeff’s travels. Large black and white photos in plain, tan wood frames hang on the walls. There is with a small fireplace on the left wall and a large built-in bookcase with three vertical sections on the right. The bookcase wall separates the main room from the kitchen. A large mahogany table with turned legs sits against the front of the bookcase, covering the left and center sections, the short end of its rectangular top faces towards the windows. It’s top is cluttered with piles of 8 x 10 black and white photos and contact sheets. A tall lamp with a dark marbled base and wide white shade sits in at the rear of the table, in the corner formed by the front wall and the bookcase. A portable lightbox with a slanted front and a handle on top sits in front of the lamp. An 8 x 10 negative of a portrait of a woman is in the frame on the front of the box. A camera with a small flash attachment sits on the front corner of the table closest to the window, a battered leather satchel lays flat on the table behind it. Framed black and white photos in simple wooden frames rest on the desk, leaning against the bookcase. Two larger ones hang in the center section of the bookcase, where several shelves have been removed.
There is passageway into the kitchen between the end of the bookcase wall and the rear wall of the apartment, to the left of the window alcove. A piece of macrame fiber art hangs on the end of the bookcase. A stack of thick phone books and a wired black telephone with a round white dial sit on a small wooden table against the opposite wall. A black and white cylindrical light fixture that is narrower at the bottom hangs above the table.
Jeff sits in a brown leather and polished chrome wheelchair in a niche created by the end of the window bay and the twin bed that is tucked lengthwise into the bay beneath the windowsill. Several pillows are stacked at the head of the bed, which is against the right wall of the window bay. A pendant lamp pale with a broad, pale yellow, pleated shade dangles from the ceiling beside the head of the bed.
Just past the bed, another oriental cabinet rests against the wall outside the rectangular recess. On top of the cabinet, is a tray holding assorted brass containers. Still more black and white photos in plain, pale wood frames hang over the cabinet and more still on either side of the fireplace where they flank a large, colorful abstract still life in a broad white frame hung over the crowded mantel. Small sculptures, notebooks, and envelopes fill the spaces in between round mantle clock with its extended base and the brass candlesticks that stand at either end of the petite mantelshelf.
A celadon green, Chinese urn-shaped lamp and a brass ashtray sit on a low dark wood table with shelves to the right of the fireplace. A dark taupe club chair sits in front of the table, facing the windows and the bed. Also in the center of the room, a modern yellow wooden chair with a spindled back and curved headrail is angled, facing the bed and the club chair, creating a triangular conversation area. Just beyond the lamp, to the right of the fireplace is the door into the bathroom. The steps to the landing and front door are just beyond the right side of the bathroom door frame.
On the landing, a trench coat, camera bag, and a parka hang from hooks over the oriental cabinet. To the right of the cabinet, a furled umbrella leans against the front door frame. At the base of the steps, between the steps and the desk, is a mid-century modern cabinet in light wood with two flat circular gold knobs. Two large stacks of magazines are on top of this cabinet. Three more large photographs hang over the cabinet. A large yellow and dark taupe geometric-patterned area rug covers the wide dark floorboards in the center of the room.
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