20 Iconic TV And Movie Locations That Have Been Overrun By Tourists

Situated in Los Angeles, the Rosenheim Mansion has been featured in everything from Bones to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But the building is undoubtedly known best as the Murder House from the debut season of Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story. Well, to most people anyway. The owners of the property actually had no idea of its spooky connections when they bought it!

Owners Angela Oakenfold and Ernst Von Schwarz were left stunned when they first saw hundreds of strangers outside their new home. And American Horror Story fans don’t appear to be the most civilized bunch, either. They say some have climbed fences, others have broken in, and one even asked the driver of a garbage truck if they could be hoisted up on their crane to get a better view.

Located in Ireland’s County Kerry, the island of Skellig Michael was already a beloved tourist destination before it became a part of the Star Wars universe. As a UNESCO World Heritage site the picturesque area was used to welcoming visitors from across the globe. But its popularity reached new heights after being featured in The Force Awakens. 

In 2018 the island welcomed 17,000 tourists. That’s 6,000 more than the recommended cap. And Skellig Michael’s bird population is suffering as a result — as are the fragile monastic remains that date back to medieval times. According The Irish Independent, tourism levels need to be reduced by a third to become sustainable.

Back in the late ‘80 and early ‘90s, Broderick Street was home to one of TV’s best-loved families: it's where D.J., Stefanie, and Michelle Tanner all learned various life lessons in popular family sitcom Full House. And the producer of the show, Jeff Franklin, was so enamored with the property that he ended up buying it!

As you can understand, those who already lived in the San Francisco street weren’t particularly happy with their new neighbor. The area has been overrun with tourists since the show’s heyday, even more so since the 2016 reboot Fuller House began airing on Netflix. In fact, the situation got so bad that a motion to stop tour buses circling the neighborhood was passed by the city’s transit authority. 

St. Luke’s Mews is the setting for one of the most divisive moments in romcom history. To some Andrew Lincoln’s cue-card declaration of love to Keira Knightley is a beautiful romantic gesture. To others it’s the height of creepiness. But the woman who now owns the pink house where the Love Actually stunt took place obviously isn’t a Richard Curtis fan: she had no idea of the property’s cinematic history when she purchased it.  

Of course, the anonymous homeowner certainly knows all about it now. She told the Daily Mail newspaper that she’s “living under a blanket of selfies, tour guides, and a queue of tourists lining up to take photos on weekends.” But rather than get angry, the lady has embraced her charitable side by installing a donation box at the front of her property. Its proceeds go to nearby homeless organizations.

Who knew that a simple set of steps could inspire countless superhero movie fans across the world to take a New York pilgrimage? The stairway in question is located in the Bronx neighborhood of Highbridge and specifically between Anderson and Shakespeare Avenues. And it’s where Joaquin Phoenix’s maniacal villain does his merry dance in Joker.  

The #jokerstairs have become something of a sensation on Instagram. But those who live or work near the unlikely tourist destination no doubt rue the day that the hashtag started trending. Climbing up and down the stairway now takes twice as long due to the number of people attempting to recreate Phoenix’s wild moves.  

You can’t blame those who’ve been inspired to flock to Maya Bay after watching The Beach. The Leonardo DiCaprio flick made the cove, situated on the island of Phi Phi Leh in Thailand, look like paradise with its cerulean seas, lush greenery, and pristine beaches. But just as in the 2000 film itself, the dream destination has turned into something of a nightmare.  

Yes, with 5,000 people wanting to follow in DiCaprio’s sandy footsteps each day, the bay’s coral population has taken a bit of a battering. The situation got so severe that the country’s National Parks Department was left with no option but to restrict all access to the beach in 2018. It took another four years for the area to be reopened to the public.

The Philadelphia Museum of Art is home to nearly 250,000 works spanning across two millennia including paintings by icons such as Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Pablo Picasso, and Vincent van Gogh. But for many visitors to the building the main attraction isn’t in the many galleries. It’s the 72 steps outside it! 

And these steps aren’t anything to do with the art world, either. They are, of course, the ones that Sylvester Stallone is seen running up in the film that helped to make his name, Rocky. And the more physically fit fans of the boxing flick like nothing more than recreating that exhausting climb. 

Fans of the Harry Potter franchise certainly have their fair share of movie locations from which to choose. The boy wizard’s adventures were spread across eight mammoth feature films, after all. But one of the most popular is the viaduct that famously featured in The Chamber of Secrets. And if you really want to make a day of it you can hop aboard the steam train that travels across it, too. 

Of course, the National Trust for Scotland no doubt wishes that Potterheads would try to reenact their favorite scenes elsewhere. According to BuzzFeed, the organization has expressed concerns that the route between Mallaig and Fort William is becoming too overcrowded by tourists. And as a result the potential for accidents is only likely to increase.

The stone city walls of Dubrovnik have undoubtedly helped build the epic world of Game of Thrones. They surround the Westerosi royal family’s home, the Red Keep, which in real life is known as Fort Lovrijenac. And it’s where the Kingsguard famously keep watch. But you have to be prepared for quite the walk if you want to see them all.  

Yes, the walls that envelop the Croatian city’s old town stretch to nearly 2,000 meters. They were built in the Middle Ages to keep out hostile threats, and they have been expanded on ever since. Over 1 million people headed for Dubrovnik following its Games of Thrones showing, forcing officials to implement restrictions which would help prevent real-estate surges and damage to the environment.

Just when the tourism levels inspired by the Poldark show of the 1970s had died down along came another adaptation. Yes, the BBC version that hit screens in 2015 once again left period-drama fans flocking to the picturesque coastal county of Cornwall. According to Visit Cornwall nearly an eighth of the area’s tourists now visit due to the Aiden Turner hit.

Unfortunately, the idyllic beach of Kynance Cove suffered from this increase. In 2018 the same tourist board issued a plea aimed at reducing the amount of traffic and overcrowding that had swamped the area. It recommended heading for one of the county’s other beaches instead. Cornwall has at least 400 to choose from, after all.

Situated in the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, the tiny town of Forks wouldn’t necessarily be the most obvious place in which to set a vampire saga. But the area has become synonymous with blood-thirsty teens thanks to its use in the young adult phenomenon that is Twilight. And the visitor center has witnessed a particularly notable surge in tourists as a result.  

Yes, before the bizarre love triangle between a human, vampire, and werewolf hit our screens Forks’ visitor center typically welcomed 5,000 individuals every year. After Twilight’s 2008 release, though, this figure ballooned to a whopping 70,000! And the likes of the Forever Twilight in Forks Festival 

A movie has to be pretty special to inspire law-abiding members of the public to willingly head to a prison. And that certainly applies to The Shawshank Redemption, the slow-burning 1994 hit adapted from Stephen King’s eponymous novel. The Ohio State Reformatory where most of the film is set has become a must-visit for those who were gripped by the story of Andy Dufresne. 

The film’s continued popularity, though, has caused a very different kind of prison overcrowding. In 2019 for example, approximately 30,000 people descended upon the iconic building as part of the movie’s silver-anniversary celebrations. Not that the industrial town of Mansfield is likely to be complaining: as per NPR, the success of The Shawshank Redemption brings in roughly $15 million to its economy each year!

The scene in which Bryan Cranston’s Walter White tosses a pizza on to the roof of his Albuquerque home quickly became one of Breaking Bad’s most iconic. Of course, this also had the unwanted knock-on effect of fans trying to recreate the impressive flip. In fact, roughly 200 people would head for the home on Piermont Drive each day in 2013 — most of whom were armed with a margherita or two.

Francis Padilla, who owns the property alongside partner Louis, later told Time magazine that she has a novel way of scaring off her unwanted guests. She said, “We’ve had pizzas on our roof. We’ve had pizzas on our driveway; pizzas until we’re sick of looking at pizzas. I’ll sit outside with a shotgun in a rocking chair. You know, like Granny from The Beverly Hillbillies.” 

The Goonies is one of the most beloved kids’ films of the 1980s. But would you expect the Astoria house on 368 38th Street where the gang hung around to still draw a significant number of fans several decades on? Sandi Preston, who bought the property in 2001, soon found out that the answer is a resounding, and a messy, yes!

Preston initially embraced all the love for the madcap caper. But her attitude understandably changed in 2015 thanks to a 30th anniversary celebration that got way out of control. Roughly 15,000 fans turned up to the area where they littered, parked where they shouldn’t have, and allowed their dogs to foul on the streets. Preston has since tried to put off visitors by making the place less Instagram-friendly.

If you’re up on your Bollywood movies then you’ll already know that 3 Idiots was nothing short of a sensation. In fact, it became India’s biggest ever box-office hit on its release in 2009. But the region of Ladakh in which the broad comedy filmed suffered for all the success. Even one of its local schools had to deal with interfering tourists.

Yes, 3 Idiots proved to be so popular that many fans made the pilgrimage to the Druk Padma Karpo school that doubled up as the trio’s college. Unfortunately, they also did so in term time. As a result the school chose to construct a replica wall away from the main building in the hope that it would deter visitors from disrupting classes.

Never has a film made the line “If you go down to the woods today...” seem more menacing than The Blair Witch Project. But that still didn’t stop hordes of horror aficionados from descending upon its Maryland setting of Burkittsville. And many of these fans proved to be a far more threatening proposition than any mythical curse.

Not only was the “Welcome to Burkittsville” sign repeatedly thieved by souvenir-hunters, but the town was also subjected to constant invasions of privacy. For example, as per website Cracked, there was a particularly scary incident when a tourist gate-crashed their way into the mayor’s house under the misguided belief it was on the itinerary for a Blair Witch tour. Little surprise, then, that residents refused to allow the sequel to be filmed in their town, too. 

Susan Trotta-Smith and her family were left cursing the day that A Haunting in Connecticut hit cinemas. The 2009 horror took inspiration from their one-time funeral parlor home which is said to have haunted previous occupants the Snedekers. Wall shadows, strange noises, and even levitating bed covers were just a few of the supernatural ongoings that were reportedly experienced at the time. And a whole host of fans journeyed to the Southington home to see what the fuss was about.  

Trotta-Smith, who’d been living in the house for a decade by the time of the movie’s premiere, told website The Hour that she and her loved ones were now experiencing a very different kind of haunting. She said, “It’s been a total change from a very quiet house in a very quiet neighborhood to looking out the window and seeing cars stopping all the time. It’s been very, very stressful, and sometimes worrisome.” 

3. Lansing Road Farm (Field of Dreams) 

“If you build it, he will come,” went the famous line in baseball favorite Field of Dreams. And that kind of mentality could be applied to the film itself. Yes, approximately 50,000 fans have headed to the Iowa farm where the Kevin Costner movie was shot every year since its 1989 release. But this figure essentially started a neighborly war.  

You see, the couple who owned the majority of the outfield wanted to capitalize on the film’s success and make the farm a merchandise-heavy tourist destination. The pair who owned the lion’s share of the infield, on the other hand, largely wanted to keep the space as a working farm. As you would expect, a bitter court battle ensued.

Number 2640 Steiner St. was already a popular haunt for fans of early ‘90s family comedies with slightly dubious parenting antics. It was the place where the Hillard family resided in Mrs. Doubtfire, of course. But the property became even more of a tourist attraction when its star Robin Williams tragically passed away.  

Douglas Ousterhout, the plastic surgeon owner of the San Francisco house, told website SF Gate that the week of Williams’ death was nothing short of bedlam. He said, “I didn’t bother coming home for dinner. The place was packed.” Candles, flowers and heartfelt notes were just some of the ways in which fans paid their respects, much to Ousterhout’s annoyance.  

The Lord of the Rings trilogy is widely regarded as one of the pinnacles of 21st-century filmmaking. And the location scouts were undoubtedly integral to its success. So it’s little wonder that thousands of fans each year flock to part of its magical world: Hobbiton, a.k.a. the 1,250-acre Alexander farm situated in the Waikato region of New Zealand.

But while Peter Jackson’s masterpiece has undoubtedly boosted the country’s economy there is a downside to all the Hobbit love. Yes, many residents believe that the area brought to life as The Shire isn’t equipped to deal with such an influx of tourists. And as a result it’s now more likely to face significant environmental problems.