Upon my arrival in the morning to the Fifty Shades Freed location for the book location of the Zig Zag Cafe, I found only a few trucks on the streets and the West Oak restaurant completely covered in black tarps. The new name for the restaurant was now the Bunker Club. Maybe a reference to E. L . James “Bunker Babes”. The production team had also set up to use the front space of the restaurant next door for costuming and other uses. They also had set up in another office area across the street for the 60 plus extras they had coming in for the day. At first I noticed how this street in the Yale Town part of the downtown Vancouver BC, resembles several streets in NW Portland with its raised sidewalk and narrow lane for drivers.

Along where they had started to set up the restaurant area there were several trails of cables leading out along the roadway and along the adjacent sidewalks. They also started to set up background lighting across the street in Yale Park and also large lighting up on the crane. All of this lighting was for the one scene with Dakota, Eloise and Brant as Sawyer that they played out in front of the restaurants entrance. They all came out the front door of the restaurant and the girls had a conversation together while Dakota checked her phone. Brant stood off to the side scanning the area and watching the girls. He then went up to them towards the end of the scene.

They rehearsed the scene several times and also with their stand ins several times. By the time they actually filmed the scene it was dark with only their set up lighting providing enough light to film with. They had to set up several lights at the front of the restaurant area to finally have the right look they needed. Between filming the girls were wearing their black quilted coats to stay warm. At the end of the filming they did what was called an “insert” which I was told was a close up of Dakota holding her phone. At the end of the night Eloise was seen saying goodnight and leaving out the restaurant exit. Dakota and Brant left out the front street for the night.

It was a fun night of filming with several fans now visiting the city. The three actors had spent the afternoon inside the restaurant filming interior scenes as well.

None of the these videos are from the actual filming.

First Look in the morning:

Light equipment at Yale Park:

The big crane lighting setting up:

In late afternoon they cleared the front of the restaurant and starting setting up for the outside scene:

Christian Grey’s new 2017 Audi Q7 was parked out front and used as background only.

The stand-ins for rehearsing:

Director James Foley and cinematographer John Schwartzman:

Production Designer Nelson Coates was very busy setting up the area the the filming:

Brant as Sawyer:

Also on set for the filming was producer Michael DeLuca:

UPDATE:  Later I was able to return to West Oak and have a great sunday brunch. Here are few pics of the inside of the restaurant which was used for FS FREED with Dakota and Eloise filming.