Where Is Eastwick in 'The Witches of Eastwick'?
There is no town in Rhode Island called Eastwick where fire burns and cauldron bubbles. But there is a Wickford, Rhode Island, and John Updike, a transient in town, conjured his world-famous coven here. A brilliant satirist of middle-class America, Updike found historic Wickford to be the perfect Eastwick, a backward place primed for moral, magical uproar.
Built in 1637, Smith's Castle in Wickford could take the part of Lenox Mansion any day.
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Richard Smith's 'castle' in Wickford, RI |
But the onscreen adaptation of The Witches of Eastwick chose the majestic Castle Hill of the Crane Estate in Massachusetts as Darryl Van Horne's love nest and place of sabbat.
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Devilishly decadent Castle Hill in Ipswich, MA |
Two other Massachusetts towns, Scituate and Cohasset, channeled Eastwick in the movie. The Cohasset First Parish Meeting House, built in 1746, is a shooting location. Recognize this?
RIP John Updike.
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