The West Wing and CSI’s Emily Procter reveals destroyed home after devastating LA fires

The flames have long since died down but the ash still hangs heavy in the air, catching the back of your throat.

Whereas West Sunset Boulevard in the Pacific Palisades was once brimming with life, it now lies eerily quiet. It’s hard to believe that just a few miles away the city is rolling out the red carpet for the biggest night of the showbusiness calender.

The fact the Oscars is going ahead at all is hard to fathom given the utter devastation stretching for miles in front of my eyes. Around me, a handful of workmen in high-vis jackets and masks toil in the midday sun, but they are sparse in numbers.

There are even fewer residents save a petite, blonde woman standing in the centre of what must have once been her home. You can only just make out the four walls, a bath-tub maybe, among the tons of rubble at her feet.

It feels like a huge intrusion but she is happy to talk. “I used to be on television anyway,” she laughs. This is the land of Hollywood, after all. Her name is Emily Procter, and it transpires she is a seasoned actress and star of The West Wing, and CSI Miami..

“I would offer you something but I don’t have a refrigerator any more,” she smiles. Humour is perhaps the best policy when dealing with what’s been described as one of the most destructive natural disasters in Los Angeles history.

Driven by winds of up to 100mph, the fire had rolled over the mountainside behind her home before roaring through the neighbourhood. More than 20,000 acres were engulfed in flames, destroying nearly 7,000 structures, including churches, schools, and hospitals.

Emily’s home was one such casualty, and as she shows us around its remains, she can be forgiven for reminiscing about life before. “You are standing in my dining room right now….that’s my fireplace,” she says. “You know it really was a lovely house.” Emily, who lives with her musician partner Paul Bryan, and their daughter Pippa, points out the mangled remains of a Steinway piano. Then there is where Paul’s studio used to be, and all his beloved bass guitars. Their artwork, too, is all lost.

“I left a Picasso, a Matisse…..I had portraits of my family going back to the early 1700s and they’re all gone,” she says. The fire was so ferocious that even the most sturdy features practically disintegrated under the heat. They were convinced a table with a marble slab would survive but she says it was as if the stone had “evaporated.”

Emily remembers vividly the moment they had to flee their homes.A friend’s husband who lived in a high-rise said he could see flames in the hills behind their home prompting her to race home from tennis. Once there her and Paul had to make the decision as to what to take and what to leave behind. “I argued with my partner Paul over me packing and him not packing,” she says. “I was putting the animals on my daughter’s bed this morning and I thought ‘oh I am so glad that I took them.’ But so many people didn’t take anything.”

Staggeringly, the Palisades fire burnt for a month before it was fully contained. Going back for the first time was understandably emotional, and nearly everything was lost bar a few random items.

“I love to do interiors and I found my tape measure and my scissors,” she says, adding that she’s now going to frame them on the wall. I went and sifted through my friend’s house and there was one thing she wanted and we managed to find it….figurine that her grandmother had given her.” Emily was not alone when it comes to Palisades celebrities losing their homes. Her neighbours included fellow actor Billy Crystal and his wife Janice, who lost their home of 46 years.

“We raised our children and grandchildren here,” he said in a statement. “Every inch of our house was filled with love. Beautiful memories that can’t be taken away. We are heartbroken of course but with the love of our children and friends we will get through this.”

Fellow Palisades resident Steve Guttenberg meanwhile described the blaze as “the most unbelievable I’ve ever seen.” The Police Academy star, who had earlier tried to help evacuate the area, added: “The sky was dark, like it was nighttime.”

For Emily, she has no doubt that her house will rise from the ashes again. And like the Oscars, life has to go on.

“I think most of us will be back…it was a real neighbourhood,” she says, choking up. “We knew our mailman…we argued over football. It was a very special place.”

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Source: Mirror