Where was The Resort filmed? (And is it actually haunted?)

Update Feb 2., 2023 

A lot of people find this post searching for info about where the Peacock series The Resort was filmed. This post was initially about where to find the resort used in a horror movie of the same name. However, because I never want visitors to leave disappointed, I’ve included filming location and paranormal info about the Peacock series below too.

---

The Resort is a horror movie set to release on VOD on April 30. It’s about a writer named Lex who is obsessed with the paranormal. For her birthday, her friends gift her an excursion to a Hawaiian island where a ghost known as the Half-Faced Girl haunts an abandoned resort. Does she? That’s what they take a haunt jaunt to find out.

The second I saw the resort in the trailer, I wanted to know more about it, namely: is it a real place? If so, I had more questions, including, where is it, is it really abandoned, and is it haunted?

So I set out to uncover where The Resort was filmed, as well as the answers to my other questions, and here’s what I found out.

Is the resort in The Resort a real place?

Yes!

It was most recently known as the Makena Beach & Golf Resort. When it first opened in 1986 it was called the Maui Prince Hotel. It switched owners a few times. Under the management of the Landmark Hotels Group, its name was changed to the Makena Beach & Golf Resort in 2012.

It closed in 2016, in order to accommodate a new plan for the land, which would see it transformed into the Makena Golf & Beach Club, “a members-only community of family-friendly residences.” In 2018, the resort was demolished.

So The Resort movie gives us a chance to explore the former 290 room and 20 suites vacation destination in a way we’ll never get to again.

Where was it located?

Thanks to Wikipedia, we know the name for the Makena Beach & Golf Resort comes from the district it was in, Makena, which is situated on the southern shore of Maui County in Hawaii.

Was the resort abandoned?

Yes.

From the time it closed in 2016 until it was demolished in 2018. The producers of The Resort had a unique opportunity to put it to good use during that time. Which is handy for those of us urbexers who like to check out abandoned places, even if only from the comfort of our couches.

Was the Makena Beach & Golf Resort haunted?

Did you ever watch “The Night Marchers” episode of Into the Unknown with Cliff Simon?

According to a post about ghost stories of Hawaii, Maui is one of the places where you can find the Night Marchers. (So is Oahu.) However, it specifically says they’ve been reported in certain parts of Maui, particularly Kahakuloa and Makena.

However, if anyone had experiences with the Night Marchers, or any other ghosts while staying at the Makena Beach & Golf Resort, it’s not well-documented anywhere on the Internet.

What about the cast and crew while filming The Resort? I haven’t seen anything about that either, but I’ll keep an eye out and be sure to share any updates if they come through.

The Resort Trailer

Want to see the Makena Beach & Golf Resort for yourself? You can get a few glimpses of it in the trailer for The Resort. Until you can spend more time there when The Resort is released on April 30, of course.

Where Peacock’s “The Resort” Was Filmed

While the series is set in Mexico, filming took place in Puerto Rico, according to Distractify. Specifically in San Juan and Culebra.

Conde Nast Traveler conducted an awesome interview with the show’s production designer, Bret Tanzer. He explained they used Dorado Beach, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve for the pool scenes. A suite at the Fairmont El San Juan Hotel was used for the room Emma (Cristin Miloti) and Noah (William Jackson Harper) stay in. And the “’07 scenes,” as he called them, were filmed at the Ritz-Carlton, San Juan.

Which, in the series, a bad storm damages the resort in ’07. In real life, Hurricane Ian wreaked havoc on the Ritz-Carlton in 2017. It’s been closed since but is set to reopen in 2023. Which is terrible, but for the series, it worked out for filming purposes.

As for jungle scenes, those were filmed at the Julio Monagas National Park in Puerto Rico, while some cave scenes were shot in the Dominican Republic.

Besides being haunted by bad weather, there really aren’t any reports of the resorts they filmed The Resort in being haunted. However, they did also film some street scenes in Old San Juan, which is where you’ll find two picturesque haunted forts, Castillo San Felipe del Morro (a.k.a. El Morro) and the Castillo San Cristobal. Fans of the Pirates of the Caribbean Ride at Magic Kingdom Disney who have been to El Morro will definitely recognize elements from it on the ride’s facade.

And then there’s the legend of the Chupacabra, which originated in Puerto Rico. I look for it every time we’ve been. But, alas, it has always eluded me…

If you found this post while searching for info on the Peacock series, I hope you found this updated info pertaining to it helpful.

Check-In

Would you consider yourself an urbexer?