But which Kelly’s shall we go to?

A while back the Blog Will Hunting crew payed a visit to the Christopher Lee Playground, the South Boston location in which the GWH boys watch some little league before picking up some burgers (and then getting into some street fights).

The screenplay, as written, is a little different from the scene in the film:

The next scene shows them in Chuckie’s car — with Kelly’s Roast Beef bags, of course.  As you will recall, in the film the exchange doesn’t have Chuckie dissing Kelly’s this way… it’s a bit of a surprise to see such anti-Kelly’s sentiment on the page, as the local chain is regarded as something of an institution.  (As we noted a couple weeks ago, guest star Julianne Moore namechecks Kelly’s in a recent episode of 30 Rock — “Let’s go to Kelly’s! Let’s get some roast beef!”).

Founded in 1951, Kelly’s lays claim to the invention of the Original Roast Beef Sandwich — “before 1951, no one had ever heard of eating such a creation!“  Their original location is their beachfront outpost in Revere, and over the years four other locations have sprung up around Boston.  One is inside a Jordan’s Furniture.  (Also in that Jordan’s Furniture: an IMAX theater.  I’m pretty sure I saw The Dark Knight there.  At that furniture store.  It’s weird, I know.)

Celebrating six decades of quality, customer service, and value, Kelly’s is still a family owned and operated business that continues the original philosophy of our founders. Many of Kelly’s hourly employees and managers have been with the company over thirty years! Kelly’s is open 363 days a year, providing our valued customers with the quality and consistent standards they have come to expect over the years. Now when people ask, “Why is Kelly’s So Famous Anyhow?” Our answer remains: because of our loyal customers.

They of course also mention Good Will Hunting as one of their many claims to fame.

Their marketing plays up their sense of tradition and customer service, and though Chuckie would have found some allies in his discontent on the Yelp customer review message boards, most Yelpers have positive things to say about the staff, and especially the food, often using the word “fried” as an adjective of deeply satisfied approval.  The reviews tend to prefer the flagship restaurant at Revere Beach, despite the seagulls’ attempts at food theft, and perhaps indicative of nothing, at least one reviewer at another location admits to being drunk during his visit.

So on the day of our visit to Southie, we left the Christopher Lee playground wondering, which Kelly’s did they go to?

It essentially comes down to the flagship Revere location and the one in Medford.

We know that is that it is 15 minutes out of their way… according to Google maps (assuming they were coming back to Southie afterwards) it would take 37 minutes to drive to Revere Beach and back, but only 25 to get to Medford.  Also, the Medford location has a drive-thru, and Chuckie’s comment as they squabble in the car on the return trip — “I know what you ordered, I was there” — suggests they did the drive-thru and Chuck did the ordering (and the paying).

So we drove by the Medford location, and… well… it looked pretty boring….

Despite the fact that is probably the one they went to (CORRECTION: This has been disproved, thanks to Patrick. Check out the comments) … we wanted to go to the beach.

So on that summer day we had a wonderful meal — open air seating, a sea breeze, seagulls, Bostonians, and more than once, someone would sing out, “Chuck I had a double burger!”