“New York, You’ve Changed” is a new Scouting NY site feature in which the New York depicted in movies is compared with the city of today. This is not the usual list of shooting locations and addresses to visit next time you tour the city. Instead, this is a full shot-by-shot dissection to see what New York once was and what it has become, for better or worse. I’ve tried to recreate the angles and framing as best as possible, and have presented the shots (more or less) in the order they appear in the film. This is Part 2 to our look at Ghostbusters – Part 1 is here. And be sure to check out our new Taxi Driver examination here. Enjoy!
With this article, we’re completing our “New York, You’ve Changed” look at Ghostbusters. Picking up where we left off, Egon, Ray, and Peter have been kicked out of Columbia and have since purchased a Tribeca firehouse to base their fledgling ghostbusting business in.
In this scene, Ray drives up in what will soon become the iconic “Ectomobile” – not a hearse, as some believe, but actually an old ambulance (to be specific, a 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteor limo-style endloader combination car [ambulance conversion]). If you look in the background, you get a brief glimpse of the neighborhood surrounding the firehouse on North Moore Street.
You get a better view later in the film, when Peter arrives to find EPA officer Walter Peck attempting to shut down the powergrid. As you can see in both pictures, a lot has changed, primarily the complete gutting of what I think was the “Vera Electronics Company,” now the Cercle Rouge Brasserie. Lots of building painting changes to boot. Also, North Moore Street has lost meter parking but has gained some foliage.
Also, note the squat brick building on the corner, which you can see in this aerial view when the storage facility blows.
This brick building was purchased by a wealthy family, who recently built a five story home on top of it (yep, that’s a single family house). Because the brick building is landmarked, they had to integrate it into their design. Ha, I’d sort of rather live in the firehouse, but then, I’m nuts.
As Peter listens to Ray’s endless list of car repairs, we get a glimpse across Hudson Street, which has completely changed (the restaurant on the corner is now Walkers). Also note that the “ENTRANCE AROUND CORNER” sign on the firehouse still exists:
After meeting Dana Barrett, the Ghostbusters complete their first successful bust at the Sedgewick Hotel. Where is its New York counterpart? You’ll have to go to California for that one – they filmed at LA’s Millennium Biltmore Hotel.
We next get a montage taking us through their rapid successes at busting ghosts, and I’m going to need a little help identifying this first location. Anyone recognize it? It feels very familiar to me, but I just can’t place it. I think that sign says “Mens Wear” on the right, though I doubt that helps. Also, the bearded guy looking into the camera is actually an actor.
The next part of the montage appears to have been shot around the Little Italy/Chinatown neighborhood. I was excited to go searching for some of the more obscure shots, but was ultimately thwarted by the San Gennaro festival (for non-New Yorkers, thousands of people descend on Little Italy for an enormous street fair, making photography, walking, even breathing nearly impossible). I’m planning on returning to the area after the festival is over sometime this November. We get a shot of the Ectomobile passing by the infamous Umberto’s…
Next, we see Peter and Ray in Chinatown. I really feel there’s enough clues in this picture to locate this (the metal railing, the yellow sign, etc.) and for shooting purposes, I bet it’s very close to Umberto’s.
This next shot of Egon with a smoking trap had me wondering, until I noticed both a “Luna Restaurant” and a “PIZZA” sign in the background. Granted, this could be ANYWHERE in New York (there are several “Luna” establishments in the city), but if they were doing montage shots in Little Italy, it seems to be a safe bet that this was there.
It would also make perfect sense to find an apartment building with a lower level like this in the neighborhood. If anyone knows differently, please let me know!
Here, we see the Ectomobile cruise past St. Patrick’s and Saks Fifth Ave. In many of these shots, it’s actually Dan Aykroyd driving the car, even though you can’t see him. Looks like the awnings are gone. Also, for reasons unknown, we now need to put up with that incredibly frustrating sidewalk barrier:
Finally, we see the Ghostbusters running up Rockefeller Center. Apparently, they had no permission to shoot there, and you can actually see a security guy (maybe the man in white on the left?) running after them in the shot.
After the montage, Peter chats with Dana about Zuul and Gozer in Lincoln Center. The fountain was recently replaced, to the dismay of preservationists, with a modern version that will entertain tourists with computer-controlled water displays.
Bad things quickly begin happening in Dana’s apartment building. For the life of me, I can’t find this location in Central Park. It’s obviously faked – Dana’s apartment is superimposed where it simply doesn’t exist. But I can’t seem to find this curve. Any guesses? The best I could come up with is the entrance at 72nd Street, which doesn’t feel totally right.
With a terror dog right behind him, Louis Tully flees to Central Park and desperately tries to get into Tavern on the Green via the patio (I believe the statue was a prop).
Inside, a birthday party is in full swing (trivia – the birthday girl is Debbie Gibson). I located the correct side of the patio by that tree, which is hidden behind the hanging flowers in the below picture.
Louis runs to the left and desperately tries the door, which is locked (FYI for anyone running from terror dogs, the door is still locked):
Finally, in what has to be one of the more sympathy-inducing scenes in modern cinema, Louis backs against a window – it’s the second one to the right of the tree trunk.
Shortly after, Walter Peck shuts down the protection grid and the containment unit blows. As you watch the enormous explosion blow out of the Ghostbusters roof, you could be forgiven for not noticing the MATERA CANVAS ad on the building to the left, which is still there today:
The ad advertises a store at 5 Lispenard Street, which was in business as recently as 1990, having been around since 1907 (more info in this NY Times article).
During the commotion, Louis manages to escape – anyone know what street this?
A quick tidbit you might have missed – in this shot, you can see a “STAY PUFT MARSHMALLOWS” wall ad on the building to the left (wouldn’t that be a great addition to the now otherwise ugly wall?).
As ghosts escape, we see one fly out of a subway station, which can be found at the City Hall RW train entrance on Broadway west of City Hall (the newsstand seems to have shifted south a block):
Next, a commuter gets in a cab with a corpse. Any idea what avenue this is?
I’ve had this cab driver before:
The cab takes off, sending traffic swerving out of its path. This might give a second clue to the location of the scene:
For a brief moment, we get a shot of Louis crossing the street as he makes his way to Dana’s apartment. What I find interesting about this shot is an awning that reads “WIENERWALD – Austrian Restaurant.” I had never heard of a WienerWald before – apparently, it was the largest fast food restaurant in Europe during the 1970’s, and had attempted to expand to America. Now, there are only 63 locations left in Germany and Austria.
Slimer makes another appearance, this time in a hot dog vendor’s cart outside of the McGraw-Hill building at Rockefeller Center:
Dana sends a signal to Louis, who hears it in Times Square. This is the weirdest shot – it’s like the went out of their way to hide the fact that it’s Times Square. I only recognized it for the TCKT booth (boy has that changed) and the George Cohan statue. Odd that they would shoot in the heart of Manhattan and not show the surrounding area (methinks they got this shot on the fly).
After a meeting with the mayor at city hall…
…the boys in gray peel out and head uptown…
…vowing to “run some red lights.”
Much of the destruction that occurs to the street in front of Dana’s building was actually shot on a soundstage in California with a full two-story replica of the apartment’s facade (if you pay close attention, it’s very clear when they’re on the set):
Finally, the one and only Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man makes an appearance in Columbus Circle. Aw, I miss the old Museum of Arts & Design building, even if it was one of the ugliest buildings in the city (for years, I thought it was some sort of parking garage). Note the sliver of an old Marlboro Cigarettes ad on the right:
As terrified New Yorkers flee, they have no idea that the store on the corner will one day be a FedEx-Kinkos:
As Stay-Puft approaches the building, you can see just how drastic the building addition is:
I had to post this great shot – I never noticed that two great villains, Walter Peck and Stay-Puft, appear in one brief shot.
Finally, years later, the marshmallow has been cleaned up and New York is basically back to normal.
As it turns out, most of the changes between the New York in Ghostbusters and the New York of 2009 are pretty small, due to the fact that the movie was mostly shot in locations where change is not allowed (the New York Public Library, Columbia, Rockefeller Center, etc.). In my mind, it’s a very good thing that these New York’s treasures are still standing strong more than 25 years later.
With the recent success of 80’s nostalgia reboots (G.I. Joe, Transformers, etc.), there’s been renewed talk about a Ghostbusters 3. A script was commissioned by Sony Pictures, with writing duties handed to Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg, the writers of Year One.
The writers of Year One. Are you fucking kidding me?
Look, I’d kill to see the Ghostbusters hit the streets of New York for one last fight against the paranormal, but when I say the Ghostbusters, I don’t mean a new crop of comedic actors. Nothing makes me fear for the worst more than thinking of Ben Stiller, Jack Black, Seth Rogan, or Paul Rudd hefting on a proton pack (in his defense, Seth Rogan is on record as saying he will not be the guy to ruin Ghostbusters). I’ve heard industry-types say that there’s no way Murray, Aykroyd, or Ramis could support a tentpole movie like Ghostbusters 3.
Bullshit. If Harrison Ford can pack ‘em in at 67 for a subpar Indy IV, there is no question that audiences will turn out in droves to see Ray, Peter, Egon, and Winston save New York one more time.
Anyway, hope you enjoyed! I’m going to try to make this a regular site feature. Next time, we’ll move a bit further back in film history.
-SCOUT
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Tags: 55 Central Park West · blogsherpa · Central Park · Chinatown · george cohan · ghostbusters · little italy · Manhattan · new york · new york city · rockefeller center · Scouting New York · Scouting NY · tavern on the green · tckts booth · Times Square · tribeca · umbertos34 Comments
34 responses so far ↓
“Also, for reasons unknown, we now need to put up with that incredibly frustrating sidewalk barrier.”
I’m pretty sure the sidewalk barriers went up when Giuilani increased the jaywalking fine. In an attempt to keep pedestrians from messing up traffic patterns, he installed barriers so you can only cross at certain intersections.
Here’s a NYTimes article about it from January 1998: http://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/13/nyregion/with-higher-fines-giuliani-hopes-to-hobble-jaywalkers.html
“The Mayor, however, said a crackdown against jaywalking, like the pedestrian gates placed in midtown, would improve traffic flow and allow speedier travel for emergency vehicles. On Sunday, Mr. Giuliani had said that the pedestrian barricades would stay up ”indefinitely” at the end of the pilot program yesterday. The police erected them on Dec. 23, at 10 intersections between Lexington Avenue and Avenue of the Americas on 49th and 50th Streets.
The barriers were greeted with a torrent of criticism, with many people claiming they struck at the heart of New York’s identity as a pedestrian city.”
Re: sidewalk barriers, see also this New Yorker cover: http://archives.newyorker.com/?i=1998-04-06
Actually, from what I understand and have read, Ramis and Akroyd have been reading each draft of the script to make sure it’s up to par. They are on the 3rd draft now, so there are chances it may not suck. And after the recent videogame, Murray agreed to sign on as well.
This is an awesome feature, and you couldn’t have picked a better film to start it off with.
Thanks for putting it together! I look forward to what you do next.
I see folks have beat me to the Blame Giuliani front on the sidewalk barriers! I remember how angry people were when they went up. Jaywalking is an innate NYC right!
My mom worked at Rockefeller Center from 1970 to 1987, and she and I used to have lunch at the neighborhood Wienerwald ALL THE TIME in the 1970s. Yum. There were a couple of Teutonic wurst chains back then–I’m blanking on the other one. I just remember, when you walked in, there were two huge beerkegs mounted on the wall, labelled “Dunkel” and “Hell.” That used to crack me up.
[...] get the treatment is ‘Ghostbusters,’ the movie that introduced Carr to NYC. In the two-part series, Carr revisits famous locations from the movie, including Tribeca’s Hook & Ladder [...]
Fucking A, dude. This was great. I moved to the city only around 6 months ago, so these old New York movies still have lots of magic to me–I’m gobbling them up. Your post is easily the best I’ve read (and I’ve gone back pretty far in your archives).
My suggestion for future movies:
– Taxi Driver
– My Dinner With Andre (should be a really short one, but interesting)
Talk of other screenwriters attached to Ghostbusters 3 sickens me, especially since Aykroyd’s original script was more about the later years of the Ghostbusters, after they had established a franchise. Sounds like a perfect solution to work with that, especially since there was real magic to Aykroyd’s 80’s scripts. Whereas everything he did after 1989 was utter crap. Blues Brothers 2000 particularly.
Industry types may be right that Murray, Aykroyd and Ramis aren’t names that can open a big weekend, but as the Ghostbusters there’s more than enough beyond the sum of its parts to get people born after 1989 into the theater.
That was really great! To see how it all has changed so much. Id love to go back to when they were filming and see all these LANDMARKS, to me they are. I think you should keep going and show us Ghostbusters 2 locations. The art museum, the court room (or outside of it), Peters appartment, the middle of 1st Avenue where they dug the hole, (the river of slime J/K) etc.. Id love to see that and i bet a whole lot of others that just love the ghostbusters!
for the record, ambulances often did double duty as hearses until i think the late 70s.
[...] second part of Scouting New York’s Ghostbusters retrospective is up, as they continue to take a look at all the film’s locations around New York, then and [...]
GB004c – Luna:
I’d bet heavy that this is the Luna Pizza on Mulberry St. Check it out after the festival.
How about an “Annie Hall” series?
Great work, congratulations. And thanks for sharing it with us, at least, it´s too hard to me to find my way to go and visit NYC by myself, but I can´t die without doing it.
Cheers from the mexican GB biggest fan.
INCREDIBLE! Do Scent Of A Woman next! The scenes in DUMBO will provide some very interesting differences: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0rPbwN0gbA
Wow, this is great. Excellent job carried out with care and love.
I’ve spent a lot of time walking the streets of New York trying to understand some of those locations. The Sedgwick Hotel had me beat — now I know why! Just last week I passed by the fire house and saw the sign from Ghostbusters II just inside the entrance. I’m amazed the Matera Canvas ad is still there.
I just noticed the photograph on the front page of the New York Post during the montage sequence is actually a still from the climax of the movie, when the Ghostbusters “crossing the streams” to defeat Gozor.
Well I got one so far – the commuter gets in cab with a corpse at Madison Avenue on the east side of the avenue at about 61st street. the back of the GM building/FAO Shwartz can be seen a few blocks away I think.
Fantastic series start! Ghostbusters is one of my all time favorite movies. I look forward to more in your series. Keep up the great work!
[...] –This next one comes compliments of MTV Movies Blog reader Rebekah Burgess. I love myself some “Ghostbusters.” It’s a bonafide classic, and it’s set in a New York City that doesn’t really exist anymore. Not that you’d be able to tell by simply comparing the locations. A pair of new posts on Scouting New York show a series of “then & now” photos — movie stills compared with current-day locations — from “Ghostbusters,” with appropriate commentary. It’s fantastic; I urge you all to click through and see for yourselves. (Scouting New York (Part 1) and Scouting New York (Part 2)) [...]
[...] Louis Tully tries to get into Tavern on the Green! The Ghostbusters montage it up through New York! And more! Part 2 is here! [...]
[...] Scouting NY put together a fun collection of then-and-now pictures of NYC to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Ghostbusters. Check out Part 1 & Part 2! [...]
Very detailed and entertaining.
More movies please!
Really awesome article!
Hate to break it to you, but all four of the guys are back for GB3. But what is nice to hear is that Bill wouldn’t come back unless Ernie Hudson got a bigger role. So at least there’s that.
[...] “New York, You’ve Changed” is a new Scouting NY site feature in which the New York depicted in movies is compared with the city of today. This is not the usual list of shooting locations and addresses to visit next time you tour the city. Instead, it is a full shot-by-shot dissection to see what New York once was and what it has become, for better or worse. I’ve tried to recreate the angles and framing as best as possible, and have presented the shots (more or less) in the order they appear in the film. Today, we delve into Part 2 of our Taxi Driver coverage (Part 1 is here). Enjoy! And for those who missed our look at Ghostbusters: Part 1 & Part 2!). [...]
Just brilliant – thanks for sharing. Nice to see things haven’t changed that much!
This is Great! Well researched!
I also saw this at age 8 for the first time and it changed my life!!!
Good work…
You… You earned it (handing you a candy bar).
Wonderful walk done memory lane!
Would absolutely LOVE a Ghostbusters reunion/sequel–but only if the original actors are in it.
Great job!!! A thoroughly entertaining read. Funny because I’ve walked past that fire station numerous times and always thought it looked really cool but never realized it was the GhostBusters station! Awesome! Thanks for doing this!
this post is full of locations that you have yet to find. I was under the impression you wanted your viewers to find them for you, then maybe you would give credit to those who’d helped you with your post.
I guess I was wrong, You’re just going to leave these posts incomplete. I won’t waste my time trying to find your locations for you. it would’ve been fun.
Noah –
I appreciate any reader feedback, and have been meaning to check out and shoot the various addresses supplied by readers (including you) for both the unknown Ghostbusters and Taxi Driver locations. When I have a chance, I plan on updating my posts with full credit given (note that in my Taxi Driver part 1, a reader corrected me on a location and I gave him full credit in the revision). Unfortunately, as this site is not my primary job, I don’t have unlimited free time to go out taking photos and tracking down obscure locations. Wish I did.
I can’t be positive, but I think that the street depicted here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/32277674@N08/3946946002/) is on Watts Street between Sixth Avenue and Thompson, not too far from the firestation.
This was really a great project, and as a big Ghostbusters fan, I can’t say how much of a kick I got out of this.
Talk of Ben Stiller and other actors (and indeed, the addition of outside screenwriters) worries me. Ghostbusters 3 might very well end up being the disaster I hope it won’t be.
[...] two parts, and set aside some time to take it all in. The commentary is also awesome. Part One and Part Two. Related [...]
The pictures you have are really good, I am a huge Ghostbusters fan and I love seeing what the buildings and streets look like now.
Keep the good work up