1 week Ago By Jen Zoratti
When I went to New York City for the first time in 2019, I visited a certain apartment block on the corner of Bedford and Grove in the West Village. Read this article for free: Already have an account? To continue reading, please subscribe: * To continue reading, please subscribe: *$1 will be added to your next bill. After your 4 weeks access is complete your rate will increase by $0.
00 a X percent off the regular rate. When I went to New York City for the first time in 2019, I visited a certain apartment block on the corner of Bedford and Grove in the West Village. Read unlimited articles for free today: Already have an account? Opinion When I went to New York City for the first time in 2019, I visited a certain apartment block on the corner of Bedford and Grove in the West Village.
The address 90 Bedford St. may not mean anything to you. But if it does, then you know that this is the apartment block where your friends Monica, Rachel, Joey, Chandler (and, for a spell, Phoebe) lived.
Of course it’s not, not really. It is merely the apartment that served as the establishing shot used in all 10 seasons of the NBC sitcom , from its debut in 1994 — almost 25 years to the day that I stood outside of it — until its finale in 2004. continues to have cultural endurance, a new lease on life afforded by streaming and a crop of gen Zs discovering it, which means 90 Bedford St.
remains a tourist attraction (probably to the chagrin of the real people who actually live there). Just like the steps to Carrie’s apartment in — so frequently mobbed by tourists they necessitated a gate — or Tom’s Restaurant on the corner of West 112th and Broadway, which you might recognize as Monk’s Cafe in . Like many Canadians, I first experienced America through screens.
And not just New York City, either, despite it being the setting of so many TV series and movies. Seattle’s coffee culture came to me from ; the rumble-and-screech of the L train in Chicago was practically the soundtrack to . In 2022, I saw the Painted Ladies houses of San Francisco, but I saw them first in the opening credits of .
That same year, I went to the Art Institute of Chicago for the first time and saw Georges Seurat’s , but I’d already seen it with Cameron in . When you visit these cities for the first time, they feel shockingly familiar. Walking through Central Park in 2019, I could have sworn I’d been there before, many times, in every season.
It’s a bit of a thought experiment to visit sites such as the apartment, because you’re visiting places that don’t actually exist — or they do, but not how you thought they did. Monica’s purple apartment is not inside the building on the corner of Bedford and Grove; those steps on Perry Street will never lead up to Carrie’s. But when you’re standing there, you feel like maybe they could.
That maybe these places, these stories, these people could be real when really, it’s just the art and your feelings that are. During Elections Get campaign news, insight, analysis and commentary delivered to your inbox during Canada's 2025 election. These days, I’m feeling nostalgic for the fictionalized — and often idealized — America I consumed through TV, which is actually probably misplaced nostalgia for the ’90s, when everyone and their opinions didn’t live in your pocket.
But it’s also the America I first fell in love with, the America that made me want to explore America IRL. And there are still — yes, still — so many places I want to see. I’m not sure when I will go back to the United States, or what it will be like when I do.
Maybe I will only find uncanny valleys. Maybe there will just be a governing sense of unreality, like standing in front of the apartment on Bedford and Grove. Like the America I thought I knew — the America I miss — only ever existed on a sound stage in Burbank.
[email protected] Jen Zoratti is a columnist and feature writer working in the Arts & Life department, as well as the author of the .
A National Newspaper Award finalist for arts and entertainment writing, Jen is a graduate of the Creative Communications program at RRC Polytech and was a music writer before joining the in 2013. . Every piece of reporting Jen produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print – part of the ‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism.
Read more about , and . Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider .
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support. Jen Zoratti is a columnist and feature writer working in the Arts & Life department, as well as the author of the .
A National Newspaper Award finalist for arts and entertainment writing, Jen is a graduate of the Creative Communications program at RRC Polytech and was a music writer before joining the in 2013. . Every piece of reporting Jen produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print – part of the ‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism.
Read more about , and . Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider .
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support. Advertisement Advertisement.
