Lights, Camera, Action: Top NYC Television and Movie Sites
Author: Dave Knapp

A unique type of student travel is available In New York City,
where groups can learn about the world of television and movies
with visits to sites made famous on both the big and small
screens.

In the 1990s, Georgette Blau moved into an apartment on the
East Side of Manhattan, only to discover that she lived near
what had been the Jefferson apartment in the long-running
situational comedy, The Jeffersons. This gave Blau an idea to
create tours that allow people to straddle fiction and reality
by passing the doorsteps of television and movie characters and
real-life celebrities. As a result of Blau's imaginative idea,
student tours can shop, eat, drink, and dance at the New York
sites that have been featured in movies and on television,
including visits to some of the hotspots featured in such shows
as The Sopranos, Spider-Man, Friends, and Cosby.

The New York TV and Movie Sites tour is a three-hour motorcoach
tour that covers more than 40 sites featured in over 60
television shows and movies. Tourists head to locations from The
Devil Wears Prada, The Interpreter, and The Apprentice. From the
bus, students also catch a glimpse of the restaurant used in
Spider-Man. After so many years seeing it on the television
screen, students visit the familiar apartment building where
Monica, Chandler, and the other Friends live. Great photo ops
are available on the steps of the Cosby townhouse, the
Ghostbusters firehouse, and to the diner used in Men in Black
and Woody Allen's Manhattan.

Tours can also be combined with a visit to the historic NBC
Studio. An NBC Page serves as a guide for student tours as they
visit the television operating center and NBC/Sharp History
Theater. The tour also includes a visit to a couple of NBC's
most famous studios, including Saturday Night Live, Today Show,
and others. In the make-up room, students see prosthetic pieces
built for Saturday Night Live and Late Night with Conan O'Brien.


The two-hour Central Park Movie Sites Tour walks student
through some of the famous park's movie sites, including the
Boathouse Café used in When Harry Met Sally and the park's
Bandshell from Breakfast at Tiffany's and Kramer vs. Kramer.
Groups also take a water break at Bethesda Fountain, used in
Ransom and One Fine Day. There are great photo-ops at the famous
Tavern on the Green, used in Ghostbusters and Wollman Rink,
featured in movies like Love Story and Serendipity. In all, the
tour covers more than 40 movie and television locations.

Sopranoland has never been more alive than it is now with a
four-hour bus tour of sites made famous in the smash-hit The
Sopranos. More than 40 location sites on the tour include Father
Phil's Parrish and the high school where A.J. dumped pizza boxes
into the pond. Tours also see Pizzland, the Muffler Man, and
other sites from the opening credits. Memorable photo-ops are
taken at the restaurant booth where Tony sat in the final scene
of the series and on the steps of the diner where Chris met his
untimely end.

For those student tours visiting Washington, D.C., tours are
also available of the Capitol city's television and movie sites.
The three-hour bus tour features more than 30 locations from 50
movies and television shows on this guided tour.

Student tours enjoy shopping at the mall where No Way Out and
True Lies was filmed, followed by a chance to stand on the steps
of the house used in The Exorcist. The tour also visits
locations from Wedding Crashers, West Wing, X-Files,
Independence Day, and Forrest Gump. Along the way, student tours
also take in some of the Capitol's most important and famous
government sites. From classic films of the 1970s such as The
Godfather II to the recent Mission Impossible III, the tour of
Washington, D.C., movie and television sites takes student tours
on a journey of the timeline of filming in D.C. Tours are led by
local Washington, D.C., actors.


About The Author: Travel Adventures is a student tour provider
staffed by educators who understand the needs of teachers. It
has served over one half million students since 1987 and its
mission is to "empower teachers to create change by expanding
the classroom to the world." visit
http://www.traveladventures.com.