After the financial success of 1984’s Ghostbusters, it was inevitable that a sequel would eventually emerge, and thankfully, the entire main cast (Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts) returned five years later to fight off NYC’s supernatural community again. While not as inventive and laugh-out-loud hilarious as the original, this sequel is decent enough to be a worthwhile endeavor. Some of the issues I have with Ghostbusters II involves its muddled plot and its overwhelming reliance on special effects, sacrificing some of the quieter moments for more extravagant action sequences.
And on a more personal level, one of the biggest cons for me was the limited amount of NYC locations. It’s very clear they utilized more Los Angeles locations and studio sets than they did in the first film, and the stuff they shot in Manhattan was mostly concentrated in just a few general areas.
As was the case when I covered the first movie, I relied heavily on the fabulous and immensely thorough Spook Central website to provide background and evidence for most of these locations.
Dana’s New Apartment
This location was widely identified as taking place on First Avenue and 77th Street. Of course, Dana’s new Upper East Side apartment is nowhere near as popular with movie fans as her original “Spook Central” pad on Central Park West. It’s a pretty nondescript pre-war apartment building, typical for this part of Manhattan.
For the record, the whole baby carriage chase is geographically correct. It starts at Dana’s apartment building on E 77th Street and heads east to the intersection of 77th and First Avenue, which is only a half block away. But this will be one of the last geographically correct sequences in the film.
Ghostbusters Drive to Kids Party
Kids Birthday Party
So pretty much all of the driving shots leading up to the kids party were filmed by a second-unit team with a stunt driver operating the Ectomobile. They seem to have just grabbed random shots here and there without much concern about being geographically accurate.
And once they arrive at the birthday party, we are only one block away from where Dana’s apartment is, keeping things nice and close for production.
As to the interior of the kids party, the only source I could find that was able to identify its location was on the Spook Central website. As described by webmaster and dedicated Ghosthead, Paul Rudoff:
It took us fans a long time to figure out that this scene was filmed at the old headquarters of Fire Station #23 at 225 East 5th Street in Los Angeles. Yes, the same building used for all Ghostbusters headquarters interiors in both films was also used for this scene. While the headquarters scenes used rooms on the first and second floors, the birthday party was held in the old Captain’s Quarters on the third floor.
Dana Visits Egon
Bookshop
The quick scene of Dana entering the Institute for Advanced Theoretical Research was back at Columbia University, which was also featured in the first Ghostbusters movie. Not sure if this is supposed to be the same place, but if so, I guess it would suggest that Egon was able to get rehired by the university.
The bookstore on St Marks was obviously identified in no small part to the awning on the neighboring building with its address clearly written on the side.
If it wasn’t for that, it might’ve been challenging to identify the store’s location, especially since the area have changed so much since 1988. The street-level door at 33 St Marks has been replaced with a second-floor staircase and all of the white paint has been stripped away. These changes make it hard to match things up today, but the pair of windows on the far right still line up nicely, and the same tree is still out front, albeit a little chunkier.
Digging up the Street
This sequence starts off at the same intersection we saw earlier when the baby buggy was going out of control, only this time it’s from the opposite point-of-view, looking northwest towards Dana’s apartment building.
After that, the action switched from NYC to LA in one quick cut. I don’t know why director Ivan Reitman opted to change locations mid-sequence, but I would assume it was either because digging a hole on First Avenue was impractical, or the studio pressured the team to film as much as possible in the Los Angeles area.
While the change in locales is quite apparent now, I must admit, when I first saw this movie in ’89, I didn’t notice a thing. I think by having it go from day to night helped hide the switcheroo. Plus, the art department placed a fake “Food Shoppe” awning on the corner building in both places, giving us at least one consistent visual element.
When it came to where in LA this scene was filmed, several sources indicated that it was at or near the intersection of E 8th and S Los Angeles Street, but without offering a specific address. So, I ended up relying on a couple YouTube videos to show exactly where the action took place… which turned out to be a big mistake.
I looked at two different videos and both of them placed the action at 732 S Los Angeles Street, which is about a half block away from the actual intersection used in the film. I think what happened was they read somewhere that the filming location was at 8th and Los Angeles Street but assumed it was just a generalization. They ultimately ended up about 100 feet away, probably because they spotted an empty lot there and just assumed it was the same one from the movie.
I can sort of understand the confusion since the buildings that flank the empty lot are similar to the ones in the scene. And even though it’s mid-block, there’s still a crosswalk in the street.
I started questioning these videos when I noticed that the building to the left of the lot wasn’t quite right. In particular, the far window in the movie was noticeably narrower than the one in real life.
Another thing that made me question this location was the fact that the reverse shot in the movie didn’t match anything that was on that block.
I finally solved this mix-up while cruising around in Google Street View and discovered a building around the corner at 214 E 8th Street whose windows lined up perfectly with the one in the movie. And when I checked out the reverse view, I could see it also matched up.
Generally speaking, if it was a NYC location, I wouldn’t have been so sloppy, but since I don’t know LA that well, I often rely on the “knowledge” of others. Thankfully, I eventually rectified my mistake.
Courtroom Trial
Usually, if there is any sort of trial in a NYC movie, they will use the exterior of one of the two columned buildings in Foley Square. In this case, they used the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse at 40 Foley Square. The interiors were naturally a set, especially considering the scene involved pyrotechnics and blue-screen effects.
Even though Ghostbusters used a set, I’ve found that some movies that feature these lower Manhattan exteriors will end up using a real New York courtroom. But as far as I can tell, they always end up using one at a completely different (and less busy) neighborhood, such as Queens, the Bronx or even Yonkers.
We’re Back!
This “We’re Back” montage is very similar to the montage in the first movie —taking place all over Manhattan— but as you look more closely, you can see they did a lot of doubling up at a single location.
The montage begins at the iconic firehouse on N Moore Street, with a new logo being added to the building. (To get the same high-angle perspective for my modern picture, I relied on my handy 104 inch selfie stick.)
The interior of the firehouse, which appears later in the montage, was back in the Los Angeles station which is currently under construction. It’s in the process of being converted into a community youth art center.
While it’s great the city is creating a much-needed youth center in what is a mostly-impoverished section of Los Angeles, it appears they are stripping away a lot of the iconic elements and fixtures. (At this point, I’m not even sure if the fire pole holes will remain.) But in the end, even if a lot of the recognizable elements will be gone, at least Ghostbusters fans will finally have access to this normally-elusive filming location.
The next two shots of the Ecto-1A traveling around the city were filmed near two other driving locations used in the beginning of the movie. One was on Columbus Avenue and the other was on First Avenue. Both of these locations were identified by the Spook Central Website. The Columbus Avenue location was found by cross-referencing the store names seen in the background with a photograph taken around 1990 by the non-profit organization, Landmark West!
The shot of the Ghostbusters in holiday garb was filmed outside the former Record Explosion at 2 Broadway. Turns out, the store was right across the street from the U.S. Customs House, which we shall soon see, was a major filming location in this movie.
My memory of Record Explosion is that they were a somewhat hip-hop-leaning chain of local stores scattered around Manhattan and Queens. Known for its reliably cheap prices, it felt like this chain of indie stores reached its pinnacle somewhere in the 1990s, as it began selling both music and videos.
But by the mid-2000s, all of the stores were out of business, and the space at 2 Broadway eventually became a Chipotle restaurant.
The next shot of Ray and Egon collecting a slime sample from some church steps was apparently a real puzzler that took Ghostbusters fans decades to identify.
Its whereabouts was eventually published on the Spook Central website but it wasn’t explained how it was found. I assume someone just searched through images of Manhattan churches until landing on the relatively-unchanged Church of St Paul the Apostle. (I’ve personally been inside this church many times as its basement is often used as a catering location for film and TV productions.)
After the church was identified, the folks at Spook Central were able to immediately find the location of the payphone scene since it was literally one block away. It makes sense since both involve the same three things: Ray, Egon and pink slime.
The jogging scene has been identified by many sites, so I have no idea who first found it, but there are many clues that would lead a skilled location-seeker to the reservoir in Central Park. And the one thing that helped fans find the exact spot of the trap was a weird marking at the base of the fence.
It’s clearly been repainted several times since the movie was made, but I haven’t been able to figure out what it exactly represents. My guess is it’s some mile marker, but who knows for sure?
After the jogger scene, we get a quick shot of the Ectomobile speeding through a red light at Hudson and Barrow Street. I instantly recognized this location since it features the exterior of Barrows Pub, a place I frequented numerous times when I lived in the West Village.
I always found the regulars at the Barrows to be a little odd (like one guy who went by the name, One-Armed Joe from the Alamo), but the atmosphere was generally friendly, selling cheap drinks, and microwaved pizzas. They also managed to squeeze a jukebox, a pool table, a video game machine (which a customer once attempted to steal) and a dart board into the small wood-paneled space.
The next scene takes place at Orrefors, a high-end glassware boutique on East 57th. While the interior was most certainly a set, the real-life interior is now an Aston Martin showroom. So I guess that space is reserved for fancy shops only.
After a quick shot of FDR Drive, this montage ends with the boys running towards camera with traps in hand. This was found by Lars Karlsen in conjunction with the Spook Central website. Working on a hunch, he was able to figure out that this fairly nondescript shot was filmed across the street from Orrefors. It was confirmed by matching up the specks in the granite cornerstone of 456 Park Ave.
It’s another example of the film crew maximizing the use of a single location by basically swinging the camera around and shooting in the opposite direction.
Haunted Museum
So, this was the most-used location in the film, and was also the easiest to identify. The former customs building is very distinct looking and has been featured in many other films, including the 1928 silent comedy, Speedy, Billy Wilder’s 1960 film, The Apartment and 1995’s Batman Forever.
While the building wasn’t a museum at the time this movie was made, shortly thereafter, the lower floors were converted into the Museum of the American Indian, which still operates there today.
As I mentioned above, most of the museum interiors were shot on Stage 16 at Warner Brothers’ Burbank Studio, which is one of the tallest soundstages in the world. Originally named Stage 7, the structure was raised 30 feet shortly after its construction in 1935 to allow for the filming of the musical finale of Cain and Mabel.
As the story goes, William Randolph Hearst, whose mistress Marion Davies was the star of Cain and Mabel, got into a hissy fit when the standard 45-foot high soundstage couldn’t accommodate the movie’s $400,000 grand finale featuring a 90-foot pipe organ and 160 chorus girls.
So Hearst paid Warners $100,000 to raise Soundstage 7 to the needed height by having them hand-jack the bottom off the ground, one foot at a time. Every time the bottom got raised a little bit, workers would insert railroad ties into the gap. They continued this laborious routine until the stage reached its current height of 98 feet. Afterwards, the foundation and walls were quickly built, and the soundstage was ready to be used for the musical finale.
The stage also includes a 2,000,000 gallon water tank which was used in such moisture-laden films as The Perfect Storm and The Goonies.
Louis Asks Janine Out
Peter’s Apartment
The first scene was obviously at the famed firehouse on North Moore Street, but what’s baffling is how little it’s featured in the film. Aside from the above “Louis Asks Janine Out” scene, the exterior is only seen in a couple quick shots, mostly featuring Rick Moranis.
As to Peter’s apartment, I can’t remember if I found it on my own or not. But at this point, it’s commonly known by movie aficionados to be on the corner of Broadway and Bleecker.
Strangely enough, this scene where the boys invite Peter to join them in their slime adventure was shot two times. The unused version took place inside Peter’s apartment, rather than out on the street. I believe all the New York stuff was shot first in the schedule, which would mean the interior version was shot later, but ultimately rejected.
This deleted version is available on the latest home discs and is currently on YouTube. There’s not much of a difference in dialogue between the two versions, but I actually think the interior version is a little bit better; for some reason, Harold Ramis’ line delivery on the street seems kind of stilted.
Restaurant
I probably never would’ve been able to find this restaurant location on my own — all credit goes again to the Spook Central website. These days, you won’t be able to see anything resembling a restaurant at this Toluca Lake location because, as you can tell from the images above, the space is currently a Trader Joe’s.
A sequence that was intercut with these restaurant scenes was one that took place in the haunted tunnels of an old subway line, which was mostly shot on sets in Burbank. But supposedly, part of it was shot at Tunnel Nightclub at 220 12th Avenue in NYC.
The club was inside the old Terminal Warehouse Company Building whose massive arches on 11th and 12th Avenues used to admit freight trains for storage and unloading.
The nightclub operated from 1986 to 2001, but no photos have been unearthed to provide definitive proof that the movie was filmed there. So, this is technically one of only a couple unresolved locations from Ghostbusters II (the other is the hallway in the mental institution, but it’s been suggested that that was filmed in the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles).
Gracie Mansion
While some folks thought this was shot at the actual New York Mayor’s residence, Gracie Mansion, it was instead filmed at the most overused mansion in the Hollywood area — Greystone. This Beverly Hills estate has been featured in countless movies and TV shows, including the cult classic, The Big Lebowski.
The outside area is open to the public year round, but the interior is less accessible, only open to the public on special occasions.
Mayhem in the City
Once again mirroring the first movie, this Ghostbusters sequel has its own “city out of control” montage right before the climactic ending. But this montage ended up having much fewer gags and a limited number of NYC locations.
It starts with Dana going into the museum, followed by the building getting completely covered in pink slime. Most of the effects used for this gimmick look decent, except for the wide overhead shot, which looks more like a cartoon (and includes tons of geographical inaccuracies).
The montage really gets going when a group of terrified theater patrons are seen fleeing for their lives. But the way these shots were framed, you’d hardly be able to tell that it took place in Times Square at the former Movieland Theater at 1567 Broadway.
Built for the Shubert Brothers in the late 1910s as the Central Theatre, the Broadway space originally operated as a legitimate theater. By the 1930s, the Central became a permanent movie house, although there were occasional attempts a turn it into an “all-girl revue.” After going though decades of different names and venue iterations, the theater became known as Movieland, keeping that name from 1980 to 1989 when the theater finally shut down.
Afterwards, the lobby was turned into the Roxy Deli, and the auditorium became a disco called Dance USA. By the mid-1990s, both had closed and the building sat vacant until the auditorium was demolished in the early 2000s to make way for a W Hotel. The Roxy later became a Radio Shack, and is now an upscale jewelry shop.
The montage then gives us a quick gag of of minks coming alive outside LA’s Biltmore Hotel (which served as the haunted Sedgewick Hotel in the first film). Next, we’re back in NYC down at Washington Square Park where a giant ghost mounts the iconic arch. This was apparently a leftover gag from the first film when production was planning on having Dana’s apartment at 1 Fifth Avenue, located one block north of the park.
The montage ends with the boys being released from a mental institution and racing in the Ecto-1A to the pink-covered museum.
Down at the museum, production had about 500 extras on call, but that number slowly grew as the night went on, as Ghostbusters fans kept wanting to be in the movie’s sequel.
Lady Liberty Walks the Streets
This is probably my least favorite part of the movie. The logic behind slime being able to make a copper statue bend like a human being is lost on me, and the characters betting that a walking Lady Liberty will make everyone in New York suddenly cheerful seems a bit far-fetched, even for a supernatural comedy. The whole thing comes off as a little corny, and the special effects are not so great.
And as one more thing to irritate me about this sequence, the geography is all wacky. The statue’s progress on Fifth Avenue follows no logic, jumping from place to place.
But even more illogical is the fact that they’re in Midtown Manhattan at all. The museum is at Bowling Green at the southern tip of the island, adjacent to the New York Harbor, where Liberty Island is. So, after crossing the harbor, the museum would’ve been one of the first places they’d encounter after making landfall.
Louis Catches a Bus
To finish things off, we have one last geographical inconsistency, where Louis exits the firehouse down in Tribeca and runs about 110 blocks to the Upper East Side, just to take a bus back down to Lower Manhattan.
After that, the movie’s finale takes place at the museum, where most of it was filmed on a Burbank soundstage. Overall, a kind of anticlimactic ending to the movie, without any memorable “cross the streams” moments.
Despite my little quibbles and complaints, there are enough funny and clever moments in Ghostbusters II to make it a worthy sequel. While nowhere near as great at the original, the biggest strength in this 1989 movie is its cast.
All the actors go full-tilt with their characters, giving it as much gusto as possible.
The one clear stand-out was Peter MacNicol’s depiction of Janosz, Dana’s clunky boss at the museum, making him one of the most lovably comic villains in movie history.
I still wish there were a few less fantastical scenes and few more quieter comical moments. But at least the cast and crew tried to emulate the style and tone of the first film, unlike the latest franchise sequels, which seem to be more inspired by the MCU or the TV show, Stranger Things.
Compared to those 21st-century efforts, Ghostbusters II is an absolute masterpiece!
Great to see all these locations today and that most of them are unchanged. I remember Record Explosion. They had a lot of cheap “cut-out” LPs and CDs.
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Nice work, again, Mark (and the Spook Cental additions). Very thorugh. A great NYC movie choice for locations.
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