Undoubtedly the most iconic New York movie of the 1970s, Martin Scorsese’s­ Taxi Driver embraces the seedy landscape of a fallen city, creating a visually powerful experience, filled with colorful characters and unsettling circumstances.

The story revolves around Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro), a disturbed loner who tries to fill his emptiness with endless hours behind the wheel of a taxi cab. Desperate to find some sort of meaning in his addled life, Travis becomes fixated on two women —an alluring campaign volunteer (Cybill Shepherd) and a 12-year-old prostitute (Jodie Foster)— while slowly descending into a deeper state of madness fueled by a seething rage.

Shot entirely in NYC without the benefit of any traditional movie sets, Taxi Driver is the quintessential on-location film, capturing Manhattan during its most unglamorous period. With so many locations, I went through great lengths to find nearly every one, with only a couple shadowy streets left unsolved. So with that, let’s begin our “deep drive” into Scorsese­’s indisputable urban masterpiece. 

 

 

Opening Credits

After a shot of a checker cab bursting through a billowing cloud of steam, we get a slow motion POV shot of the Times Square area, featuring Modell’s at 243 W 42nd Street.

 

Next, we get a stationary shot looking north in Times Square, featuring the National Theatre on the right, located at 1500 Broadway.

 

The location challenges begin with the opening credits, which is made up of some nebulous close-ups of Robert De Niro’s face followed by a couple stylized, hyper-contrasted street scenes. Fortunately, in both of those street shots, you can make out a few business signs.

In the POV driving shot, there’s a vertical neon sign for Modell’s Sporting Goods, and since it’s on a two-way street, I assumed we were on W 42nd at Times Square.

From 2021, looking south at 234 W 42nd Street, shortly after Modell’s flagship store closed its doors.

Up until 2020, there was a Modell’s at 234 W 42nd Street, but the one featured in the movie was actually across the street at number 243. I realized this after I found several vintage photos of the sports store situated next to the old Harem movie theater, whose address was 249 W 42nd.

The fact both stores had similar addresses —just a transposition of the last two numbers— made things a little confusing at first. However, in several of those vintage photos, you can clearly see the number 243 at the base of Modell’s vertical neon sign, confirming the location.

A Joe Buck wannabe walking towards the Harem Theatre on W 42nd, circa 1980.

Where the Harem movie theater helped me find one of the shots from the opening credits, the National movie theater helped me find another.

If you look closely on the right side of the frame you can see the name National on a large marquee, which was a movie house at 1500 Broadway, on the southeast side of Times Square.

The National Theatre opened on December 12, 1972 with the world premiere of The Poseidon Adventure, making it the first cinema to be built in Times Square in over thirty years. The 1,445-seat theater originally had a single screen, but was twinned in 1982 and remained as such until its closing in the winter of 1998.

From 1980, looking northeast towards National’s large marquee in Times Square.

Afterwards, the space was gutted and became the street-level studios of ABC’s Good Morning America, lasting until June 13, 2025, when the network left the building to move downtown.

 

Taxi Garage

Travis Bickle applies for a job with the Yellow Taxi Company at 623-629 W 57th Street (now the site of a residential building).

 

After getting the job, Travis exits the taxi garage and slowly walks east on W 57th Street (with views of New Jersey in the far background).

 

 

When I first started tackling this movie a few years back, a lot of its filming locations had already been figured out by others, most notably by Nick Carr in a 2009 post on his website ScoutingNY. As usual, the site’s author did an admirably extensive investigation into the filming spots, but there was still a good chunk left unidentified, giving me plenty to work on.

However, this taxi garage was thoroughly covered on his website and basically required no work on my part.

A wider view of 57th Street leading up to Pier 97 on the Hudson River, c 1973, with a screenshot from the movie (inset) showing the matching garage.

Naturally, the large pier in the background with 57th Street emblazoned on its facade was the key giveaway to where the action was taking place.

Today, the area is virtually unrecognizable — the pier’s Swedish-American terminal, the West Side Elevated Highway, and all the industrial garages are nothing but a faint memory.

From 1975, a closer view of the Swedish-American terminal at Pier 97.

Aside from one corner building, West 57th Street between 11th and 12th Avenues is now wall-to-wall glass and steel.

Looking west on 57th Street from 11th Avenue.

The dark, dingy garage (which really was home to the Yellow Taxi Company) has since become the site of a tetrahedron luxury apartment building called VIA 57 West.

Driving Around Times Square

Travis is soon on the job, first seen driving south on Broadway at W 49th Street.

 

Continuing south, he passes a Fascination arcade at 1597 Broadway (with the fire hydrant being the only thing remaining today).

 

Still southbound, Travis drives through Times Square, passing the Bond clothing store at 1514 Broadway.

 

Moments later, he passes some hookers at 680 Eighth Avenue near the corner of W 43rd Street.

 

Continuing north on Eighth, Travis’ inner monologue lists off all the “low-lifes” that come out at night.

 

Aside from the wide shot of Times Square, none of these locations had previously been identified by any other website. Figuring out the first shot, beautifully taken from the front bumper of the cab, was fairly easy since it showcased a Fascination arcade. I immediately knew exactly where that particular one was after having done extensive research on Times Square arcades for the 1981 movie, Arthur.

Named after a popular redemption game, Fascination was a local arcade chain similar to the more ubiquitous Playland. And even though I was fairly confident I found the right one, I did doublecheck my work since there were other Fascinations in Manhattan.

Luckily, I found a black-and-white photo of that Broadway block from 1972, showing several matching storefronts, including Mark Kayne on the corner and a book shop next to the Trans-Lux West Theatre. (The Trans-Lux would later close down and reopen as the Grand Pussycat Cinema).

The tracking shot of hookers walking past two eateries was not immediately recognizable to me, but fortunately, I was able to spot some signage for one of the businesses, called Syntagma Square.

Syntagma Square and Old Fashion Donuts. located at 255 W 43rd Street at Eighth Avenue, 1976. (Photo by Jack Falat.)

Amazingly, I was able to dig up a 1976 photo on Flickr of the very two eateries seen in the movie, with a caption giving their exact address. The corner shop was Old Fashion Donuts, and directly adjacent to it was Syntagma Square, a cheap Middle Eastern restaurant. Both places were located on the ground floor of the Times Square Hotel, reputed at the time to be a hangout for prostitutes, druggies and the homeless.

To my surprise, the Times Square Hotel is still around today, operating as a successful low-income residence since the 1990s.

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Businessman and a Hooker

Travis’ sullen monologue continues as he passes some streetwalkers drumming up business outside 95 Lexington Avenue.

 

Travis then drives through the Park Avenue Tunnel, entering at E 33rd Street with a prostitute and a very anxious businessman in the backseat.

After dropping the couple off, Travis drives downtown, passing an open fire hydrant at W 87th Street and Columbus Avenue.

 

None of the locations from this sequence were mentioned on Carr’s website, and while the tunnel was easy to identify, finding the locations of the other two shots were a little tougher.

I spent hours searching Google Street Views for those large arched windows in the first shot, but was never able to find a perfect match. It was eventually solved by my research partner, Blakeslee, who noticed that the building in the far background looked a lot like an armory. Guessing that it was the 69th Regiment Armory in the Murray Hill neighborhood, he looked around the area in Google Maps and soon determined that the camera was on Lexington Avenue looking southwest towards E 26th. (The armory’s side entrance would later be used as the “city morgue” in the 1997 sci-fi comedy, Men in Black.)

I figured out the fire hydrant location mostly thanks to it being near another location that appears later in the movie. I just looked around the same neighborhood on a hunch they filmed multiple scenes close to each other, until I found what looked like a matching block on Columbus Avenue.

A screenshot from the 1976 film (top) compared to a 2019 Google Street View of the east side of Columbus Avenue at W 87th (bottom) with red annotations showing matching elements.

As a way to bolster my conclusions, I was also able to look up a 1990 photo of the block in an Urban Planning Report which had a few more things I could match up. 

Comparing a few elements from the 1976 movie (top) and a 1990 photo of 565 Columbus Avenue (bottom).

It’s great that all the old tenement buildings that appear in this scene are still there, which is rare in this part of the city.

 

Porno House

After a long night of driving a cab, Travis walks south on the west side of Eighth Avenue from W 47th Street.

 

He goes into the Show & Tell adult movie house at 737 Eighth Avenue.

 

This location was already identified on Carrs’ ScoutingNY website back in 2009, written around the same time the porno building De Niro goes into was being prepped for demolition.

A 2009 view of 773-781 Eighth Avenue, which used to be home to Show & Tell, shortly before it was demolished.

And even though Eighth Avenue is more or less sanitized of any adult enterprises, the porno theater marquee seen in the first “then/now” image above is still in place (although I have a feeling not for much longer).

As to the Show & Tell theatre at 737 Eighth Avenue, I couldn’t find much information out there about it.

The only thing I could find was a 1977 New York Times article that briefly mentions Jacob A. Fine, the controversial real estate operator who owned the property at the time. In the article, the Show & Tell isn’t described as a movie theater but instead as an illicit “massage parlor.” This adds a little perspective to a 1976 ad I found for the place, touting “$10 complete, best deal, guaranteed satisfaction.”

Sounds like Show & Tell had a variety of services, offering both buttered popcorn and full releases.

 

Random City Shots

As Travis describes the city in a more positive light, we get a few random shots of Manhattan, starting with the northwest corner of Seventh Avenue and W 34th Street.

 

Next we go to the intersection of Seventh Avenue and W 33rd Street, looking towards the Empire State Building.

 

After that, we get a view of passersby in front of 358 Fifth Avenue, just north of 34th Street.

 

We end this series with a shot looking towards the northwest corner of W 50th and Fifth Avenue.

 

Most of these random handheld shots of the city were fairly easy to find thanks to popular NYC landmarks appearing in the frame. The only tough nut to crack was the very first shot.

The second shot, taken near Penn Station, featured both the Empire State Building and the Hotel Pennsylvania. Sadly, the famed hotel whose phone number was immortalized by the 1940 Glenn Miller tune, “Pennsylvania 6-5000,” was torn down in 2023.

From 2022, showing the corner of 33rd and Seventh shortly before the historic Hotel Pennsylvania was destroyed.

The location of the third shot was discovered after Blakeslee spotted St. Patrick’s Cathedral on the right side in the far distance. Using the Cathedral as a guidepost, he and I calculated that the camera was on the west side of Fifth Avenue, probably about 10-20 blocks to the south. Moments later, we landed on the corner of 34th and Fifth, whose building has thankfully remained the same.

Even though the last shot might not be super evident, I instantly recognized it as being at Rockefeller Center. All that was required was to look around the Center and find the corresponding corner.

But when it came to the first shot in this series, it seemed almost impossible to find, mostly because the camerawork was so shaky and fairly tight on the pedestrians. Nevertheless, Blakeslee and I were able to spot a few clues — a small bank sign in a window and a large “house cocktail lounge” sign hanging above.

A few frames from the film stitched together to assemble the “house cocktail lounge” sign hanging above.

However, after several days of starts and stops, neither of us were able to make any progress. Then, just as I was beginning to accept the idea that we wouldn’t be able to identify this location, Blakeslee took one last stab at it, scanning the Midtown area on a 1930 map. Focusing on corner buildings, as soon as he saw one marked, National City Bank, he went, “oho!”

After checking out the building in Google Street View, he could tell right away that it was a match.

A wide view of the building on 34th and Seventh, from 1954.

However, neither of us were ever able to figure out what that “house cocktail lounge” sign was for.

 

Palantine Headquarters

Travis first sees Betsy as she walks into her job on Broadway. (Note Martin Scorsese sitting on the wall by the entrance.)

 

She works at Senator Palantine’s New York campaign headquarters, located at the southeast corner of W 63rd Street and Broadway.

 

The building has since been torn down and replaced with an ugly apartment highrise. (The ground floor used to be a Bank of America but is now vacant.)

 

Travis sits in his car on W 63rd Street, watching Betsy work inside.

 

Betsy comments to her co-worker Tom that a cab driver is staring at her.

 

Tom exits onto W 63rd to ask Travis to move his cab.

 

This is a location that was identified on the ScoutingNY website, although there was a little bit of confusion at first.

When webmaster Nick Carr first wrote his Taxi Driver post, he placed the campaign office on W 62nd & Broadway, but was later informed that it was one block north on W 63rd. It was understandably easy to make that mistake since the building that was used in the movie has been gone since around 1979.

A 1940 tax photo of the corner of 63rd and Broadway, showing the original building used for the campaign headquarters in the movie.

Despite the screen-used building being no more, most of its neighbors are still around (which will appear in some later scenes).

Times Square to Hotel Olcott

Travis Bickle drives through Times Square, heading south on Seventh Avenue towards W 42nd Street.

 

He picks up a fare near the northwest corner.

 

Next, we see Travis driving south on Lexington Avenue, approaching E 83rd Street.

 

He then takes his passenger to the Upper West Side.

 

He drops her off at the Hotel Olcott at 27 W 72nd Street.

 

The locations of both the Times Square pick-up and the hotel drop-off were previously identified by others. What’s interesting about the Times Square location is that it’s near a Playland arcade that would later be featured in another Scorsese picture, The King Comedy, also starring Robert De Niro.

A still from 1976’s Taxi Driver (left) compared to a still from 1983’s King of Comedy (right), both featuring Playland, formally at 1485 Broadway.

The drop-off location on W 72nd Street was in front of the clearly marked Olcott Hotel, which had been in operation for most of the 20th century.

Entrance to the Olcott Hotel on W 72nd Street, 1976. 

When the Olcott first opened in 1925, the somewhat remote Upper West Side was almost exclusively reserved for the affluent.

Catering to this moneyed clientele, the hotel’s edifice was constructed of lavish materials, such as limestone and gold-colored tapestry, and inside each of the 227 suites, they included what were at the time, cutting-edge conveniences, such as “private serving pantries with automatic refrigeration.”

By the time the 1990s rolled around, most of the hotels in the area had been converted into apartments, but the Olcott continued to hang on to its original iteration. This lasted until 2005, when the building was converted into standard condominiums.

In between the Times Square and the Olcott Hotel scenes, there’s a brief POV shot of Travis driving past an A&P supermarket whose location was unidentified.

I could’ve gone to the library and look up addresses to A&P in an old phone book, but I ultimately took a different route. Instead, I focused on two key clues in the scene’s landscape —  a narrow avenue (only three active lanes) and a peak to a small hill. Those two things, in conjunction with architecture typical for the Upper East Side, made me surmise they were on Lexington Avenue.

From there, I just checked out each hill on the avenue (there are only two or three) until I settled on 83rd and spotted matching buildings. As an extra bit of satisfaction, there’s even still a supermarket there — although, the 1975 food prices are long-gone.

 

Greasy Diner

Travis enters the former M&N Restaurant at 632 Tenth Avenue.

 

He and his fellow hacks sit at a table across from a HESS gas station.

 

A pair of pimps at a neighboring table seem to get under Travis’ skin.

 

One of the cabbies, named Doughboy, tells Travis that he can get him a gun if he needs one.

 

After Doughbiy leaves, Travis pours salt into his glass of water and silently watches it bubble.

 

This was a missing location for many years, but when I saw a HESS gas station in the background, my mind instantly went to the one that used to be on Tenth Avenue in Hell’s Kitchen. (A good friend on mine lived in the hood in 1990s and I’d always pass the station on my way to his pad.) However, since there were other HESS stations in Manhattan at the time, I had to do some more in-depth research.

From the 1970s, looking northeast at the HESS gas station from W 44th Street with Tenth Avenue in the background.

First thing I did was check out a few behind-the-scenes photographs taken at the location by Steve Shapiro.

The photographs didn’t provide much evidence as to their location, but they did show the general convivial mood of the production. This was supported by an interview with De Niro in a 1998 issue of Neon Magazine, who said:

There was a lot of laughing and joking during the shooting between takes. I remember that. It was a lighter period, even though the material was very heavy.

A big breakthrough finally came months later when I discovered a 1976 documentary called, News from Home, which included one long continuous take of a car driving up Tenth Avenue, offering some valuable visuals.

A still from the 1976 documentary, News from Home, featuring the corner shop at 632 Tenth Avenue.

In the film, we get views of all the buildings across from the HESS station, located between 44th and 45th. Judging by the facades, I thought the corner building at no. 632 looked to be the most likely candidate.

I then reversed a frame from Taxi Driver and compared it to a frame from the documentary and found several matching details, including what looked like the very same chairs.

Today, the retail space is a deli/mini-mart, but it still has the support post outside its entrance. It also has a couple tables in the back where patrons can sit and eat a meal or drink coffee.

From 2015, the last days of the HESS gas station on Tenth Avenue.

As you might’ve noticed in the “then/now” images above, the HESS gas station is no longer there, but it did manage to stick around until 2015. After briefly becoming a Speedway, the station finally had to shut down to make way for —you guessed it— some high-end apartment buildings.

 

Travis Asks Betsy Out

Travis returns to the campaign headquarters at 1886 Broadway on the corner of W 63rd Street

 

He confidently walks inside.

 

He approaches Betsy, claiming he’d like to volunteer.

 

It soon becomes obvious he”s more interested in her than working for the Palantine camaoign.

 

After a little sweet-talking, Travis convinces Betsy to meet him for pie at 4 o’clock. 

 

Even though I’ve mentioned the campaign offices were on the corner of 63rd and Broadway, that no longer is technically true.

In 2019, as a way to celebrate the TV show Sesame Street’s 50th anniversary, then-mayor Bill de Blasio had 63rd Street between Broadway and Central Park West renamed Sesame Street.

The reason the city chose this seemingly arbitrary street to be named after the children’s program is because the offices of Sesame Workshop are located in the building on the north side.

Sesame Street cast and muppets stand on 63rd and Broadway in 2019, roughly where Travis Bickle creepily waited for Betsy.

So I guess the city finally gave us the answer the age-old question, “Can you tell me how to get—how to get to Sesame Street?” The answer: the 1 train.

 

Having Some Pie

Travis takes Betsy to a Childs Coffee Shop at 4 Columbus Circle where they eat pie and talk about getting “organizized.”

 

Travis manages to intrigue Betsy enough to get a proper date with her.

 

You can tell where they filmed this scene based off the position of the Columbus Monument that appears out the window. You can also tell by the position of the old Museum of Arts & Design building at 2 Columbus Circle, which is still there, but highly remodeled.

So, the filming location was pretty clear-cut, but when it came to the name of the establishment they ate in, there was a bit of a discrepancy out there.

A behind-the-scenes photo by Steve Shapiro showing the cast and crew preparing to film the scene at 4 Columbus Circle.

If you read the subtitles from the movie, it has Travis saying, “I took Betsy to Charles’ Coffee Shop,” but in fact, I’m pretty sure he says “Childs Coffee Shop.” (In the original script he says “Mayfair Coffee.”)

Formally a national chain, Childs was a small chain of restaurants in New York City at the time this movie was being made, and had a location on the southwest corner of Columbus Circle — matching the spot used in the film.

What used to be a Childs Restaurant at Columbus Circle later became a place called Snow White, seen here in 1985. (Photo by Matt Webber.)

At some point, all the Childs Restaurants disappeared in NYC and the location used in the movie got renamed “Snow White.” Then around 1987, the building (and its neighbors) got torn down and replaced with a large mixed-use skyscraper. The corner space is now a Duane Reade drug store.

 

Record Store

After Betsy mentions a Kris Kristofferson song, Travis goes to a Sam Goody record store at 235 W 49th Street to buy his latest LP.

 

He exits the store with the record, planning to give it to Betsy on their date.

 

Travis walks to his cab parked on W 49th Street.

 

Scorsese used a fairly long lens for this brief scene, compressing the image and making it harder to see any details. However, it was pretty clear by the yellow smock the saleswoman was wearing that they were at a Sam Goody record store, which used to be all over the city. So naturally, the first thing I did was look up the store’s addresses to see if any of them looked right.

Using an ad I found in a 1981 New York Times, Blakeslee and I investigated each address listed. In the end, the only one that made any sense was the one at 235 W 49th Street. Although, at first, we had a little trouble finding any definitive visual proof to confirm it.

Eventually, after studying the scene and Google Street Views, Blakeslee and I were able to spot a few things from the church on 49th Street that seemed to line up with the movie (seen in the second “then/now” image). We then gleaned several items across the street that also seemed to line up.

A still from the 1976 film (left) compared to a 2018 Google Street View of 242-250 W 49th (right), showing three key alignments.

Granted, things had been greatly updated since 1975, but the basic layout was still there, including a descending stairwell next to a standpipe. Unfortunately, the brick building with the standpipe got torn down right before I was able to get a proper picture of it and they’re currently constructing a new building on the site.

From July 2025, construction of a new building on its way at 250 W 49th Street, near Eighth Avenue.

As further proof of this location, I found a tax photo from the 1980s that showed a store on the nearby Eighth Avenue whose signage matched the movie.

A cropped-in frame from the 1976 film compared to a c 1984 tax photo of the southwest corner of Eighth Avenue.

The Sam Goody space is now a steakhouse that is part of The Pearl Hotel New York. I briefly chatted with the steakhouse manager who was delighted to know his restaurant space was used in Taxi Driver.

 

Giving Senator Palantine a Ride

Excited about his upcoming date with Betsy, Travis suddenly becomes frustrated that he never got her last name as he passes 1 Times Square on W 42nd Street.

 

He then passes the old Terminal Bar at 636 Eighth Avenue.

 

Next, Travis picks up a passenger at the St Regis Hotel at 2 E 55th Street.

 

After pulling away, Travis realizes one of the passengers is Senator Palantine. 

 

He drops off Palantine and his colleagues at The Pierre Hotel at 795 Fifth Avenue.

 

The presidential candidate thanks Travis for his unabashed insights about the city.

 

He and his team then go inside the hotel.

 

The location of the two street shots before Travis picks up the senator were pretty obvious and already identified before I began my research on Taxi Driver. Sadly, both of those locations are pretty much unrecognizable today. The building at 1 Times Square is technically the same one, but it’s been so ghastly modernized, it’s nothing like its original appearance. And as to the Terminal Bar on Eighth Avenue, the entire block is now occupied by the New York Times Building (EST 2007).

The Terminal Bar was an interesting midtown fixture. In business from the late fifties to the early eighties, this corner dive bar earned a reputation as a rough and tough place, patronized by a wide range of riffraff, often filtering in from the nearby Port Authority. (The sketchy bus terminal was presumably the inspiration for the bar’s name.)

From 1981, the Terminal Bar on the southeast corner of 41st and Eighth Avenue.

Even though the bar is long-gone, its vast mélange of customers has been immortalized through a series of black-and-white portraits taken by bartender Sheldon Nadelman, who worked at the Terminal in the seventies and eighties. Along with pimps, prostitutes, drag queens and winos, he also captured the occasional celebrity who would stop by to tip a few drinks, such as character-actor Jack Warden.

From the late 1970s, actor Jack Warden hangs out at the Terminal Bar with an unknown patron.

The Terminal Bar was identified as a Taxi Driver filming location on several websites, but the senator’s pick-up and drop-off points were not.

The pick-up spot wasn’t too difficult to figure out. It clearly looked like a Midtown hotel, and on a hunch, I decided to investigate the St Regis on East 55th, mainly because I knew it was used later in the film’s timeline. Then, as soon as I spotted the small window by the entrance with its distinct balustrade railing, I could tell it was a match.

A zoomed-in still from the movie (left) compared to a modern photo of the St Regis on E 55th (right) showing the same balustrade next to the entrance.

The drop-off spot was not as evident, although I suspected it was also a Midtown hotel. The ornate pattern above the entrance, flanked by marble columns, was a common look with the city’s upscale accommodations. But with not much more to go on, it was sort of a shot in the dark I’d be able to find the location.

I eventually asked my research partner Blakeslee to help out, and even asked Robert Egan, creator of the extraordinary website PopSpots, if he had any ideas. At one point, he thought maybe it was the side entrance to the Carlyle Hotel on the Upper East Side. The ornamentation above the doors did look similar, but I eventually determined that it wasn’t the right place.

Princess Diana exits the swanky Carlyle sometime in the 1990s.

Then, months later, Blakeslee saw something that had escaped us before. As the senator enters the building, you can see what looks like a P insignia on one of the glass doors.

That one simple letter was enough to inspire me to seek out all upscale Manhattan hotels in the 1970s that began with P, hoping one of them would be our senator drop-off point.

Thankfully, the website, Stuff Nobody Cares About, took the time to transcribe a list of hotels inside The New York Guidebook, which was published in 1964 to coincide with the New York World’s Fair.

All together, there were 183 hotels included in the book. And even though the list was not exhaustive, it pretty much covered every major hotel in the city at the time. So I felt confident our P would be in there.

Ignoring the places I knew wouldn’t be a match, like the Plaza and the Penn Terminal Hotel, I soon zeroed in on The Pierre on E 61st and Fifth Avenue. One reason I went to The Pierre early on is because it’s directly across from Central Park, and in the movie, it looks like they’re also possibly across from a park.

Turns out my instinct was right. As soon as I dug up a few vintage photos of the hotel, I could tell the structure and its awnings looked very much like what was in the movie.

From 1976, looking south on Fifth Avenue with The Pierre on the left, displaying a flag celebrating America’s bicentennial. 

Once I visited the hotel in person, I was 100% certain I arrived at the right place. The same columns were still at the Fifth Avenue entrance and I was able to match up the white swirls in the red marble.

In addition to Taxi Driver, the Al Pacino movie, Scent of a Woman, filmed at the Pierre, using their ballroom for the legendary tango-dancing scene.

 

Travis Meets Iris

As Travis parks outside the Variety Theatre at 100 Third Avenue, a young girl jumps in the cab, but is then taken away by an older man who leaves a 20 dollar bill. 

 

The Variety’s marquee was the unmistakable clue in finding this location. Plus, the theater was just one block from where they filmed the pimp and brothel scenes — probably the movie’s most well-known location.

The marquee of Variety Photoplays at 110 Third Avenue between 13th-14th Streets, circa 1988.

The Variety Photoplays was a mainstay of the Union Square area for nearly 90 years. The venue began as a nickelodeon around 1914, but by the 1920s, had become a more traditional cinema. And yet, because of its limited size, the Variety never attracted the best first-run features, and was considered more of a working class theater.

From 1933, looking north at the Variety Photoplays Theater which sat in the shadow of the Third Avenue El.

By the time Taxi Driver was filmed there, the Variety had moved into the world of adult entertainment, screening a miscellany of soft- and hardcore porno films. The theater also had a reputation as a hook-up joint for gay and straight men, often described as being in a state of “constant bustle.”

The Variety ended up being closed by the city’s health department in 1989, but reopened a couple years later as a live off-Broadway theater.

Inside the Variety around 1991 as it was being converted into a live performance theater.

It continued as a legitimate theater for the next 12 years, finally closing its doors in 2004. And despite calls to have the building landmarked, it was demolished in 2005.

A boarded up Variety in 2005, shortly before its demolition.

Today, a 21-story condominium tower sits in its place, making the block practically indistinguishable from an average corporate street in Midtown.

 

Kids Throw Eggs

Growing more and more disgusted with the “scum” of New York, Travis drives west on W 42nd Street, approaching the corner of Eight Avenue. 

 

He continues west, giving us a northern view of Eighth Avenue and the former Show World Center porn theater.

 

Later on, as Travis drives his cab down Columbus Avenue, he gets pelted with a bunch of eggs thrown by some kids just south of W 90th Street.

 

The poultry assault doesn’t seem to phase him, as he just slowly drives away towards W 89th Street.

 

The traveling shot at 42nd and Eighth was included on the ScoutingNY website, with the Show World Center marquee probably being the thing that helped identify its location.

Show World was a huge, four-story sex center at 669 Eighth Avenue, offering a variety of x-rated entertainment: movies, peepshows, magazines, and live sex acts. It was one of the longest surviving entities from the sleazy bygone days of “the Forty-Deuce,” lasting until 2018. The infamous marquee is still there today, now being used by Smashburger.

The Show World Center marquee on Eight Avenue, 1980s versus the 2020s.

When it came to the egg pelting scene, ScoutingNY hadn’t identified it. In fact, it didn’t even mention it. But being the fanatical completist that I am, I was obsessed with finding its location.

For years, I struggled to nail it down, but when I got my hands on an HD Blu-ray of the movie, I could finally read a street sign that was previously too dark and blurry to decipher.

I could see from the sign that they were at W 89th Street, so all I had to do was check out all the cross avenues, hoping I could match up an extant structure. I eventually landed on Columbus Avenue when I spotted a modern apartment tower about one block up that matched the movie.

To further confirm the location, I also checked out the 1940s tax archives and found a photo of the corner building on 89th. Comparing it to the movie, I could see the tax photo building was the same one that appeared next to the egg-tossing kids.

Once this egg location was confirmed, it helped me find that open fire hydrant location in an earlier scene, which was literally just one block south.

 

Travis and Betsy’s Evening Date

On their official date, Travis and Betsy walk south through Columbus Circle, with the Gulf & Western Building in the background. 

 

Travis gives her the Kris Kristofferson LP he bought at Sam Goody.

 

He takes her to the Lyric Theatre at 213 W 42nd Street,

 

Betsy is reluctant to go to what she thinks is a “dirty movie,” but Travis assures her that lots of couples go there.

 

Moments later, Betsy rushes out, disgusted with what she saw,

 

She tells Travis that she has to go and that they’re not meant for each other.

 

Travis tries to get her to stay but she ignores his pleas and drives off in a cab.

 

The locations to this date sequence are widely known and mentioned on several movie websites, although for some reason, the ScoutingNY website erroneous claimed the walking scene that led up to the movie theater was shot in Times Square. Not sure how that mistake could’ve been made since the scene is way too dark to be in the brightly-lit Square. Plus, you can pretty easily see the old Gulf & Western Building in the background with its distinctive white marble columns.

Even though Taxi Driver is known for its bloody violence, for me, one of the more disturbing images is the sweaty street drummer from this scene, with his Elvis-like sideburns and slicked-back, jet-black hair that looks more like freshly-paved tar.

The drummer was a real street performer named Gene Palma who was known for his wild percussion work, mostly in the Times Square area.

Street drummer Gene Palma performs in front of 1633 Broadway (another location that’d be used in Scorsese’s King of Comedy), photographed by Jack Falat in 1976.

Palma reportedly got paid $172.50 for his appearance in Taxi Driver and used his minor celebrity status as a way to generate some extra donations from passersby.

He continued working the New York City crowds for years to come, often using newsstands or an oblong suitcase as his instrument. Palma kept at it, drumming five days a week through the 1990s. He eventually retired and entered an assisted living facility, where he died in 2005 at the age of 81.

Scorsese directs De Niro and Cybill Shepherd outside the 42nd entrance to the Lyric.

The movie theater section from the date sequence took place at the old Lyric Theatre on 42nd, whose marquee is clearly visible in the opening shot.

The Lyric Theatre first opened in 1903, equipped with two entrances — a larger facade on the W 43rd Street side and a smaller one on W 42nd.

It was initially used as a legitimate stage but by the 1920s, was regularly sub-leased to screen movies. In 1934, the theater became a full-time movie house, continuing as such until 1992 (at which time the building was in pretty poor shape).

The Lyric Theatre in 1987, having seen better days.

In 1996, the beleaguered Lyric and the neighboring Apollo Theatre were razed, but their facades were salvaged.

Afterwards, the Ford Center for the Performing Arts was built on the lot, using architectural fragments from the original Lyric and Apollo structures, retaining both the 42nd and 43rd Street facades. The Ford Center was later renamed the Hilton Theatre, and in 2011 became the Foxwoods Theatre, only to be renamed one more time in 2014, becoming the Lyric Theatre once again.

 

A Sad Phone Call

After a disastrous first date, Travis tries to win Betsy back, calling her from a payphone inside the Ed Sullivan office building at 1697 Broadway. 

 

After making the sad phone call, a dejected Travis walks out of the building and onto W 53rd Street.

 

This location was identified by Carr on his ScoutingNY site, although I already knew where they filmed this scene from an appearance Scorsese made on the Late Show with David Letterman. On the show, the director mentioned the connection Taxi Driver had with the Ed Sullivan Theatre and after showing a clip from the movie, they compared it to a “live” view of the same hallway.

From Martin Scorsese’s May 11th, 1995 appearance on The Late Show, where they discuss the use of the Ed Sullivan lobby in Taxi Driver.

Of course, knowing where something was filmed and being able to get modern pictures of it are two different things. As with most office spaces, the one at 1697 Broadway had a security checkpoint at the entrance and a rule against unauthorized picture-taking (especially since it’s the same entrance used by host, Stephen Colbert).

Knowing this, I concocted a story about delivering an envelope for my boss to the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment which has a space on the 6th floor. However, without an official appointment, the guard couldn’t let me through. Luckily, it was a slow Friday near closing time, so the guard made the extra effort to call MOME and have an employee come down to talk to me.

As I waited, I slyly slipped past his desk and stood near the bank of elevators. About a minute later, a very nice woman from the office came down and politely listened to my whole rigmarole about wanting to conduct an interview with someone from her department. Somewhat sympathetic, the woman told me I needed to call the office on Monday to see if arrangements could be made.

After that, she went back onto an elevator to the 6th floor, and I pretended to be talking to my boss on my phone, explaining to him/her the situation. As I did this, I noticed the guard went back to watching a video on his computer, so I took the opportunity to slip to the back of the bank of elevators and quickly snap as many shots as possible — all while still pretending to talk to my boss.

A few seconds later, satisfied I got at least a couple usable pics, I headed for the 53rd Street exit, thanking the guard for his help as I walked out the door at hit the streets.

 

Travis Confronts Betsy

After several failed attempted to reconnect with Betsy, Travis bursts into the campaign office on W 63rd/Sesame Street.

 

Travis is eventually forced out of the office as Tom calls the cops.

 

The irate cabbie storms off, heading south on Broadway.

 

A Cheating Wife

Later that night, Travis picks up a fare at McAnn’s Bar, which was at 692 Third Avenue.

 

The passenger tells him to go to 26 Tudor City Place.

 

The macabre passenger (played by Martin Scorsese) explains to Travis that his cheating wife is at this apartment.

 

He points to his wife’s silhouette, then gives a grisly description of what he wants to do to her.

 

The apartment address in Tudor City was already listed on several websites when I began my research into this movie. And not much has changed in that area since 1975, so it was easy to verify.

As to the pick-up location, I thought I could figure it out by looking into where McAnn’s Bar once was, which I assumed was just a basic, standalone Irish dive.

Unbeknownst to me, McAnn’s was actually a chain of Irish bars similar to the Blarney Stone that used to be all over old New York. This group of Irish pubs got its start in 1945, and during its heyday in the 1980s, had almost 30 locations across Manhattan (with most of them amassed in Midtown).

A 1968 view of a McAnn’s bar on Sixth Avenue and W 48th Street. (Photo from Ephemeral New York.)

McAnn’s was renowned for its aromatic steam-table lunches serving such Irish staples as corned beef sandwiches and baked ham. They were also notorious (at least in the eighties and nineties) for allegedly watering down their beers.

With so many McAnn’s in one city, it might’ve been tough to establish which one was used in Taxi Driver. But luckily, you can see a 692 address in the shot, and after a little poking around, I discovered there was a McAnn’s at 692 Third Avenue. And even though McAnn’s is gone from that location, I was pleased to see there’s still an Irish pub in its place.

But if you still want to have an authentic McAnn’s experience, there’s one left in New York — inside Port Authority.

This windowless watering hole has been in the bus station since the 1990s, and even though they don’t have a restroom, McAnn’s still attracts plenty of commuters wanting to grab a lager or two before being shipped home.

 

Belmore Cafeteria

Travis and fellow cabbie, nicknamed “the Wizard,” exit the Belmore Cafeteria at 407 Park Avenue South.

 

Travis watches as some local women fight near the corner of E 28th Street.

 

Growing more and more anxious, Travis asks the Wizard for advice, but basically gets nothing very promising or useful.

 

The Wizard then gets in his cab and drives north on Park Avenue S.

 

Besides the brothel, this cafeteria is, in all likelihood, the best-known location from this movie.

The Belmore Cafeteria first opened in 1929, where it quickly became a favorite hangout for members of the organized crime group, Murder Inc. But as the decades passed on, the self-serve eatery became more known as a late-night haunt for NYC cabdrivers, just as it’s depicted in the film.

From 1977, several cabbies, dressed in their hack guises, relax inside the Belmore Cafeteria, reading about the death of Elvis Presley.

Despite being a popular pit stop for taxi drivers, their thoughts on the Belmore were as disparate as their opinions of the Yankees vs the Mets. As described in a New York Times article, some raved about the cheap food and hot coffee, while others complained that the cafeteria’s offerings were too expensive and tasted terrible.

Looking inside the Belmore near the front turnstile where you’d get a ticket, c 1975. 

The divided opinions continued when news of the Belmore’s closing came through in 1981. Some of the cabbies seemed unaffected, but others proclaimed it to be a travesty. In the NYT article, one of the drivers pontificated, “‘[Mayor] Koch should declare the place a city monument.” But the closure and demolition went through as planned.

From the summer of 1975, a crew member slates one of the takes filmed inside the Belmore.

Like most of the demolished landmarks in this movie, the Belmore was replaced with a large, unimaginative apartment tower, which is undoubtedly absent of any off-duty cabbies.

 

Stalking Betsy

Still reeling from Betsy’s rejection, Travis slowly drives past her workplace on Broadway.

 

He looks through the window, trying to get a glimpse of her inside. (Note the same fencing on the Broadway median.)

 

As he reaches 63rd Street, Travis becomes self-conscious and speeds up.

 

He heads north on Broadway.

 

Running into Iris

As night falls, Travis drops off a passenger at 231-233 E 13th Street (which has since removed one of its front doors).

 

Driving past 202 E 13th, Travis spots Iris, whom he recognizes from before.

 

He slowly parallels Iris and her companion, making them feel uneasy. 

 

He stops at the corner of E 13th Street and Third Avenue and watches as both girls try to pick up some men,

 

He then suddenly speeds off, continuing west on 13th.

 

As I mentioned earlier, this area where Iris and her pimp/boyfriend work is the most documented filming location from Taxi Driver.

Incredibly, most of the buildings that appear in this East Village scene are still around today and look about the same, albeit, a bit more spruced up. The biggest difference is the addition of some trendy restaurants and the changing of venues on the southwest corner of 13th and Third — swapping a furniture store for a Taco Bell.

The furniture shop was the longtime Gothic Cabinet Craft, which actually was still on the corner of Third Avenue up until 2015.

The original Gothic Cabinet Craft on Third Avenue, late 2014. 

The family-owned wood furniture shop still has outlets in the NYC metropolitan area, but the East Village location is noteworthy for being its first, opening its doors in 1969. It was definitely a useful place for young New Yorkers moving into their first apartment, offering you cheap prices in exchange for having to do the finishing/painting yourself.

Now with a Taco Bell in its place, the new challenge is having to do the eating/digesting yourself.

 

Passing a Movie Theater

Travis’ inner monologue talks about his ongoing loneliness as he passes the former Baronet Theatre at 993 Third Avenue.

 

He continues with his morose thoughts, saying that loneliness follows him everywhere.

 

As he drives north, he next passes the Cinema I & II Theatre at 1001 Third Avenue.

 

As he watches the people go about their business, he muses he’s “God’s lonely man.”

As soon as I saw this short bit of Travis driving past a movie theater, I thought it looked familiar, but couldn’t quite place it. One idea Blakeslee had was look up where Nashville was playing in New York in the summer of 1975 since its (out-of-focus) poster can be seen in one shot.

Taking his advice, I went to the New York Times archives and found an ad for the film which indicated it was playing in just two theaters — the Baronet and Cinema II, both of which were on Third Avenue between E 59th and 60th Streets.

As soon as I saw Cinema II’s address I already had a clear mental picture of the theater’s facade and knew it was a match to the one in this scene. Cinema I & II is one of the last remaining movie houses on the Upper East Side and I’ve passed it at least five or six times in the past year alone. (In retrospect, I can’t believe I didn’t recognize it right away.)

From 1973, moviegoers line up outside Cinema I, whose facade matches the one seen in Taxi Driver.

Meanwhile, Blakeslee was busy focusing on a small sign that appeared in another shot which he thought indicated showings of The Day of the Locust. After searching through some old movie listings, he was able to establish that Locust was showing at Cinema I from June to mid-August (which aligned with the Taxi Driver shooting schedule).

After that, he determined that the first shot with the Nashville poster was actually at the Baronet which was the theater directly to the south of Cinema I & II.

From 2001, looking southeast on Third Avenue towards Cinema I & II (on the left) and the Baronet/Coronet Theatre (on the right with the Shrek banner).

The confusion came because the street-level exteriors of both theaters looked similar but were slightly different.

Comparing a frame from the 1976 movie (inset) with a 1985 photo of the Baronet & Coronet Theatre.

As further evidence, you can actually see part of the Baronet name on the frame surrounding the Nashville poster.

The row of Third Avenue theaters across from Bloomingdale’s Department Store, 1984.

Sadly, the Baronet/Coronet’s once famous facade and reputation declined during the end of the 20th century and the duplex cinema finally closed on September 13, 2001. The old theater with its fading exterior was taken down a few years later and replaced with yet another towering apartment building. (This seems to be the recurring theme in this post.)

 

Buying Guns

Travis waits on the northwest corner of W 19th and Fifth Avenue.

 

Doughboy pulls his cab up to him.

 

He introduces Travis to his gun connection in the back seat,

 

The three of them drive west on 19th.

 

The gun dealer takes Travis to a room at 97 Columbia Heights in Brooklyn.

 

Travis gets the feel of one of the guns for sale by pointing it out the window towards the BQE below.

 

He ends by pointing the gun towards the east side of 68 Columbia Heights.

 

The pick-up spot on Fifth Avenue was first identified by Carr on his website in 2009, but he didn’t touch upon the location of the room where the gun sale went down.

It wasn’t too hard for me to make a rough assessment of the location, since we get a nice panoramic view of the Manhattan skyline in the scene. Using that, as well as the building next to the BQE below, I estimated they were on Columbia Heights between Orange and Cranberry Streets in Brooklyn. At first, I thought they were in no. 81, but I eventually concluded that they were in the building just south of that.

A c 1940 tax photo of 97 Columbia Heights, showing a column of bay windows on its north side that match the ones in the movie (inset).

The big clue that led me to that specific address was the shape of the windows. Of course, you might’ve noticed the window in the modern pic is quite different. That’s because the old building in the movie got razed in the mid-1980s.

The current building at 97 Columba Heights, which replaced the one used in the gun-buying scene in 1987.

The new building operates as Affordable Student Living Spaces, offering dorm-like accommodations for college students and interns.

 

Firing Range

Now armed to the teeth, Travis practices his shooting skills at the West Side Rifle & Pistol Range at 20 W 20h Street.

 

He fires several rounds into “The Thug” paper target.

 

This is one of those filming locations that I discovered through an offhand comment on a movie website, which usually are quite unreliable, but in this case, was spot on. Basically, if a movie or TV show has a scene taking place at a New York City firing range, it was mostly likely filmed at West Side Rifle & Pistol Range on W 20th Street.

This longstanding shooting facility even displays a photo of De Niro firing a pistol when he was there in the summer of 1975.

Located in the heart of the Flatiron District since 1964, Westside heralds itself as Manhattan’s only full-service shooting range, catering to a variety of loyal customers — from casual hunters to members of law enforcement.

Westside Manager and Range Officer, John Arron, prepares a rifle for firing. 

When I visited the underground shooting range last week, I immediately got a feeling of an old New York community. The staff, in particular manager John Aaron (who’s been working there since the 1990s), were very accommodating, allowing me into the range to take my photographs.

As he was showing me the stall used by De Niro, John mentioned that when he saw Taxi Driver for the first time, he immediately wanted the same oversized Magnum featured in the movie. While the long-barreled Model 29 looks cool on film, he said it’s fairly unwieldy and generally only useful for game hunting.

By the way, if you don’t have a gun permit but are interested in trying out the range, Westsiide offers the opportunity to legally fire off a .22 caliber rifle at their facility after taking a short in-house certification class. Definitely an unexpected but worthwhile place to check out.

 

First Rally

Betsy works with some volunteers on a stage at 107 Pineapple Walk in Brooklyn. 

 

Tom and a co-worker prep the sound system in anticipation of Palantine’s speech.

 

Meanwhile, Travis (now presumably armed) walks up to a secret service agent in front of 100 Pineapple Walk.

 

The agent immediately assesses that Travis is a potential threat, and tries to get his information, but is given a fake name and address.

 

I was surprised this scene was left as a “missing location” on Carr’s website, as it always seemed like a pretty findable place. With the Manhattan Bridge appearing in the background, as well as the presence of a lot of trees, it seemed clear they were in Brooklyn. Then, using the angle of the bridge as a reference point, I just virtually backtracked from it in Google Maps, stopping at the Cadman Plaza area.

One there, I spotted several matching buildings, including an apartment building at 200 Cadman Plaza, which happened to be home to a long-time actress-friend of mine.

 

Market Robbery

A cop car with its siren blaring, speeds east on E 14th Street towards Third Avenue. (Note the pink neon sign on the left for the former Julian Billiards.)

 

The cop car continues east, heading towards Second Avenue.

 

After a long night’s work, Travis stops off at M&R Market at 540 Columbus Avenue.

 

The cashier greets him by name.

 

Travis goes into the back of the mart to pick out a drink, when he suddenly hears a commotion iup front.

 

He sneaks forward, sees a robbery taking place and quietly pulls out his weapon.

 

Without thinking, Travis shoots the robber as he turns around.

 

The man falls to the floor, dead.

 

The first shot of a cop car racing down the street was one of the last locations I found, mainly because it goes by so fast, I missed it whenever I’d scan through the movie.

The two clues present in the shot (which were only visible after massively brightening up the image) were a two-way street and a subway station. Since I already knew Scorsese filmed a bunch of stuff in the East Village, I thought Third and 14th was a logical place to check out since 14 is a two-way street and there’s an L-subway entrance on the corner. One minute later, I could see I hit the nail on the head, matching up the large Con Edison building next to an open parking lot on 14th.

When it came to the M&R Market location, even though it wasn’t officially identified on ScoutingNY, one of its readers wrote in the comments section that it was at 540 Columbus Avenue. I was able to confirm this address by matching up the terra cotta carvings on the building’s facade. And to find exactly where the entrance to the mart used to be, I used the window placement on the second story as a guide.

Now a Starbucks, the interior of the building looks and feels nothing like the violent, dystopian setting presented in the movie.

One cool remnant that survived for many decades afterwards was a coffee shop across the street, which can be seen out the front door in the movie.

A still from the 1976 movie (left) compared to a 2018 photo of the same coffee shop at 541 Columbus Avenue (right) which is now a pet care center. 

The shop lasted until 2020, still bearing the same name — 3 Star Coffee. (I guess the owners thought 5 Star would be too presumptuous.)

As a side note, the Puerto Rican cashier in this scene was played by Victor Argo, a character actor who appeared in a ton of urban thrillers throughout the latter 20th century, often playing a tough guy. He was one of several actors I’d occasionally see on the streets when I lived in the West Village in the early 2000s. In fact, I specifically remember seeing him at the Homestead Steakhouse on W 14th Street while having dinner with my mom on Christmas Eve. Like Travis Bickle, he was all alone.

 

Second Rally

Palantine speaks at another rally. this one at W 38th Street and Seventh Avenue.

 

The scene starts with several low angle shots of the surrounding skyscrapers.

 

This includes a shot of 526-530 Seventh Avenue.

 

Looking north on Seventh, we can see the large portable speaker amplifying Palantine’s speech. (Note in the modern picture’s background a new glass office building.)

 

We next see a crowd forming along the sidewalk in front of 526 Seventh Avenue.

 

As the senator orates from a platform, secret service men scan the crowd.

 

We finally see Travis, quietly sitting in his car on the northwest corner of W 39th and Seventh, which catches the attention of a cop.

 

The officer tells Travis that he can’t park there and that he has to move.

 

The obsessed cabbie drives away, heading east through Seventh Avenue on W 38th.

 

This second political rally was easy to locate, as the first shot features street signs showing us exactly where we are.

The crew mounts the camera on the front bumper of the cab, setting up the last shot of this scene.

The area looks a lot the same, and even though the stores are new and modern, the intersection still has a vibe of twenty or thirty years ago.

 

The Brothel

Travis returns to E 13th Street and Third Avenue, looking for Iris.

 

He walks with the girls, pretending to be “looking for some action” as they pass 202 E 13th Street.

 

Travis then goes to Iris’ pimp, “Sport,” who stands at the doorway of 204 E 13th Street.

 

Travis makes a deal with Sport to get 15 minutes with his girl.

 

Iris and Travis walk east on 13th.

 

She takes him to her makeshift brothel at 226 E 13th Street.

 

The camera pans up to show the upper floors.

 

Like I mentioned earlier, all these locations along E 13th Street have been widely published and documented over the years.

A series of promotional photos taken of Jodie Foster at 202 E 13th Street. (Photos from The Edit Room Floor.)

While it’s interesting to compare the differences between 1975 and today, you can even see major changes from just a few years ago.

Comparing the movie to my 2017 photo of the same spot. 

When I checked out the pics I took of this location back in 2017, the thing that stood out was a set of pay phones by the corner — something that no longer exists anywhere in Manhattan. Funny how something as innocuous a set of public phones sticks out like a sore thumb in 2025.

Even though the nearby Variety Theater was torn down, the corner building on 13th (seen behind De Niro’s head in the photo above) is still around today. It’s received a bit of a makeover, but remains a modest two-story structure.

The building at 226 E 13th Street, which stood in as the “hot sheet” hotel, looks roughly the same as it did in 1975, albeit a little brighter and surrounded by more greenery. But if you’re expecting the hallway and Iris’ room to look the same, you’ll be out of luck.

The bottom level hallway at 226 E 13th Street.

That’s because all the interiors were shot at a completely different location up on Columbus Avenue. I’ll cover that location in more detail in the “Travis’ Apartment” section below.

Breakfast with Iris

After refusing to have the sex with Iris, Travis meets her the next day for breakfast.

 

The pair go inside a coffee shop at 120 Third Avenue on the corner of E 14th Street.

 

Inside, Travis tries to convince Iris to leave her pimp and give up her awful life as a prostitute. offering to pay for her passage back home.

 

This was a location that remained a mystery for quite a while. But it turned out to be practically on top of several other already-established filming spots in the East Village.

I can’t remember the exact details, but at some point over the years, I stumbled on an online discussions about Taxi Driver where a couple folks postulated that the coffee shop where Travis and Iris had breakfast was an old donut shop on E 14th and Third.

Turns out, there used to be a place called Disco Donut next to Variety Photoplays, back when the corner building was 3½ stories tall.

A couple views of the former Disco Donut on E 14th and Third, which donned the popular hyperbolic neon, “World’s Best Coffee” (a declaration that would be ridiculed in the 2003 movie, Elf.)

Above the donut shop was Carmelita’s Reception House, which from the outside, looked a little like a sleazy bordello, but was actually a hip after-hours club.

Operating throughout the 1970s and 80s, the private upstairs bar, filled with Christmas lights and velvet-draped tables, was a popular party spot for artists, punkers, club employees and the occasional celebrity. It was also a place struggling artists could use as a flop house. (New Wave band, the B-52s, evidently stayed there when they first came to NYC in 1979.)

Looking east on the south side of E 14th towards the entrance to Carmelita’s Reception House, 1979.

Starting in 1988, Carmelita’s was also being used as the reception hall in the audience-participation play, Tony and Tina’s Wedding. But that only lasted a couple years, as the space was shut down after the 1990 Happy Land fire in the Bronx triggered a safety-code crackdown across the city.

Looking southwest towards Disco Donut, sometime in the 1980s. 

A few years after that, the upper floors of the building were removed. Today, the squat, single-story building stands out from the swath of modern glass and steel towers, and what used to be Disco Donut in now a Gen Korean BBQ House.

The best way to verify that this corner donut shop was the one used in the movie was to match up some of the buildings that appeared out the window in the scene.

Comparing the 1976 movie to a 1972 photograph of 201 E 14th Street, featuring the same row of single windows.

Relying mostly on vintage photos, I was able to match up a couple structures, including the building that was catty-corner to Disco Donut, home to a gay book store at the time. I also compared the restaurant’s exterior in the movie to a 1984 tax photo of the corner building, which showed a similar brick base (just painted a different color).

All of this, plus the fact they were mere feet from other established filming locations, convinced me that Disco Donut was where Travis and Iris had their breakfast together.

 

Travis’ Apartment

Becoming more unhinged, a heavily-armed Travis prepares for some violent exploit in his squalid  apartment on the 2nd floor of 586 Columbus Avenue (since-demolished).

 

Playing out some imaginary confrontation in his head, Travis turns to his mirror and asks, “Are you talkin’ to me?”

 

As with most interiors, the location of Travis’ apartment wasn’t easy to find. And while several clues (including Scorsese’s commentary track on the movie’s DVD) indicated the general area of the apartment, none of it was proof-positive.

The one thing that was known was that the apartment was a set built inside an old tenement building on the Upper West Side that was slated to be demolished.

Because the space was abandoned, the crew could have free rein there — building fake walls, cutting holes in the floor, and covering the rooms in fake blood.

The blood was used in the final confrontation scene at the brothel, whose interiors were shot in the same building as Travis’ apartment.

Cultural historian Robert Egan approached this mystery location another way — by going through promotional photos that were reportedly taken outside the apartment building. This included a photo taken of Robert De Niro standing in front of his cab near a bar, which was later repurposed for the movie poster.

Egan was able to conclude the photo was taken on the west side of Columbus Avenue between W 88th and W 89th Streets. This was based off the Handy Bar seen in the background, whose address was found in the 1975 Manhattan Yellow Pages (archived at the 42nd Street Library).

Comparing details in the promo photo (inset) to a c 1940 tax photo of 586 Columbus Avenue. (Click to enlarge.)

He was also able to establish the location of another promotional photo to be across the street near the corner of W 89th Street.

A promotional photo of De Niro taken in 1975 (top) versus a ca 1980 photo taken by Carl Burton (bottom) both featuring the former White Cup Food Shop on the corner of Columbus and 89th.

The photo showed the White Cup Food Shop in the background which closed around the same time this movie was made (after nearly 40 years of business). The corner shop was also featured in a 1976 BBC documentary, Watching My Name Go By.

All of this got us close to the apartment location, but it still didn’t offer any hard evidence as to which building was used (especially since we only get brief, partial views out the windows in the movie). The definitive proof finally came when someone was able to unearth an original call sheet from 1975, documenting the exact address of Travis’ apartment.

The production sheet substantiated that the address was 586 Columbus Avenue, and once I had that info, it inspired me to seek out other vintage photos of the block.

From 1976, a woman sits on a horse outside the White Cup on W 89th, just one block away from the 89th Street horse stables (briefly featured in the movie musical, Hair.)

The coolest thing I found was a picture from around 1974 looking down onto Columbus Avenue, offering us a view that was pretty close to what would’ve been seen out Travis’ apartment window.

As indicated earlier, the building used for Travis’ apartment and Iris’ brothel was demolished a few years after this movie was made. A large apartment building took over the entire west side of Columbus Avenue in 1985, with no acknowledgment that it was the location of one of the most iconic movie lines in cinema history: “You talkin’ to me?”

It might be noted that this immortal line was actually improvised by De Niro on the day. In Paul Schrader’s script, it just says, Travis speaks to himself in the mirror.

 

The Last Rally

Palantine gives his biggest speech yet, in front of the USS Maine National Monument at Columbus Circle.

 

In the crowd is Travis, now sporting a mohawk haircut and prepared to sacrifice himself for what he sees as a necessary act of violence.

 

The senator continues his speech from the monument,

 

Travis movies in closer, clutching a gun inside his army jacket.

 

After Travis is spotted by one of the secret service agents, he takes off running towards 1 Central Park West.

 

This was one of the more obvious filming locations, featuring the well-known USS Maine National Monument at Columbus Circle, dedicated to the men killed aboard the ship that sunk in 1898. The 57-foot-high monument stands at the southwestern entrance to Central Park, and has been a popular filming location over the years.

However, I’m assuming Scorsese specifically chose Columbus Circle for this assassination-attempt scene due to it being the same place where Mafia boss Joseph Colombo Sr. was shot during a rally.

Nearly 3,000 people jammed into Columbus Circle for the Italian Unity Day rally, which ended in violence when a man pretending to be a press photographer shot Joseph Colombo Sr.

The assassination attempt occurred on June 28, 1971, so it was probably still fresh in the minds of New Yorkers when this movie was being filmed.

Colombo was paralyzed from the shooting and died seven years later of cardiac arrest on May 22, 1978 at St. Luke’s Hospital in Newburgh, NY.

Of course, this scene is also notable for being the first to show Travis Bickle’s emblematic mohawk haircut. For a long time, I assumed De Niro had actually shaved his head, but it was in fact a latex cap, created by award-winning make-up artist Dick Smith.

Makeup artist Dick Smith adjusts the backing to De Niro’s mohawk cap.

According to De Niro, the latex application limited his movement, because too much motion could cause the cap to come unstuck. But it was sort of fortuitous, as this limitation added something to his character, reinforcing Travis’ rigid and unnerving demeanor.

 

Killing Spree

After failing to kill the senator, Travis decides to unleash his wrath on E 13th Street.

 

He goes to Sport’s post at 204 E 13th and shoots him in the belly.

 

Travis then sits down on the stoop at 208 E 13th Street.

 

A moment later, he decides to go inside the brothel at 226 E 13th Street.

 

The action switches to a back room at 586 Columbus Avenue (since-demolished), where a bloodbath ensues.

 

In the aftermath, a crowd forms outside 226 E 13th Street.

 

As the camera pulls away we see several cop cars arrive on the scene.

 

As mentioned before, the exterior of the brothel was on 13th Street, but the interiors were all filmed about six miles away inside an abandoned building at 586 Columbus Avenue.

With the building being vacant, Scorsese was able to cut a 15-foot-long open channel into the ceiling of Iris’s room for the slow-motion tracking shot at the end of this shootout.

It’s this very last overhead shot that has convinced me that Travis Bickle died in the shootout and everything that follows is a hallucination as he drifts into an eternal sleep. Firstly, in the scene, he gets shot in the carotid artery, which would normally be quite fatal. Secondly, as he slowly drifts off, things switch to a floating overhead shot, which is a perspective often described by people who have had near-death experiences.

The disembodied shot continues outside as we float upwards in a slow, ethereal motion.

This overhead point-of-view is even present in the newspaper clipping in the next scene. A very odd perspective to be used in a news article.

This is accompanied by a voiceover of Iris’ father who gives this overly grateful response to Travis’ crazed attack. And it’s followed by an even more improbable scene where Betsy astonishingly ends up in Travis’ cab and is suddenly completely enamored with him. This, for me, all adds up to a fantasy in the head of a dying man.

Writer Paul Schrader jokes around with Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro.

I know my interpretation of the ending is in the minority, and neither Scorsese nor screenwriter Paul Schrader have indicated that Travis died at the end. However, what makes this movie so phenomenal is that one can find a different meaning to the ending, even if it wasn’t the intention of the filmmakers.

 

Betsy’s Apartment

After supposedly recovering from his injuries and being declared a hero, Travis hangs out with his fellow cabbies in front of the St Regis Hotel at 2 E 55th Street.

 

The Wizard lets Travis know that he has a passenger in his car.

 

The passenger turns out to be Betsy, who seems enamored by Travis’ heroism. 

 

He drops her off at her apartment at 340 E 69th Street.

 

When she asks him how much she owes him for the ride, he smiles and switches off the meter.

 

Travis then drives off, leaving Betsy in front of her home.

 

This very last location of Betsy’s apartment was a longtime mystery, but was solved thanks to the help of Robert Egan of PopSpots.

After seeing my post on Crocodile Dundee and the location of one of the character’s East Side apartment, it reminded Egan of Betsy’s apartment, and he sent me an email to pass on his previous findings.

Interested in identifying the location, the chief clue he focused on was what looked like a church next to the brownstones.

An image from the movie with an annotation added by Robert Egan.

Then from time to time, Egan would troll up and down the streets of the Upper East Side in Google Street View looking for the church. But in the end, he just happened to run across the location by accident while walking around the city one day. It was one of those random, double-take moments that has only happened to me once or twice.

A close-up view of the First Hungarian Reformed Church of New York City, situated near Betsy’s brownstone.

And with his help, I was able to close the case on this missing location, which in turn, helped conclude my research into Taxi Driver.

There’s not much I can say about this movie that hasn’t already been said before. Its depiction of abject loneliness, juxtaposed with a depraved city overcome with stygian darkness, creates both a heartbreaking and revolting experience for the viewer. It can also give glee to those who latch onto Scorsese’s black humor that sneaks into the peripherals of the film.

Martin’s mother, Catherine Scorsese, visits the set on 13th Street. She also had a small part in the movie, playing Travis’ first fare, but the scene was cut.

Bearing a resemblance to exploitative films of the era, Taxi Driver succeeds as an elevated piece of storytelling, thanks to a serendipitous convergence of old and new talent.

The amalgamation of skills is evident throughout the filmmaking team: from composer Bernard Herrmann’s haunting score to cinematographer Michael Chapman’s bold, dreamlike visuals. Together with a dark, audacious screenplay by Schrader and an unconventional, stylistic approach by Scorsese, helped make Taxi Driver a pioneering masterpiece in film.

That being said, all of this wouldn’t have worked if the lead actors didn’t do their job. But they do — in particular, Robert De Niro and Jodie Foster. Their commitment to their anomalous roles is spellbinding and it’s especially impressive considering Jodie was only 12 at the time.

It’s been reported that before she was given the part, Jodie was subjected to psychological testing at UCLA to ensure she wouldn’t be emotionally scarred by her role. Additionally, production used Jodie’s 19-year-old sister, Connie, as a body double for any of the extremely explicit parts.

While De Niro didn’t have to go through the same sort of cautionary preparations, he did do his homework to get ready for the role. This included acquiring a hack license and driving a yellow cab for several weeks around the city.

And while I didn’t talk in great length about them in this post, we also get great performances from the supporting cast — Albert Brooks, Peter Boyle and Harvey Keitel.

But my favorite character, outside the main cast, is Easy Andy, the black market dealer who sells Travis his guns.

He was played by Steven Prince, Martin Scorsese’s longtime friend and former bodyguard. While he didn’t have much of an acting career, according to his IMDb page, Prince did have a small part in Richard Linklater’s experimental animated film, Waking Life.

Another small but standout character is the brothel doorman played by Murray Moston. He has appeared in a bunch of Scorsese pictures, as well as Saturday Night Fever, playing the shirt salesman in the opening montage.

Doing a write-up on Taxi Driver on this website was a long time coming. There was a lot of ground to cover and I wanted to make sure to leave few stones unturned before publishing. (But hopefully it wasn’t overkill.)

As satisfying as it was to find nearly every location from this classic film, it was a little disheartening seeing the overall change in architecture and attitude in NYC. And what’s mind-boggling is how much of a metamorphosis has gone on even since ScoutingNY’s 2009 post.

The gentrification and the commercialism continues in full force in New York, and regardless of its potentially deleterious effects, there’s not much we can do to stop it. To quote Travis Bickle: “All the king’s men cannot put it back together again.”