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NYC's Legendary Tour Guide Speed Levitch Takes Us To The FRIENDS Wall
By
Jen Carlson
Published May 28, 2021
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By
Jen Carlson
Published May 28, 2021
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Last year, in the early days of March, I had the pleasure of walking around New York City with legendary tour guide Timothy "Speed" Levitch. As we traversed the downtown streets and parks, Levitch narrating the history of the city with typical effervescence, we noticed it was a little emptier than usual. We didn't know it then, but we were spending time together in the last moments of semi-ignorant bliss, right before a citywide shutdown that would put life as we knew it on pause for over a year. Just a few days later, we'd all be isolating in our own homes.
Still, that week some New Yorkers and tourists were still out — unmasked, just a little wary. And at the corner of Bedford and Grove streets, things were bustling. This otherwise quiet section of the West Village had a steady stream of tourists who all seemed to be having some sort of religious experience at a brick wall.
It's the Friends wall, Levitch told me.
"People come here, in 2020?," I asked. "The show wasn't even filmed here!"
We were staring at 90 Bedford Street, which served as the exterior for the building that housed the apartments of Monica Geller, Chandler Bing, Rachel Green, Joey Tribbiani and at times Phoebe Buffay. Ross Geller was a frequent visitor. (While you could see a restaurant in the shot, it was not Central Perk.) This building existed in seconds-long bursts throughout the series, and was one of the only times you'd see the real New York in the show.
Speed Levitch at the Friends wall
We got our first glimpse of this building when the show debuted in September 1994, and while it was filmed on a set in Los Angeles, this establishing shot — seen over and over again throughout the show's 10 season run (and endless syndication) — was embedded in viewers' minds. Once its location was revealed in 1997, it became a pop culture pilgrimage site, "a mecca," Levitch called it, complete with an "analogous Western Wall."
Fans from all over quickly caught on that this was The Friends Building, but shockingly it was only less than a decade ago that they started to tag the wall with quotes from the show. According to a 2019 article in The New Yorker, it all began by accident, with an innocent chalk tag directed not at a character from the show, but at the chef of the restaurant that anchors the building.
"About six years ago, a street-artist friend of [Little Owl chef Joey] Campanaro’s wrote 'i love joey' in chalk on the side of the building. Tourists, not realizing it was a message for Campanaro, started scrawling Friends catchphrases in marker all over the wall." Campanaro said his landlord wouldn't like it, and that he'd have to clean it up, but it's only grown since then. This, despite a small sign in the window of an apartment that politely requests, "do not write on our building."
Looking back over the crowd before we left, Levitch joked, "I was thinking that could be a new Seinfeld episode" (his preferred '90s sitcom). "Get all the Seinfeld characters together, and they're here, and they're like, 'Guys, Friends changed the world, what did we do?'"
Update, May 29th, 2021: The landlord removed the graffiti (we'll update when we know more, but this likely happened during the pandemic when tourism — and therefore new Friends tags — all but stopped). There is now a sign up on the side of the 90 Bedford St building that reads "No Graffiti." According to Scott Lynch, while the Sharpie homages to Friends were buffed, there were "still more tourists than I’ve seen anywhere else all day." With the city opening back up, will the tributes return?
The Friends Apartment building on May 29th, 2021. The tags have been buffed.
Video by Sai Mokhtari. For more on Speed Levitch visit speedlevitchonline.com.
Tagged
speed levitch
west village
friends
Jen Carlson
Jen Carlson is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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