I arrived in New York just in time to experience the final gasps of smut. Times Square was a wasteland of boarded up porn-theatres and peep shows, with rickety “decor” along the exteriors, showing the buildings’ seedy show-biz beginnings. There were a couple of peep shows holding out along 8th Avenue – clustering close to Port Authority – but those too are now gone. Once The Lion King arrived, the area was “revitalized” and “cleaned up”. Which isn’t entirely a bad thing. But … I don’t believe that having an Applebee’s on 42nd Street is an improvement.
When I first moved to New York, I wandered around the area – and of course I had been to New York many times as a child and teenager when it was far FAR worse than a street of boarded-up buildings. I visited New York for the first time in its wildest most chaotic era, you know, when graffiti covered all the subway trains. By the time I came to New York to live, the “party” was over, but the Lion King “party” hadn’t started yet. I could sense changes were coming. 42nd Street wouldn’t be a ghost town for long. So I took tons of pictures. I wish I had taken more.
I went to CCNY from January of 1980 until June of 1981, so I got to experience the “party” at full swing. I remember that every time I had to walk through Times Square, I’d quicken my pace a little, and keep my eyes straight ahead and slightly down, to avoid eye contact. Without romanticizing that era, I still regret what Times Square has become. It strikes me as the same as the “Paris” or “Venice” you see in Las Vegas; it’s “New York” for people who don’t really want to see New York. For anyone who wants to see the party, HBO’s The Deuce does a remarkable job in re-creating it in all its sadness and glory. As Mott the Hoople put it, back in 1975: “Oh, Alice/You remind me of Manhattan/The seedy and the snazz/The shoeboys and the satin/Like a throne made of gilt/That too many johns have sat in/Oh! I like you!”
// It strikes me as the same as the “Paris” or “Venice” you see in Las Vegas; it’s “New York” for people who don’t really want to see New York. //
That’s a good analogy! I don’t understand why you would come to New York and eat at Applebee’s.
Bill – I remember as a kid coming to visit my aunt, via the train, and you’d come out into Port Authority and it was like one of the circles of hell. You legit felt the danger. People squatting there, all kinds of shenanigans going on, it was like hungry wolves were circling you. I also remember the hookers greeting cars outside the Lincoln Tunnel!
and you watch movies from the 70s filmed in New York and you can really get a sense of the desolation and sleaze. But you lived it!
I keep meaning to check out The Deuce – it sounds right up my alley.