by Cortlandt Alley represents New York in countless movies and shows; a visual stand-in for a city that no longer exists.
In a corner of Lower Manhattan, running between Canal and Franklin Streets, is Cortlandt Alley. Narrow, weathered, and grim, this is exactly how many people visualise an alley in the Big Apple.
There’s graffiti and garbage, trash cans, back doors to the buildings on either side, fire escapes on the walls. It looks tough and edgy, the kind of alley you wouldn’t want to walk down alone at night.
Cortlandt Alley has embraced this role, and appeared as a piece of New York in a long list of films, TV shows and music video clips. For the creatives behind these projects it works as shorthand, aligning with an image of the city people already have in their mind.
Only, the alley is not really this at all. New York in the modern era is a city almost entirely devoid of alleyways; Cortlandt is an outlier, rather than the norm.
Cortlandt Alley was first laid out in 1817. The surrounding area was already a bustling commercial district, the alley functioned as a service corridor, used for deliveries, and garbage removal.
The fronts of the buildings lining it presented along Broadway and Lafayette Streets, showing a polished face to the passing public. Cortlandt Alley was hidden from view behind, unglamourous but essential.
The alley was named after the Van Cortlandt family.
Captain Olof Stevense Van Cortlandt had arrived in the city when it was still under Dutch control, in 1637. Working for the Dutch West India company, he made his fortune in trade goods, and established his position as the city grew.
His descendants would stay on after the British took control and renamed it New York. Through shrewd business dealings and a growing involvement in politics, by the 19th century the Van Cortlandt’s were one of the city’s most prominent families.
While their influence would fade again, they left their name on a number of New York’s public spaces, including Cortlandt Street in Manhattan, and Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. Cortlandt Alley was named after them as they owned property nearby.
In its early years New York developed organically, without an overarching plan. This turned Manhattan into a chaotic space: a rabbit warren of alleys and small lanes, crowded and difficult to navigate.
This would change with the Commissioner’s Plan, in 1811.
The Commissioners’ Plan was designed to provide an orderly framework for the inner city. Conceived by a three-man panel, it introduced a rectangular grid of 12 north-south avenues and 155 east-west streets, stretching across Manhattan.
Designed to promote commercial opportunities and efficiency, the plan prioritised simplicity and function over existing structures.
This drastically altered the Manhattan’s layout, in a way that would become iconic. One consequence was the near elimination of alleyways, the grid system providing little room for such narrow, in-between spaces.
‘About 40% of the existing buildings had to be destroyed to make way for the grid. To compensate the owners, the commission did not place any alleys on the land that remained, so that they could profit from more housing and commercial units.’
– 99% Invisible
Over time, the lack of alleys contributed to issues like overcrowding and poor sanitation, particularly in tenement districts. It also meant that Cortlandt Alley, which survived this overhaul, would continue afterwards as an uncommon remnant of a much earlier New York.
By the 20th century, the alley’s now unique character would give it a second life, as a filming location.
It is not certain, exactly, what the first production to shoot in Cortlandt Alley was.
In the 1970s, ‘New Hollywood’ turned American cinema towards adult themes and gritty realism, several major films from this era were shot in New York. It is speculated, although not confirmed, that classics ‘The French Connection’ and ‘Taxi Driver’ may have used Cortlandt Alley as a location.
The picture becomes clearer in the 1980s.
Three films in 1986 would make use of the alley.
In ‘Highlander’ it is used for a sword fight sequence between two immortals; in ‘Crocodile Dundee’, Paul Hogan chats to sex workers and has a run in with some hoods; and in ‘9 ½ Weeks’ it features in the opening credits, as Kim Basinger walks past a garbage truck.
In the early 1990s, trendsetting police procedural ‘NYPD Blue’ would use it multiple times, reframed and dressed up to look like a different location each time, and in 1997 Will Smith would run down the alley chasing an alien in ‘Men in Black’ (part 3 would also shoot there).
More productions would follow, in addition to the major movies and TV shows listed above, Cortlandt Alley would also star in ‘Kate and Leopold’, ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2’, ‘Arbitrage’ and the remake of ‘Annie’.
Part of a key scene in the movie ‘Unfaithful’ was shot there, with a jumbo jet engine deployed to simulate the very windy day that sets the plot in motion.
In ‘Boardwalk Empire’, crews famously reimagined Cortlandt Alley as it was in the 1920s, stringing laundry between buildings, parking vintage cars along the curb, and covering the modern touches with historically accurate grime.
And in more recent years, Carrie Bradshaw is shown in ‘And Just Like That…’ opening the door to the fictional Au Cheval restaurant, this scene shot on Cortlandt Alley between Walker and White Streets in Tribeca.
Cortlandt Alley remains a popular shooting location to the present day, often used by multiple productions in the same week. Its use has expanded, to include music videos, social media content, and photo shoots.
Another reason for its popularity: in a city where an increasing amount of property is private, the alley is still a public thoroughfare. The neighbourhood around it continues to change, however.
Tribeca’s property values have soared this century, and the buildings around the alley have seen some redevelopment. Loft conversions and new residential developments nearby show the area being increasingly gentrified.
For now, Cortlandt Alley remains. A symbol of a New York long vanished, moving into an ever-changing future.
