Revenge of Shot on Site Summer - Ghostbusters II Locations, Part 5

In honor of the respective 35th & 30th anniversaries of the original Ghostbusters movies, every Sunday - henceforth dubbed Shot on Site Sundays - at Noon (Eastern) for the next several weeks (schedule here), I will go through the original two movies from start to finish, showing and telling you where everything was filmed in Manhattan, New York and Los Angeles, California. This will be part filming locations rundown, part behind the scenes exploration, and part "Making Ghostbusters". All parts are available here in reverse order: Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II. I will be utilizing the home video cuts of both movies, which can be found on the 2014 Blu-ray Double Feature, as well as the recently-released 5-Disc 4K UHD & Blu-ray with Bonus Disc Set. With that in mind, SPOILER WARNING if you read any further... though I suspect that if you're at Spook Central, you've already seen both movies a million times over.

The majority of real world New York photos were taken by Alex Newborn in July 2014 and Lars Karlsen in July 2018, and are being used with permission. The enlargements for these photos, and for the movie framegrabs, can be found on the various Filming Locations pages elsewhere on Spook Central. Other images are credited where known. Locations were identified by various people and sources over the past 35 years. Those that are not common knowledge are credited on the specific Filming Locations pages (see previous link). The title graphic seen at the top was created by Lars Karlsen, based on an idea by Paul Rudoff. It can be enlarged for a better look at its beauty. Now that that's out of the way, we've got movie sign...

Jack Hardemeyer, in an effort to protect the mayor's best interests, has the Ghostbusters committed to Parkview Psychiatric Hospital. In order to properly do this location justice, I need to breakaway from the movie for a little bit. And now, it's time for a breakdown.

The movie never gives us a proper look at the Parkview exterior. Our only good look at the exterior comes via Sony's stock footage library.


That exterior was identified as the Veteran's Administration West Los Angeles Medical/Healthcare Center in Los Angeles, California. Specifically, it's the rear of Building 115 (Quad 7) at the intersection of McArthur Avenue & Pershing Avenue.


The only time we even get a glimpse of this exterior location in the final film is a shot of Winston putting on elbow pads, shown under his credit card at the end of the film. This shot was from a deleted scene in which Louis' cousin Sherman Tully (played by Eugene Levy) helped get the guys out of the psychiatric hospital.


Getting back into the film, we are only shown the guys inside the hospital.



Aside from one non-descript room (which could be a set) when they state their case to the psychiatrist, this hallway is all we see of the inner-workings of the place. It's definitely not a set as it has a ceiling. On page 151 of Ghostbusters: The Ultimate Visual History, it states that "one additional scene occurred at the Veteran's Administration Medical Center. This would serve as New York's fictional Parkview Psychiatric Hospital, where straitjacketed ghostbusters are incarcerated thanks to the meddling of the mayor's aide. 'The interiors were set at the VA Medical Center in Brentwood,' says [art director Tom] Duffield."


Here's television personality David Giammarco posing for a candid photo with Harold, Dan (who autographed it), Bill, and Ernie at the filming location.


On this night at the museum, the only painting that will come alive is Vigo. He and Janosz discuss their nefarious plans.


Blowing air on actor Wilhelm von Homberg's face.


Wilhelm gets made-up while standing in the painting set at ILM.


Wilhelm standing next to his painted counterpart.


Dennis Muren stares down Vigo.


Vigo beckons Oscar to the ledge of Peter's apartment building, where he will be picked up by Janosz dressed as a ghost nanny.


Filming the scene on the Peter's apartment exterior set.


Peter MacNicol was filmed separately against a bluescreen at ILM.


Mark Sullivan painting the matte painting that shows the building exterior and the surrounding area.


The final matte painting.


Dana knows where Janosz has taken Oscar. Off to the museum!


She arrives in a taxi at the Customs House in lower Manhattan. The revolving door has since been replaced by more traditonal doors. It's the real place up until the doors close. Once the slime starts to fall, it's a miniature model.


Vigo uses his powers to float baby Oscar across the restoration room when Dana tries to take him away.


This is how the floating effect was accomplished live on the set.


When the slime starts to rise, when babies float across rooms, there's only one thing to do...have a montage! Our last montage of the movie starts off with terrified theater patrons fleeing for their lives.


Ivan pretty much hides the fact that this is in Times Square. They're running out of the Movieland Theater at 1567 Broadway. Movieland closed in March 1989, not long after Ghostbusters II was filmed there, when the Shubert family sold the theater. The lobby was turned into the Roxy Delicatessen, while the auditorium became a disco, called Dance USA. The auditorium was demolished around 2005 to make way for the W Hotel (whose entrance is on 47th Street). The Roxy Delicatessen later became a Radio Shack, which closed sometime between December 2014 and November 2017.


As of this writing, it is a Swarovski jewelry store, which no longer has the large marquee over it, making it virtually unrecognizable.


A posh woman steps into a puddle of pink slime, which causes the mink pelts in her fur coat to come alive.


Hard to believe, but this is actually one of the most notable filming locations of the first movie. The woman is standing outside the Fifth Street entrance of the Biltmore Hotel at 506 South Grand Avenue in Los Angeles, California. Yes, the place that doubled as the Sedgewick Hotel was reused for this quick scene. Again, for some reason, Ivan decided to hide the fact that it took place in a famous Ghostbusters location.


A pretty pink monster scares the straights at Washington Square Park.


Washington Square Park, at 5th Avenue & Washington Square North, plays itself in the film. It's an appropriate place for a Ghostbusters film since there are well over 17,000 bodies still under the park from its days as a cemetery.


The Titanic finally arrives in New York, 77 years after it departed on its maiden voyage. Better late than never, I suppose.


The deceased passengers were filmed at ILM separate from...


...the miniature Titanic model.


This is what remained of the Titanic model when I visited the Times Square Planet Hollywood in April 2003.


Once the mayor finds out that Hardemeyer had the Ghostbusters institutionalized, he fires him on the spot.


This conference room scene was filmed on April 27, 1989 on Stage 16 at The Burbank Studios. It was a late-stage cover for scenes that would later be removed, such as the previously mentioned Sherman Tully scene, as well as all scenes involving the mayor and Hardemeyer outside the slime-covered museum.

The guys are sprung from Parkview by the mayor (and not Sherman Tully) and make their way through a long hallway to freedom.


On page 151 of Ghostbusters: The Ultimate Visual History, art director Tom Duffield says, "When they're coming out of the mental hospital in their ghostbusters uniforms, that was shot at a side door service entrance of the Biltmore Hotel." No photos have appeared online to prove this true or false.

Do the Ghostbusters make it to the museum on time? Find out next week - same ghost time, same ghost channel - when we continue our look at the filming locations from Ghostbusters II.