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If you want upscale New York glamour on the big-screen, you head for The Devil Wears Prada 2. But if you’re looking for a more authentic, more relatable vision of the Big Apple, indie cinema is where to look.
Like Sean Baker’s Anora, which put Brighton Beach on the Oscars map, Jordan Firstman’s Club Kid is about to spotlight Dimes Square, Chinatown and Brooklyn’s queer club scene as the Long Islander’s debut film storms into the cultural zeitgeist—and potentially this awards season—over the next few months.
Club Kid follows washed-up club promoter Peter (Firstman) as he’s forced to embrace his new-found responsibilities as the dad to nine-year-old Arlo (Reggie Absolom). When the kid he didn’t know he had is left with him, the pair gradually bond over SoHo breakfasts, crate-digging shopping trips and unlikely DJ gigs, all with Peter’s narcotic-fuelled nocturnal past not quite in the rearview.
Firstman and his cinematographer Adam Newport-Berra (The Invite) bring the grainy 35mm aesthetic of films like William Friedkin’s queer nightlife thriller Cruising (1980) and Paul Mazursky’s An Unmarried Woman (1978). They also give the city a heady, soul-enriching glow all of its own—"a beautiful naturalism" as Firstman puts it. "I wanted this movie to feel timeless and classic," says the writer-director-actor. "So much of New York City now looks modern, but certain parts of Downtown Manhattan, including Chinatown, the Lower East Side and Seward Park, feel untouched, and I knew I wanted to shoot on those streets."
Here’s how—and where—they did it.
Where was Club Kid filmed? A full NYC filming locations guide:
The opening club scene was filmed at Market Hotel in Brooklyn
Club Kid opens with a friends’ night out that takes in a raucous, Rihanna-soundtracked Uber ride and a VIP entry into a darkened, strobing New York bacchanal. This is Bushwick’s Club Labor, an "It" nightspot in the movie into which Peter, his fellow promoter Sophie (Cara Delevingne) and their gang disappear for a night of house music and hedonism.
Club Labor is fictional but the location used ticks many of the same boxes: Market Hotel in Brooklyn is famous for sitting eye-level with the train tracks on Myrtle-Broadway and for its techno nights, queer parties and gigs. The scene features cameos from NYC nightlife luminaries like Amanda Lepore, RuPaul's Drag Race-r Kandy Muse, and trans drag queen Linux, while actors Alaska Riley, Benny Jean Pierce and Saturn Risin9 play Peter’s friends.
And real-world NYC parties were used to give the film its bass-bumping authenticity
To capture the visceral decadence of NYC's queer rave scene, Firstman was adamant about filming inside actual New York clubs and party collectives, including Pit//Stop, the cult-favorite underground rave founded by Noah Shakoor that regularly pops up at rotating warehouses and galleries in Brooklyn and Manhattan.
“So many New York City gays are in this movie,” says Firstman. “The community showed up, because the people around the film, the dolls, the gay party boys, the muscle dudes, they’re all part of the actual scene, and the energy came from the people in the clubs,” the director adds. “There was an aspect of trust that we built. It wasn’t like this filmmaker was coming in to gawk—we were all trying to make something special and real.”
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Peter’s apartment is located on Allen and Canal streets in Dimes Square
Peter’s rent-controlled Lower Manhattan apartment, which he shares with Nicky (Eldar Isgandarov), an aspiring queer philosopher from Azerbaijan, is the film’s hero location. Finding it was a headache-inducing challenge. With less a week before the shoot began, the film’s producer struck upon a Dimes Square property he’d used before. "The apartment was exactly what I was looking for," says Firstman, "on a high floor, with ample light, and nice enough so that it had that movie feeling, but we could still rough it up a little bit to house someone like Peter."
Arlo and Peter enjoy "mid" food but good vibes at Balthazar
One scene sees the father-son duo enjoying lunch at Balthazar, the long-running French brasserie from British-born restaurateur Keith McNally. The Soho restaurant—which opened at 80 Spring Street between Broadway and Crosby back in April 1997—is known for its steak frites, shiny red banquettes and premium people watching. "The food is mid, but people mostly come for the vibes," declares Firstman's character in the scene.
Arlo gets into a fight in Manhattan's Seward Park
Named after a 19th century New York statesman, Seward Park is where Arlo learns to skateboard and gets into a scrap with some local kids. Peter chats with his ex Devon (Nigil Whyte) on one the park’s benches.
Peter takes Arlo LP shopping at A1 Records on East 6th Street
Awed by his young son’s hyper-credible music taste—the kid loves Cocteau Twins and Björk—Peter takes Arlo to flick through the vinyl at Manhattan’s A1 Records. Billed as a ‘funky, cozy destination to buy, sell, or trade vintage vinyl records of all genres’, this East Village staple, a mile north of Peter’s on-screen apartment, has been selling (and buying) records since 1996. Alarmingly for his dad’s bank balance, Arlo ends up walking out with a $300 Elliott Smith LP.
Peter takes a job tending bar at downtown's Bar Oliver
Most of Peter's professional career revolves around New York's buzzing nightlife scene, but he ends up taking on a decidedly chiller gig as the bartender at Bar Oliver. Located at 1 Oliver Street on the cusp of Manhattan's Chinatown and Two Bridges neighborhoods, the Basque-inspired restaurant-bar serves Spanish wines, on-tap vermouth and an assortment of shareable tapas and pintxos.
In one scene, Peter runs into his old party pal Saffron—played by multidisciplinary artist-performer Saturn Risin9—during one of his Bar Oliver shifts.
Club Kid premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. It’s out in U.S. theaters Nov 6.