The best TV and movie tours in NYC

With 843 acres of meadows, woods and streams, Central Park offers a gorgeous green backdrop for filmmakers. So perhaps it’s no surprise that countless movies have been set here, from When Harry Met Sally to Ghostbusters. Movie buffs will recognize the skating rink featured in Serendipity, the people-watching scene from Annie Hall and the path that Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra and Jules Munshin biked along in On the Town. This two-hour walking tour takes you to 30 film locations within the park, though hundreds more exist. $25

Instead of hitting all the usual downtown spots, this bus tour focuses on Midtown, the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side. Find the Seinfeld gang’s favorite restaurant, the fountain from Moonstruck, the Plaza Hotel from the The Way We Were and more filming locations. Bonus: You’ll also get a good look at Columbus Circle, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Guggenheim along the route. $39

Consider this the one-stop-shop for filming locations in the Big Apple: The three-hour bus tour takes you all over Manhattan, from the East Village to the Upper West Side. Highlights include the apartment building where Monica, Rachel, Chandler and Joey lived on Friends, a hotel featured in American Hustle and Ghostbusters headquarters. $43

Photograph: Courtesy CC/Flickr/Eli Duke

Spotted: You checking out all of B and S’s usual Upper East Side haunts. You don’t need a Sidekick or plaid school uniform to hit up the Constance Billard School for Girls or Blair Waldorf’s lavish apartment building—or at least, the real-life locations that inspired them. In true Gossip Girl fashion, your guide will also dish the dirt on some little-known facts about the show on this three-hour tour. $49

Prefer the classics to new releases? The Turner Classic Movies bus tour of 60 filming locations around Manhattan has you covered. As you pass each spot, your guide will queue up the accompanying scene inside the bus so you can compare the original clip to the current day site. The subway grate on 52nd and Lexington might not look like much today, but it gains a whole new meaning once you rewatch Marilyn Monroe’s scene from The Seven-Year Itch. $49

What Sex and the City fan hasn’t daydreamed about switching lives with Carrie, Samantha, Miranda or Charlotte for the day? The over-the-top outfits, glamorous parties and outrageous dates might be too good to be true, but at least the scenery is true to life. Visit Carrie’s brownstone, some of the girls’ favorite bars and an X-rated store featured on the show on this three-hour bus tour. There might even be time to stop for a Cosmopolitan. $49

Don’t worry, reality TV fans: There’s a bus tour on this list for you, too. Now’s your chance to see where Bethenny coined her most famous saying and—who could forget—Aviva threw her prosthetic leg across the room. The four-hour route takes you to some of the glamorous locations featured on the series—and the backdrop for some of the most infamous fights. $49

Technically speaking, this tour takes you outside the five boroughs, but The Sopranos is such an iconic New York show that we couldn’t leave it out. After you board the bus in Midtown, you’ll go through the Lincoln Tunnel—the site of the show’s unforgettable opening sequence—on your way to the New Jersey suburbs. There, you’ll check out the Bada Bing! strip club, Big Pussy’s auto body shop and the restaurant featured in the final scene of the series. $52

Channel Liz Lemon for this tour of NBC’s film and television studio at Rockefeller Center. After visiting a few film locations in the area, you head inside for the main event: a tour of the production studios where Saturday Night Live, NBC Nightly News and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon are filmed. Better get ready for your close-up: You’ll also get a chance to record your own five-minute talk show segment. $84