I ran across Richard Widmark shooting an episode of the TV series Madigan in 1972 somewhere in the 80s on the West Side. He was about a block away and it suddenly dawned on me who he was, very distinctive look about him.
They were preparing a shot to be filmed on the street. Cameras were setup near a “pimpmobile”. This took maybe an hour, but I stood there to watch what was going to happen. Widmark stood at a distance waiting and smoking. Finally, they filmed the scene with him talking to someone in the car.
Later I made certain to watch the episode on TV. The scene which took an hour to setup and film lasted maybe 10 seconds on screen. Just damn.
Interesting. I grew up on Manhattan's Lower East Side during the 1960s and near all of '70, but have recently moved to that area that you referred to, Upper West Side. Lots of snooty Libs and movie people here. Still, the area is great. One block from Central Park, where my late parents met around the time this movie was shot, late 1940s. Dad, from Tennessee, was in the Navy on leave visiting the park with a shipmate. Mom, an Italian girl from Manhattan, was at the park with a friend.
Wife and I had a similar experience in the '80s in Sierra Madre, CA (LA suburb). My brother-in-law was a stand-in for James Karen in one of the "Living Dead" sequels. My sister called and said they were shooting a scene nearby. We hotfooted over there about 10 pm.
Dozens of crew and group-scene actors milling about. At 1 pm they were STILL farting around, so we gave up and went home. The scene turned out be a 15-second shot of a zombie stopping by an electronics store and watching female aerobics on a demo TV.