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One of the most beloved New York movies ever made, The Warriors, will be find a whole new fanbase on October 18, courtesy of Lin-Manuel Miranda and Eisa Davis’ concept album based on the novel and Walter Hill’s iconic 1979 movie.
While Broadway fans are still waiting for news on Miranda’s long-rumored stage musical, Davis has confirmed that they’ve “spent the last three years musicalizing the Warriors’ journey home, from the South Bronx to Coney Island.
The Warriors tells the story of the titular New York City street gang: leader Cleon (Dorsey Wright), second-in-command Swan (Michael Beck), and enforcer Fox (James Remar). They have to travel 25 miles from the Bronx to their home turf on Coney Island when they’re framed for the murder of a legendary gang leader—a man striving to reunion the city’s rival criminal factions.
Along the way, they travel through various New York locations, seeking refuge and avoiding the gangs that want retribution. With The Warriors reaching cult status over the past 45 years, fans now trek to these spots to pay tribute to the film.
But where should fans go to see where the crime thriller was shot? Here are the six New York locations that turned The Warriors into a cult classic.
Where was The Warriors filmed?
1. Wonder Wheel, Coney Island
The 150-foot Coney Island Ferris wheel that gave Deno’s Wonder Wheel Amusement Park its name is so iconic that The Warriors’ co-writer and director Walter Hill used it in the film’s opening shot. Hill shoots the ride as a hauntingly dystopian edifice—a perfect motif for what follows.
2. Riverside Park, Manhattan
The midnight conclave where Cyrus brings the gangs together is depicted as Van Cortlandt Park in the very north of the Bronx. In reality, it was shot in Riverside Park on the Upper West Side. The Warriors’ turned the 97th Street Playground—better known as the Dinosaur Playground— into Cyrus’s arena, where he is ultimately gunned down by the leader of the Rogues, Luther, who then frames the Warriors for the murder. Suddenly every gang in New York is after our small band of misfits.
In a 2014 interview with Esquire, Hill described the sequence as the film’s “big production number.” In order to make it look as authentic as possible, they reached out to real gangs members from across the city and invited them to be extras. Somewhere between 200 and 300 showed up. “We were worried that there was going to be trouble, but there wasn’t,” said Hill. “It had a good feeling to it.”
3. Firemen’s Memorial Entrance, Riverside Park
Turns out making The Warriors was a lot like being in the Warriors. Hill tells Brooklyn Magazine that the cast and crew “got chased off primary locations time after time.” There were run-ins with real gangs. “We were shooting under an elevated train one night and real gangs literally pissed on us from up above,” remembers the director.
No wonder the quieter and more secluded Riverside Park subbed in for many of the film’s sketchier ’70s locations. When the Warriors battle the Furies, a gang that wear baseball uniforms and use baseball bats to fight, Hill had them running into Riverside Park through its majestic Firemen’s Memorial entrance on 100th Street. Later, after defeating the Furies, the Warriors exit the park via the grandiose stone staircase on 99th Street.
4. Hoyt-Schermerhorn Station, Brooklyn
To get back to the safety of Coney Island, the Warriors have to trust the reliability of the New York City subway.
But the scenes on the platforms at 96th Street and Union Square were actually filmed on two abandoned platforms at Hoyt-Schermerhorn Station in Brooklyn. Other Hollywood productions—like Tony Scott’s remake of The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Michael Jackson’s ‘Bad’ music video— have all shot there, too.
If you’re aiming to see some of the film’s most famous subway exteriors, 72nd Street Station was actually turned into 96th Street Station for the film. Not only is this noticeable because of the distinctive subway building, but the legendary hot dog restaurant Gray’s Papaya can clearly be seen in the background, too.
5. Riegelmann Boardwalk, Coney Island
When the Warriors finally make it back to their home turf at dawn, they get off at Stillwell Avenue Station, before then making their way into Deno’s Wonder Wheel Amusement Park and along Coney Island’s historic Riegelmann Boardwalk.
This is where they’re stalked by Luther and the Rogues in their car, with Luther ultimately uttering the most famous line of the movie: “Warriors, come out to play-ee-ay!”
The boardwalk and surrounding area has changed in the intervening years—you won’t be able to get underneath it like the Warriors do—but just walking through these locations will evoke the film’s unique spirit.
6. Fort Tilden Beach, Queens
The Warriors’s final sequence wasn’t actually shot on the nearby Coney Island beach, but the much more remote Fort Tilden Beach in Breezy Point, Queens.
Hill used a wooden platform to depict the Warriors’ arrival on the beach, before shooting Swan’s defeat of a gun-wielding Luther on the sand. There are also various pieces of wood sticking out of the beach—probably from washed away fishing piers—that add to the dystopian look and help make the scene more dramatic.
Hill incorporated the sand dunes on the beach for the arrival of the Riffs, who by this point of the film have figured out that the Rogues killed Cyrus, so tell the Warriors that the hit on them has been cancelled and they’re finally safe.
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