{"id":413443,"date":"2025-11-29T19:04:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-29T19:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/413443\/"},"modified":"2025-11-29T19:04:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-29T19:04:10","slug":"sorry-christmastime-in-new-york-is-hell-on-earth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/413443\/","title":{"rendered":"Sorry, Christmastime in New York is hell on Earth"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the biggest lies the movies tell?\u00a0<\/p>\n

That New York City is a magical place to be at Christmastime.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hollywood depicts pleasantly bustling streets full of festive commuters, warm and inviting department stores, and warehouses worth of garland, tinsel and string lights that combine into a spectacular holiday fantasyland.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Improbably, characters smile in these films.<\/p>\n

The New York Christmas that Macaulay Culkin\u2019s Kevin experiences in \u201cHome Alone 2\u201d does not exist. \u00a920thCentFox\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

And, hey, I get it. NYC is a smart place to set a Christmas movie \u2014 an entire city full of Scrooges ripe for redemption.<\/p>\n

Especially that one Krampus of a critic from the New York Post. Jerry Oliesky, or something like that.<\/p>\n

But believe me, from now until Jan. 2 any seasonal spot in Manhattan that looks nice and fun onscreen is actually a cruel and unusual hellscape of crowds, stress and astronomical credit card debt.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Midtown is a nightmare before Christmas, during Christmas and for several days after Christmas.<\/p>\n

Starting Wednesday, when the godforsaken Rockefeller Center tree is officially lit, Sixth Avenue turns into the Running of the Bulls without paella and with far more gruesome injuries.<\/p>\n

The absurd notion that a 12-year-old boy played by Macaulay Culkin could safely have that entire plaza all to himself at night and be easily found there by his worried mother is slightly less realistic than the plot of \u201cAvatar.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s beyond jammed. You wait and shiver and elbow and shove your way to an Instagram-friendly vantage, slap on a fake grin, snap a pic and elbow and shove your way out. Merry Christmas, ya filthy animal!<\/p>\n

The Rockefeller Center Christmas tree is jammed with crowds every year. AP<\/p>\n

Oh, and that cute, romantic ice skating rink next to the Godzilla conifer? It costs you anywhere from $47 to $124 for an hour of falling and back-side bruises.<\/p>\n

The travel website Holafly just rated it the most overcrowded Christmas attraction <\/a>in the world.<\/p>\n

Awfully big place, the world.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

In \u201cHome Alone 2: Lost In New York,\u201d scenes are scored by jaunty John Williams music that would imply that people are actually enjoying winter.<\/p>\n

Of course, our real official soundtrack is incoherent shouting. And we hardly even get snow until mid January. We\u2019re just freezing our asses off on the same old ugly asphalt.<\/p>\n

The Rockefeller Center ice rink costs anywhere from $47 to $124 per adult. Getty Images<\/p>\n

It does not come as a surprise that the last remake of \u201cMiracle on 34th Street\u201d came more than 30 years ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Been on 34th Street lately? A miracle would be someone picking up a broom.<\/p>\n

On a good day, everything in the city is a series of competitive lines at the end of which is a lackluster gelato. But the fight goes into overdrive in late December. Seeing a Broadway show becomes a battle of wills and wallets.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Christmas week tends to be Broadway\u2019s most lucrative of the year. So, tickets to \u201cWicked,\u201d \u201cLion King\u201d and \u201cHamilton\u201d are at their most expensive and in-demand.<\/p>\n

You might, might be able to squeeze into a wholesome family entertainment like \u201cOedipus.\u201d<\/p>\n

But coveted seats to the \u201cRadio City Christmas Spectacular\u201d are spoken of in low voices like drug deals on one of our many fine upstanding street corners.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cCome on, man, I need some!\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The movie \u201cElf\u201d gets a lof things right.<\/p>\n

The rare movie that mostly gets this unbearable time in NYC right is \u201cElf.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Nobody on the street puts up with Buddy the Elf\u2019s high-spirited crap, not even the CD hawking guys. His biological father tries to kick him out of his office.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

When Buddy gets into a spat with a mall Santa Claus, Saint Nick says, \u201cHow would you like to be dead?\u201d<\/p>\n

Now that is a New York Christmas in a chestnutshell.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the biggest lies the movies tell?\u00a0 That New York City is a magical place to be…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":413444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,44679,194200,171,53,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-413443","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-christmas","10":"tag-christmas-movies","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-movies","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-city","15":"tag-newyork","16":"tag-newyorkcity","17":"tag-ny","18":"tag-nyc","19":"tag-united-states","20":"tag-united-states-of-america","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","23":"tag-us","24":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115634547337376317","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=413443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/413444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=413443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=413443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=413443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}