The Shop Around The Corner
When I was in 5th grade, my mother brought me a special treat home from her grocery trip to Wal-Mart: a VHS tape of the 1995 Nora Ephron-directed romantic comedy “You’ve Got Mail.” I put it into our VCR and was immediately entranced, from the opening credits up until the very last verse of “Somewhere Over The Rainbow.” Sure, I’m your regular rom-com loving romantic, but this one was about bookstores. Give me a standard romantic comedy and I’ll be mildly entertained, but give me a bookstore and I’ll be enchanted. I’m admitting here the excessive importance that a fictional Meg Ryan character had on my life. What awkward, brace-faced, Colorado-living, book-obsessed 12-year-old wouldn’t want to be Kathleen Kelly, the enchanting owner of a successful Manhattan children’s bookstore (and the love of the charming Tom Hanks, to boot). Let’s face it: I still think of her when I think about what I want to do, even as a slightly less awkward looking 22-year-old (still just as book-obsessed, though it might be a little less intense since I now have more friends).
Nora Ephron passed away a couple of weeks ago. As a fellow female writer who admires much of her work, it was a sad and shocking moment, and I spent some time reading the many articles detailing her life and career. One tribute I read about her mentioned how “You’ve Got Mail” was not a movie about bookstores, but rather a love letter to the Upper West Side.
The 100+ times I had watched “You’ve Got Mail” in my life, it simply took place “in New York.” I didn’t know the neighborhoods. I didn’t know the streets they talked about. I didn’t know why moving “to Brooklyn” was such a bad thing for the out-of-work “Shop Around the Corner” employees. But now, I live on the Upper West Side–so I rented “You’ve Got Mail” the other night to see if my old favorite would now take on a new meaning.
“Do you want to get off at 72nd and Broadway and not even know you’re in New York City?” Meg Ryan yells at the anti-Fox Books protestors. That’s the stop I get off at regularly to go to Trader Joe’s. Or Josie’s restaurant. Or the Barnes Noble on Broadway and 83rd. Which, I found out, was the very Barnes & Noble that “You’ve Got Mail” is based off. It opened in the early 90’s, and local Upper West Siders were outraged with it, suspecting it would drive local Shakespeare Books out of business (which it did). When Kathleen and Joe visit that ridiculously busy urban grocery store on Thanksgiving (remember: “Happy Thanksgiving Back” in the cash-only line) I now noticed that it was Zabar’s, the UWS grocery staple, that I now go to regularly. I know “Oceans,” the restaurant Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks go to in one the last scenes (it’s at 79th and Columbus. I’ve never eaten there. I can’t afford it. But I’ve been to the Shake Shack right next door). I know the spot in Riverside Park and 91st street where the park path curves.
I’ve been “hating” on New York lately, and this little discovery was the juice I needed to keep an open mind (to which I tell myself I’m just romanticizing New York in order to like it, which most everyone else does anyway…and what’s wrong with a little romanticizing?). I went to the Books of Wonder children’s bookstore that IMDB told me was the shop that The Shop Around the Corner was based off of (and where Meg Ryan worked the counter to study for her role). The bookstore is actually in Chelsea, not the Upper West Side (there’s a Barnes and Noble right around the corner from it, and it’s actually been able to survive).
It’s a lovely store with kids running all over the place–and reading. I bought a blueberry scone from their cafe and sat there watching them all, happy as Kathleen Kelly during storytime.
