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Joker Stairs

Film and television memesHighbridge, BronxInternet memesInternet memes introduced in 2019Joker (character) in other media
Stairways in the United StatesTourist attractions in the Bronx
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The "Joker Stairs" is the colloquial name for a step street connecting Shakespeare and Anderson avenues at West 167th Street in Highbridge in the Bronx, New York City. Located near the 167th Street station on the New York City Subway's 4 train, the stairs served as one of the filming locations in the 2019 film Joker. In the film, the character Arthur Fleck, portrayed by Joaquin Phoenix, is repeatedly shown walking up and down these stairs as part of his daily routine. Later, towards the film's climax, he dances down the stairs wearing a brightly-colored suit and clown makeup, which represent a change in his character, as Gary Glitter's "Rock and Roll Part 2" plays in the background. The stairs appear in a promotional poster for the film and have become a tourist destination. Both the stairs and Arthur's dance have become Internet memes.Many visitors reenact the scene from the film, sometimes in Joker attire, to the point that the stairs have become crowded with sightseers. Bronx residents complained that tourists caused crowding during their commutes while snapping pictures and wielding selfie sticks. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, U.S. representative for New York's 14th congressional district (which covers portions of the Bronx), asked visitors to stay away from the Joker Stairs to avoid causing problems for residents.India Today notes, "Even though the stairs have been around for years and lead to some of the most famous spots in New York [...] they were never really popular because of their association with crime in the area." The New York Times notes that originally, the stairs used in the 2007 biographical crime film American Gangster, located in a South Bronx neighborhood, were going to be used in the scene, but they had been repaved and beautified too much to be aesthetically acceptable for Joker.NBC New York notes that the Joker Stairs have joined "the ranks of well-known movie settings, like that of the steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art" seen in the 1976 American sports drama Rocky. In 2019, Burger King released a promotional video featuring the Joker Stairs, with a title card saying "We know clowns can be annoying", an innuendo directed at McDonald's.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Joker Stairs (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Joker Stairs
West 167th Street, New York The Bronx

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Wikipedia: Joker StairsContinue reading on Wikipedia

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 40.8359 ° E -73.9239 °
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Address

West 167th Street

West 167th Street
10452 New York, The Bronx
New York, United States
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Grand Concourse (Bronx)
Grand Concourse (Bronx)

The Grand Concourse (also known as the Grand Boulevard and Concourse) is a 5.2-mile-long (8.4 km) thoroughfare in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Grand Concourse runs through several neighborhoods, including Bedford Park, Concourse, Highbridge, Fordham, Mott Haven, Norwood and Tremont. For most of its length, the Concourse is 180 feet (55 m) wide, though portions of the Concourse are narrower. The Grand Concourse was designed by Louis Aloys Risse, an immigrant from Saint-Avold, Lorraine, France. Risse first conceived of the road in 1890, and the Concourse was built between 1894 and 1909, with an additional extension in 1927. The development of the Concourse led to the construction of apartment buildings surrounding the boulevard, and by 1939 it was called "the Park Avenue of middle-class Bronx residents". A period of decline followed in the 1960s and 1970s, when these residences became dilapidated and the Concourse was redesigned to be more motorist-friendly. Renovation and redevelopment started in the 1980s, and a portion of the Grand Concourse was reconstructed starting in the 2000s. The southern portion of the Grand Concourse is surrounded by several historically important residential buildings, which were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987 as part of the Grand Concourse Historic District. In 2011, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission designated numerous buildings around the Grand Concourse as part of a city landmark district. Additionally, several individual points of interest are located on or near the Concourse, including the Bronx Museum of the Arts and Edgar Allan Poe Cottage.