The King of Queens House

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As mentioned in Wednesday’s post, I have many stalking adventures to share from the day my fiancé and I spent with fellow stalker Owen in New York City, including one that actually led us off the island of Manhattan and into the Garden State, aka New Jersey.  In all of my many trips to the Big Apple, I have only actually been off the island once and even then I only ventured as far as Brooklyn.  So, leaving Manhattan to head to an entirely different state was quite the stalking endeavor for me!  The location that led us to such uncharted territory, you ask?  The home where the Heffernans lived in the Kevin James/Leah Remini sitcom The King of Queens.  Owen had actually tracked down this location back in August, after what he described as “the longest, most headache-inducing search for a location that I’ve been through”.  LOL  Oh, I’ve so been there!!!  🙂  Owen’s quest for The King of Queens house actually began ordinarily enough, with him contacting numerous people who had worked on the series, from production designers all the way up to the Vice President of Sony’s Media Relations!  Not kidding!  Unfortunately, they all came back with the exact same answer – they had absolutely no idea where the Heffernan house was located.  Owen certainly had his work cut out for him on this one.  I mean, if a production staff doesn’t even know where one of their filming sites is located, how are any of us stalkers ever supposed to find it???  One of the crew members did remember one pertinent piece of information, though. He said that the establishing shots of The King of Queens  house which were used throughout the series nine year run had been found in the Columbia Television (now Sony) Stock Footage Library shortly before the pilot first aired.  No one on The King of Queens staff knew who had taken the footage or what production it was originally used for and in the nine season run of the show, no one had ever come forward to claim the house as theirs. 

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For those not familiar with Hollywood lingo, stock footage, or archive footage as it is sometimes called, is basically a video image of a location that is not taken for a specific production, but is instead cataloged in a studio’s stock footage library to be used on an as-needed basis.  Footage that has actually been used in a specific production can also very well wind up in a stock footage library.  Using stock images ends up to be much cheaper for a production than actually sending a crew out to shoot establishing shots of each different locale needed for a particular show or movie.  So, in essence, footage originally shot for, oh say, a car commercial, may wind up being used regularly on a hit television series almost a decade later.  Which is pretty much exactly what happened with The King of Queens  house.  Anyway, once Owen found out that the images of the Heffernan house had been procured from the Sony Library, he went through the painstaking task of searching through all of Sony’s archives until he came across the right video.  But, amazingly enough, his quest didn’t end there!  All Owen was able to gather from locating the footage of the Heffernan house was that it had originally been shot in 1991 for use in a production entitled SIBS II.  Because he had never heard of SIBS II and because that production is not listed in the IMDB database, thought his search may have suddenly hit a brick wall.  Until an idea struck him.  Owen decided to rifle through some of the other stock footage that had been taken for the mysterious SIBS II production and eventually stumbled across this video, in which a clapboard with two crewmember’s names written on it was visible in the opening frames.  Employing a bit of internet savvy, Owen somehow managed to track down one of the crewmembers listed and sent him an email asking if he remembered the location of the Heffernan house.  Here is the crew member’s response, “You should work for the FBI.  I’d be delighted to answer your question, if I can find the info.  But hopefully you’ll be kind enough to answer mine: How in the hell did you find me?”  LOL LOL LOL 

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The shocked crew member said he had the address of the house written down in one of his files and promised to dig through them to find it.  As promised, just a few days later he emailed Owen with an address, FINALLY putting to rest the mystery of the Heffernan house location!  🙂   And because Owen knew that I would be coming to New York just a few weeks after he had received the address, he promised to wait to stalk the house until I arrived.  YAY!  So, on October 2nd, Owen, my fiancé, and I ventured across the Hudson River to do some King of Queens stalking.   And, let me tell you, seeing the Heffernan house in person was extremely exciting, especially considering the long road that got us there!  

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A big THANK YOU to Owen for finding this location and for waiting to stalk it until I could join him!  🙂

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Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The King of Queens  house is located at 519 Longview Avenue in Cliffside Park, New Jersey.  If you plan to take a cab ride from Manhattan to the Heffernan house, be forewarned, even though it is only about a ten mile ride, it will cost you upwards of $45!  Not kidding!!!!  I would suggest taking a bus there instead, as it is the much cheaper option. 

91 Replies to “The King of Queens House”

  1. Does anyone else notice the interior shots do not match up with the exterior. The front door is different and has two windows on either side from the interior view.

  2. There are two different exterior houses use. There is this one and another one that is bigger and has a wide brick and concrete stairway with a wide porch. Does anyone know why they changed the exterior shot. The interior remained the same.

  3. I always loved King of Queens it is 1 of my Faves the Shows on earth next too Emergency that is & Alie Smith & Jones well it was a great Show too watch sorry it had too end shuch short nodes 😢😢😢😢😢😢😣😣😣😣but I though it was very funny also I lovedon’t Adam 12 😃😃😃😃😄😄😄very sad Those Great Police Men are gone now😧😧😧😧😧😧😧😧

  4. I’m so into this show. I have seen every episode, about 3 times over. 9 seasons, 125 episodes I do believe? But anyways, I’ll get to the point of my post.

    There are scenes where there is an attached side garage to their neighbors house? Also touching Doug and Carrie’s. That is not seen here in the photos. I also noticed the fridge changed a few times in the kitchen. Haha

  5. I love the show. Fact is, the full porch is shown many times but absolutely doesn’t jive with the house shown. There are only a front door and a back door so it’s not a side entrance. Also, there is an episode where Arthur makes a bare minimum donation to PBS to get a tote bag but receives a complete Civil War VHS set instead. In the scene in the kitchen with Carrie it literally changes back and forth to much smaller Great War (WW1) set.

  6. This is the exact house my grandparents owned in the late 30’s and early 40’s. I have a pic of my mom and aunts sitting on the stoop in 1940

  7. HERE’S SOMETHING FUNNY… The WINDOWS on the house in the opening credits are on the left side. When they film IN THE HOUSE… the windows are on the right!! Hahaha… and I JUST NOW started watching this show! Wish I had watched it when it first aired. #NEW FAN

    1. Yeah, the windows would be that way. Think about it: when you look out from the inside everything is backward from the perspective of when you look in from the outside.

      1. Hey Tom R, did you even watch the show?? What Taylor D is saying is true, but he’s saying it slightly wrong. The way Taylor states it is by using perspective from outside the house for both his inside and outside observations. In the show the windows are always on the left of shot, when both inside and out. So if you took your POV from inside and used it outside, the door would be on the left. I noticed this simple continuity mistake years ago, and always wondered if their continuity editor still worked in the industry??!! LMAO

        1. In some episodes they have a front porch, and in others they have just a stoop. Also, when inside the house, there are windows on both sides of the front door.

    2. Speaking of windows, in the episode “King Pong” around the 28 min. mark you can see the window behind their headboard being closed, clearly by a crew member, while the shot is being filmed. I also noticed in “Prints Charming” s-5 ep-15, it appears the Starbucks that Arthur visits around 13 min. in is the same set as the usual coffee shop for Charlie and Alan in Two and a Half Men “unconfirmed”.

  8. I know this is an old post and someone else might’ve told you already but this is the show (“Sibs”): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101196/ When I read your post, the name “Sibs” sounded vaguely familiar so I looked it up. Turns out the production company was Gracie Films and it featured Dan Castellaneta — both associated with “The Simpsons” and “The Tracey Ullman Show,” along with executive producers James L. Brooks and Sam Simon (and the creator, Heide Perlman). It was cancelled after its first season but resurrected a year later as a summer pilot renamed “Related by Birth” starring some of the original cast. The network passed on development, however. Ted Bessell was a producer and George Clinton supplied the theme music. Huh. Here’s the Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibs Anyway, thanks to your friend for his detective work. I love that sort of thing myself. Hey, here’s a commercial for it from 1991: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYheE76xc7c

  9. Forgive me if this was already noted – in a Thanksgiving Day epidsode where the stranger shows up at the door and is made to wait out in the cold – Doug steps out on a porch to talk with the stranger. I see no porch in the photos. Of course, I understand with stock footage and sets, they most likely improvised. Still curious to me.

    1. Yes, I’ve always wondered about the porch too. Do they even show it on the show in other episodes? I also remember the episode where they leave Arthur outside on the porch when no one shows up for his birthday party, if I remember correctly. I went to the Brady Bunch house in Encino, CA 2 yrs ago. Really cool. The driveway actually went back to a basketball hoop on the detached garage. We talked to the local mailman delivering mail in the neighborhood and he told us that there’s actually no staircase in the house as in the series. That was disappointing to learn but would still love to see inside the house!

      1. The Brady Bunch house (the one they show from the outside), is NOT the actual house they tape in, i.e. the inside. Come on people. The interior is a SET. The inside doesn’t even line up with the outside. Think about it. Try to put the inside in the house you see from the curb. It doesn’t fit. These are just PICTURES of actual houses. The INSIDE is A SET. You all are so naive.

  10. The Scene after the train getting on to queens boro plaza station is located in Elmhurst Queens and Broadway.

  11. I grew up in Cliffside Park and love the show King of Queens (also because I was born in Queens). I hope to get back to NJ and check out this House. How cool is that! Cliffside is really close to NYC, the GW Bridge is only 2-3 miles away but if you’re coming in from the Tunnel then it’s longer (10). There is nothing luck growing up in, from what I remember, a wonderful Town on the Hudson River. Also, parts of the movie Big with Tom Hanks was filmed in Cliffside Park near PS # 6 School. That was also a cute House.

  12. I am a very big fan of King of Queens. I remember the house differently in the episode where a man with a patch stops by at Thanksgiving to use the phone because he is having car trouble. In this episode I think the man is standing out on a porch which this house does not have. This episode is not consistent with the images shown in other episodes. The whole gang got locked outside while the man robbed them. Does anyone else remember that episode?

  13. I am watching the show right now, where Arthur almost burnt the house down and they were thinking of moving him out. The house is not the same one!! The one on the show there is a window on both sides of the door. The space from Google’s maps show not enough space on the right hand side of the door to have a window. Also the rails for the front door on the show are brick, Google maps show they are metal, granted they can be changed but probably not since its more expensive to take the brick and replace it with cheaper metal rails. Sorry I do not mean to offend any home owners. Last in front of the window on the left side of the front door there is a small walkway where you can go up the front steps and make a left and see through the front window. That’s not visible from Google maps. The interior of the house there is a break in the wall extending it outside, that s a structural change that should be visible from the street.

    Other shots in the show they actually show the house from Google maps !! It’s two different houses, they were recording in, unless the inside was in a studio. If so then that’s a blooper, the inside of the house does not match the outside 😉

    Any ideas ?!!

    Thanks.

    1. King of Queen’s was filmed in California, the interior shots are a set. The exterior establishing shot is of a house on Longview Avenue, establishing shots are just that, fictional. Just as the exterior of Jerry Seinfeld’s New York apartment on Seinfeld, have no connection with the actual set in California, where the show was filmed. Sit-coms have to be filmed on a sound-stage or a film studio, due to the lighting, sound, and so forth, they aren’t shot in real houses. Part of the illusion which is Hollywood, the exterior shot of the house in Cliffside Park is (as the article clearly states) simply old Sony film-stock.

    2. Hi Passer By,
      Browse some of the earlier (older comments). I even left a 2 minute tour I found on youtube of the soundstage they used for the show.

  14. Hi Lindsay. You are a genius!! Thank you so so so much for this post.

    I’m a big fan of the show and I was looking for this house on the net for ever. And when I found this site, with all the locations, I couldn’t believe my eyes!
    I’m from Argentina, so I’m kind of far away from Queens, but thanks to the street view of google maps I could walk those streets, and for a tiny moment I felt like I was there.

    My dream is to make a road trip sometime to USA with my brother, so this places are a “must go” for us.

    Thank you very much!

    PS: Is a pleasure to read Michael and the actual owner of the house!

    1. German,
      Thank you for the compliment!!! If you do make it up here to check out the sights of Queens, NY
      You have to go to Flushing Meadows Corona Park. It is where Carrie and Doug are rolling around on the grass and sitting at a park bench together at the beginning of each episode. This park was the site of the 1964-65 New York Worlds Fair. The big steel globe (Unisphere) behind them is one of the remnants from the worlds fair.
      http://www.nycgovparks.org/park-features/virtual-tours/flushing-meadows
      The next stop would be The Lemon Ice King of Corona. This is where you see Carrie and Doug
      buying Italian Ice. I was just there last weekend and the ices are the best!!!
      http://thelemonicekingofcorona.com/
      Although you will be far from Argentina you will still feel at home!! That section of Queens is known as Little Argentina. Here you can visit Bakeries, Restaurants, and Shops with an Argentinean flavor.

      1. “Little Argentina”, wow, I didn’t know that! Althought I was “walking” around the area with google map’s street view and saw a few places with Argentinian names, but I’d never imagine that it would be called like that.

        And you are right, those places you named, and the house in NJ are in my map 🙂

        Thanks for the tip!

  15. Found a video on Youtube that takes you on a 2 minute tour of the different sets used on the King of Queens.

  16. Hi All,
    I found a few more exterior shots used in several episodes.

    Episode (Fresh Brood) This is where Arthur wants to become customer of the month at his favorite coffee shop, the Java House. It is filmed at the intersection of Astoria Blvd. and 30th Street looking east towards the elevated train tracks (N & Q).

    Episode (Buy Curious) This is where Arthur meets with and uses Spences mom as a guinea pig to test his new psoriasis pills. It is located at the intersection of 72nd Ave. and Metropolitan Ave. Forest Hills, NY.(looking east)

    Episode (Dougie Nights) This is the night club that Doug took Deacon to after Kelly left him and went to her mothers in New Jersey. This exterior shot is not located in NY or CA. and is a very famous night club. It was called Nicks Fat City and has been renamed Diesel. It is located at 1601 E. Carson Street, Pittsburgh, PA. You can check it out on youtube and see the bands that have performed there.

    Episode (Soft Touch) Carrie tries over and over again to parallel park. Intersection of 95th Street and 4th Ave, Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Next to St. Patricks Church.

    Episode (Curbed Enthusiasm) This is where Doug has bought an ice cream cone and the man working behind the counter cannot make change of his 20 dollar bill. Eddies Sweet Shop located at 105-29 Metropolitan Ave. Flushing , NY 11375. Just down the block where they took exterior shots for episode (Buy Curious).

    Episode (Tank Heaven) This is where Carrie treats Doug to dinner after landing a new job. Turtle Bay Tavern located at 987 2nd Ave. NY, NY 10022.

    1. There’s also a shot they use that’s supposed to be their block and it was 83rd and Penelope in Middle Village, not one mile from the building that is supposed to Spence and Danny’s. Spence and Danny’s external shot is at 62nd drive and Queens Blvd. The external shot they use as Deacon’s is I think right in that area. They use a lot of footage in that area and the Astoria area.

      1. Nicole,
        You are absolutely right the shot used is one of the blocks off Penelope in the lower 80s, except that’s no longer Middle Village, it’s Rego Park. The line between Middle Village and Rego Park is Dry Harbor Road and 80th Street. They’re 3 blocks from Middle Village, but technically live in Rego Park. Deacon lives in the smaller buildings of Lefrak City on Horace Harding Expressway off Penrod Street in Corona, also often confused with Rego Park. There are never shots of them Middle Village. The movies they go to are the like the Trylon and Midway are in Rego Park and Forest Hills, Coopers is in Glendale, opening shots of him on his route are in Jackson Heights. It’s all the heart working class blue collar Queens. This show was as spot on as it could possibly get.
        To try to claim this was shot in California is preposterous. You can’t replicate being an authentic New Yorker and that’s the show real appeal It was a real life show played by real New Yorkers set in New York. Those of us who grew up here and had friends like Spence, Richie, Danny, Deacon, Doug, and Carrie appreciate the opportunity to look at ourselves and have a good laugh.

        1. To try to claim this was shot in California is preposterous?

          All of the indoor scenes for this show were filmed in front of a live audience at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City, California.

          As for the outdoor scenes, those were also shot in and around Los Angeles. That’s quite clear in Season 7, Episode 15 “Deconstructing Carrie.”

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