This is my third post on visiting New York City with children. We’ve been to Central Park, walked the Brooklyn Bridge and the Williamsburg Bridge. It’s time to address the elephant in the room: Times Square. Just as I will shout my love for Central Park from the rooftops, I make little effort to hide my ambivalence about the human zoo that is Times Square. Imagine your town/city on the craziest day of the year and then multiply it times 10. That’s what Times Square feels like with little ones. Our family used to make occasional visits to the Toys R Us. My daughter (yes, my daughter) has an abiding fascination with dinosaurs. We stood in front of that roaring, stomping T Rex countless times. We rode the Ferris Wheel. We bought candy. We were a bit sad to see Toys R Us go. NYC always changes.
Still. Everyone needs to see Times Square, preferably at night. When it’s 9pm and the lights are so bright it might as well be midday, it is pretty impressive.
Most of the big Broadway shows are in this area. I wish I had great words of advice on getting cheap seats. EVERYONE wishes they could find cheap seats, even families that have lived their entire lives here. Make friends in the business, that’s all I can tell you. For everyone else, there’s the TKTS Booth. Standing in line for several hours on the day of the show may not be an option with little kids. If you have older kids, you could probably send them off to M&M World to create a custom bag of candy while a couple of you wait in line.
When our family sees a show, we tend to just bite the bullet and pay. Sometimes that means we’re sitting in the nosebleeds. But, as a New York native once told me, “The only bad seat is not having one.” I like that philosophy!
We’ve seen quite a few shows over the years. We’ve liked most and loved a few. Look. You might not see the hottest show in town at the height of its popularity. But on each stage are some of the best performers in the world, singing and dancing and acting their hearts out. Some shows come together and it’s magical. (The first time I saw Spamalot, I laughed so hard my whole body hurt the next morning. No lie.) Not all shows achieve the heights of “magical” – that’s ok! You will still get to see amazing performances.
A safe bet are the big Disney type shows – The Lion King, Aladdin, The King & I, Mathilda, etc. If I could make a suggestion, though: take a chance on one you’ve never heard of before! Carissa and I knew nothing about a little show called “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.” That show has been one of our all-time favorites – partly because it was hilariously good, and partly because Carissa was pulled up on stage and mocked mercilessly. She took it all in stride. Nothing keeps CC down! My preteen daughter and I attended an Off-Broadway musical starring two people. Two people. Two hours. It was incredible. Seriously, don’t limit yourself to the big shows. In some of the smaller venues, you might sit 20 feet away from the stage with an artist who knocks your socks off.
Do your research for family -appropriate content. We learned that the hard way with The Book of Mormon. 🙂 Here are a few websites to get you started for Off-Broadway shows:
The New Victory Theatre is especially targeted for kids (with age ranges for each show on their website). Some of the shows are as little as $10 per ticket! Showtimes are also earlier in the day.
Our favorite family activity to do near Times Square is something we didn’t discover right away.
It was a big hit with Grandma and Grandpa too!
The Intrepid
If you have a kid interested in planes, space, boats, the military, or science, they’ll love the Intrepid Sea, Air, and Space Museum! See the Space Shuttle, hear from veterans of WWII, go inside a submarine, get up close to fighter planes, all while seeing fantastic views of the city. You could spend a couple of hours to an entire day here, depending on your interest level. Parent’s note: because it’s on the Hudson River, The Intrepid takes a little work to get to. The closest subway stop is quite a distance from the pier. Spring for a cab. Save your energy for the visit itself, rather than on the walk getting there.
In the summer, the Intrepid hosts outdoor movies on the flight deck. For real. Top Gun. Can you imagine watching Top Gun on a flight deck while overlooking Manhattan? Makes me want to listen to some Kenny Loggins. My kids saw Jurassic Park on the Intrepid (I wasn’t exaggerating about the love of dinosaurs). They still talk about it as one of their favorite memories. It will be a late night, and the lines for movie night are long, long, long, so it’s probably best to do with teens. But a fun experience!
There are other options near Times Square: Madame Tussaud’s, Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, & The Discovery Center. We’ve just never been interested- too many other interesting things to pay $35/ticket for. But if you go, and Madam Tussaud’s is the best part of your trip, let me know. I don’t want to rule anything out.
Have fun in this crazy, busy city!
[author] [author_image timthumb=’on’]https://ccandmike.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/headshot-rhesa-1.jpg[/author_image] [author_info]Rhesa currently lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two kids- a high schooler and a middle schooler. For several years the family lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. She drags her kids to a lot of museums. Find her on Twitter or Instagram: @rhesastorms[/author_info] [/author]
