u/thenygroove

"Tribeca Film Festival" often conjures thoughts of bougie thousand-dollar movie passes or famous people schmoozing at The Odeon. But after exploring the last few years, New York Groove contributor Valerie Askinazi is happy to share that the Tribeca Festival (as it’s now officially known) can also be fun for local New Yorkers. She put together a guide on hacking the fest for first-timers. Some highlights:

• Free events: There will be free outdoor screenings of previous Tribeca favorites like Jiro Dreams of Sushi and high-fashion documentary Dior and I next to the Vessel in Hudson Yards. 
• Weekday matinee pass: This is $100 + $10 fee, so $110 total. A matinee movie costs $16 + $4 fee, so the pass is worth it if you plan to see at least six movies.
• Rush tickets: Tribeca reserves a certain number of seats at each showing for unlimited pass-holders (people who can go to whatever films they want without reserving tickets beforehand). There’s a good chance that not all seats are filled and that tickets will be sold to the rush line.

She also put together her picks for this year's fest, including:

• Mario, a documentary on Mario Cuomo, and New York in the 1980s.
• The Last Play at Shea (free), a 2010 documentary about Billy Joel’s final shows at Shea Stadium before it was demolished.
• Doc Meets World, a documentary for fans of the ‘90s TV show Boy Meets World.
• Never Change, a comedy about returning to high-school in your 30s (with a local cast, including the great Jo Firestone).

Check out the whole guide here if you've never tried the festival before, and let us know if you have other picks we missed.

For 44 years now Madison Square Garden has been exempted from paying property taxes to New York City. The arena has been the only sports venue in the city that’s able to skip out on the bill since 1982 thanks to a poorly thought-out bit of panic legislating last century, despite the fact that it sits on ludicrously valuable land smack dab in the middle of Manhattan on top of a thriving mass transit network that makes it easy to get to and from games and concerts. 

A 2023 report from the city’s Independent Budget Office put the total amount of unrealized tax revenue from MSG at a staggering $946.7 million between 1984 and 2023, and estimates from the city Department of Finance since the report came out push that number over $1 billion in total. Since 2015, the city has been losing out on over $40 million per year in property taxes.

Is it time to change the exemption finally? Knicks fan Dave Colon. makes the case here.