TV Characters Ranked by How Affordable Their Apartments Are – TheWrap

Television has provided unrealistic standards of lifes many truths for as long as its existed from being able to hang out in a coffee shop during the work day to going on thousands of dates in a single year. But one of the most bothersome standards TV has warped audiences into thinking is what kind of apartment New Yorkers today can realistically afford.

Millions of residents live in the five boroughs, and more people move there every day with dreams of getting a 212 area code and a mailing address in the big city. If only they knew what they were actually in for. The 15 TV characters ranked below lease or own apartments that have become characters in and of themselves, leading New York natives and newbies alike to think they can afford an apartment like Monica Gellers from Friends or Hannah Horvaths from Girls. So, exactly how fictional are these fictional TV apartments?

TheWrap has ranked the most realistic contemporary TV apartments to the least realistic apartments, featuring favorites like billionaire Logan Roys penthouse abode in Succession to TV writer and producer Liz Lemons digs in 30 Rock.

As the most realistic apartment on the list, Logan Roys (Brian Cox) is also the most extravagant and ostentatious. Of course, the Roy family is not your typical family. Theyre regularly shown taking helicopters or private jets to their various homes around the world, including Season 3s Italian villa. The Roys simply exude wealth. Therefore, the patriarchs main home, a luxurious Manhattan penthouse, is the most realistic home based strictly on who Logan is. As a billionaire media mogul, having a$23 million Manhattan penthouseis just a rite of passage.

Contrary to what her co-workers might think, Ilana Wexler (Ilana Glazer) does technically work. Picking up a paycheck from various odd jobs and side gigs be that it babysitting gigs, a Deals! sales associate or cleaning strangers homes Ilana does live within her means. A Gowanus, Brooklyn, resident with a roommate, Ilana lives in one of the most reasonable units on this list. Its a bit cramped, slightly messy and theres limited space for more than two people in the living room.

Charlotte Yorks (Kristin Davis) apartment is realistic by New York standards because, well, she won it in her divorce. The Park Avenue penthouse has become a staple in the Sex and the City world, and its thanks to Charlottes Season 3 arc where the former art gallery curator marriedand divorced the old-moneyed cardiologist Trey MacDougal (Kyle MacLachlan). Trey gifts Charlotte the apartment after their divorce since he was unable to give her the family shes always dreamed of. Charlotte makes the apartment her home throughout the series, the films and the And Just Like That reboot.

Will Truman (Eric McCormack) is a corporate lawyer who lives on the Upper West Side. His home because the main locale for he and his friends Grace Adler (Debra Messing), JackMcFarland (Sean Hayes) and Karen Walker (Megan Mullaly) to come for breakfast, a night in or even a prolonged stay. Wills two-bedroom apartment is one of the more lavish apartments on this list, but it still remains realistic for the era, location and characters profession.

Formerly a father living in the suburbs, Don Draper (Jon Hamm) and his new wife Megan (Jessica Par) move to an apartment on Park Avenue in New York City. As an advertising Creative Director and Junior Partner of Sterling Cooper & Partners, Don could shell out a few more dollars on a beautiful Manhattan apartment, but since the shows conclusion, NYC real estate agents have revealed Don really couldnt live in the magnificent mid-century apartment today.

Gossip Girl may be a New Yorkset series that mostly takes place on the Upper East Side, but it detoured to Brooklyn with the Humphrey family. Located in Brooklyns DUMBO neighborhood, Dans (Penn Badgley) family loft requires a slight stretching of the imagination. Dan and Jenny (Taylor Momsen) reside in the three-bedroom unit with their father Rufus (Matthew Settle), a former musician and current gallery owner. While the spacious apartment wasnt as luxurious as Serena van der Woodsens (Blake Lively) or Blair Waldorfs (Leighton Meester) on the Upper East Side, its location and size did leave some viewers wondering if a divorced dad could afford it while taking care of two teenagers. But the Humphreys home mostly did make sense, given the success of their fathers former and present careers.

As a former writer for Saturday Night Live, Tina Fey brought some realism to 30 Rock and her character Liz Lemon. While the entertainment industry sitcom rolls out some of the most outrageous plot lines, Lizs apartment is one of the few elements that teeters on the edge of realism. Like many of the characters on this list, she lives on the Upper West Side, providing a realistic neighborhood for the comedy writer. But when Season 4 features Liz buying the unit above to her current place, thats when the line of the characters finances becomes a bit blurry.

Jerrys apartment in Seinfeld also teeters on the edge of realism. As a successful stand-up comedian, the reality of Jerry Seinfelds life behind the camera seemed to slip into the fictional world of Seinfeld. The character isnt quite starving-artist material, but even as a semi-famous comedian on-the-rise, performers at that level typically live in quainter spaces before making it big. Then again, if Kramer could live there, Jerry could definitely swing it.

New York City OB-GYN Mindy Lahiri (Mindy Kaling) lived in one of the most colorful sitcom apartments in television history. And as colorful as Mindys apartment was matches its lack of realism. The one-bedroom apartment in a Manhattan Brownstone has both a walk-in closet and a staircase that leads to another unit. Kaling knowingly created an unrealistic bachelorette pad, and provides cheeky quips about the unreasonable NYC housing market early on in the series. By further introducing the apartments of other characters, including Danny Castellano (Chris Messina) and Jody Kimball-Kinney (Garret Dillahunt), the rom-com sitcom provides a picture-perfect world of expansive and well-decorated lower-Manhattan homes.

Yes, rent-controlled apartments are the caveat to some of these units, but Oliver Putnam (Martin Short) seems unable to make his monthly payments at the Arconia. The amateur detective (and retired theater director) has lived on the Upper West Side for decades; however, hes positioned himself as a bit of a late-stage struggling artist. The theater director has failed to helm a successful production, despite repeatedly receiving investments from his neighbors, including Teddy Dimas (Nathan Lane). While Charles-Haden Savage (Steve Martin) starred on a successful network TV show and Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez) resides in her late Aunts home, Olivers place in the Arconia is constantly put up for questioning even facilitating a possible criminal motive in Season 2.

Ted Mosby (Josh Randor) is an architect-turned-professor who lives on the Upper West Side for the duration of the How I Met Your Mother series run. Teds apartment has a rotating door, with the main characters, Marshall Eriksen (Jason Segel), Lily Aldrin (Alyson Hannigan), and Robin Scherbatsky (Cobie Smulders) consistently occupying the two-bedroom unit. With roommates, Ted could possibly swing the rent, but given his roommates rocky employment histories, it doesnt seem as likely. Teds apartment was large enough to house a telephone booth, entertain a fencing duel and to host many, many parties. How I Met Your Mother fueled young 20-somethings moving to the big city with very unrealistic expectations for what their first apartment might look like but the latest spin-off How I Met Your Father definitely nails the realistic aspect of NYC living.

Fans and savvy NYC residents have long refuted the plausibility of Carrie Bradshaws (Sarah Jessica Parker) Upper East Side apartment. As one of the only characters to actually name the price of her rent (around $700), its extremely unlikely shed have found a space to live alone in that neighborhood for that price, even when considering rent-controlled opportunities.

Venturing back to Brooklyn, Hannah Horvaths (Lena Dunham) two-bedroom apartment in Greenpoint, which she shares with Marnie Michaels (Allison Williams),stands as another writer living in a completely unrealistic apartment given the location, era and character. Hannah is very open about her finances and is willing to admit when she hits financial struggles which makes Hannahs fictional Brooklyn fantasy utopia is just that: a fantasy. Contradicting the fantasy of Hannah and Marnies shared apartment, Marnies Chinatown stbox studio poses as the most realistic home on the HBO series.

Yes, technically, Monica Geller (Courtney Cox) from Friends inherited her iconic, rent-controlled apartment from her grandmother but even so, the unit stands as one of the most famous unrealistic homes across film and TV. Monica was a line cook, then unemployed, then founder of a short-lived catering company, and eventually a chef. But she still managed to live comfortably in a massive NYC apartment in a trendy downtown neighborhood. The Greenwich Village space boasts two large bedrooms and a huge living room and joint kitchen; who watched Friends and didnt dream of jumping onto Monicas lease?

Although the cult-comedy Search Party is a satire, the absurdity of the show doesnt stop with the characters or the storylines and of course extends into the main characters homes. More specifically, unemployed scam artist Elliott Goss (John Early) who lives in Brooklyn near his old college friends Dory Sief (Alia Shawkat), Portia Davenport (Meredith Hagner) and Drew Gardner (John Reynolds). Even while professing that he doesnt enjoy working, Elliott has a number of on-again, off-again jobs through the series five seasons. He begins Search Party as the founder of a charity called Water Bottles for Africa, then he receives a book deal, then he becomes a right-wing news pundit but hes never able to stay with this gigs and actually build a career. Therefore, spending frivolously with no consistent paychecks and living in an enormous Brooklyn apartment with a staircase and enough room for Portia, Drew or Dory to stay over as-needed is one of the least plausible housing scenarios in television today.

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TV Characters Ranked by How Affordable Their Apartments Are - TheWrap