NYC - West Village: Riviera Cafe & Sports Bar

A Greenwich Village institution since 1969, the Riviera Café was a popular hipster hangout throughout the 70's. It was here that Lou Reed kicked John Cale out of Velvet Underground.

These days, it functions as an unpretentious sports bar and has achieved notoriety as "Landsdowne on the Hudson," catching on as a magnet for expatriates from New England for Manhattan's biggest Boston Red Sox bar. When the city of Boston banned filming on the streets outside Fenway Park during the World Series after an unfortunate incident during the ALCS, MLB Video and FOX Sports used the Riviera as a stand-in for all its obligatory "local" sports bar shots.