Brighton Beach is an oceanside neighborhood in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. As of 2000 it has a population of 75,692 with a total of 31,228 households.
Culture
Brighton Beach was dubbed "Little Odessa" by the local populace long ago, due to many of its residents having come from Odessa, a city of Ukraine. In 2006, Alec Brook-Krasny was elected for the 46th District of the New York State Assembly, the first elected Soviet-born Jewish politician from Brighton Beach.
Brighton Beach is home to many other ethnic groups. On Brighton 7th Street and Neptune Avenue, there is a mosque where Muslims (mostly from Pakistan and Bangladesh) pray, and another between Brighton 8th Street and Banner Avenue known as Al-Arqam. Nearby areas are sometimes called "Pakistani Brighton". There are numerous Polish, Russian, Armenian, Turkish and Georgian residents, but relatively few Italian-Americans or African-Americans remaining. There are also some Korean markets, but for the most part their owners do not reside in the neighborhood. Notable past residents include talk-show host Larry King and current General Bancorp President Adnan Mohammad.
Brighton Beach is replete with restaurants, food stores, cafes, boutiques, banks, etc., located primarily along Brighton Beach Avenue and its cross streets. The neighborhood has a distinctively ethnic feel, akin to Manhattan's Chinatown. The proximity of Brighton Beach to the city's beaches (Brighton Beach Avenue runs parallel to the Coney Island beach area and the Boardwalk) and the fact that the neighborhood is directly served by the Brighton Beach Avenue subway station, makes it a popular summer weekend destination for thousands of New York City residents.
Transportation
Car
Major roadways in Brighton Beach are the Belt Parkway, Coney Island Avenue and Ocean Parkway.
Subway
The Brighton Beach and Ocean Parkway stations of the New York City Subway serve the neighborhood. Both stations are located on an elevated structure over Brighton Beach Avenue. Trains are the Q for local service and the B for weekday express service. If the first phase of the Second Avenue subway is completed, the Q train service will be extended up the east side of Manhattan.
Bus
MTA New York City Transit provides the community with express and local bus stops. Brighton Beach is serviced by buses 1, 4, 36, 49, and 68.
Location
Brighton Beach is bounded by Coney Island at Ocean Parkway to the west, affluent Manhattan Beach at Corbin Place to the east, Gravesend at the Belt Parkway to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the south (at the Riegelmann Boardwalk/beachfront). It is patrolled by the NYPD's 60th Precinct.
History
Brighton Beach was developed by William A. Engeman as a beach resort in 1868, and was named by Henry C. Murphy and a group of businessmen in an 1878 contest; the winning name evoked the resort of Brighton, England.
The centerpiece of the resort was the large Hotel Brighton (or Brighton Beach Hotel), placed on the beach at what is now the foot of Coney Island Avenue and accessed by the Brooklyn, Flatbush, and Coney Island Railway, later known as the BMT Brighton Line, which opened on July 2, 1878. After a series of winter storms threatened to swamp the hotel, an audacious plan was developed to move the 5,000 ton hotel in one piece 520 feet further inland by placing railroad track and 112 railroad flat cars under the raised 460 ft. by 130 ft. building and using six steam locomotives to pull it away from the sea. Engineered by B.C. Miller the move was begun on April 2, 1888 and continued for the next nine days, being the largest building move of the 19th century.
Adjacent to the hotel, Engeman built the Brighton Beach Race Course for Thoroughbred horse racing. The village was annexed into the 31st Ward of the City of Brooklyn in 1894.
Brighton Beach was re-developed as a fairly dense residential community with the final rebuilding of the Brighton Beach railway into a modern rapid transit line of the New York City Subway system c. 1920. The subway system in the neighborhood is above ground on an elevated structure (the "El").
The years just before and following The Great Depression brought with them a neighborhood consisting mostly of first and second generation Jewish-Americans and, later, a number of concentration camp survivors. Notable establishments included Diamond's (a small clothing store owned by the parents of Neil Diamond), Irving's Deli, Mrs. Stahl's Knishes and The Famous, a kosher restaurant. The summer would bring the crowds, and many world renowned celebrities, to the Brighton Beach Baths (Private Beach Club) and the surrounding public beaches.
In popular culture
The Neil Simon play, Brighton Beach Memoirs, which won two Tony awards in 1983, and its subsequent film adaptation, are both set against the backdrop of Brighton Beach in 1937.
The 1994 film Little Odessa is set in Brighton Beach.
In Darren Aronofsky's 2000 film, Requiem for a Dream, the character Sara Goldfarb (played by Ellen Burstyn) lives in an apartment on Brighton 6th Street.
In the film Lord of War, the main character, Yuri Orlov, played by Nicolas Cage, lives in Brighton Beach.
In the 2007 crime drama, We Own the Night, the character Bobby Green, played by Joaquin Phoenix, is the manager of a nightclub in Brighton Beach.
In the 2009 film Two Lovers, featuring Joaquin Phoenix and Gwyneth Paltrow, the action takes place in Brighton Beach.
Brighton Beach is also featured in the 1990s Russian spy-comedy Weather Is Good on Deribasovskaya, It Rains Again on Brighton Beach.
In the Russian crime film Brother 2, Danila, the protagonist, comes to Brighton Beach from Russia.
In the 1998 novel In Every Laugh a Tear by Lesléa Newman, developments take place partly in Brighton Beach.
In the 1998 trading autobiography The Education of a Speculator, speculator and hedge fund manager Victor Niederhoffer takes us back to his childhood in Brighton Beach during the 1950s.
In the 2000 novel Vector by Robin Cook, disillusioned former Russian biochemical worker Yuri Davydov develops weapons-grade Anthrax in the basement of his Brighton Beach home.
Brighton Beach is where Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character Neil McCormick was taken to be beaten and raped in the 2004 film, Mysterious Skin.
In the 2008 video game Grand Theft Auto IV, Brighton Beach is represented by the neighborhood of "Hove Beach". This is in reference to Brighton, England's proximity to, and relationship with, neighboring Hove. The two, having city status, are officially known as Brighton and Hove.
In the songs "Xero Tolerance" and "Hey Pete" by Type O Negative, Brighton Beach is mentioned as the place where Pete is going to kill his cheating girlfriend. The D-train is his means of transportation in these songs. The full title of the band's faux-live album on which these songs appear is "The Origin Of The Feces - Not Live At Brighton Beach".
In the video game, XIII, Brighton Beach is one of the first settings of the game's complex plotline.
The French electronic music group Telepopmusik has a song on their album Angel Milk entitled "Brighton Beach".
In the space flight simulator Orbiter, there is a fictional base on the moon named Brighton Beach.
On the TV series The West Wing, Toby Ziegler (Richard Schiff) hails from Brighton Beach.
On the TV series Bored to Death, unlicensed private detective Jonathan Ames investigates a case based at a Russian nightclub in Brighton Beach.
A Lifetime reality TV show called Brighton Beach Show, documenting the lives of young Russian-Americans sharing a house and a group of Brighton Beach housewives spending time in a popular Russian nightclub, probably Rasputin Restaurant, is in the works for the Spring of 2011.
In an episode of the CBS hit drama Blue Bloods, airing on January 26, 2011, the storyline revolves around the murder of a Russian Mob associate who lived in Brighton Beach. Several scenes are shot on and around the boardwalk.
In Haley Tanner's debut novel "Vaclav and Lena" (2011) action takes place in Brighton Beach
Brighton Beach is mentioned:
In a Rilo Kiley song "Close Call", in which the lyrics "She was born on a Brighton pier to a gypsy mother and a bucket of tears..." are sung.
In a Little Brazil song "Brighton Beach", in which the lyrics, "I first met her Brighton Beach back in 1973..." are sung.
In two songs on gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello's album Multi Kontra Culti vs. Irony: "Smarkatch" and "Let's Get Radical".
In the 2002 film 25th Hour during Edward Norton's rant about New York City.
In the German soap opera Verbotene Liebe (Forbidden Love), when Christian Mann and Oliver Sabel return to Düsseldorf from New York. Christian claims to have learned a new recipe while in "Little Odessa.
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