Manhattan's Textile Building was used as the exterior shot for Gimbels in the movie, according to the IMDb page for "Elf." CGI was used to transform the building's facade into a Christmas wonderland for the film, its IMDb page says.
Principal photography began on December 9, 2002, and wrapped on March 7, 2003. Filming took place in New York City, as well as in Vancouver and at Riverview Hospital in Coquitlam, British Columbia. The film makes heavy use of forced perspective to exaggerate the size of Buddy compared to all the other elves.
However, it's worth noting that 2003, when the film was made, there wasn't a coffee shop at 20 East Hastings Street. Instead, the location was home to a long-standing seafood restaurant, The Only Sea Food.
8. Macy's doubles as the film's department store, Gimbel's. Anyone who has been to New York would immediately recognise Macy's, but the iconic department store was renamed Gimbel's in Elf. Gimbel's is a now-defunct rival to Macy's and the store actually featured in the original Miracle On 34th Street film, back in 1947 ...
Gimbels was acquired in 1972 and its remaining stores shuttered in 1986, with the Herald Square flagship sold and later converted into what's now the Manhattan Mall.
So that actually was the fun part of doing the role. Was the sidewalk gum pre-cleaned for you? WF: No, we didn't have a big enough budget, so I actually had to eat old New York City gum. But it wasn't as bad as you would think, still relatively favorable.
I was only 21 when I made that movie. I remember sitting—I was at my parents' house because I basically just dropped out of college to be an actor—and I remember sitting at my parents' house reading that script and laughing out loud. Since then, I've seen that that's a good sign." Deschanel said.
Although Jim Carrey didn't end up in this film you probably recognise him as playing The Grinch. An actor called Chris Farley was also asked to play Buddy but the writer of Elf didn't think he was a good fit. It took years before they found the perfect Buddy.
Elf was Will Ferrell's second box office hit. He reportedly received a whopping salary of $17 million for that film alone, more on par with what his talents would dictate in the mid-2000s. He was allegedly offered $29 million to act in an Elf sequel, but couldn't get his heart into it, so he turned it down.
– The outdoor scenes shot in New York City feature real people so many of the reactions you see are genuine! – In fact, several minor traffic accidents occurred when Will Ferrell walked through the Lincoln Tunnel in his costume, because people were so surprised and distracted to see a grown man wearing an elf outfit.
Macy's, however, didn't like the idea of being associated with an “imposter” Santa Claus, according to Favreau. So if “Elf” wanted to film at the Santaland in Macy's, or even mention Macy's in the movie, the scene had to go. “We had to think long and hard about it,” Favreau told Rolling Stone in 2013.
These scenes were filmed in early December 2002, so New York was already looking festive. There is an unforgettable scene of Ferrell's character, after arriving in the city, spotting a man with a white beard wearing a red jogging suit, and calling him Santa.
Walter, a selfish workaholic who seems to care about nothing other than making money, works as the Executive Vice President of Greenway Press, a children's book publishing firm in New York City's Empire State Building. However, he stopped being selfish at the end of the movie.
The prop was purchased by Elf fan Mark Bozek, an entrepreneur on New York's Long Island, who snagged the sleigh at an online auction 20 years ago for $12,000 following a bidding war. It was quite a jump up from his original bid of $500.
Buddy proudly shows Jovie a large Christmas tree that he recently discovered at 1221 Sixth Avenue. As they stare at the tree in the W 49th Street lobby, Jovie tells Buddy that she knows of a bigger tree she'd like to show him.
Eventually Jovie and Buddy got married, and they spent many Christmases together. They had a baby girl whom they name Susie. Jovie, Buddy and Susie visited the North Pole. There, Jovie met Papa Elf.
James Caan was a true delight. My favorite memory of him was shooting part of a montage for the end of Elf and he started playing piano — he played beautifully — I sang and he played and I was just astonished by his talent!
“I would have had to promote the movie from an honest place, which would've been, like, 'Oh no, it's not good. I just couldn't turn down that much money,'” Ferrell said. “And I thought, 'Can I actually say those words? I don't think I can, so I guess I can't do the movie.
I put him in those situations and he had to improvise and stay in character while dealing with people who, for the most part, didn't even know they were in a movie."
This actually makes Buddy a fair amount younger than Will Ferrell himself, who was 35 years old at the time of Elf's filming, and 36 when the movie was released to theaters.
Deciding that Gimbels was a marginal performer with little potential for increased profitability, BATUS in 1986 decided to close its Gimbels division and sell its store properties.
As Favreau revealed to ABC News, the Elf team asked Macy's if they could use the store for the movie, but Macy's declined. He told the publication: "Because we're using a Santa, of course, everybody thinks Macy's. "But Macy's didn't like the idea that there was a fake Santa working there.
