“Flying Lessons” follows long-time Lower East Side (LES) resident Philly — known by her stage name Philly Abe — as she fights against gentrification. 

Often described as the queen of the LES, Abe has been a key member of the downtown NYC art scene since she first moved to the city in 1983. She spent two decades as the muse of Todd Verow, an avant garde film director also based in the city. The majority of the movie is spent in her cramped apartment with her art hung up on cracked walls. It’s no McMansion, but she is fiercely protective over it. Especially as her landlord guts the apartments of her former fellow tenants, renting them out for exponentially larger expenses. 

The LES used to be full of stories: life, drugs, parties and raging against the machine. Now this is the only one, the fight to stay from the people those stories belong to. The neighborhood exists as a ghost of its former self, slowly filling up with Whole Foods Markets and high-rise apartments. I know this story better than most, having been born and raised in the LES, and in turn having dealt with tenant harassment all my life. 

My father first moved into his apartment on First Street and First Avenue in 1977, paying $125 a month in rent. When I was born 30 years later, he was our landlord’s biggest nightmare — the tenant of a rent-controlled apartment. So, I have always been privy to the fact that while landlords often seem useless, in the East Village they are often absolutely cunning. 

If they don’t want to buy you out, which is usually their first tactic, they can ignore maintenance issues, over or under heat the apartment, take you to court over trivial disagreements and more. The targets of these attacks are primarily older residents with rent-stabilized apartments, which means their rent can’t be hiked to the exorbitant prices landlords have become greedy for. 

The antagonist for the greater part of the movie is Steve Croman, an infamous New York City landlord and fraudster who has been wreaking havoc on the East Village since the 1990s. In fact, in 1998 he was named in The Village Voice’s list of The City’s Top Ten Worst Landlords. I knew him in childhood by the nickname my father not-so-affectionately gave him, “rat bastard Mr. Conman.” 

Abe attends meetings with her fellow tenants where they organize protests to fight against Croman for their right to stay. This is where she meets her downstairs neighbor, Director of “Flying Lessons” Elizabeth Nichols. Originally, Nichols was filming tennant meetings to tell the story of harassment by landlords in her neighborhood, but when she saw Abe, she was immediately drawn to her. From there, Nichols continues telling the story of the Lower East Side from Abe’s perspective. 

Around halfway through the movie, the tenants win. Decades of filing complaints and organizing protests culminates in a massive civil case against Croman brought forward by New York state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. Croman is charged with 20 felonies including falsifying business records and scheming to defraud, effectively ending his career as a landlord. And yet the film continues, hit with another plot twist; Abe has cancer, and doesn’t have long left to live. 

At first, I felt like the film had lost its footing, suddenly switching to an entirely new struggle. However, the way Nichols frames Abe’s final months makes it achingly clear that this is still the same fight: the fight to stay. There are many tears shed over relived memories, being changed by a warped neighborhood and not loving art the same way she used to. 

The film ends under no false pretenses, with no saving grace. Abe passes away, and the words flash across the screen; her apartment was gutted and is now being rented out for over $8,000 a month. Unfortunately, there couldn’t have been an ending more accurate to the struggle of LES natives.

My 75-year-old father gave up fighting his landlord’s abuse two years ago and moved uptown. I can’t even pretend it’s better for him; the men at the local deli don’t know his name like they did downtown and a bagel costs ten bucks. 

Still, Nichols concludes Abe’s story with the same perspective I had at 16, moving away from my childhood home. In showing an exhibition of Abe’s art, intertwined with shots of the city and clips from the films she used to make with Verow, the message is made clear. Philly Abe may be gone, but the art and history she created in the time she got to live there will live forever. 

Edited by Alex Goldstein and Alyssa Royston | agoldstein@themaneater.com and aroyston@themaneater.com

Copy edited by Grace Knight | gknight@themaneater.com

Edited by Scout Hudson | shudson@themaneater.com