New York City has always been more than just a backdrop for Law & Order — it’s the heartbeat of the series, and for the Season 25 cast, filming in the Big Apple’s iconic streets has been the gift that keeps on giving. 

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Watch Law & Order Thursdays at 8/7c on NBC and next day on Peacock. 

Amid Law & Order’s milestone season, NBC Insider spoke with the stars making up Season 25’s lineup of steadfast prosecutors — Tony Goldwyn, Odelya Halevi, and Hugh Dancy — and they were all excited about jumping back into the courtroom grind. Between thrilling courtroom showdowns, the stars opened up about the joys of filming on location in New York City, which can be jam-packed with just as many twists and turns as a typical Law & Order episode. Many Law & Order stars call NYC their home, and Dancy couldn’t be more grateful to be part of a series that’s woven the city into its primetime identity.

“It’s a great luxury to be able to work in the place that you call home. And especially on a show that is so intrinsically New York, right?” Dancy told NBC Insider while chatting about A.D.A. Nolan Price‘s return. “It’s a part of the DNA of the city, and in turn, the city is part of the DNA of the show. So it feels great.”

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Halevi, who’s played A.D.A. Samantha Maroun since 2022, echoed Dancy’s sentiment, telling NBC Insider that New York City has become “another character” in the long-running series.

“If you could smell the smells of the city,” Dancy joked, giving fans a humorous mental image. 

The Law & Order lawyers dish details about filming in New York City

Dancy added that New Yorkers can be quite blasé toward the Law & Order cast and crew. The city has been the locale of 35 years of courtroom drama, so spotting one of the TV detectives on the street isn’t the most shocking of headlines. Halevi opened up about the varying reactions the cast gets from local passersby and visiting tourists when they catch them filming on the streets of the Big Apple.

“There would be the people who don’t care. They’re on their phone, and they’ll just pass through your shot,” Halevi revealed. “And then, you’ll get the fans who are visiting New York, and all of a sudden, ‘Oh, there’s Law & Order filming here!’ And they’ll take pictures and videos, which just makes you feel good.”

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Now spearheading Law & Order as the passionate Manhattan District Attorney Nicholas Baxter, Goldwyn couldn’t agree more with Dancy and Halevi’s appreciation for the show’s filming locale. As a prolific television producer and cameo director of a Law & Order episode, Goldwyn told NBC Insider, “There’s no better city to shoot in than New York.”

“It’s just such a great place,” Goldwyn continued, reminiscing about an unforgettable reshoot the cast completed for the Season 25 premiere. “I mean, the other night when we did that reshoot for the first episode. At night, showing up on the East River with this incredible view of downtown Manhattan and the Brooklyn Bridge, and it’s just like ‘Wow.’ What a cool place to come to work.”

The prosecutors and detectives have opposite NYC filming experiences

A fascinating behind-the-scenes fact about Law & Order is that the prosecutors and detectives have completely different experiences filming these nail-biting episodes. While Detective Vincent Riley (Reid Scott) can be spotted investigating bloody murder scenes, A.D.A. Nolan Price spends most of his time in the courtroom.

“It’s funny, I was talking to Reid in the car about this the other day,” Dancy told NBC Insider in an April 2025 interview. “And this is not my experience, but they say that now when they drive around New York, they’re like, ‘Oh yep, found a body there’… ‘Yep, yep, we found another body there.’ That’s their experience of New York.”

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The same can’t be said for Dancy — Price typically only arrives after a successful arrest has been made. As a member of the Order side of the franchise, Dancy has vastly different associations with New York City. “That is not my experience because I, by and large, don’t find bodies,” Dancy teased. 

Still, Scott has had his fair share of breathtaking moments while filming Law & Order. During a 2025 interview with NBC Insider, Scott revealed that one of his favorite parts of playing Detective Vincent Riley is filming late-night crime scenes.

“Usually we shoot [crime scenes] at night, which tend to be on a Friday, generally, ’cause we’re sort of shooting later and later as the week goes by,” Scott told NBC Insider. “There’s a certain energy. And especially this time of year, in the city, when the weather’s great and you could be outside in the elements. You’re so happy to be shooting in New York in the fall… I get a huge charge out of those.”

Watch Law & Order on Thursdays at 8/7c on NBC and the next day on Peacock. 

Reporting by Stephanie Gomulka