No, the apartment building doesn’t match the inside from the outside, and that’s fine.

“What always upset me was that they were in a hurry to film and found this picture of a building in New York with arched windows on the top floor,” says Shaffner. “And that’s why I always explain it like this, well, their apartment was in the back. And they were lucky because they were on a floor that had only two apartments.”

Although Monica’s apartment was bigger, purple, and had a balcony and bricks in the kitchen, the apartments were designed to look like they might be in the same building. The moldings, all based on Shaffner’s real New York apartment, all go together and have similar floor plans.

Shaffner was also accused of giving the apartment a balcony and window that New York didn’t have.