Throughout the show’s four seasons, Only Murders in the Building fans have come to know the Arconia, the fictional building where Charles-Haden Savage (Steve Martin), Oliver Putnam (Martin Short) and Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez) reside, as a sort of fourth main character. And though last season of the Hulu whodunnit saw our beloved podcasters spending some time in Los Angeles, their NYC building remained the trio’s home base—there’d be no show without it. As such, we expect the titular structure to remain at the heart of season five, which begins its rollout tomorrow with a three-episode drop. Before you settle in to watch the latest installment, here’s everything you need to know about the Arconia and the real-life building used as its exterior.
The Arconia and The Belnord
The fictional Arconia is a prewar, entire-block apartment building on New York City’s Upper West Side. It draws inspiration from real buildings in the neighborhood, like the Apthorp, the Dakota (where John Lennon was shot and where Rosemary’s Baby is set), and the Belnord—which lends its exterior as a filming location for Only Murders in the Building.
While the Arconia was canonically designed by architect Archibald Carter, the Belnord was originally constructed in 1908 by architectural firm Hiss and Weekes. The 225 West 86th Street complex initially had 175 apartments, increasing to 225 in the 1940s, with a final bump to 231 flats during its most recent redesign by Robert A.M. Stern Architects in 2018. The condos overlook an interior courtyard—which at the time of construction was the largest interior courtyard in the world and remains one of the largest in New York City today—featuring landscaped gardens and fountains. Everyone from Martha Stewart to Lee Strasberg, Marilyn Monroe’s acting coach whom she would visit there, have called the Belnord home. No doubt they would be ripe podcast subjects if OliMabel (the triptych’s group name, according to Oliver, who claims “the Charles is silent.”) had encountered the blonde bombshell.
“A season-two storyline revealed the secret passageways, a passion of the fictitious architect, that gave viewers even more insight and perspective to our characters,” production designer Patrick Howe told AD during a set tour. And though we doubt any passages in the real-life building played host to the sort of shenanigans seen on the show, The Belnord’s director of sales at Douglas Elliman, Maya Kadouri, revealed to Thrillist that it does indeed have some.
Will we see the Arconia in season five?
Fans will recall that the notoriously starry cast got the Hollywood treatment last season; movie executives wanted to adapt the central trio’s podcast for the screen. Producers booked Eva Longoria as jaded millennial Mabel (“The age gap between you and the guys…was creepy”) and Zach Galifianakis—or “Galifragalistic,” as he’s nicknamed—as Oliver. The casting choice that made the most sense was Eugene Levy as Charles. (It’s the glasses.) The high maintenance actors, all playing versions of themselves, shadowed the sleuths and inevitably caused more problems for them as they left the Arconia behind to sojourn to sunny Los Angeles—where last season’s victim, Charles’s stunt double Sazz (Jane Lynch), was based before succumbing to a bullet. However, the show never stays away from home for too long, and season four quickly returned to the scene of the crime at Charles’s apartment in the Arconia.
Thankfully, we Arconiacs can expect a similar treatment for the new season—no matter where the mysteries and hijinks take Charles, Mabel, and Oliver, we know that they will always end up back at the Arconia. “Creatively, for the writing team and myself, the wealth of amenities and elevated style provides unlimited inspiration and opportunities for stories to unfold within the building,” Howe said. “The vast scale of the building provides endless source material for writers and viewers alike to continue to investigate and solve crimes together.” In addition to more deeply exploring the Arconia, the three will be uncovering more secrets around the Big Apple at large this season, as “their investigation plunges them into the shadowy corners of New York,” per a Hulu press release. Fans can expect to see them discovering “a deeper divide between their storied city they thought they knew and the new New York evolving around them” in the process.
So what new details and new tenants will be revealed? No matter what, it’s certainly going to be star-studded. This season welcomes Christoph Waltz, Logan Lerman, Beanie Feldstein, Keegan-Michael Key, and Renée Zellweger as guest stars, with Meryl Streep, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Richard Kind, Nathan Lane, Bobby Cannavale, and more reprising their roles from past seasons.
With its floor-through dwellings, celebrity penthouse, secret passageways, and camaraderie (begrudging or otherwise) between residents both longtime and new, the Arconia is a world within itself.
