LA and NYC

Los Angeles, the city Will Smith makes his temporary home. Also LA is the rival city of New York City which Jay Gatsby makes his temporary home. What makes these comparisons even greater than they originally were is that these cities are so similar in structure with having multiple social districts. We see the home of Will Smith in Bel Air being the home of the young rich and Jay Gatsby being from West Egg, the home of New York’s young rich. These two locations serve as the main staging areas for the characters lives in their stories. Along with that we have New York’s Valley of Ashes which can be compared to Los Angeles’s Compton. The only big difference in these is that no one makes it out of the Valley of Ashes where as in Compton there were the rare few who were able to climb out of the pit. The East Egg comparison is a bit more vague because it would Beverly Hills, but we do not see any major characters come from their in The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. The city of LA and NYC themselves serve as the mixing pot for these places. Other than Jazz’s visits Will’s house that always end in him being thrown out by Uncle Phil, we never see character from either city mix into places other than the main city areas. One example is Tom and Myrtle, who would always meet up and hook up in New York City, but never at one or the others home. Gatsby, Tom, Nick, and Daisy all start at Tom’s house, but shortly after go into New York. As for Will and company, they are always seen together at school or the mall in the LA and rarely is it more than just family at the Banks house.