Sam Waterston on his favorite NYC ‘Law & Order’ moments

Sam Waterston spent 16 seasons playing assistant district attorney Jack McCoy on “Law & Order,” and has been performing at Central Park’s Delacorte Theater — where he’ll star in Shakespeare in the Park’s “The Tempest” from May 27 to July 5 — for more than 50 years.

As such, Waterston, who splits his time between the Upper West Side and Connecticut, has evolved from celebrity to New York institution. “People just call me ‘Law & Order,’ ” says the 74-year-old. “ ‘Hey, Law & Order.’ It’s one of the great pleasures that remains from having done that show. People still regard me as if I belong to them. I feel like a mascot of the city.”

From 1994-2010, Waterston filmed the television show all over the city and has fond memories of favorite locations. This is his “Law & Order” New York.

1. Tweed Courthouse

52 Chambers St., between Broadway and Lafayette Street

“For a long time it wasn’t occupied by anyone, or only partly occupied by offices on some floors, and there was a huge courtroom there where we shot for probably the first half of the time I was on ‘Law & Order.’ It could get hellishly hot there because the air conditioning was practically nonexistent. The building was almost a shell. It was in the Downtown area where all the courts were, and it gave you a feeling of the reality behind the show. [Later] they built a replica at Chelsea Piers, and we shot in the replica thereafter.”

2. Surrogate’s Courthouse

31 Chambers St. at Elk Street

“It’s the most beautiful beaux-arts building, only partly occupied. I don’t know what they’ve done with it now. It really reminded me of Michelangelo architecture. I might be mixing up TV and reality myself, but I think I remember Mayor Bloomberg (right) making a statement in a scene from ‘Law & Order’ at the Hall.”

3. The steps of the New York State Supreme Court

Court building, 60 Centre St., between Worth and Pearl streets

“That was the [setting] of a lot of final scenes of ‘Law & Order.’ It’s a beautiful place with grand columns and fabulous wrought-iron work. The interior has that famous rotunda, with laws from throughout the ages on the ceiling. We’d be working on the steps or inside, and people would regularly confuse TV with reality and ask us if we worked there. There were a lot of lawyers we ran into there who told us they got into the law because of us. I must have done 150 scenes on those steps.”

4. Silver Screen Studios at Chelsea Piers

West Side Highway at 22nd Street

 “I went to work there every day for 16 years. At the time, and maybe even to this day, it’s the only soundstage in Manhattan big enough to shoot a TV series or movie on. It was very handy for me, a walk-to-work thing, because I lived in Chelsea at the time. At lunch, I’d go out and lie down on a park bench and take a nap, like any other New Yorker. We used Chelsea Piers as the law offices the whole [run of the show]. When they built the courthouse [set there], the set decorator had a sailboat, and he found out I had one too, so he painted pictures of both of them, and they hung in the hall outside the courtroom. They show up sometimes in the background. If anyone’s looking, mine’s the sloop.”

5. Foley Square

In front of 60 Centre St.

“We used to do a lot of walk-and-talks in that park. After a while, after doing hundreds and hundreds of these, you get used to screwing up a few times and gradually figuring out how to do it right. Ed Sherin was the showrunner, and he directed lots of episodes. When Ed would come out to direct, he’d wake us all up, because the first time we said the lines in a row, he’d print it. Everybody got the message that you had to be ready or you were left behind, and it really worked. He didn’t like to do long, long hours, and everybody got the idea that if they all pulled themselves together, we’d have reasonable days. It caught on.”

6. Zuccotti Park

Broadway between Cedar and Liberty streets

 

“We shot a bunch there. [‘L&O’ costar] Fred Thompson and I had an unforgettable conversation there, in 2003, about the Bush Doctrine, just before the invasion of Iraq. Fred was a senator [in Tennessee], so he had an inside view.”

7. Robert Morgenthau’s office (The New York County DA’s Office)

1 Hogan Place

 “Robert Morgenthau was the district attorney for almost 35 years. We never shot in his office, but one day, when we were shooting downtown, I was invited to meet him. He was a big hero of mine, and it was a big thrill. And he was a fan of the show. Then, after he retired, I was part of an effort to get a new trial for a guy in Alabama who’s been on death row for 26 years, Billy Kuenzel, and Morgenthau wrote a friend-of-the-court brief for him. It’s brilliant. If anybody goes to Billy Kuenzel’s Web site and reads it, you’ll know he’s not guilty. [Morgenthau is] a wonderful gentleman, from another era, but very on the ball, very on top of things.”