Premiering in Bronx theaters on Oct. 30, writer-director Noah Segan’s “The Only Living Pickpocket in New York” stars John Turturro as Harry Lehman, an aging con man struggling to adapt his clever thievery and lifestyle to the rapidly advancing technological world around him.
Harry spends his days caring for his disabled wife Rosie (Karina Arroyave) in a humble Bronx apartment and his nights scouring the city for easy targets, until he accidentally finds himself at odds with a very powerful family.
Segan and Turturro spoke with the Bronx Times about the film, and how it connects to what they love about human connection, and fear for its technological future.
“On my mother’s father’s side, they were in the Bronx. We all come from somewhere here. I think I chose the Bronx because that was where grandpa Art originated,” Segan said.
When Turturro reminded Segan that the Bronx is the only New York City borough connected to the U.S. mainland, Segan admitted that context as more revelatory than intentional.
“That is profound. The fact that the movie starts in the only place connected to the rest of the United States and ends on an island [Staten Island] that is not connected to anything.”
However, Segan did purposefully take care to highlight everyday struggles working class New Yorkers may recognize in his script – like broken elevators making apartment life particularly challenging for disabled residents and their caregivers – which Turturro appreciated.
“It could have worked in a lot of different places, but it was set here and in places that were not upper middle class, it’s in working class neighborhoods,” Turturro said.
With only about 20 days for filming, “The Only Living Pickpocket in New York” was shot on-location throughout New York City. While filming a scene where a pawn shop is defaced, Turturro remembers the genuine concern of passerby and regulars who were just harmlessly looking out for the wellbeing of their community.
“There’s an energy about the city. Especially when you leave it and you return and you realize, ‘Wow, there’s this collision of different cultures, races, languages.’ It’s a city of immigrants, really. There is something challenging about that and also beautiful about it when the mosaic functions,” Turturro said.
The inspirational “grandpa Art” that Segan mentioned is acclaimed photographer Arthur Rothstein, son of Jewish immigrants that raised him in the Bronx in the 1920s. A century later, the Bronx remains a hub for immigrants. The world as a whole, however, has seen major technological advancements, for better or worse, as seen in Segan’s film.
“The surveillance state — I don’t know anybody that is a super big fan of that who’s not selling it,” Segan said.
The lead actor shared additional concerns of how technology can resemble some of the financial barriers low-income people might face, citing his wife’s work as a social worker.
“She works with a lot of people on Zoom and they don’t have computers, they can’t navigate the health system. They don’t have a certain amount of technology to help them, so poorer people are really being left behind,” Turturro said.
Scored by Gary Lionelli, some of the film’s most striking scenes are soundtracked with New York City classics like the Odyssey’s “Native New Yorker.” At some point throughout production, Segan created a long playlist of music that spoke to him and shared it with Turturro.
“It’s great when a director shares music because music is emotional transportation … I imagine that Rosie, his wife- they worked as a team as pickpockets, and they would go out dancing,” Turturro said.
“I know from experience that people sometimes who can’t speak, they can hear you, they can see you. Their spirit is really alive. And so, it’s not a waste of time talking to them, not only caring for them, but also doing things that reminds them of the life they had.”
Turturro loves dancing, and when Turturro sent Segan him a short video theorizing that Harry should use dance as a way to communicate with his nonverbal wife, Segan was enthusiastic.
“We did not have this on the schedule originally, and we had to wait until the end of the day and everybody had left. It was just actors and a cameraman, Sam [Levy] and myself and we put the song on and just went for it,” Segan said.
“Movement brings happiness,” Turturro added.
The joy of dancing, and other in-person shared bonding activities, is something Turturro hopes remains even as technological forms of communication become omnipresent.
“One of the best things about life is meeting people and having an exchange or sharing something, and there’s this space that’s created between us that is unobstructed. I think that Noah touches on that really in a very subtle way, but a very powerful way, in the movie,” Turturro said.
After having its New York Premiere at the 2026 New York Film Festival, Noah Segan’s “The Only Living Pickpocket in New York” will premiere in Bronx theaters on Friday, Oct. 30.
