There is something unmistakably cinematic about the way New York lives inside the people who are born into it. Not as nostalgia, not even as memory, but as a rhythm. A pulse. A kind of internal soundtrack that never quite quiets. For Erich Bergen, a born-and-raised lifelong New Yorker—born in Chelsea in the mid-1980s, raised among artists, records, and a city in constant motion—that rhythm began early, long before career, before craft, before language even had a chance to define ambition.
By Moonah Ellison
Photos by James Weber
Erich Bergen has built a multifaceted career spanning Broadway, television, and music, gaining widespread recognition for his electric performance in Jersey Boys. He continues to evolve with his latest project, the super hot Love Story on FX, where his portrayal as John F. Kennedy Jr.’s first cousin, Anthony Radziwill, brings emotional nuance, historical resonance, and contemporary relevance to the project.
“I learned to read by reading the backs of albums,” he says, laughing at the memory. It’s a line that feels almost too poetic to be true, and yet it explains everything. Before formal education found its footing, before structure and systems took hold, there was music. There was curiosity. There was immersion. Quincy Jones made more sense than George Washington. MTV was more instructive than any classroom. And New York, in all its layered chaos, became both teacher and stage.
“I knew who Quincy Jones was before I knew who George Washington was.”
This was not a childhood shaped by strategy or even intention. It was instinctual. Organic. His parents—creative, free-spirited in a distinctly New York way—filled their home with art and sound. Not as a pathway to fame, but as a way of living. His father performed cabaret. His mother moved through artistic circles that blurred the lines between work and expression. It wasn’t industry. It was environment. And that environment left its mark.
By the age of nine, he had been discovered. By ten, he had his union card. Acting came first, almost by accident, but it was never the full story. The real love—the enduring one—was always music. Acting became the vehicle, the visible expression. Music remained the internal compass.
“I was obsessed with it. I wanted to be Michael Jackson.”
APC, sweater and jeans; Banana Republic, t-shirt, loafers, socks; Agmes, ring
There is something revealing in that admission by Erich Bergen. Not the aspiration itself, but the purity of it. It wasn’t about celebrity. It wasn’t about recognition. It was about feeling. Performance, at its core, is energy transfer, and music was the most immediate, most powerful form of that exchange. Even now, long into a multifaceted career that spans stage, screen, and producing, that connection remains central.
Ask him about stepping onto a stage, even in a non-musical context, and the conversation inevitably circles back to sound. Entrance music. Sonic energy. The emotional architecture of a moment. Music is not an accessory, it is the spine.
“The sonic energy that music has is so important to any kind of presentation,” insists Bergen. That understanding has shaped not only his performances, but his evolution behind the scenes. In recent years, producing has become an increasingly significant part of his work, offering a broader perspective on the machinery of entertainment. It is a shift that has brought clarity, and at times, a more sobering awareness of the industry’s realities.
Broadway, he says, can break your heart. There is a romanticism attached to theater that audiences rarely see beyond the curtain. Applause, reviews, standing ovations—these are only fragments of a much larger equation. Behind them lies a complex ecosystem of financing, logistics, and risk. A show can be loved and still fail. It can resonate deeply and still close early. The disconnect between artistic success and commercial viability is one of the industry’s most enduring tensions.
“You walk out on stage every night and you can feel the people loving it, but if it doesn’t cover the weekly running costs, it’s over.”
It is here that his dual perspective as both performer and producer becomes invaluable. Understanding the business does not soften the emotional blow of a closing night, but it contextualizes it. It replaces confusion with awareness. It transforms disappointment into part of a larger narrative—a reality check if you like, one that every artist at some point in his or her career must confront.
“You’re signing up for a business of goodbyes.”
Banana Republic, t-shirt; Rag & Bone, jacket
And yet, despite the inevitable endings, there is no sense of disillusionment. If anything, the opposite. The deeper Bergen moves into the mechanics of the industry, the more intentional his choices become. The more he understands the stakes, the more deliberate his engagement with each project.
That intentionality extends beyond the stage and into the city that shaped him.
New York, as he describes it, is not a backdrop. It is a living, breathing entity, one that demands participation. In an era increasingly defined by digital presence and transient engagement, he is deeply aware of what is at risk.
“This is a neighborhood. This is a community. Don’t come here, take your Instagram photos, and not contribute to the flow of the city.”
It is a sentiment that feels both urgent and timeless. New York has always been a place of reinvention, of arrival, of aspiration. But it has also always been a place of responsibility. The myth of the city as an individualistic playground—every person for themselves—is, in his view, fundamentally flawed.
What makes New York work is not competition. It is coexistence.
“It’s a city,” Bergen says, “that belongs to everyone.”
That sense of shared ownership has been tested in recent years. Post-pandemic shifts, changes in work culture, rising costs, and evolving tourism patterns have all contributed to a city in flux. Broadway, once a cornerstone of global cultural identity, is navigating new challenges. The economics of theatre have shifted. Audiences have changed. Expectations have recalibrated. And yet, he remains optimistic—not blindly, but pragmatically.
“We’ve been here before. The solve is always the same: take care of the city and make it shine.”
There is a cyclical nature to New York’s struggles and recoveries. Waves of uncertainty followed by reinvention. Periods of decline followed by resurgence. What determines the outcome, he believes, is not policy alone, but people. Community. Engagement. A collective willingness to invest not just financially, but emotionally in the life of the city. It is, in many ways, the same philosophy he applies to art.
Which brings the conversation, inevitably, to the present and to the evolving landscape of technology. Social media and artificial intelligence, he acknowledges, have fundamentally altered the way stories are told, shared, and consumed. They have democratized access, amplified voices, and created opportunities that did not exist a generation ago.
But they have also introduced new complexities. New risks. New responsibilities. “With great power comes great responsibility.”
Banana Republic, t-shirt, shoes; Rag & Bone, jacket; APC, pants; Agmes, ring
It is a familiar phrase, but in this context, it carries weight. Technology, he argues, is not inherently good or bad. It is a tool. Its impact is determined by the intention behind its use. AI can accelerate creativity, but it cannot originate it, replicate it, or replace the human impulse to create.
“The greatest ideas in this world happened without AI. They came from someone’s brain.”
There is no fear in his assessment—only clarity. The unknown, he suggests, often feels threatening simply because it is unfamiliar. The solution is not avoidance, but understanding. To engage with these tools without surrendering to them. To use them without being defined by them.
It is, once again, about balance.And perhaps that is the thread that runs through everything—the childhood shaped by music but grounded in discipline, the career that bridges performance and production, the love of New York tempered by a clear-eyed view of its challenges, the embrace of technology paired with a respect for human creativity.
Nothing exists in isolation. Everything overlaps. Even his own journey, beginning in a Chelsea loft, and moving through off-off Broadway stages, expanding into global collaborations feels less like a linear path and more like a series of interconnected moments. Each one building on the last. Each one informed by the same core instincts that defined him as a child.
Curiosity. Passion. Obsession. Through it all, the music never stops.Not literally, of course. There are pauses. Silences. Transitions. But internally, the rhythm continues. A quiet, constant presence. The same force that guided him from reading album covers to sharing stages, from listening to creating, from observing to leading.Because in the end, whether on stage, behind the scenes, or simply walking through the city that raised him, everything comes back to that original impulse—the desire to connect. To feel. To contribute to something larger than yourself.
A song. A story. A city. Always moving. Always evolving. Always, unmistakably, New York.
CREDITS:
Photographer: James Weber
Stylist: Megan Mattson
Groomer: Angella Valentine @ See Management