I am a pizza fanatic. I think many places get parts of good pizza. What I have learned in my pizza travels is that it is always the company which adds or takes away from good pizza. "Company" can be the people with whom you are dining, or the people who are working in the pizza joint, or the other patrons in the restaurant with you.
The way I see it is there are places to go to "eat" pizza and there are places to go "for" the pizza. Usually the places I go "for" the pizza are up in the NE Philly to NY and are usually old storefront, family-owned places with an Italian name or have "Sons" in the title.
The best pizza "eating" experience I remember was at a "pretty good" pizza place in north Oahu, Hawaii at the original "North End Boston Pizza" (I think there are 3 or 4 on the island now). The place had only opened about a couple of weeks and was run by 6 Goombahs from the streets of Boston--doing what comes naturally in the pizza joints, namely lots of loud patter, insults and laughing as they tossed the pies into the air...it was great theater just to get a couple of HUGE slices, sit back at a table on mis-matched old kitchen chairs and watch the show. One evening a "too-upscale-dressed for the area" couple wandered in. When it was their turn at the order counter they then started discussing between themselves what to order--(people from the US Northeast KNOW you must know what to order before you reach the counter!)--they held up the line a bit too long by asking the order taker about each selection. I could see the order-taker was getting a bit peeved as the seconds ticked by and the line grew long and impatient--even the guys tossing the pizza noticed the break in rhythm of the orders and gave the couple the "stink-eye."
The couple now was the center of attention of the dining area as the woman asked the order-taker questions about each selection on the menu posted on the wall (is the spinach fresh or frozen? is the garlic from a jar? is the pepperoni very fatty?). She finally got to the bottom of the menu and said, "What's on the Vegetable Pizza?" and without missing a beat the order taker said, "F**king Vegetables! What the f**k do you think is on a f**king vegetable pizza lady!!" The place exploded in laughter and needless to say, the couple left without ordering a pizza. Too bad for them, because that pizza place had the best "Northeast" style foldable pizza on the island.
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