Friends of ours: Soprano Crime Family, Corleone Crime Family, Tony Soprano, Vito Corleone, Al Capone, Charles "Lucky" Luciano, "Crazy Joe" Gallo, Mickey Cohen, John "Dapper Don" Gotti, John "Junior Gotti
Once home to New York's huge immigrant Italian population and a hot-bed of mafia activity, Little Italy still draws crowds fascinated by mob life.
Now a popular tourist destination, there is little in Little Italy to back its violent history and visitors are unlikely to encounter anything more unusual than the smell of fresh garlic wafting from family-owned restaurants. But a recent exhibition, "Made In America, the Mob's Greatest Hits," gave fans of fictional mobsters Tony Soprano and Vito Corleone a taste of what the community used to be like with curator Artie Nash in talks to take the show elsewhere.
The exhibition housed in a small museum in Little Italy, featured a collection of original photographs and arrest warrants of some of the most notorious Mafiosos, including Al Capone and Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Luciano was the Italian-U.S. mobster behind the explosion in the international heroin trade on whom the character of Vito Corleone in "The Godfather" was loosely based.
Nash, curator of the exhibition, spent the best part of 15 years putting the collection together piece by piece, from both police department sources and from the estates of some of the most famous figures in organized crime. "I am mainly fascinated by the relationship that the American public have had with organized crime. It really has, over the last 75 years, permeated our popular culture to such a great degree," Nash told Reuters.
The mob enjoyed its hey-day during the backbreaking years of the Great Depression and Prohibition in the 1920's and 30's, when gangs all over the country carved out an existence in bootlegging, drug-dealing, blackmail and racketeering.
New York and Chicago were home to some of the most active branches of the mob and violent rivalries between different Mafia "families" often resulted in bloodshed.
Hollywood and the media have contributed in large part to glamorizing the life of the mobster, often depicted as fiercely loyal foot soldiers who struggled to protect their families.
The exhibit has attracted a wide variety of visitors, including students, high-ranking police officers, and even some current crime figures, Nash said.
Actor Leonardo Di Caprio even took a tour of the collection to check out the real "Gangs of New York," the 2002 Martin Scorsese film in which he played a gangster in the blood-soaked turf wars set in the 19th century in the notorious "Five Points" slum in what is now downtown Manhattan.
Popular items include a fedora worn by "Crazy Joe" Gallo, a ruthless Brooklyn-born killer, the day he was shot on Mulberry Street and a collection of silk pajamas from the lavish wardrobe of diminutive dapper Los Angeles don, Mickey Cohen.
The collection also features a series of gruesome photos of the victims of "Murder Inc," a crime organization that carried out hundreds of hits on behalf of the Mafia in the 1920's.
Public interest in the Mafia has been revived in recent years by hit TV drama "The Sopranos" and real-life events such as the trial of accused mob boss John Gotti, son of the late John J. Gotti, former head of New York's Gambino family.
Friday, October 06, 2006
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Sopranos Helping al-Qaida?
Friends of mine: Soprano Crime Family
The FBI's top counterterrorism official harbors lots of concerns: weapons of mass destruction, undetected homegrown terrorists and the possibility that old-fashioned mobsters will team up with al-Qaida for the right price.
Though there is no direct evidence yet of organized crime collaborating with terrorists, the first hints of a connection surfaced in a recent undercover FBI operation. Agents stopped a man with alleged mob ties from selling missiles to an informant posing as a terrorist middleman.
That case and other factors are heightening concerns about a real-life episode of the Sopranos teaming with Osama bin Laden's followers. "We are continuing to look for a nexus," said Joseph Billy Jr., the FBI's top counterterrorism official. "We are looking at this very aggressively."
The new strategy involves an analysis of nationwide criminal investigations, particularly white collar crime, side by side with intelligence and terrorist activity. "We have developed an ability to look harder and broader in a greatly enhanced way to see if there is any crossover," Billy said in an interview with The Associated Press.
Organized crime syndicates could facilitate money transfers or laundering, human smuggling, identification fraud or explosives and weapons acquisitions, officials said.
The options are many for terrorists groups.
There are the five reputed La Cosa Nostra families in New York, Russian criminal enterprises from Brighton Beach in the New York borough of Brooklyn to Moscow, and the emerging Asian crime syndicates that operate in many Islamic countries with al-Qaida offshoots.
A contract study produced recently for the Pentagon and obtained by the AP warned that the potential for organized crime assisting terrorists is growing. "Although terrorism and organized crime are different phenomena, the important fact is that terrorist and criminal networks overlap and cooperate in some enterprises," the study said. "The phenomenon of the synergy of terrorism and organized crime is growing because similar conditions give rise to both and because terrorists and organized criminals use similar approaches to promote their operations."
The traditional mafia has highly developed networks for acquiring goods and services and money, all for a price.
The mob's potential interest in helping a terrorist has nothing to do with ideology or sympathy but with greed, said Matt Heron, head of New York FBI's organized crime unit. "They will deal with anybody, if they can make a buck," Heron said. "They will sell to a terrorist just as easily as they would sell to an order of Franciscan monks. It's a business relationship to them."
"If the mob has explosives and a terrorist wants them and they have the money, they could become instant friends," he said.
Pat D'Amuro, a retired senior FBI official and now chief executive of Giuliani Security, said a Mafia boss once acknowledged that the mob would help terrorists. "I am aware of a high-level Mafia figure, who was cooperating with authorities, being asked if the Mafia would assist terrorists in smuggling people into Europe through Italy," D'Amuro said. "He said, 'The Mafia will help who ever can pay.'"
Officials said they have no specific evidence that such a relationship has been cemented. But concerns were heightened last year after an Armenian immigrant was arrested in New York for allegedly leading a plot to sell military weapons to an FBI informant posing as a middleman for terrorists.
Arthur Solomonyan had claimed to be able to deliver shoulder-fired missiles from his connection in Russian organized crime to the informant, who claimed to have ties to al-Qaida, federal prosecutors said. Solomonyan and 17 others in New York, Florida and California were charged in the case.
Solomonyan is scheduled for trial this month. His lawyer, Seth Ginsberg, said he plans to "vigorously contest" the charges and call the government's confidential informant to the stand to challenge his motives. The Italian, Russian, and Asian mafia remain active, particularly in New York, even though the government has successfully prosecuted numerous figures in recent years.
In the past three years, well over 100 associates from all five La Cosa Nostra families have been arrested in New York, Heron noted.
While the potential of a gangster-terrorist marriage is on the FBI's radar, homegrown terror cells and weapons of mass destruction are also big concerns for those in the FBI given the job of stopping the next terrorist attack. "We are not only aware that they want to come across the ocean to attack us but they may be physically here developing in our own homeland," Billy said.
The Internet has become the new Afghanistan, allowing terrorist sympathizers to promote their radical ideas and to recruit and train followers right their home computers. That makes it far more difficult for investigators to identify them.
Billy said his biggest concern remains weapons of mass destruction. While Hezbollah and Hamas are more defined terrorist groups, with a territorial focus and a political platform, al-Qaida is more unpredictable. "We know they were trying to acquire it prior to 9/11, bin Laden's own words said that," said Billy. "What makes us think they are still not trying?"
Thanks to Pat Milton
The FBI's top counterterrorism official harbors lots of concerns: weapons of mass destruction, undetected homegrown terrorists and the possibility that old-fashioned mobsters will team up with al-Qaida for the right price.
Though there is no direct evidence yet of organized crime collaborating with terrorists, the first hints of a connection surfaced in a recent undercover FBI operation. Agents stopped a man with alleged mob ties from selling missiles to an informant posing as a terrorist middleman.
That case and other factors are heightening concerns about a real-life episode of the Sopranos teaming with Osama bin Laden's followers. "We are continuing to look for a nexus," said Joseph Billy Jr., the FBI's top counterterrorism official. "We are looking at this very aggressively."The new strategy involves an analysis of nationwide criminal investigations, particularly white collar crime, side by side with intelligence and terrorist activity. "We have developed an ability to look harder and broader in a greatly enhanced way to see if there is any crossover," Billy said in an interview with The Associated Press.
Organized crime syndicates could facilitate money transfers or laundering, human smuggling, identification fraud or explosives and weapons acquisitions, officials said.
The options are many for terrorists groups.
There are the five reputed La Cosa Nostra families in New York, Russian criminal enterprises from Brighton Beach in the New York borough of Brooklyn to Moscow, and the emerging Asian crime syndicates that operate in many Islamic countries with al-Qaida offshoots.
A contract study produced recently for the Pentagon and obtained by the AP warned that the potential for organized crime assisting terrorists is growing. "Although terrorism and organized crime are different phenomena, the important fact is that terrorist and criminal networks overlap and cooperate in some enterprises," the study said. "The phenomenon of the synergy of terrorism and organized crime is growing because similar conditions give rise to both and because terrorists and organized criminals use similar approaches to promote their operations."
The traditional mafia has highly developed networks for acquiring goods and services and money, all for a price.
The mob's potential interest in helping a terrorist has nothing to do with ideology or sympathy but with greed, said Matt Heron, head of New York FBI's organized crime unit. "They will deal with anybody, if they can make a buck," Heron said. "They will sell to a terrorist just as easily as they would sell to an order of Franciscan monks. It's a business relationship to them."
"If the mob has explosives and a terrorist wants them and they have the money, they could become instant friends," he said.
Pat D'Amuro, a retired senior FBI official and now chief executive of Giuliani Security, said a Mafia boss once acknowledged that the mob would help terrorists. "I am aware of a high-level Mafia figure, who was cooperating with authorities, being asked if the Mafia would assist terrorists in smuggling people into Europe through Italy," D'Amuro said. "He said, 'The Mafia will help who ever can pay.'"
Officials said they have no specific evidence that such a relationship has been cemented. But concerns were heightened last year after an Armenian immigrant was arrested in New York for allegedly leading a plot to sell military weapons to an FBI informant posing as a middleman for terrorists.
Arthur Solomonyan had claimed to be able to deliver shoulder-fired missiles from his connection in Russian organized crime to the informant, who claimed to have ties to al-Qaida, federal prosecutors said. Solomonyan and 17 others in New York, Florida and California were charged in the case.
Solomonyan is scheduled for trial this month. His lawyer, Seth Ginsberg, said he plans to "vigorously contest" the charges and call the government's confidential informant to the stand to challenge his motives. The Italian, Russian, and Asian mafia remain active, particularly in New York, even though the government has successfully prosecuted numerous figures in recent years.
In the past three years, well over 100 associates from all five La Cosa Nostra families have been arrested in New York, Heron noted.
While the potential of a gangster-terrorist marriage is on the FBI's radar, homegrown terror cells and weapons of mass destruction are also big concerns for those in the FBI given the job of stopping the next terrorist attack. "We are not only aware that they want to come across the ocean to attack us but they may be physically here developing in our own homeland," Billy said.
The Internet has become the new Afghanistan, allowing terrorist sympathizers to promote their radical ideas and to recruit and train followers right their home computers. That makes it far more difficult for investigators to identify them.
Billy said his biggest concern remains weapons of mass destruction. While Hezbollah and Hamas are more defined terrorist groups, with a territorial focus and a political platform, al-Qaida is more unpredictable. "We know they were trying to acquire it prior to 9/11, bin Laden's own words said that," said Billy. "What makes us think they are still not trying?"
Thanks to Pat Milton
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Tony Montana Has Game
The "Scarface" franchise was "built for the video game generation before video games existed," according to Universal Pictures chairman Marc Shmuger. "Now that technology and the audience have all caught up, we're hoping for great results."
"World," produced by Sierra Entertainment, allows players to assume the persona of the sneering, ruthless crime boss who stormed the screen in Brian De Palma's 1983 film amid a ferocious hail of bullets, blood and four-letter words. It retails for $49.99 and is set to hit stores Oct. 8 for PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, Xbox and Windows PC.
Shmuger calls the game, which took three years to create, an "A-plus" production. Striving to adhere to the movie's spirit, story line, characters and locations to create a sequel of sorts, developers first answered the question: How does one build a game around a film in which the main character dies?
Screenwriter David McKenna was brought onboard to craft a game story worthy of the iconic drug lord. He proposed: What if Tony gets out of the movie's mansion shootout alive but with nothing -- no power, real estate or money?
According to "World" executive producer Pete Wanat, players must rebuild Tony's empire from scratch, earning back his cash, clout and crib. "They can pimp out his house however the player wants it done," he says.
Game developers painstakingly portrayed details in order to create a "fictional extension" of the film. "The fictional extension is not to tell the movie story but to fill in the blanks," says Bill Kispert, vp interactive at Universal Studios Consumer Products Group.
Locations such as Tony's mansion, the Babylon Club and the Sun Ray Motel are identical to those in the film, he adds. "Tony still hates Colombians, and he still has a propensity for dropping the F-word," Wanat says.
The biggest coup for Vivendi was bringing Al Pacino onboard to review the characters and other game elements. "World" marks the first time the actor has allowed his likeness to be used in a video game, according to Kispert.
Says Wanat: "Tony is a much-loved character. You have to nail that character -- it can't just be OK. It's gotta look like Tony, walk like Tony and talk like Tony."
Pacino insisted on bringing Tony's moral code into "World," especially given the popularity of violent video games such as those in the "Grand Theft Auto" franchise. "Scarface" has a body count of 42, but Tony does not hurt innocents -- and the game does not allow players to do so, either.
If a "World" player lines up an innocent woman and attempts to shoot her, Tony's voice will issue a reprimand like, "That goes against my code!" "If you did this game without that, it wouldn't be Tony Montana," Wanat says. But that does not mean the game version of Tony will take it easy on his enemies, or that there is a lack of action. "World" opens with a shootout scene at Tony's mansion and does not slow from there.
Striving to match De Palma's crisp colors and rich textures, Wanat and his team were supported by production values including THX sound, effects from Skywalker Sound, McKenna's script and musical licensing from top artists.
Rounding out the talent are about 40 Hollywood actors, many of whom requested to be a part of the game. Joining the film's Steven Bauer and Robert Loggia were Ricky Gervais, Elliott Gould, Oliver Platt, James Woods, the music industry's B Real, Ice-T, Ivy Queen and Lemmy of Motorhead and even popular NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt Jr.
A collectors' edition of "World" will be available for a limited time for PS2. Retailing for $59.99, the specially packaged set includes a bonus DVD featuring a "Making of the Game" documentary, a walk-through with producer commentary, cast interviews, playing tips and a map of the game world.
Thanks to Angelique Flores
How Capone's Successors Built a National Syndicate
Friends of ours: Al Capone
Friends of mine: Sidney Korshak, Jimmy Hoffa, Frank Sinatra
He was dubbed with one of the all-time greatest gangland nicknames, The Fixer. The tag fit Sidney Korshak like a calfskin glove.
Born to immigrant parents, Korshak beamed his bright light on a law career and - with the connections of several underworld mentors - got his start representing wiseguys against criminal charges. But his real value to the Chicago Outfit, as the inheritors of Al Capone's criminal empire came to be called, was as a labor consultant and negotiator.
With Korshak in the foreground, Gus Russo's "Supermob" tells the story of how a tightknit claque of mostly Russian Ashkenazi Jews rose from the rough-and-tumble rackets to seats of influence and power in some Fortune 500 companies.
In their heyday, around 1960, the gang had long tentacles in Hollywood, controlled an interest in the Hilton hotel chain and held sway over ally Jimmy Hoffa's Teamster's union. That's to say nothing of their outright, if well-hidden, ownership of several Las Vegas casinos, including the Desert Inn - the high roller's haunt where Frank Sinatra made his Sin City debut.
Organized crime's ultimate objective is to make the lucre go in filthy and come out clean, through investments in legitimate businesses. In this, the Supermob had no equal.
Their most sophisticated scheme involved buying property that Japanese-Americans were forced to sell during World War II. Korshak, his cronies and their man inside the Roosevelt administration's Office of Alien Property, turned this land grab into a dandy cash-washing machine. Their exertions were so diabolically intertwined with legal maneuvers that the exact details have eluded two generations of investigators.
The complete story, the author admits, is still unknown. This complex trail is also difficult to follow, and though germane to the work, makes for some glacially paced reading.
When he wasn't perverting a union or arranging a sweetheart loan, Sidney's activities were far more entertaining. The Fixer hustled Dean Martin out of Chicago in one piece after Dino's roving eye locked on the moll of one of the Outfit's boys. Korshak also hot-wired a hooker-filled hotel room with an infrared camera, blackmailing a Senate investigator into going easy on his Chi-town pals.
"Supermob" is chocked with anecdotes like this. The gangland gossip and Hollywood scuttlebutt ultimately outweigh Russo's dissection of Byzantine financial chicanery, and in the end, the book adds up to an exhaustive Who's Who of the dark power players of 20th century America.
Thanks to Peter Pavia
Friends of mine: Sidney Korshak, Jimmy Hoffa, Frank Sinatra
He was dubbed with one of the all-time greatest gangland nicknames, The Fixer. The tag fit Sidney Korshak like a calfskin glove.
Born to immigrant parents, Korshak beamed his bright light on a law career and - with the connections of several underworld mentors - got his start representing wiseguys against criminal charges. But his real value to the Chicago Outfit, as the inheritors of Al Capone's criminal empire came to be called, was as a labor consultant and negotiator.
With Korshak in the foreground, Gus Russo's "Supermob" tells the story of how a tightknit claque of mostly Russian Ashkenazi Jews rose from the rough-and-tumble rackets to seats of influence and power in some Fortune 500 companies.
In their heyday, around 1960, the gang had long tentacles in Hollywood, controlled an interest in the Hilton hotel chain and held sway over ally Jimmy Hoffa's Teamster's union. That's to say nothing of their outright, if well-hidden, ownership of several Las Vegas casinos, including the Desert Inn - the high roller's haunt where Frank Sinatra made his Sin City debut.
Organized crime's ultimate objective is to make the lucre go in filthy and come out clean, through investments in legitimate businesses. In this, the Supermob had no equal.
Their most sophisticated scheme involved buying property that Japanese-Americans were forced to sell during World War II. Korshak, his cronies and their man inside the Roosevelt administration's Office of Alien Property, turned this land grab into a dandy cash-washing machine. Their exertions were so diabolically intertwined with legal maneuvers that the exact details have eluded two generations of investigators.
The complete story, the author admits, is still unknown. This complex trail is also difficult to follow, and though germane to the work, makes for some glacially paced reading.
When he wasn't perverting a union or arranging a sweetheart loan, Sidney's activities were far more entertaining. The Fixer hustled Dean Martin out of Chicago in one piece after Dino's roving eye locked on the moll of one of the Outfit's boys. Korshak also hot-wired a hooker-filled hotel room with an infrared camera, blackmailing a Senate investigator into going easy on his Chi-town pals.
"Supermob" is chocked with anecdotes like this. The gangland gossip and Hollywood scuttlebutt ultimately outweigh Russo's dissection of Byzantine financial chicanery, and in the end, the book adds up to an exhaustive Who's Who of the dark power players of 20th century America.
Thanks to Peter Pavia
The "Scarface" Brand
What a difference 20 years makes. When Brian De Palma's "Scarface" hit theaters in 1983, it was panned by critics and earned a paltry $45.6 million at the domestic boxoffice -- enough to squeak by "Jaws 3-D" for the No. 16 position on the year-end rankings.
"We were trashed," says Martin Bregman, the film's producer. It was Bregman and Universal Pictures who had taken a chance on Oliver Stone's audacious script about a ruthless Cuban immigrant's rapid rise and fall in South Florida's underworld drug trade, and it was De Palma and star Al Pacino who had turned it into an operatic testament to the dark side of the American dream.
Today, "Scarface" resonates with a new generation of viewers that relates to the outsider status of Pacino's antihero and finds truth in the message of societal forces that reward -- however fleetingly -- aggression, naked ambition and greed.
Roger Ebert, one of the few reviewers to weigh in positively upon the film's initial release, lauded "Scarface" for its ability to "take a flawed, evil man and allow him to be human," writing in the Chicago Sun-Times that Pacino "does not make (Tony) Montana into a sympathetic character, but he does make him into somebody we can identify with in a horrified way, if only because of his perfectly understandable motivations. Wouldn't we all like to be rich and powerful, have desirable sex partners, live in a mansion, be catered to by faithful servants and hardly have to work? Well, yeah, now that you mention it." But most observers did not see so deeply into a story that, on its surface, contains entirely raw violence. Combined with a performance by Pacino that was trounced roundly as over-the-top, the violence generated a ripple of notoriety -- but not enough for the film to avoid becoming a commercial disappointment.
Universal Pictures chairman Marc Shmuger believes that "Scarface" was ahead of its time, suffering in the long shadow of Francis Ford Coppola's "Godfather" movies. To enter the epic gangster genre after 1972's "The Godfather" and 1974's "The Godfather: Part II" won a combined nine Academy Awards, he says, was an uphill battle.
Only later would "Scarface" find its niche among the broadband generation, which finds Tony's Cuban swagger more relatable than that of the old-school Corleones, who seem quaint by comparison. That youthful embrace has propelled "Scarface" into a marketing juggernaut, with more than 40 licensees in the U.S. alone that make everything from T-shirts, jackets and skullcaps to comic books, money clips and even a die-cast model of a Cadillac, complete with a miniature Tony Montana in his famous white suit and smoking a cigar.
Although the groundswell has bubbled up organically through bootleg goods, obscure musical references and the like, Universal's licensing group has been savvy enough to recognize an opportunity and take it to the next level. The latest installments in the "Scarface" merchandising phenomenon are the Vivendi video game "Scarface: The World Is Yours," set to hit store shelves Oct. 8, and Universal Studios Home Entertainment's planned Tuesday "Platinum Edition" DVD release, for which the film's sound effects and audio have been overhauled. Both products are launching into a market that has embraced "Scarface" as a part of pop culture.
The hip-hop community has adopted the film as its rags-to-riches morality tale, and clips from "Scarface" have appeared in countless movies and TV shows including the 2004 feature "Meet the Fockers," in which a precocious baby hits a remote control and changes the channel from a children's show to a blaze of bullets. "Scarface's" classic "money line" -- where Tony, about to open fire on a foe, sneeringly says, "Say hello to my little friend" -- has echoed around the globe.
"In one of my kids' middle school, there was a board, and every day there was a new quote -- by (William) Shakespeare, (Mahatma) Gandhi, people like that," Shmuger says. "One day, the quote was, 'Say hello to my little friend.' It has become a touchstone; it has left a lasting impression on our culture in ways that nobody could have imagined when it was originally released in 1983." Adds Bregman, "It's a major part of pop culture, and not just in this country: You can go to Israel and buy T-shirts with Pacino's face in every souvenir store."
"Scarface" was intended to be a remake of Howard Hawks' noirish 1932 mob drama of the same name, set in Chicago during that period. After producing 1973's "Serpico" and 1975's "Dog Day Afternoon," both starring Pacino, Bregman was seeking another vehicle for the actor. He approached De Palma, who began working on an adaptation with playwright David Rabe.
When it became clear that the script was not working, De Palma dropped out, and Stone and director Sidney Lumet were brought in. Lumet came up with the concept of moving the film to 1980s Miami and turning the Al Capone-inspired lead character into a Cuban refugee who makes his fortune in cocaine.
Stone, reportedly battling cocaine addiction at the time, took the idea and ran with it. When he submitted his draft, though, Lumet had problems with it -- so Bregman, who liked what Stone had written, turned back to De Palma.
De Palma liked Stone's graphic, violent script, and soon he and Pacino traveled to Miami, immersing themselves in the local culture. Big-screen newcomer Michelle Pfeiffer was cast as Pacino's girlfriend, and the supporting cast was filled out by several Latin Americans including Cuba-born Steven Bauer, then married to Melanie Griffith.
Crews began to set up the shoot in summer 1982, but trouble began almost immediately. A group of Cuban immigrants protested what they felt would be a slam on their culture, and a Miami city commissioner threatened to introduce a bill that would ban the shoot from taking place there unless Pacino's character was turned into a Communist spy sent by Fidel Castro.
An agreement was reached to screen "Scarface" before a group of Cuban-American leaders who could (and did) tag it with a disclaimer, but the filmmakers, fearing further repercussions, moved most of the production to Los Angeles. The Miami internment camp seen in the movie was built beneath the Santa Monica and Harbor freeways, and the Little Havana cafeteria in which Tony works is actually a restaurant in Los Angeles' Little Tokyo.
"Scarface" was pegged for U.S. release on Dec. 9, 1983, but the MPAA's Classification and Ratings Administration gave it an X rating that October for "cumulative violence," and the movie underwent several hasty edits. When the X rating stood after four go-rounds, the filmmakers appealed -- and the final vote was 17-3 in favor of an R rating, clearing the way for a wide release. But things would get worse: Reviews went from bad to scathing, and the filmmakers were lambasted for the movie's excessive violence.
"Even in our test screenings, the movie wasn't playing well," says Shmuger, who saw the film in a New York theater long before he joined Universal. "I was just stunned; I didn't know how to take it. 'The Godfather' had seemed so perfect and proper, but 'Scarface' just felt so aggressive."
"Scarface" earned only $4.6 million during its opening weekend and wound up grossing $45.6 million during its initial theatrical run -- hardly the makings of a blockbuster. Slowly but surely, though, a cult following developed, primarily among young urban audiences who kept coming back for repeat viewings.
In 2003, while preparing the release of a 20th anniversary "Scarface" DVD, Universal conducted a second round of test screenings -- and met with markedly different results.
"We put a print in front of audiences on the West Coast and the East Coast because we wanted to see if it would stand up as a theatrical release again in Los Angeles and New York, and scores were through the roof," Shmuger says. "The movie hadn't changed; what had changed was the audience and the culture."
Not only was the graphic violence more palatable to viewers raised on films like 1994's "Natural Born Killers" and video games like Midway's "Mortal Kombat" franchise, but also the premise of "Scarface" resonated among the test-screen throng.
"The whole story of trying to fight your way up, by hook or by crook or by violence -- of doing anything to achieve the American dream -- became something of an anthem to the hip-hop culture," Shmuger says. And the film's authenticity has endured. Says Bregman, "What makes all this possible, 23 years later, is a movie that is very much still a fresh and hot property."
Thanks to Thomas K. Arnold
"We were trashed," says Martin Bregman, the film's producer. It was Bregman and Universal Pictures who had taken a chance on Oliver Stone's audacious script about a ruthless Cuban immigrant's rapid rise and fall in South Florida's underworld drug trade, and it was De Palma and star Al Pacino who had turned it into an operatic testament to the dark side of the American dream.
Today, "Scarface" resonates with a new generation of viewers that relates to the outsider status of Pacino's antihero and finds truth in the message of societal forces that reward -- however fleetingly -- aggression, naked ambition and greed.
Roger Ebert, one of the few reviewers to weigh in positively upon the film's initial release, lauded "Scarface" for its ability to "take a flawed, evil man and allow him to be human," writing in the Chicago Sun-Times that Pacino "does not make (Tony) Montana into a sympathetic character, but he does make him into somebody we can identify with in a horrified way, if only because of his perfectly understandable motivations. Wouldn't we all like to be rich and powerful, have desirable sex partners, live in a mansion, be catered to by faithful servants and hardly have to work? Well, yeah, now that you mention it." But most observers did not see so deeply into a story that, on its surface, contains entirely raw violence. Combined with a performance by Pacino that was trounced roundly as over-the-top, the violence generated a ripple of notoriety -- but not enough for the film to avoid becoming a commercial disappointment.
Universal Pictures chairman Marc Shmuger believes that "Scarface" was ahead of its time, suffering in the long shadow of Francis Ford Coppola's "Godfather" movies. To enter the epic gangster genre after 1972's "The Godfather" and 1974's "The Godfather: Part II" won a combined nine Academy Awards, he says, was an uphill battle.
Only later would "Scarface" find its niche among the broadband generation, which finds Tony's Cuban swagger more relatable than that of the old-school Corleones, who seem quaint by comparison. That youthful embrace has propelled "Scarface" into a marketing juggernaut, with more than 40 licensees in the U.S. alone that make everything from T-shirts, jackets and skullcaps to comic books, money clips and even a die-cast model of a Cadillac, complete with a miniature Tony Montana in his famous white suit and smoking a cigar.
Although the groundswell has bubbled up organically through bootleg goods, obscure musical references and the like, Universal's licensing group has been savvy enough to recognize an opportunity and take it to the next level. The latest installments in the "Scarface" merchandising phenomenon are the Vivendi video game "Scarface: The World Is Yours," set to hit store shelves Oct. 8, and Universal Studios Home Entertainment's planned Tuesday "Platinum Edition" DVD release, for which the film's sound effects and audio have been overhauled. Both products are launching into a market that has embraced "Scarface" as a part of pop culture.
The hip-hop community has adopted the film as its rags-to-riches morality tale, and clips from "Scarface" have appeared in countless movies and TV shows including the 2004 feature "Meet the Fockers," in which a precocious baby hits a remote control and changes the channel from a children's show to a blaze of bullets. "Scarface's" classic "money line" -- where Tony, about to open fire on a foe, sneeringly says, "Say hello to my little friend" -- has echoed around the globe.
"In one of my kids' middle school, there was a board, and every day there was a new quote -- by (William) Shakespeare, (Mahatma) Gandhi, people like that," Shmuger says. "One day, the quote was, 'Say hello to my little friend.' It has become a touchstone; it has left a lasting impression on our culture in ways that nobody could have imagined when it was originally released in 1983." Adds Bregman, "It's a major part of pop culture, and not just in this country: You can go to Israel and buy T-shirts with Pacino's face in every souvenir store."
"Scarface" was intended to be a remake of Howard Hawks' noirish 1932 mob drama of the same name, set in Chicago during that period. After producing 1973's "Serpico" and 1975's "Dog Day Afternoon," both starring Pacino, Bregman was seeking another vehicle for the actor. He approached De Palma, who began working on an adaptation with playwright David Rabe.
When it became clear that the script was not working, De Palma dropped out, and Stone and director Sidney Lumet were brought in. Lumet came up with the concept of moving the film to 1980s Miami and turning the Al Capone-inspired lead character into a Cuban refugee who makes his fortune in cocaine.
Stone, reportedly battling cocaine addiction at the time, took the idea and ran with it. When he submitted his draft, though, Lumet had problems with it -- so Bregman, who liked what Stone had written, turned back to De Palma.
De Palma liked Stone's graphic, violent script, and soon he and Pacino traveled to Miami, immersing themselves in the local culture. Big-screen newcomer Michelle Pfeiffer was cast as Pacino's girlfriend, and the supporting cast was filled out by several Latin Americans including Cuba-born Steven Bauer, then married to Melanie Griffith.
Crews began to set up the shoot in summer 1982, but trouble began almost immediately. A group of Cuban immigrants protested what they felt would be a slam on their culture, and a Miami city commissioner threatened to introduce a bill that would ban the shoot from taking place there unless Pacino's character was turned into a Communist spy sent by Fidel Castro.
An agreement was reached to screen "Scarface" before a group of Cuban-American leaders who could (and did) tag it with a disclaimer, but the filmmakers, fearing further repercussions, moved most of the production to Los Angeles. The Miami internment camp seen in the movie was built beneath the Santa Monica and Harbor freeways, and the Little Havana cafeteria in which Tony works is actually a restaurant in Los Angeles' Little Tokyo.
"Scarface" was pegged for U.S. release on Dec. 9, 1983, but the MPAA's Classification and Ratings Administration gave it an X rating that October for "cumulative violence," and the movie underwent several hasty edits. When the X rating stood after four go-rounds, the filmmakers appealed -- and the final vote was 17-3 in favor of an R rating, clearing the way for a wide release. But things would get worse: Reviews went from bad to scathing, and the filmmakers were lambasted for the movie's excessive violence.
"Even in our test screenings, the movie wasn't playing well," says Shmuger, who saw the film in a New York theater long before he joined Universal. "I was just stunned; I didn't know how to take it. 'The Godfather' had seemed so perfect and proper, but 'Scarface' just felt so aggressive."
"Scarface" earned only $4.6 million during its opening weekend and wound up grossing $45.6 million during its initial theatrical run -- hardly the makings of a blockbuster. Slowly but surely, though, a cult following developed, primarily among young urban audiences who kept coming back for repeat viewings.
In 2003, while preparing the release of a 20th anniversary "Scarface" DVD, Universal conducted a second round of test screenings -- and met with markedly different results.
"We put a print in front of audiences on the West Coast and the East Coast because we wanted to see if it would stand up as a theatrical release again in Los Angeles and New York, and scores were through the roof," Shmuger says. "The movie hadn't changed; what had changed was the audience and the culture."
Not only was the graphic violence more palatable to viewers raised on films like 1994's "Natural Born Killers" and video games like Midway's "Mortal Kombat" franchise, but also the premise of "Scarface" resonated among the test-screen throng.
"The whole story of trying to fight your way up, by hook or by crook or by violence -- of doing anything to achieve the American dream -- became something of an anthem to the hip-hop culture," Shmuger says. And the film's authenticity has endured. Says Bregman, "What makes all this possible, 23 years later, is a movie that is very much still a fresh and hot property."
Thanks to Thomas K. Arnold
Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Powerbrokers
Reviewed by Hillel Levin
Reviewed by J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Reviewed by Peter Pavia
Reviewed by Geoff Schumacher
Reviewed by Steve Warmbir
The Dealmakers Behind the Chicago Mob
Friends of ours: Al Capone, Pat Marcy, John "Dapper Don" Gotti
Friends of mine: Sidney Korshak, Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Hoffa
For most Americans, real racket power in the last century hovered somewhere over the Hudson River, and no wonder. They saw New York-area gangsters featured in the best books and movies about the Mafia. Flamboyant bosses like John Gotti grabbed headlines with good sound bites and flashy trials, or the occasional high-profile hit in a crowded restaurant. But while East Coast mob families splattered each other's brains in the marinara, the Second City's less-colorful Mafia, known as the Outfit, built a criminal empire that was truly second to none. Its tentacles stretched to the West Coast and wrapped securely around Las Vegas. Not that its members didn't whack their own wayward bosses along the way, but their executions were mostly private affairs, often dispatched with a few well-placed .22s to the back of the head.
Author Gus Russo has done yeoman's work in pulling the Outfit bosses from the shadows to show how their muscle and methods came to dominate organized crime. In his 2001 book, suitably titles "The Outfit," he chronicles the Chicago mob's rise to national power after Al Capone. Now, he weighs in with "Supermob." If you know about the short shrift the Outfit has received in the popular imagination, you can almost forgive the breathless title, but Russo pointedly uses the term "Supermob" to describe a band of Jewish lawyers, politicians and businessmen who acted as cat's-paws for some of the Outfit's most ambitious scams. Although he credits a Senate investigator with first using the term "Supermob," Russo takes it to a new level, suggesting a gang of white-collar kingpins as ruthless and tightly knit as a Mafia family. He is also serious about the "Super," claiming that the members of his "Kosher Nostra" would ultimately profit more from their "amoral, and frequently criminal careers" than did their Outfit allies.
Like all other Chicago gangster stories, Russo's starts with Capone, a criminal mastermind far more sophisticated than the brutal Scarface we know from the movies. Unlike gang leaders before him, he was not content with cornering the market on gambling and bootlegging. The "financial wiz" who showed him the way was Alex Louis Greenberg. He put Capone's money into real estate and service industries with free flowing cash, such as banks, entertainment venues and hotels. In the beginning, to protect the various investments, the mob used its excess money to buy politicians and its excess muscle to strong-arm unions. Eventually these inroads into the public sector and labor organizations would become lucrative sources of income themselves.
As the schemes got more complicated, the mobsters needed the help of lawyers, politicians and frontmen with relatively clean criminal records. It was a Faustian bargain, but it helped launch some of the most prominent names in Chicago's Jewish community. For example, according to Russo, Outfit funds and connections formed the foundation on which lawyer Abe Pritzker's family built the Hyatt hotel chain.
At the nexus of mob influence and political corruption was lawyer Jacob Arvey, the most important Jewish cog of the city's multiethnic Democratic machine. His clout with the Truman administration put a protege in charge of property seized from German companies and interned Japanese-Americans. Russo documents how these West Coast assets were sold for a fraction of their value to silent mob partners and the young lawyers, Arvey accomplices, who served as their frontmen. Some of these young lawyers then set up shop in California and duplicated Chicago's Democratic machine there, fueling their candidates' campaigns with money donated by the mob and its related unions. But the Outfit's insidious control of unions most drove its westward expansion. Back in the earliest days of moving pictures, Chicago mobsters used the threat of projectionist walkouts to shake down local theaters. These extortion schemes worked their way back to the studio lots. According to Russo, the movie moguls did not mind seeing leftist organizers pushed to the side by mob goons, who could at least be paid off to keep the cameras rolling.
Producers also got squeezed by the stars in front of the cameras, especially those managed by Jules Stein and Lew Wasserman of MCA, Hollywood's first powerhouse talent agency. Back in Chicago when Stein started the firm as Music Corporation of America, he was booking area bands and using a "union racketeer" to throw stink bombs in nightclubs that wouldn't take his acts. He was supposedly a silent partner with Outfit bosses in the hot spots where his bands played, and according to Russo, he would continue to blur the line between ownership and union influence throughout his career.
Later, when Wasserman client Ronald Reagan assumed the presidency of the Screen Actors Guild, he helped push through a waiver permitting MCA to be the only agency that could also produce programs for the burgeoning TV industry. This competitive edge helped Stein and Wasserman gain control of Universal Pictures and create Hollywood's first multimedia behemoth. In return for the SAG waiver, Russo asserts, Wasserman secretly cut Reagan into production deals (counter to SAG rules) and helped transform him into the ubiquitous TV presence that launched his political career.
The Outfit had its hooks in Las Vegas from the start (a Chicago mobster bribed Nevada legislators to pass the Wide Open Gambling Bill), but if the bosses hadn't had their fingers in the Teamsters pension fund, the city wouldn't be what we know today. From 1959 to 1961, they took $91 million from the union to build or improve one casino after another. Over the next decade, as Las Vegas' popularity soared, the Outfit was perfectly positioned to dominate the scene, with its control of corrupt politicians from both parties, its manipulation of the service unions and even its access, through Hollywood back channels, to the hottest entertainers, like Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. Eventually millions in cash skimmed from the casino counting rooms would make its way to Chicago's mob bosses.
Members of Russo's Supermob were pivotal resources in each of the Outfit's connections to Las Vegas, but none more so than Sidney Korshak. An obscure labor lawyer from Lawndale, Korshak would ultimately be dubbed the most powerful man in Hollywood. By the mid-'60s, the same would be true in Las Vegas. His brother Marshall had gone on to a very public career in Chicago as a lawyer, Democratic politician and city officeholder. Though Sidney would have his own notoriety, the source of his power would lurk in the shadows. Working on a flat retainer of $50,000 per job, Korshak was anointed the official labor negotiator for almost all of the Outfit-connected businesses. With just a phone call he could spark or quell strikes--a fearsome power in the seasonal hotel industry or during the massively expensive process of film production. But the contacts with his clients went far beyond labor matters. Moguls like Wasserman called him virtually every day. He helped negotiate deals for casinos and even business conglomerates on the backs of envelopes, often keeping a small piece of the action for himself. No favors were too big or too small for his clients, whether a Chicago hotel room for Warren Beatty during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, or a pardon from President Richard Nixon for ex-Teamsters leader Jimmy Hoffa. Ironically, he may have even contributed to the success of the film "The Godfather" by prying Al Pacino away from another studio.
Many a Korshak miracle was worked from the corner booth at Bistro, a posh Beverly Hills eatery, where a private phone was brought to his table. Russo fails to note that this setup closely emulated the notorious corner table at Counsellors Row, a restaurant across from Chicago's City Hall where the Outfit's kingmaker, Pat Marcy, ruled supreme. Like Marcy, Korshak would walk guests outside the restaurant to talk about especially confidential subjects. Some of the best yarns in "Supermob" come from a book written by Bistro's owner, Kurt Niklas, who kept tabs on the strange bouillabaisse that simmered around Korshak: It could include producer Bob Evans, actor Kirk Douglas, Gov. Jerry Brown, coarse Teamsters and, on rare occasion, cursing mobsters. One later testified that an Outfit boss warned him to stay away from Korshak because " `he's our man, been our man his whole life. [But he] can't be seen in public with guys like us.' "
In other words, the mob had to keep him subservient and separate. This was one of many conflicts in Korshak's fascinating life. He went to great ends to quash any media coverage of his activities, but he gladly relented to fawning mentions by Joyce Haber, the Los Angeles gossip columnist who, Russo says, coined the term "A-list" to describe the celebrities in the Korshak inner circle. He was a doting husband to his glamorous, shopaholic wife and a serial philanderer, not embarrassed to be seen on the town with paramours like Jill St. John. He dressed and collected art with impeccable taste but still exuded a threatening though soft-spoken manner. At one moment he could lament the unbreakable ties to his Outfit overseers and in the next threaten a recalcitrant business executive with " `cement shoes.' " In the words of one producer, " `Sidney was a very loud man in a very quiet way.' " Unfortunately, Russo does not give us much insight into how Korshak or his friends could bridge such contradictions. While "Supermob" is long on anecdote, it's much too short on analysis. No doubt there was something different about either Chicago or its Jewish community to produce the players Russo writes about. He only scratches the surface in trying to understand the world they came from. The closest he gets is a quote about Greenberg: " `[L]ike almost everyone who became rich through racketeering, respectability was what he sought most.' " The words came from long-time Sun-Times reporter Irv Kupcinet, a close friend of Korshak's and another macho Jewish guy who loved rubbing shoulders with the mob.
In fact, most of the Supermob families Russo writes about did find legitimacy, if not for themselves then for their heirs; hence the shock some of us may feel at discovering the roots of their fortunes. The same is true for some Outfit clans as well. Perhaps there is something about the institutional memory in Chicago that has helped ease the transformation. Kupcinet was a gossip columnist but a nice one, the sort who never delved too deeply into the dark sources of power. When he spotted you on a prestigious perch, like Booth One at the Pump Room, a mention in his column brought some glow of fame without the painful questions about how you got there.
Thanks to Hillel Levin
Friends of mine: Sidney Korshak, Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Hoffa
For most Americans, real racket power in the last century hovered somewhere over the Hudson River, and no wonder. They saw New York-area gangsters featured in the best books and movies about the Mafia. Flamboyant bosses like John Gotti grabbed headlines with good sound bites and flashy trials, or the occasional high-profile hit in a crowded restaurant. But while East Coast mob families splattered each other's brains in the marinara, the Second City's less-colorful Mafia, known as the Outfit, built a criminal empire that was truly second to none. Its tentacles stretched to the West Coast and wrapped securely around Las Vegas. Not that its members didn't whack their own wayward bosses along the way, but their executions were mostly private affairs, often dispatched with a few well-placed .22s to the back of the head.
Author Gus Russo has done yeoman's work in pulling the Outfit bosses from the shadows to show how their muscle and methods came to dominate organized crime. In his 2001 book, suitably titles "The Outfit," he chronicles the Chicago mob's rise to national power after Al Capone. Now, he weighs in with "Supermob." If you know about the short shrift the Outfit has received in the popular imagination, you can almost forgive the breathless title, but Russo pointedly uses the term "Supermob" to describe a band of Jewish lawyers, politicians and businessmen who acted as cat's-paws for some of the Outfit's most ambitious scams. Although he credits a Senate investigator with first using the term "Supermob," Russo takes it to a new level, suggesting a gang of white-collar kingpins as ruthless and tightly knit as a Mafia family. He is also serious about the "Super," claiming that the members of his "Kosher Nostra" would ultimately profit more from their "amoral, and frequently criminal careers" than did their Outfit allies.
Like all other Chicago gangster stories, Russo's starts with Capone, a criminal mastermind far more sophisticated than the brutal Scarface we know from the movies. Unlike gang leaders before him, he was not content with cornering the market on gambling and bootlegging. The "financial wiz" who showed him the way was Alex Louis Greenberg. He put Capone's money into real estate and service industries with free flowing cash, such as banks, entertainment venues and hotels. In the beginning, to protect the various investments, the mob used its excess money to buy politicians and its excess muscle to strong-arm unions. Eventually these inroads into the public sector and labor organizations would become lucrative sources of income themselves.
As the schemes got more complicated, the mobsters needed the help of lawyers, politicians and frontmen with relatively clean criminal records. It was a Faustian bargain, but it helped launch some of the most prominent names in Chicago's Jewish community. For example, according to Russo, Outfit funds and connections formed the foundation on which lawyer Abe Pritzker's family built the Hyatt hotel chain.
At the nexus of mob influence and political corruption was lawyer Jacob Arvey, the most important Jewish cog of the city's multiethnic Democratic machine. His clout with the Truman administration put a protege in charge of property seized from German companies and interned Japanese-Americans. Russo documents how these West Coast assets were sold for a fraction of their value to silent mob partners and the young lawyers, Arvey accomplices, who served as their frontmen. Some of these young lawyers then set up shop in California and duplicated Chicago's Democratic machine there, fueling their candidates' campaigns with money donated by the mob and its related unions. But the Outfit's insidious control of unions most drove its westward expansion. Back in the earliest days of moving pictures, Chicago mobsters used the threat of projectionist walkouts to shake down local theaters. These extortion schemes worked their way back to the studio lots. According to Russo, the movie moguls did not mind seeing leftist organizers pushed to the side by mob goons, who could at least be paid off to keep the cameras rolling.
Producers also got squeezed by the stars in front of the cameras, especially those managed by Jules Stein and Lew Wasserman of MCA, Hollywood's first powerhouse talent agency. Back in Chicago when Stein started the firm as Music Corporation of America, he was booking area bands and using a "union racketeer" to throw stink bombs in nightclubs that wouldn't take his acts. He was supposedly a silent partner with Outfit bosses in the hot spots where his bands played, and according to Russo, he would continue to blur the line between ownership and union influence throughout his career.
Later, when Wasserman client Ronald Reagan assumed the presidency of the Screen Actors Guild, he helped push through a waiver permitting MCA to be the only agency that could also produce programs for the burgeoning TV industry. This competitive edge helped Stein and Wasserman gain control of Universal Pictures and create Hollywood's first multimedia behemoth. In return for the SAG waiver, Russo asserts, Wasserman secretly cut Reagan into production deals (counter to SAG rules) and helped transform him into the ubiquitous TV presence that launched his political career.
The Outfit had its hooks in Las Vegas from the start (a Chicago mobster bribed Nevada legislators to pass the Wide Open Gambling Bill), but if the bosses hadn't had their fingers in the Teamsters pension fund, the city wouldn't be what we know today. From 1959 to 1961, they took $91 million from the union to build or improve one casino after another. Over the next decade, as Las Vegas' popularity soared, the Outfit was perfectly positioned to dominate the scene, with its control of corrupt politicians from both parties, its manipulation of the service unions and even its access, through Hollywood back channels, to the hottest entertainers, like Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. Eventually millions in cash skimmed from the casino counting rooms would make its way to Chicago's mob bosses.
Members of Russo's Supermob were pivotal resources in each of the Outfit's connections to Las Vegas, but none more so than Sidney Korshak. An obscure labor lawyer from Lawndale, Korshak would ultimately be dubbed the most powerful man in Hollywood. By the mid-'60s, the same would be true in Las Vegas. His brother Marshall had gone on to a very public career in Chicago as a lawyer, Democratic politician and city officeholder. Though Sidney would have his own notoriety, the source of his power would lurk in the shadows. Working on a flat retainer of $50,000 per job, Korshak was anointed the official labor negotiator for almost all of the Outfit-connected businesses. With just a phone call he could spark or quell strikes--a fearsome power in the seasonal hotel industry or during the massively expensive process of film production. But the contacts with his clients went far beyond labor matters. Moguls like Wasserman called him virtually every day. He helped negotiate deals for casinos and even business conglomerates on the backs of envelopes, often keeping a small piece of the action for himself. No favors were too big or too small for his clients, whether a Chicago hotel room for Warren Beatty during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, or a pardon from President Richard Nixon for ex-Teamsters leader Jimmy Hoffa. Ironically, he may have even contributed to the success of the film "The Godfather" by prying Al Pacino away from another studio.
Many a Korshak miracle was worked from the corner booth at Bistro, a posh Beverly Hills eatery, where a private phone was brought to his table. Russo fails to note that this setup closely emulated the notorious corner table at Counsellors Row, a restaurant across from Chicago's City Hall where the Outfit's kingmaker, Pat Marcy, ruled supreme. Like Marcy, Korshak would walk guests outside the restaurant to talk about especially confidential subjects. Some of the best yarns in "Supermob" come from a book written by Bistro's owner, Kurt Niklas, who kept tabs on the strange bouillabaisse that simmered around Korshak: It could include producer Bob Evans, actor Kirk Douglas, Gov. Jerry Brown, coarse Teamsters and, on rare occasion, cursing mobsters. One later testified that an Outfit boss warned him to stay away from Korshak because " `he's our man, been our man his whole life. [But he] can't be seen in public with guys like us.' "
In other words, the mob had to keep him subservient and separate. This was one of many conflicts in Korshak's fascinating life. He went to great ends to quash any media coverage of his activities, but he gladly relented to fawning mentions by Joyce Haber, the Los Angeles gossip columnist who, Russo says, coined the term "A-list" to describe the celebrities in the Korshak inner circle. He was a doting husband to his glamorous, shopaholic wife and a serial philanderer, not embarrassed to be seen on the town with paramours like Jill St. John. He dressed and collected art with impeccable taste but still exuded a threatening though soft-spoken manner. At one moment he could lament the unbreakable ties to his Outfit overseers and in the next threaten a recalcitrant business executive with " `cement shoes.' " In the words of one producer, " `Sidney was a very loud man in a very quiet way.' " Unfortunately, Russo does not give us much insight into how Korshak or his friends could bridge such contradictions. While "Supermob" is long on anecdote, it's much too short on analysis. No doubt there was something different about either Chicago or its Jewish community to produce the players Russo writes about. He only scratches the surface in trying to understand the world they came from. The closest he gets is a quote about Greenberg: " `[L]ike almost everyone who became rich through racketeering, respectability was what he sought most.' " The words came from long-time Sun-Times reporter Irv Kupcinet, a close friend of Korshak's and another macho Jewish guy who loved rubbing shoulders with the mob.
In fact, most of the Supermob families Russo writes about did find legitimacy, if not for themselves then for their heirs; hence the shock some of us may feel at discovering the roots of their fortunes. The same is true for some Outfit clans as well. Perhaps there is something about the institutional memory in Chicago that has helped ease the transformation. Kupcinet was a gossip columnist but a nice one, the sort who never delved too deeply into the dark sources of power. When he spotted you on a prestigious perch, like Booth One at the Pump Room, a mention in his column brought some glow of fame without the painful questions about how you got there.
Thanks to Hillel Levin
Mafia and Mob Book Reviews
More Books and Reviews will be added periodically.
An Offer We Can't Refuse -- The Mafia in the Mind of America by George Stefano
"After Capone: The Life and World of Chicago Mob Boss Frank (the Enforcer) Nitti" by Mars Eghigian
Bringing Down the Mob by Thomas Reppetto
Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires By Selwyn Raab
Motor City Mafia by Scott Burnstein
Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Powerbrokers by Gus Russo
The Battle for Las Vegas by Dennis Griffin
The Brotherhoods: The True Story of Two Cops Who Murdered for the Mafia by Guy Lawson and William Oldham
The Chicago Mob by John Binder
The Last Godfather by Simon Crittle
The St. Valentine's Day Massacre: The Untold Story of the Gangland Bloodbath That Brought Down Al Capone by William J. Helmer and Arthur J. Bilek
Monday, October 02, 2006
Stool Pigeon in Mafia Cops Case Freed
Friends of ours: Anthony "Gaspipe" Casso, Lucchese Crime Family
Friends of mine: Louis Eppolito, Stephen Caracappa, Burton Kaplan
The truth has set him free.
Stool pigeon Burton Kaplan, the key witness against mob cops Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa, was sprung from prison yesterday after serving just over nine years of a 27-year sentence for dealing tons of marijuana.
Brooklyn federal Judge Jack Weinstein commuted the prison stint for Kaplan, who was the go-between for the ex-NYPD detectives and Luchese crime-family boss Anthony "Gaspipe" Casso, as part of a deal for his cooperation. "His information led to the resolution of eight murder investigations," said prosecutor Robert Henoch, who had nothing but praise for the detailed information Kaplan, 72, offered - which Henoch said was "excruciatingly corroborated."
"His memory was astounding," Henoch said, noting that Kaplan helped investigators uncover evidence that the cops were acting as paid Mafia moles and hit men while wearing their shields.
Neither Kaplan's wife nor daughter, Manhattan state Supreme Court Judge Deborah Kaplan, were in court yesterday because Kaplan feared for their safety, according to his lawyer Michael Gold. "I know words cannot change my crimes," Kaplan told Weinstein. "My only concern was my own selfish motives of not wanting to get caught."
The judge released Kaplan, who pleaded guilty in March 2005 to charges stemming from the crooked cops' case, on $2 million bail while he awaits sentencing for those crimes.
Eppolito and Caracappa were convicted in April, but Weinstein overturned the jury conviction on a legal technicality. The pair are on 23-hour-a-day lockdown in a federal prison in Brooklyn while prosecutors appeal Weinstein's decision.
Thanks to Zach Haberman
Friends of mine: Louis Eppolito, Stephen Caracappa, Burton Kaplan
The truth has set him free.
Stool pigeon Burton Kaplan, the key witness against mob cops Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa, was sprung from prison yesterday after serving just over nine years of a 27-year sentence for dealing tons of marijuana.
Brooklyn federal Judge Jack Weinstein commuted the prison stint for Kaplan, who was the go-between for the ex-NYPD detectives and Luchese crime-family boss Anthony "Gaspipe" Casso, as part of a deal for his cooperation. "His information led to the resolution of eight murder investigations," said prosecutor Robert Henoch, who had nothing but praise for the detailed information Kaplan, 72, offered - which Henoch said was "excruciatingly corroborated."
"His memory was astounding," Henoch said, noting that Kaplan helped investigators uncover evidence that the cops were acting as paid Mafia moles and hit men while wearing their shields.
Neither Kaplan's wife nor daughter, Manhattan state Supreme Court Judge Deborah Kaplan, were in court yesterday because Kaplan feared for their safety, according to his lawyer Michael Gold. "I know words cannot change my crimes," Kaplan told Weinstein. "My only concern was my own selfish motives of not wanting to get caught."
The judge released Kaplan, who pleaded guilty in March 2005 to charges stemming from the crooked cops' case, on $2 million bail while he awaits sentencing for those crimes.
Eppolito and Caracappa were convicted in April, but Weinstein overturned the jury conviction on a legal technicality. The pair are on 23-hour-a-day lockdown in a federal prison in Brooklyn while prosecutors appeal Weinstein's decision.
Thanks to Zach Haberman
Tough Time Getting Medical Help in Federal Lockup for "The Clown"
Friends of ours: Joey "The Clown" Lombardo
It wasn't cardiac clowning for Joe Lombardo. According to Lombardo's lawyer, a couple of weeks ago, the clown tried to get some medical attention. He has heart problems and thought he was having a heart attack and said he wanted to be taken to the hospital--stat. But it apparently took some convincing by Lombardo and his lawyer before he was actually taken to the hospital.
Joey Lombardo is known for his clowning around, like hiding behind a newspaper mask while walking through the courthouse or leading fellow mobsters up a construction ladder to evade news crews. But when Lombardo, sometimes also nicknamed "Lumpy," clutched his breastbone in a cell at the Metro Correctional Center, it was no sight gag.
Lombardo's lawyer Rick Halprin tells the I-Team that Lombardo himself couldn't convince MCC officials he was having a heart attack. Halprin says he had to appeal to the MCC's lawyer to get Lombardo taken seriously and treated.
The ailing hoodlum was brought to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was diagnosed as having had a minor heart attack. Lombardo was put into an operating room where he underwent surgery, according to his lawyer, to have a stent installed. A stent is a small metal tube inserted permanently into an artery, propping it open so that blood can flow through. It was Lombardo's fourth stent procedure.
Friday night, the hoodlum is on the mend back in his MCC jail cell and may be saying "I told you so."
While Joey Lombardo was a federal fugitive two years ago, he sent a prophetic letter to a federal judge explaining why his previous jail sentences prevented him from surrendering. It said: "Medical care in prison is a farce. I went 3 times with chest pain and 3 cardiograms they said I had a enlarged heart take 1 aspirin a day. 1 month later I was released had chest pain went to the hospital took a angiogram and found I had artery 98% blocked. Had angioplasty the same day. Since my release 1993 I've had 2 or 3 angioplasty and 3 stents put in."
Lombardo turns 78 years old on New Years Day. His federal murder racketeering trial isn't scheduled to begin until the spring, and with his latest cardiac crisis, expect the clown's health to be a recurring courtroom issue.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
It wasn't cardiac clowning for Joe Lombardo. According to Lombardo's lawyer, a couple of weeks ago, the clown tried to get some medical attention. He has heart problems and thought he was having a heart attack and said he wanted to be taken to the hospital--stat. But it apparently took some convincing by Lombardo and his lawyer before he was actually taken to the hospital.
Joey Lombardo is known for his clowning around, like hiding behind a newspaper mask while walking through the courthouse or leading fellow mobsters up a construction ladder to evade news crews. But when Lombardo, sometimes also nicknamed "Lumpy," clutched his breastbone in a cell at the Metro Correctional Center, it was no sight gag.
Lombardo's lawyer Rick Halprin tells the I-Team that Lombardo himself couldn't convince MCC officials he was having a heart attack. Halprin says he had to appeal to the MCC's lawyer to get Lombardo taken seriously and treated.
The ailing hoodlum was brought to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was diagnosed as having had a minor heart attack. Lombardo was put into an operating room where he underwent surgery, according to his lawyer, to have a stent installed. A stent is a small metal tube inserted permanently into an artery, propping it open so that blood can flow through. It was Lombardo's fourth stent procedure.
Friday night, the hoodlum is on the mend back in his MCC jail cell and may be saying "I told you so."
While Joey Lombardo was a federal fugitive two years ago, he sent a prophetic letter to a federal judge explaining why his previous jail sentences prevented him from surrendering. It said: "Medical care in prison is a farce. I went 3 times with chest pain and 3 cardiograms they said I had a enlarged heart take 1 aspirin a day. 1 month later I was released had chest pain went to the hospital took a angiogram and found I had artery 98% blocked. Had angioplasty the same day. Since my release 1993 I've had 2 or 3 angioplasty and 3 stents put in."
Lombardo turns 78 years old on New Years Day. His federal murder racketeering trial isn't scheduled to begin until the spring, and with his latest cardiac crisis, expect the clown's health to be a recurring courtroom issue.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
