Gianni Russo was 26 years old, with a couple million dollars in cash from running errands for mob bosses and a pretty big ego, when he used his Mafia connections to get the plum role of Carlo Rizzi in the classic 1972 movie “The Godfather.”
He had never acted in his life, which was a serious affront to co-star Marlon Brando, who considered acting an art that required years of study. As soon as filming began, Brando told director Francis Ford Coppola that Russo had to go.
“I go square nose to nose with (Brando), and I’m whispering because I don’t want the rest of the people to hear what I’m gonna say, and I said, ‘Let me tell you something, Mr. Brando, all due respect, I know who you are, but let me tell you this, you get me fired and I will suck on your heart and you will bleed out right here, today,’ ” recalled Russo, 79, of that moment more than 50 years ago. “He looked at me, he stepped back and he said, ‘That was brilliant, you can really act.’ He thought I was acting.”
Russo’s colorful stories fill the pages of his 2019 memoir “Hollywood Godfather: My Life in the Movies and the Mob” and have helped him charm audiences and make friends wherever he goes. Lately, he’s been spending time in Maine, where’s he’s appeared on a Portland public access TV show, was a guest on a Portland radio show and told stories and sang at a restaurant in Windham. Russo will be back in Maine in February to sing and tell stories about his life – which seems stranger than fiction and as dramatic as any movie. The event “An Evening with Gianni Russo” will be held at Portland Elks Lodge 188.
Some of his claims are hard to believe and impossible to verify, but people in Maine who have met and worked with him say they have no reason not to believe him.
“It’s one man’s life and experience. He’s just matter-of-factly telling people about all that he’s been through,” said Portland pianist and bandleader Jim Ciampi, who is organizing the show in February and will accompany Russo. “He’s a very convincing guy with a great way about him and a huge personality, very gracious, very genuine. People can believe him or not. I believe him.”
Gianni Russo and Marlon Brando on the set of “The Godfather.” Mary Evans/Paramount Pictures/Ronald Grant/Everett Collection
Raised in Manhattan’s Little Italy, Russo says he spent five years in a hospital with polio – where he claims to have killed a suspected pedophile who accosted him – then lived on the streets as a teen before working odd jobs and running errands for New York mob figure Frank Costello. After his “Godfather” role, he went on to act in dozens of films and TV shows and for a while ran his own Las Vegas nightspot – where he shot and killed a man who had slashed him and a female customer with a broken bottle. Nevada authorities ruled it justifiable homicide in 1988, according to newspaper accounts at the time.
Russo also has his own podcast and has written a novel called “The 6th Family.” He credits Frank Sinatra with helping him learn to sing and Brando with teaching him to act. His live shows include songs with Rat Pack vibes, including tunes famously sung by Sinatra or Dean Martin, among others.
Gianni Russo’s book about his life came out in 2019. Photo courtesy of St. Martin’s Press
Though mob figures and violence are part of many of Russo’s stories, Mainers who’ve met and worked with Russo this past year say they don’t think he’s glorifying the Mafia or reenforcing stereotypes about Italian Americans and organized crime. Russo says he was never technically in the Mafia, though he worked with mob figures and knew plenty of bosses.
A MAINE ATTRACTION
Russo’s Maine travels and relationships started about a year ago when Rob Baldacci, a Maine commercial real estate broker, invited Russo to appear on the Portland community TV show “The Rundlett & Baldacci Report,” which he co-hosts with lawyer Derry Rundlett.
Baldacci, a fan of “The Godfather” movies, read Russo’s book and thought he’d make a great guest for the talk show. Russo first appeared via Zoom in an episode of the show that aired in September of 2022.
“He’s interacted with some of the most famous and infamous people of the 20th century,” Baldacci said about why he thought Russo would be a good guest for a TV show. “He’s got the pictures and newspaper clippings to show he was there, he knew these people.”
In March, Portland talk radio host Ray Richardson invited Russo to be guest on his show, based at WLOB in Portland but aired on stations around the state. Richardson said he doesn’t remember exactly how he heard of Russo. But he does remember being surprised at some of things Russo talked about on air – including details of a tryst he said he had with Marilyn Monroe – and the way listeners reacted.
“We talked for more than an hour. He was very sharp, and some of the things he said were pretty wild. After the show, we got about 750 texts from people about him,” Richardson said.
Richardson talked with Russo off-air and learned that he performs in concerts, where he sings and tells stories. Richardson suggested he do one in the Portland area and thought Erik’s Church in Windham, run by Ken Cianchette, would be a good venue for it. Cianchette was receptive to the idea, and then Ciampi was brought in to accompany Russo. The July 17 dinner show at Erik’s Church sold out, with about 160 people seated at tables. It was billed as “An Evening You Can’t Refuse: Gianni Russo.”
“You could hear a pin drop that night. People were just captivated by his presence and by his knowledge of Hollywood and a lot of other things,” said Cianchette. “I’d love to have him back.”
Around the same time in July, Russo visited the Portland studios of “The Rundlett & Baldacci Report” to do another episode of the show, which aired in September. After the concert at Erik’s Church, Ciampi worked to get Russo another show in Maine and organized the upcoming show at the Elks Lodge.
Robert DeNiro, left, and Gianni Russo. Both men appeared in “The Godfather” movies. Photo courtesy of Gianni Russo
PROUD OF HIS HERITAGE
Some of the songs Russo is slated to sing in Portland include “Everybody Loves Somebody,” “For Once in My Life” and “Speak Softly, Love,” the theme from “The Godfather,” Ciampi said. Ciampi says he’ll also play smaller bits of music leading up to Russo’s stories.
And he has a lot of stories.
His brush with Brando, for instance, is part of a larger story Russo tells about helping to broker a deal that helped get “The Godfather” made. The Italian-American Civil Rights League, which was founded by New York mob boss Joe Colombo, had publicly decried the announcement that “The Godfather” was going to be made, protesting use of the word Mafia and other perceived slights against Italian Americans.
Russo, who had worked as a courier, carrying money and messages for various mob figures, said he went to Colombo and told him about a way to “make a lot of money” by working with the film’s producers instead of protesting them. He said he told Colombo he should ask to read the script and take out things he didn’t like, such as the use of terms Mafia and Cosa Nostra. He also told Colombo to ask for rights before its wider opening, at formal events with high prices. In exchange, Colombo and his colleagues would agree to not interfere with the film or any of the unions involved.
“I told him we could make a lot of money from this,” said Russo. “And he said to me, ‘We?’ ”
Russo said he had already auditioned for a part in the film, paid for his own screen test and had been turned down. But after he set up a meeting between Colombo and the production company, he requested and got the role of Carlo.
It’s a key role, because Carlo marries into the Corleone family, abuses daughter Connie and betrays the family by helping set up Sonny’s killing. Despite his early confrontation with Brando, Russo says Brando worked with him a lot during the film, reading lines and giving him advice.
Gianni Russo, left, in the wedding scene from “The Godfather.” Photo courtesy of Gianni Russo
Russo says the scene where James Caan’s character, Sonny, beats him up on the street was rough, literally, because Caan really hit him and kicked him. He ended up with two broken ribs. The scene where Carlo menaces his wife, Connie, played by Talia Shire, was difficult for different reasons, Russo said. First, because he had watched his father beat his mother when he was young, and second, because Shire was the sister of director Coppola.
Many of his stories involve famous people. He talks about meeting Joseph Kennedy, father of the future president, when mob representatives met with him about helping John F. Kennedy’s campaign. He also talked about becoming intimate with movie star Marilyn Monroe – when he was still a teen.
When asked if he’s proud of his time spent working with mob figures over the years, he explains that they had been part of his life and the culture he grew up in forever. He had a great-uncle in Sicily who was a feared figure in the Mafia there, and that was one of the reasons Frank Costello had given him odd jobs to do as a teenager. He knew lots of people as just friends and neighbors before finding out their Mafia affiliations.
“I am totally proud of my heritage. I’m not with the mob. I couldn’t have held the (business) licenses I’ve held,” said Russo, from his apartment in Manhattan. “The mob was started for a good reason, to help Italian immigrants, which they did do. But then there was drugs and money and you got guys like John Gotti, who destroyed it.”
Editor’s note: An Evening with Gianni Russo was rescheduled to February just before this story was published.
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