“It sorta aggravated me”: The moment Joe Pesci came across a real gangster on the set of ‘Casino’
Everybody loves a gangster flick. From 1932’s Scarface to the Francis Ford Coppola classic The Godfather, the gangster genre has always been one of Hollywood’s most beloved. Few people, though, have been quite as consistent in creating gangster classics as Martin Scorsese.
Early efforts like Mean Streets established Scorsese as a director with a particular knack for reflecting the seedy criminal underbelly of America. A core part of why the director’s crime filmography is so well-respected, both by cinemagoers and gangsters, is its roots in realism. Dedicated to creating stories that reflect the real world, Scorsese has always gone to great lengths in terms of research and development.
For a film like 1995’s Casino, for instance, Scorsese recruited real-world gangsters like Frank Cullotta as technical advisors. Cullotta, once a member of the Chicago Mob back in the 1960s and 1970s before becoming an informant for the FBI, provided key insight into the inner workings of a criminal life which helped to add a sense of realism to Casino.
Nevertheless, the former Chicago mobster didn’t always gel well with the cast of the film, at one point clashing with Joe Pesci. Pesci had already earned his stripes as a fictional gangster, starring in Scorsese’s 1990 classic Goodfellas, and Casino would see him take on the role of “made man” Nicky Santoro. Seemingly, though, that fictional power got to the head of real-world Joe Pesci.
As Cullotta recalled before his death in 2020, the issues between the pair began when Pesci brought his then-wife, Claudia Haro, onto set. The actor wanted to get his wife a role in the film, and she was eventually cast as the minor character of Trudy, the announcer of Ace’s High. “So he brings her in and introduces her to everybody,” Cullotta remembered. “He doesn’t introduce her to me. I’m looking at him, like I was invisible. It sorta aggravated me, right?”
After shooting the scene, which took 22 takes according to the retired gangster, Cullotta confronted Pesci about that affront. “I told him ‘Why didn’t you introduce me? What, did you think I was gonna make a move with your old lady?’” To which Pesci retorted, “‘What was I gonna call you, Frank the Rat?’”
Now, Frank Cullotta was, by Mob definition, a rat. In 1982, he made a deal with the FBI and prosecutors to be an informant on the various crimes he had committed over the years, and the actions of other Mob members he was affiliated with. However, he was also responsible for the deaths of at least four people, so Pesci’s remark was fairly bold, even if, as Cullotta suggests, “He was only bustin’ balls.”
Ultimately, the matter was resolved with a strict talking-to. Cullotta waited for Pesci later that day, and shook off the actor’s four bodyguards by declaring, “‘Joe, I will stack ‘em up like a brick wall over here. I want to talk to you.’” After isolating the actor, Cullotta brought up that rodent-based comment. “‘Listen, I didn’t appreciate what you said to me. […] You only play the character I am. If you ever call me a name like that again, in playing, I will rip one of your eyeballs out of your head.’”
Seemingly, that sorted things out between the pair, with Pesci and Cullotta becoming firm friends for the rest of the production. The actor would go on to star in more Scorsese gangster flicks, like 2019’s epic masterpiece The Irishman, with his eyeballs intact.
