Tom Santopietro - The Godfather Effect: Changing Hollywood, America, and Me

Orazio Santopietro behind the counter of his grocery store. Division Street, Waterbury, Connecticut, 1932. Family photo

I am particularly indebted to Jerre Mangione and Ben Morreale for their invaluable La Storia: Five Centuries of the Italian American Experience, the best overview of Italians in America that I have yet read. I also owe thanks to Harlan Lebo for his encyclopedic and entertaining study of The Godfather on film, The Godfather Legacy. Although the focus of both books is different from mine, each proved invaluable in supplying fascinating background information, which I hope I have adequately noted.

On a personal note, I offer a heartfelt thanks to the following for their guidance and assistance: Mark Erickson, for generously taking the time to read the manuscript so carefully; my cousin Peter Albini, for supplying translations wheneverwhich is to say alwaysmy virtually nonexistent Italian failed; Catherine Daly, director of the American Family Immigration History Center on Ellis Island, who spent extraordinary amounts of time helping me track my grandparents voyage to the United States; my cousin Don Albino, for sending me family records; Bill Cannon; Rheba Flegelman; Barbara Fasano and Eric Comstock; Kim Kelley; Lynnette Barkley, Brig Berney, and Jan Heise; Nola Safro; Tony DeSare; Ruth Mulhall; Mary Gates; Mimi Lines, my consultant on all matters Italian; Ron and Howard Mandelbaum at Photofest; Katie Gilligan at St. Martins Press; my publisher, Thomas Dunne; my extraordinary circle of friends, too numerous to mention, for their continual support and forebearance even as I talked incessantly of all matters Italian; Jeanine Basinger; Patti LuPone; and finally, to my pal Craig Sylvester, who inadvertently started this book thirty years ago with his smiling comment: Youre Italian all rightItalian by way of the Taft prep school. It may just be the only comment I remember from my three years in law school.

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1972 and the start of the phenomenon. Brando on Don Corleone: a bulldog: mean-looking but warm underneath.