Cosa Nostra News

On the evening of May 2, 1957, Frank Costello dined at Chandler’s Restaurant at 49 West 49th Street. In preparation for his role in The Godfather, Marlon Brando reportedly watched recordings of Costello speaking.  His companion may have been Philip Kennedy, a former semi-pro baseball player who was a sometime actor who managed a modeling agency. Costello likely enjoyed Kennedy’s company because Kennedy moved nimbly and freely among Manhattan’s wealthiest denizens. Costello, the insecure Don, was supposedly fixated on being accepted by those folks. The blue bloods made him self-conscious about his voice and his inability to lose the “deeze, doze, dem” East Harlem diction. (Bizarre stuff for the mob boss who filled Lucky Luciano’s shoes, but it is the insecurities that keep us interested in the guy, anyway.) Costello’s gravelly voice (which wasn’t as gravelly as you might think, as per the video below, which includes more of Frank talking than any other clip we’ve seen...

From left, Al Pacino, Genovese capo Patsy Eboli and Al Lettieri. I found the following while researching where in Sicily Al Lettieri 's family arrived from. Lettieri, the great character actor of the 1970s, was noticed for his infamous turn in the Godfather ; my next personal favorite Lettieri character after Virgil (The Turk) Sollozzo has to be the villian in the Steve McQueen flick The Getaway (based on the excellent novel of the same name by Jim Thompson, the blackhearted writer of criminal fictional masterpieces .) I couldn't find a reference regarding from where the actor's family hailed, but I did find interesting information about a former Genovese acting boss murdered gangland style in 1972. (His brother disappeared a few years later.) I got the chills after finding a story that seems to substantiate a claim I'd heard from one of my sources. The source is from Manhattan's Greenwich Village and lived about one block away from the Tr...

The Smoking Gun has compiled a lengthy report based on documents and interviews to tell the story of how Rev. Al Sharpton, beginning in the 1980s, worked as a mob informant for an organized crime task force of FBI agents and NYPD detectives (some of whom reportedly gave Sharpton up to the Smoking Gun). We've put together a list of 10 things we believe the mob would love to know about Rev. Al.

Genovese boss Frank "Funzi" Tieri was powerful enough to run the Commission during tumultuous times. The historical problem with writing about the Mafia is the basic fact that, since it is a secret society, it doesn't keep records regarding quarterly revenues. The CEO doesn't writer a letter to the board, informing them of any upcoming plans to "grow" the crime family, etc. So where do facts used in a given work come from? What is the source of the source? Usually law enforcement documents, such as 302s; trial transcripts of testimony -- then there are congressional  committees; enterprising journalists/historians who find information no one else has either through contemporary sources or by digging through musty old files. Then there are memoirs, such as Joseph Bonanno's Man of Honor and the one written by Nicola Gentile.