SECRETS OF HOLLYWOOD’S GODFATHER
Delve into Gianni Russo’s life as a mobster and movie star
Igot away with everything including murder,” Gianni Russo says. The former mafia runner turned actor’s memoir, Hollywood Godfather: My Life in the Movies and the Mob, details a life that’s been as dramatic as the films he’s starred in during his near 50-year career.
As well as working for one of New York’s most notorious gangsters, Russo claims he killed two people. One of them was allegedly a member of the Medellin drug cartel who was reportedly harassing a woman outside his Las Vegas club. A court ruled justifiable homicide, but this led to a meeting between Russo and Colombian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar. Russo was good friends with Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra; had affairs with stars like Marilyn Monroe and Liza Minnelli and even had a bit-player involvement in JFK’s assassination.
“I wouldn’t change a day in my life, not one. Most people suffer and get no rewards – look at my life! My life is nuts,” he says. “I was able to achieve what I’ve done without education, without anything [ just] pure nerve and persistence. And I’m still doing it – I love it.”
The 76-year-old tells WHO he had good reason for not revealing all the secrets of his colourful life before now. “I had to wait for a few people to die before I could start talking about it,” he says. “Several, actually.”
In fact, Russo says he planned on releasing his autobiography 10 years ago. At the time he gave a series of interviews announcing the publication and how a film
of his life – starring Mark Wahlberg and directed by David O. Russell – was in the works. Then, he explains, “I got threats out of the woodwork, so I said, ‘I’ll wait.’”
He was finally given the nod to go ahead with the book two years ago, from someone Russo won’t name. Russo admits it was also lucky that Colombo crime boss Carmine Persico, who features in the memoir, died just days before its US publication.
Now a movie deal is reportedly back on the table with three major studios in talks to translate Russo’s story onto the screen.
Born in Manhattan’s Little Italy to an abusive father with small-time mafia connections, Russo was seemingly destined for mobster life. Effectively abandoned by his family after contracting polio at 7 and being quarantined on a ward in New York’s Bellevue Hospital for five years, Russo was independent from an early age. By his teens he’d given up on school and was selling pens on Fifth Avenue when he crossed paths with New York crime boss Frank Costello.
Nicknamed “the Kid”, Russo became one of Costello’s messengers, delivering gambling clips and money between some of the city’s glitziest hotels and clubs.
Russo idolised his bosses. “They drove the best cars, they had all the money in their pockets, they wore the best suits – why wouldn’t I want to be them? I didn’t want to have a 9 to 5 job. I was blessed as I’ve been all my life when Costello took me under his wing,” he says. When the district’s truant officer began asking
“I didn’t want to have a 9 to 5 job”
questions, Russo’s bosses enrolled him in hairdressing school. Despite only having to attend a few hours a day, Russo learnt how to wash hair and was seconded to the Lilly Dache Beauty Salon, where Marilyn Monroe was a regular client. According to Russo, who was 16 at the time, he became her regular shampoo guy. When the movie star summoned him to her Waldorf hotel room suite for a wash one day, he says he didn’t leave for the weekend.
“I talk about how Marlon Brando was my acting teacher, and how Frank Sinatra was my only singing teacher and now I have to say Marilyn Monroe introduced me to adult life – I never knew room service, I never had a glass of champagne, and I never shared a bath with a woman until her,” he says.
Russo says he was infatuated with the actress and over the next few years, whenever Monroe was in New York, they would meet up. “We’d go to dive bars, she’d wear disguises around the hotel where she was staying,” he recalls. “She’d like to go out. We’d go over the Brooklyn bridge to look at New York City from that other side. We’d walk Central Park at night. It was just genuine, two people having fun.”
In his book, Russo writes about the link between the mafia, Monroe and the Kennedy brothers. He’s convinced Robert Kennedy ordered Monroe’s killing.
“[Monroe] made it public that she was going public about them,” he explains, referring to the alleged affairs the actress had with President John F. Kennedy and his brother.
Russo also claims he had an indirect role in JFK’s death by couriering a message between Costello and New Orleans boss Carlos Marcello that gave confirmation for the Mafia-orchestrated assassination to go ahead. “I regret it, but if it wasn’t me it would have been someone else – I was a messenger. I didn’t pull the trigger,” Russo says.
Another legendary star, Frank Sinatra,
became a good friend – and in the 1990s would become his son Luciano’s godfather.
“Sinatra was great when he was sober, but when Sinatra would get drunk, he was a bad drunk – most little men are bad drunks,” says Russo, adding, “He respected me because he recognised I was a man’s man.”
By the late 1960s, Russo had various business interests in Las Vegas and Los Angeles, but after reading the book, The Godfather by Mario Puzo and despite having no acting experience, he decided to try for a role on the 1972 film, directed by Francis Ford Coppola.
While his audition tape was unsuccessful, Russo positioned himself as a de facto go-between for the mafia and filmmakers. After smoothing over various issues, Russo was rewarded with the role as Brando’s son-in-law, Carlo Rizzi. On set, Brando coached him with acting tips and became a friend. “When you get to know that he likes you, he’s just a fun [guy] – I mean he loved practical jokes,” Russo says of Brando.
Details of Russo’s friendship with another Hollywood star, Grace Kelly, has been left out of his memoir. While he hints there was more to their relationship than just friendship, he won’t admit to anything.
“Talking about Grace Kelly is like talking about the blessed mother – I can’t do it,” he says. “She had something about her, a style and class, she always carried herself as a lady. What she did behind closed doors – why would I be the one to reveal that?”