Great gangster TV shows don’t get made as often as genre fans would like. The 2020s have had even fewer wise guys and ordinary hoodlums. Thankfully, there’sTulsa King— the shiniest jewel to come out of Taylor Sheridan’s treasure trove sinceYellowstone. The show starsSylvester Stalloneas Dwight “The General” Manfredi, a recently-paroled New York City capo who is sent to Tulsa, Oklahoma, because there is no space for him in the Big Apple. Once there, he creates one of the most financially lucrative underworlds in America.
With Terrence Winter (The SopranosandBoardwalk Empire) serving as the head writer, the show is pure joy. And its Paramount+ streaming numbers have been so good that it has already been renewed for Season 3 and 4, with a spinoff already given the green light. Besides that, the gangster series has reminded us that Stallone can give a good drama performance if he wants to. Fighting isn’t the only thing he knows.
However, this isn’t his first foray into the crime space. Just before finding fame withRockyin the ‘70s, he starred in one of the decade’s best gangster films:Capone.
Sylvester Stallone Plays Al Capone’s Chief Enforcer in ‘Capone’
In 1975, Sylvester Stallonehadn’t earned his place as a leading man. He had only starred in forgettable movies likeThe Sidelong Glances of a Pigeon KickerandLord of Flatbush.Thankfully, the latter, in which Stallone plays a member of a group of unruly Brooklyn teenagers,caught the eye of Roger Corman, who cast him inCapone. And the actor had the time of his life.
Herecalled:
“I particularly enjoyed working on Capone, because it was like the cheesy, mentally challenged inbred cousin ofThe Godfather.”
Because he wasn’t a big actor yet,Stallone was cast as Al Capone’s infamous enforcer, Frank Nitti.However, this wasn’t just a typical movie henchman role. Nitti achieved a lot during his best years, andthe film makes him look as formidable as possible.
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Starting as a barber, Nitti became a fence for stolen goods, and thanks to his good job, he was recruited into Capone’s gang. At a time of heightened suspicion and streets infested with informers, Capone didn’t have to worry about Nitti’s ability to stay under the radar and remain loyal. He soonrose to the role of right-hand manwhere he oversaw Capone’s liquor smuggling business during the Prohibition Era, importing whisky from Canada and distributing it through a network of speakeasies around Chicago.
He was eventually arrested and charged at around the same time as Capone, thoughhe was only sent to prison for 18 months (unlike 11 years for Capone).Once outside, he became the outfit’s unofficial boss.
Interestingly, Hollywood led to Nitti’s downfall. In 1943, he and eight other gangsterswere indicted for trying to extort $1 million from four major motion-picture companies (Paramount, Loew’s, 20th Century–Fox, and Warner Brothers) under threat of “union trouble.” A few hours before the New York federal grand jury handed down the game-changing indictment, Nitti shot himself while walking along a railroad track in a Chicago suburb.
‘Capone’ Beats ‘Tulsa King’ in Violence and Melancholy
Tulsa Kingis good, thanks to its endless quotidian moments, but it would arguably be excellent if it was darker. The show has tons of jokes andDwight Manifredi is more compassionate than a mob boss ought to be.Thankfully,Caponedoesn’t suffer from such a problem. The filmpainstakingly revives the look and feel of 1920s Chicago, using this sordid affair to examine the ingrained class struggles that in effect caused organized crime to flourish.
Most importantly,Caponeis brutal, so much so that ituses exact footage from the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre (the murder of seven members and associates of Chicago’s North Side Gang by Capone’s goons on Saint Valentine’s Day 1929). Through a chilling scene, we also get to see how Al Capone got the scar on his left cheek: he gets thrown through a glass window during a fight. Additionally, the murder of Chicago mob boss, Big Jim Colosimo (who was eliminated for his reluctance to enter the liquor trade), is depicted in all its horror.
Why Sylvester Stallone Hated the Movie that Made Him an Action Star
Immediately regretting signing on to the film, Stallone deemed the dialogue goofy, the pacing glacial, and the climax flat and nihilistic.
For the rest of the film,audiences are given a clear picture of Capone’s recklessness and sense of impunity.He makes no secret of his desire for everyone in the underworld to “get their mind right,” and doesn’t sleep till he’s broken all his enemies for good. He never cares about the consequences. At some point, even Nitti starts thinking that his boss is going too far.
Besides that, the moviegladly dwells into Capone’s troubled post-prison final yearswhen he became senile due to syphilitic paresis. Some historians have argued that the former Chicago Outfit leader’s illness didn’t exactly have a physical cause, but that it was a more psychosomatic manifestation of his heartbreak and depression brought about by the crumbling of his empire.
Some powerful scenes play out at the bootlegger’s mansion in Palm Island, Florida, where the nights and days are filled with swishing leaves, animal yelpings, engines of the cars of arriving visitors, and other noisery,propelling Capone into a prolonged state of agitated insomnia. Predictably, Mr. Scarface gets a tad surly, snapping even at Nitti.Watching him mistake the trusted lieutenant, an FBI agent, will bring tears to your eyes.As time moves, everyone struggles to pull him out of his ennui, so he is left to decay.
It’s this particular area thatTom Hardy’s Capone movietried to focus on, but couldn’t quite get things right.
‘Capone’ Is for Genre Fans, Not Historians
Many ofthe greatest gangster moviesride on artistic liberties and so doesCapone,so historians and devotees of Hollywood excesses won’t readily agree on the route this story takes. For example,the film depicts Frank Nitti eulogizing Capone at his funeral. In reality, he died four years before his boss.The Chicago Don’s wife, Mae Josephine Coughlin, isn’t mentioned either. Instead, he is given a fictional love interest in Susan Blakely’s Iris Crawford.
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Do these changes help? Certainly! Especially regarding the romance arcs. Mae was a decent mob wife, butIris is a wild gangster’s moll who brings some excitement into Capone’s life. In one iconic scene, she and Capone go on a picnic, and after losing the Don’s bodyguards, they have passionate public sex. Iris also gets killed by Capone’s enemies, raising the stakes, and evoking memories of the “Look how they massacred my boy!” scene fromThe Godfather.
Still, the film would have been better if Mae and Iris were both present. Such (wife andgoomah)dynamicsexist in many great gangster productions,notablyGoodfellasandThe Sopranos.As for Nitti, the move to keep him around for longer doesn’t make sense, but it sure did help Stallone’s career. The actor is exceptional here, andthe extended screen time helps him showcase his skills much better.TryCapone. It is a deranged journey to the heart of crime you shouldn’t miss.
Caponeis available to rent in the US on Apple TV+, Amazon, and Fandango at Home.
