He was born April 25, 1940 in Manhattan, New York City, to Italian-American parents, Rose (nee Gerardi) and Sal Pacino. They divorced when he was young. His mother moved them into his grandparents' home in the South Bronx.
One of the greatest actors of all time, Robert De Niro was born on August 17, 1943 in Manhattan, New York City, to artists Virginia (Admiral) and Robert De Niro Sr. His paternal grandfather was of Italian descent, and his other ancestry is Irish, English, Dutch, German, and French.
Pacino is quoted as saying, “In America, most everybody who's Italian is half-Italian–except me. I'm all Italian. I'm mostly Sicilian, and I have a little bit of Neapolitan in me.
Coming from a broken home, Al Pacino was raised by his mother and her parents. As it turns out, his maternal grandparents--John and Kate Gerardi--emigrated to America from Corleone, Sicily, the very town that fictitious Vito Corleone hailed from and borrowed its name.
He's not Italian. His father was a Sicilian immigrant, his mother the daughter of Sicilian immigrants. Al was born in New York City.
A Cuban immigrant who enters into a life of crime as he seeks success in America, Antonio “Tony” Montana is known for his violence, cocaine habit, and for the movie's iconic final scene in which he wields an M16 assault rifle while shouting “Say hello to my little friend!”
In 1891, Vito Corleone (né Andolini) was born in the small village of Corleone in Sicily. In 1901, after his father, mother and brother were killed by Corleone's Don, Ciccio, Vito fled the country and left to find his future in the America.
Corleone (Italian: [korleˈoːne]; Sicilian: Cunigghiuni [kʊnɪɟˈɟuːnɪ] or Curliuni [kʊɾlɪˈuːnɪ]) is an Italian town and comune of roughly 11,158 inhabitants in the Metropolitan City of Palermo, in Sicily.
In contrast to Guarino and Camonte, who were Italian immigrants, Montana is a Cuban immigrant. According to Oliver Stone, Tony's last name was inspired by then-NFL quarterback Joe Montana, Stone's favourite player. A prequel novel, Scarface: The Beginning, written by L. A. Banks, was published in 2006.
Such director-actors include: Danny DeVito, John Turturro, Steve Buscemi, Vincent Gallo, Al Pacino, Stanley Tucci, Robert De Niro, Sylvester Stallone, Gary Sinise, Anne Bancroft, and Madonna.
Truth is, De Niro himself boasts only one-quarter Italian ancestry: His father, the abstract expressionist painter Robert De Niro Sr., was half Irish, and his mother, painter and poet Virginia Holton Admiral, boasted Dutch, English, French and German ancestry.
For his breakout role as Michael Corleone in 1972's The Godfather, Al Pacino was reportedly paid $35,000. This relatively small salary was due to him being a relative unknown at the time he was cast, though the fact that the movie launched his career most likely more than made up for the lack of upfront payment.
Unlike Italian, which is almost entirely Latin based, Sicilian has elements of Greek, Arabic, French, Catalan, and Spanish. This can be seen in many Sicilian words, like azzizzari [to embellish, adorn] from the Arabic aziz [beautiful], or foddi [angry], which can be traced to the Norman French fol.
Pesci was born on February 9, 1943, in Newark, New Jersey. His mother, Maria (Mesce) worked part time as a barber, and his father, Angelo Pesci, was a forklift truck driver for General Motors and a bartender. He is of Italian descent with family origins both in Turin and Aquilonia in the province of Avellino.
Both of them were of Italian descent: his paternal grandparents, Francesco Paolo and Teresa Scozzese, emigrated from Polizzi Generosa, while his maternal grandparents, Martino and Domenica Cappa, emigrated from Ciminna, both in the province of Palermo, Sicily.
Corleone and the Mafia: an unbreakable link
Its fame started when its name was linked to the name of the mafia Family in the American movie saga “The Godfather.” In fact, the Corleone family does not exist. It is a cinematographic fiction.
Fictional biography and early years. Vito Corleone is based on a composite of mid-20th century New York Mafia figures Carlo Gambino, Frank Costello, Joe Bonanno, and Joe Profaci.
Castello Degli Schiavi in Fiumefreddo, Catania
The villa is called Castello Degli Schiavi in real life and it's open to visitors. This is the main The Godfather house Sicily and also features as a The Godfather Sicily location in Part II and Part III, but we'll get to that.
The Godfather was shot in multiple locations, including parts of New York City (as well as some of the burroughs), Los Angeles, and two different cities in Sicily. Francis Ford Coppola, the director, wanted the bulk of the filming to be in New York City.
Biography. A distinguished character actor, Richard S. Castellano was the highest earning actor in The Godfather, whose fame outside the saga included playing Joe Girelli in The Super. He also received an Academy Award nomination for his role in Love and Other Strangers.
The Sicilian Mafia or Cosa Nostra (Italian: [ˈkɔːza ˈnɔstra, ˈkɔːsa -], Sicilian: [ˈkɔːsa ˈnɔʂː(ɽ)a]; "our thing"), also referred to as simply Mafia, is an Italian Mafia-terrorist-type criminal society originating on the island of Sicily and dating to at least the 19th century.
Tony despises evil acts like the raping of women and slavery, he also hates Fidel Castro and Communism, he also has a furious hatred for Colombians since his friend Angel was killed brutally by them.
He is an international Bolivian drug lord and the chief supplier of cocaine for his business partner Tony Montana. Only when Sosa was betrayed did his relationship with Tony Montana end. Sosa is portrayed by Paul Shenar in the film. He is based on the Bolivian drug lord Roberto Suárez Gómez.
Although the events and characters in De Palma's Scarface closely align with the world of Al Capone, the stories of the women in Tony Montana's life are largely fictionalized and barely coincide with the female figures in Capone's life.