A Bronx Tale: One Man Show

[sirens and traffic in the distance]

It's 3 A.M in the Bronx, New York.

I'm on the corner 187 and Belmont.

I hear a million voices in my head,

and one voice in particular.

His name was Sonny, and he stood right here,

right under this lamp post here.

I can still see him calling me now.

Come here, kid. I love this kid.

Look at this kid. Let him through.

Come here, kid.

187th and Belmont.

This was his neighborhood.

A doo wop group, sang right in that alleyway there.

Four guys, Carlo, Freddie, Angelo, and a guy named Dion.

They got their name from the street sign.

They were called Dion in the Belmonts,

and they could sing better than anybody I ever heard.

I used to listen to them when I was a kid. I did,

from my fifth floor window.

This is my building, right here, my building.

This is my stoop.

My stoop.

I grew up right over this drugstore here.

But, excuse me. I mean, it was a drugstore

when I was a kid,

and two doors down was a bookie joint.

Then there was the hardware store,

and two more doors down was another bookie joint.

Then there was the bakery,

and two more doors down was another bookie joint.

And on warm summer nights,

all through the neighborhood,

you would hear the sounds of young Italian men

romancing their women.

Marie, get in the fucking car!

My name is Calogero Lorenzo Alfredo Romano Palminteri.

My mother is Rosina Christina Maria Sofia Palminteri.

My father is Lorenzo Giacomo Paulo Antonio Palminteri.

Now, just ask yourselves one question.

Are all these names necessary?

My mother.

My mother used to love to have company

over the house day in and day out.

She loved her girlfriends over every single day.

Now, my father was totally different, you see.

My father drove a city bus eight hours a day.

His bus route was 187th Street.

I would see him go back and forth in front of my house.

I would watch him from my window.

Sometimes I would even ride with him.

When he came home, he didn't want anybody in the house,

especially my mother's girlfriends.

So, he figured out a way to get rid of them.

He would come in the house, see the girls...

Hmm. Go into the bedroom, take off his pants,

come out with his underwear on.

Rosina, how about a beer?

Oh, Rosina! All the girls,

foof, right out of the house.

Yeah.

And right next to the stoop was the bar.

And it was called the Chez Joey.

And that's where all the wise guys hung out.

And it was owned by a guy named Rudy Ice.

They called him Rudy Ice because they said he was so smooth.

It always looked like Rudy was on ice skates.

And he would skate through the bar

and sing to all the girls.

And Rudy wore those Tom Jones shirts.

You know, remember those big puffy, puffy sleeves?

Cut down to here with the high, high collar.

If you dropped him off a building, he could fly.

And Rudy was a frustrated singer.

But Sonny would never let him sing with the band.

So just for spite,

Rudy would never utter a spoken word.

He would only sing it.

Hey Rudy, what's the weather like?

Sonny would:

smack him upside the head and lock him in the bathroom.

And there was Eddie Mush.

Now, Eddie Mush was a degenerate gambler.

He was also the biggest loser in the whole world.

They called him Eddie Mush because everything

he touched turned to mush.

I mean, he was such a loser

that he would go to the racetrack

and the teller would give him his tickets already ripped up.

What a jinx he was.

And Frankie Coffee Cake.

They called him Coffee Cake because his whole face

was covered with acne.

And he looked like a Drake's coffee cake.

Frankie was tough to look at.

And JoJo the Whale

five foot three, 400 pounds like this.

As they say, you didn't walk with JoJo,

you walked among him.

If you stared at JoJo long enough,

you would see him get fatter by the hour.

Legend has it, his shadow once killed a dog.

And Jimmy 10 to 2.

Jimmy 10 to 2.

He was one of Sonny's bodyguards.

They called him 10 to 2 because his feet

always pointed like the clock, like 10 to 2, like this.

Many, many years later, he got shot in the leg

and they called him 20 after.

But right here

right on this spot here

stood the man.

Sonny,

the number one man in the whole neighborhood.

Shark skin suit, diamond pinky ring.

Sonny had five fingers, but he only used three.

There was a guy on his left and a guy on his right.

Jimmy and Bobo.

And they were his bodyguards.

They looked like refrigerators with heads.

And Sonny would just stand there

and nod his head

to all of the old ladies walking by with their shopping.

And they treated him like a god.

And in that neighborhood, he was a god.

And I would just sit on my stoop just 10 feet away.

10 feet away.

And I would watch him all day and all night.

But he never, ever looked at me, never.

Until one day.

1960, the New York Yankees were playing

the Pittsburgh Pirates in the World Series.

And Mickey Mantle was like a god to me.

America was involved in a Cold War,

but we weren't afraid.

We had a young new president,

John Fitzgerald Kennedy,

and he promised us a bright new tomorrow

The Space Age.

Soon a man would be walking on the moon, he said.

Because it was of no concern in my neighborhood,

we were still mourning the breakup

of Dion and the Belmonts.

Eh. Even back then,

the Bronx had their priorities straight, right?

And me.

What was I doing in 1960?

I would sit on my stoop

night and day and day and night,

and I would watch you know who.

And in 1960

I was nine years old.

I could smell my mom's sauce coming down through the halls.

And I run upstairs, and she'd be cooking it

with that broken wooden spoon.

And then she'd rip a piece of Italian bread off

and dip it in the sauce and give it to me.

And then kiss me on my forehead.

And then I run back downstairs

with my Mickey Mantle baseball cards.

Hey, there's Phil the Peddler.

Phil the Peddler with his horse and wagon

and all the fruits and vegetables piled up on top.

Phil?

Phil?

And Phil would hold the horse by the reins,

and he would drag his right leg.

W.W.2 used to say, and he called everybody Mary

no matter who you were, male or female,

young or old, to Phil you were Mary.

Don't touch those peaches, Mary.

Watch those onions, Mary.

Three for a dollar, you bunch of Mary's.

And we would run in the street and tease his horse.

Nahhhh.

Get the hell you goddamn little marries.

I'll give you a kick up your asses,

you son of a bitches you.

Yeah, get the, hello, Sonny.

How are you today, Sonny?

I got a nice peach for you today, Sonny.

Here you go, Sonny.

I hate peaches.

September 16th, 1960,