The Cast of 'Goodfellas' Remembers the Gangster Classic in a Laugh-Filled Reunion

Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, and the rest talk at the Tribeca Film Festival.

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Complex Original

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The 2015 Tribeca Film Festival honored the 25th anniversary of the American gangster classic Goodfellas during a sold-out event at the Beacon Theatre in Manhattan Saturday night. Many key cast members showed up for a screening of the movie, which was released Sept. 19, 1990, while a crowd of 3,000 cheered all the way through the closing night of the festival.

Martin Scorsese and Joe Pesci, however, were glaringly absent. The festival's co-founder Robert De Niro, alongside Tribeca’s other co-founder Jane Rosenthal, introduced the digitally remastered film by first saying, “Joe Pesci couldn’t be here, but he sent this email: ‘Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck, fuck.’” De Niro clarified, “I’ll translate. ‘Dear Bob, sorry I can’t be there. Love to all. Best, Joe.’”

This was the Tribeca Film Festival's 14th year, and De Niro said it was, “thirteen more than we intended, and tomorrow we start work on the fifteenth.”

Next up was a videotaped message from Scorsese who couldn’t be there due to filming Silence in Tapai. “Which is in Taiwan,” he added, which received a lively laugh. Then he shared anecdotes. “I remember the previews were one of the worst experiences of my life.”

Scorsese addressed screenwriter Nicholas Pileggi, whom he knew was in attendance. “Remember that nice Italian restaurant in Tribeca that we used to go to? And then when the film came out, the owner of the restaurant said we’re not allowed in anymore because we apparently denigrated a certain ethnic group for the picture?” Another big laugh and applause from the enthusiastic room. On the red carpet Ray Liotta was asked what he thought of the Tribeca Film Festival. “I just think it’s great,” he said. “The fact that [De Niro] put it together right after 9/11 to bring Tribeca back, as well as New York, that was just honorable in itself. And for it to have sustained this long now, is just great for the city.”

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Paul Sorvino was asked if he thought Scorsese created a new genre with Goodfellas. “Oh yeah,” he said, “but it’s not even part of a genre, it’s like tearing off that wall and looking inside to see what it really is. It’s part of the iconography of American film. It’s one of the three or four greatest movies ever made, and if you get to do that in your career, you’re pretty lucky.”

Lorraine Bracco said Scorsese “definitely made it hip. The music was hip. And we were all street smart—both in Goodfellas and The Sopranos. I think that’s the juggernaut that we could say held the both of them together.” Later, on stage, she said about the film festival, “It’s for the world to see that we’re still standing strong.”

The crowd went crazy when Scorsese mentioned the scene where Henry Hill (Liotta), Tommy DeVito (Pesci) and Jimmy Conway (De Niro) visited Tommy’s mother’s—played by Scorsese’s mother Catherine. Scorsese said, “There was only one or two written lines, about showing [her] paintings. The rest was pretty much what it was like to be around my mother. Her son was just coming home to say hello to her with his friends: Joe, Bob, Ray.” He joked that nobody told her about the body in the trunk of the car.

Moderator Jon Stewart asked about De Niro’s use of the word “hoof” during the scene at Tommy’s mother’s house. He said, “It’s a normal exchange between those characters where you say certain things where you’re kind of half-aware that it’s funny, but it’s also what would be said. He says, ‘a hoof.’ A hoof is a hoof. It’s not a word that’s used a lot. My character in that situation at that dinner table in an impromptu meal while there’s a body in the trunk, it felt like the right thing to say.”

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Sorvino shared his story about finding his character Paulie Cicero. “A lot of actors talk about choices, but the fact of the matter is when you find the spine of the character, it’s kind of like an inhabitation, from which you might need an exorcism. And it makes all the decisions for you.” Three days before filming was to begin, Sorvino said, “I was really lost. What do you do? I called my agent up and said, ‘Get me out.’” But then he happened to see his reflection, “I was going to fix my tie and I saw this guy [in the mirror] and it scared the hell out of me.” He told Stewart he knew then, “That’s the guy.”

Liotta shared the story of meeting the real Henry Hill after Goodfellas came out. He said he met him in a bowling alley in Los Angeles. “The first thing he said was, ‘Thanks for not making me look like a scumbag.’” But Liotta said he responded incredulously, “Did you see the movie?” The crowd roared. Then Liotta added that he told Hill, “That’s just so not cool. You did drugs and you cheated on your wife.”

Liotta also told how Pesci’s most famous line in the movie came to be. “Joe was just telling a story in rehearsal about something that happened to him in Queens. Some guy, who happened to be a connected guy said, ‘You think that’s funny?’” Scorsese loved it and wanted it in the film.

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Bracco talked about how she found her character. “I had an Italian father, but I have an English mother. I learned a lot about being Italian from my dad, but we lived in a Jewish neighborhood, which helped create Karen.”

Screenwriter Nicholas Pileggi, author of Wise Guy, the book the film was based on, described going to the movie opening with Scorsese. “We were at the opening, at the Ziegfeld, and I was sitting next to him. It was black tie. The movie starts, and I get this elbow. ‘You see that? We shoulda cut that.’ I’m like, ‘You’re in a tuxedo. This is the opening of the movie. We’re at the Ziegfeld. Editing’s over!’”

De Niro stayed true to his tight-lipped ways. Stewart asked De Niro if Scorsese were there with them that night, would Scorsese have still wanted to edit the film. De Niro said succinctly, “I can’t answer that.”

Pileggi also spoke about refusing to return Scorsese’s calls. He got multiple messages that the director had called but Pileggi thought that his New York magazine coworker David Denby was playing a trick on him. A frustrated Scorsese called Nora Ephron, who was married to Pileggi at the time. “I got home that night,” Pileggi said and his wife yelled, “‘Are you crazy? Marty Scorsese’s trying to reach you and you won’t call him back!’”

Luckily for all of us fans, Pileggi called him back. The rest is history.

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