Don't Call Me Bugsy!

Combining interview footage with a number of authors (including Tim Powers, Max Alan Collins, and Andy Edmonds) and film industry folk (RoseMarie of The Dick Van Dyke Show, and Hollywood agent John Maschio) with still photographs and newsreel footage, Don't Call Me Bugsy! trots out the story of gangster Benjamin Siegel one more time. More comprehensive than Bugsy, Dutch & Al (reviewed in the September 1992 issue), this new program traces Siegel's rise to power in Hell's Kitchen; his migration to Hollywood--where he and boyhood friend George Raft made the night club rounds; and his triumph and disaster: the Flamingo Hotel in the still-dusty (at the time) Las Vegas. The greatest flaw of the program is the ridiculous narration which expresses awe for its hero in street slang that could best be described as archaic (I haven't run across lame hard-boiled narration like this since the early writings of Mickey Spillane). The strength of the program, however, is that viewers of the critically acclaimed Warren Beatty vehicle Bugsy will see that the film romanticized the bejeezus out of its main character (for example, the patriotic baloney about Siegel's wanting to assassinate Mussolini was just that: baloney. Siegel wanted to do business with the fascist dictator.). Interesting at times, Don't Call Me Bugsy! is also, as I've said, tiresome in its tough guy talk. An optional purchase. (Available from most distributors.)