When Pileggi came out of the men’s room, Hill said, "Come on, let’s get out of here!" Straight away, Pileggi saw why Hill was so keen to leave. "I looked over and I realised Henry had hit the Maitre D' in the head with a wine bottle. The guy was bleeding." "What happened?" asked Pileggi, as they drove away. "The guy gave me some lip," said Hill, by way of explanation. Hill died in 2012. He never read Pileggi’s book. "I don’t have to read it," he told Pileggi. "I told you everything that’s in it – what am I going to read it for?" Nicholas Pileggi's non fiction book, ' Wiseguy', is the basis for the film, GoodFellas, directed by Martin Scorsese (1990). It's the true story of Henry Hill, a member of the Lucchese organised crime family in New York. Henry's heyday takes place during the 1960s and 1970s when he works under the protection of mob boss Paul Vario in the Brownsville-East New York section of Brooklyn.

Henry sees no reason to change his lifestyle. He enjoys the fruits of other people's labor, taking over and bankrupting in weeks legitimate business that others have worked their entire lives to create. For Henry, there are no consequences. No matter how many businesses and personal fortunes he destroys for his own gain, there is always someone else out there to be lied to, stolen from, or conned. Even when Henry gets ten years in prison, he bribes all manner of guards and officials to get out after four years, and those four years are spent in relative luxury. Karen spends this time in a small, shabby apartment, supporting herself and the children even while helping Henry carry out his schemes so he can continue to live in the style to which he is accustomed.

So what sort of man was Henry Hill? "He was a hustler. He wasn’t a mean man, he wasn’t a violent man – not that he wouldn’t commit violence – but he was hyperactive, and always into mischief." He was also very clever, with a genius for thinking up moneymaking scams. Pileggi was married to fellow author, journalist, and filmmaker Nora Ephron from 1987 until her death in 2012. [2] Partial filmography [ edit ] Year And when you finally get to the end, and see how Hill escapes a bullet in the head (that was issued to everyone else who knew of the Lufthansa heist) to become a Federal employee, you wonder... is this all okay and correct that this should happen? People are killed en route to this, millions of dollars of property and cash are redistributed among wiseguys, and yet the prime mover becomes another man in lieu of the one he never was. I am not sure. Pileggi co-wrote the pilot of the CBS television series Vegas, which first aired in September 2012. [2] Personal life [ edit ] Henry believes that his wiseguy friends are invulnerable, as indeed they seem to be. In this insular neighborhood, even the legitimate businessmen are willing to cover for their wiseguy neighbors who are admired as entrepreneurs and are unafraid to bend the rules. Wiseguys offer an alternative to scraping out an honest living in difficult economic times; many otherwise honest men and women are willing to accept a bribe now and again to earn a little extra money. Many judges, lawyers, and policemen are also on the wiseguys' payroll. Given these role models, it is no surprise Henry grows up to believe that honesty is for the weak and vulnerable; he perceives law-abiding citizens as fools, as prey.

It is this disregard for other people that makes this such a chilling book. In this world of wiseguys, all is theirs for the taking. In fact, it made me think that if this is still the case, that anything you happen to possess that is of interest to the Mob can be taken away from you, the much-touted American concept of freedom is not very valid. At least you're not free to own things, and if you try to put your case to the law, Hill provides ample examples of how both the police and the judicial system has members on the take. He grew up with those people - he knows the culture better than any other movie director out there," says Pileggi. "Marty knows it, Marty grew up with it, Marty lived it. I had the same experience - I knew those people, so there was an intimacy with that material that gave Marty tremendous freedom." Wiseguy reads so well because Pileggi knew the world he wrote about. And GoodFellas plays so well because Scorsese knew that world too. For anyone who hasn’t seen GoodFellas (or read Wiseguy), Hill was an Irish-Italian New Yorker who became a small-time gangster as a teenager, and grew up to become involved in many of the Mob’s illegal enterprises.

My Book Notes

Part of me wishes that I had read this book, which directly inspired Goodfellas, without having seen or even having any knowledge of the movie. There’s so much about Goodfellas that seems outrageous and over-the-top and made up, so it was almost weird to learn that Henry Hill was a real person, and that everything he describes in his memoir actually happened. Having seen the movie created this weird mental disconnect where even though I knew I was reading a memoir, it still felt kind of like a novel. (It also doesn’t help that the narration in Goodfellas is practically lifted word-for-word from the text of Hill’s memoir, to the point where I hope he got a screenwriter’s credit for the movie) When Henry finally accepts that his old friends are after him, he agrees to cooperate with law enforcement. Henry and his family enter the federal witness protection program. Henry's detailed inside knowledge is a dream come true for law enforcement, which has long sought evidence against the elusive Paul Vario. Henry's testimony sends both Paulie and Jimmy to jail, along with a host of other less prominent figures in the criminal underworld. This is Henry's greatest scheme. By turning on his old pals and siding with the government, Henry ensures his immunity to every crime he has ever committed, or may commit in the future. By the way the legendary “Am I some kind of clown, do I amuse you…” scene is not in the book and, apparently, was improvised by Joe Pesci who had seen a real mobster do something similar. Pileggi assumed they’d be arrested. He assumed wrong. "Not a thing happened! Nothing ever came of it!" For Hill, this was normal. Clearly, there was something about him which made the Maitre D' decide it’d be best to let the matter drop. This was a wonderful read in so many ways. It’s the only time in my reading experience where I’ve read and thoroughly enjoyed the book after seeing the movie, and believe me, I’ve seen the movie countless times. Scorsese- the greatest filmmaker of all time- masterfully brought it to life on screen (as only Scorsese could). It doesn’t matter if you’ve seen GoodFellas, you will enjoy the book nonetheless and that is A RARITY. I always recommend reading the book first or the movie will mar the reading experience. For all the books I’ve read where I saw the movie first I always end up hating the book. Every. Single. Time. Except this one.