“Staff Picks” is a deeper look into movies that we love here at Video CULTure. Each edition of this column will focus on a single film (ahem.. or TV show) that we think you should check out, either for the first time or for a long-overdue revisit
By Ryan Acree (Twitter: @RyanAcree)
We have all heard of “Cult Classic” movies and albums but rarely do we discuss “Cult Classic” TV Shows (Firefly excluded). It’s even rarer to see a cops and robbers TV show from the ’80s heralded as a one… well… this particular is different and worthy of the distinction.
Yes, Crime Story was only on CBS for two seasons, but it is some of the best crime and organized crime television I have seen and it is way ahead of its time. While we were all in awe of coke dealers in Miami and another guy with a mustache in Hawaii, Crime Story was riveting like some sort of pre-Sopranos-style organized crime show set in the early ’60s.
I became interested in Crime Story because of our recent podcast episode on Michael Mann’s Thief. One of the intriguing things about Thief is it was the first movie roles for Dennis Farina and John Santucci. Now we know Dennis Farina from movies like Snatch, Get Shorty, Manhunter, Midnight Run. Farina was a Chicago police officer for 18 years and served as a police consultant to Mann as well as jumping in front of the camera in roles as a mobster as well as a cop. John Santucci was a professional thief himself who also served as a consultant and the main inspiration Thief.
For Crime Story, Farina gets to settle back in his natural role as an early 1960’s Chicago detective named Mike Torello. Santucci also stars as a mobster named Pauli Taglia. The show mostly follows Torello as the lead detective, although the underworld of the mobsters is given almost an equal footing. The main henchman mob boss that Torrello is after is Ray Luca, played by Tony Denison. Jon Polito also shows up as head of the Chicago mob presence, Phil Bartoli, and in the pilot, a young David Caruso appears Johnny O’Donnell.
Just like Miami Vice, another one of Mann’s creations, featured many up-and-coming actors pop up including Andrew Dice Clay, Julia Roberts, Kevin Spacey, Deborah Harry, Paul Anka, Gary Sinise, Ving Rhames, Christian Slater, Paul Guifoyle, Lilli Taylor, Pam Grier, Martin Ferrero (Jurassic Park), David Hyde Pierce (Frasier), Steven Weber (Wings), and Dennis Hasbert (Major League, 24, Allstate Insurance commercials) and even a young Fred Savage. The legendary jazz musician Miles Davis even appears in one episode.
Now, As I stated earlier, the backdrop of Crime Story is in the early 60s, with the do-wop music, cool jazz, skinny ties, dovetail haircuts, and cars with big tail fins. The intro music is even a re-written version of Del Shannon’s “Runaway.” Every episode features at least one rock-and-roll song, and even some jazz songs from the era as the pilot included Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five,” and another song from Sonny Rollins. Torello even drives a period-correct Ford 300, which was a line below the Ford Galaxie and often used by police and taxi fleets. Matter of fact, most of the cars, if not all, are period-correct.
The main story line has Torello and Luca playing cat and mouse as Luca climbs the ranks of organized crime as Torello tries to put the pinch on him. Jon Polito plays the more mature levelheaded established mobster trying to control the ambitious Luca. It all is shot on location in Chicago for the first season and then Las Vegas for the second (and sadly final) season.
This series had everything… music, an engaging ongoing storyline, organized crime shown from within using real criminals and how they talk and interact with one another, detectives on how they carry out business really trying to monitor organized crime and how they have to skate around laws to get their man. There are also personal stories of the cops as Torello tries to have a baby with his wife or deal with a furniture dealer trying to get his kitchen table he ordered. It shows heists as they would have happened, mob hits how they would have been carried out, and shows that although cops may do dirty things, like take bribe money, they then turn around and donate that money to the fallen detectives’ fund.
Now the first two episodes, or the pilot, could have been a movie in itself. It is certainly riveting, has amazing performances from all the cast including the aforementioned David Caruso, who went on to play for the other side, as a cop, in NYPD Blue. The pilot starts as a high-class restaurant in Chicago gets ambushed by goons ready to take everyone’s wallet and jewelry and make their escape. An exciting car chase ensues through the night streets of Chicago. Later on, we find out that the good neighborhood kid that Turello watched grow up is now involved with this organized crime gang.
Now obviously this 1986 TV show was ahead of its time. It is not Hill Street Blues or cheesy fluff like Magnum P.I., CHiPs, and not nearly as flashy and cool as Miami Vice. It was more hard-hitting than murder shows like Columbo. It has a little Godfather DNA mixed in with 1960s Chicago nostalgia that draws you into the storyline with how unpredictable and how attached you are to all the characters, especially Torello and Luca.
Why this show only lasted two seasons was a combination of many things. Yes, it was ahead of its time but it showed mob hits carried out on national TV. As much as I like nostalgia, one thing is that usually, we like good feelings about nostalgia. We don’t want to look back and see crime that was always there lurking in the shadows as organized crime started to grow and get less isolated and more connected to major cities. One major plot point is Ray Luca growing the sportsbook spree into an interconnected network so everyone can make money in that illegal activity. This is the reason Season 2 moves to Las Vegas and gone is that cool backdrop of Chicago and the show takes on a different feel and pace.
The other thing is that Michael Mann was so busy with Miami Vice which had started two years earlier in 1984 and that just gobbled up a lot of his time (and the potential audience for Crime Story). Miami Vice was a flashy mid-80’s MTV world and likely more relatable, at the time, which helped its success over Crime Story as well. The two shows have some of the same Michael Man essence of cold-hearted criminals who are very 3-dimensional, with the police, who are just one step behind them and woven into both shows is a thread that their lives are more similar to each other than they appear.
Thankfully you can watch the full two seasons of Crime Story for free on many streaming platforms. As of this writing, justwatch.com lists Crime Story on Peacock, The Roku Channel, Vuto, Tubi, and even IMDB TV for free, with very minor commercial interruption. It is totally worth checking out if you are into mobster movies, cop shows, shows set in the 60s, or like me, just a fan of the work of both Michael Mann and Dennis Farina.
To find out where this film is available to stream, click here: Just Watch