Remember that John Gotti biopic in which John Travolta was supposed to star, in which Lindsay Lohan also supposedly had a part? Well, and this part may shock you, as it turns out, a movie project that started with a shady “producer” making a deal with a mobster’s son, and continued, using a coked-out starlet for free tabloid publicity, might not exactly be on the up and up. Now, Joe Pesci is suing the producers, saying they promised him a $3 million role, only to renege on the deal and offer him a lesser, $1 million role after he’d already put on 30 pounds for the first one. And Joe Pesci has made two movies since ’98, so you know he ain’t got time for this bow sheet.
Joe Pesci is suing the producers of “Gotti: In the Shadow of My Father,” claiming his deal was so iron-clad, he gained 30 pounds for his role, only to be told he wasn’t wanted anymore.
In the lawsuit, Pesci claims reps from Fiore Films offered him the critical role of Angelo Ruggiero, Gotti’s close friend and enforcer. Pesci says he made a deal for $3 million.
But Pesci says after he was lured into making public statements about how happy he was to appear in the movie — which stars John Travolta as John Gotti, Jr. — the producers pulled the deal, claiming Pesci breached the deal by trying to back out.
Pesci claims he was offered a lesser role — playing Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso — for the lesser fee of $1 mil.
But this is the best part. Pesci’s lawyer claims his client relied on the contract by assuming the character of Ruggiero in every respect: “[Pesci] has since ended his very strict and healthy diet, and has so far gained approximately 30 pounds in anticipation of playing Ruggiero, who was well known for his heavy and stocky build.”
Pesci is suing for $3 million minimum, as well as punitive damages. [TMZ]
And if the suit contained no references to “stinky horse manuwah-smellin mudderf*ckers” or a pair of yutes, I would consider it a great letdown. Meanwhile, the suit led to today’s totally logical EOnline headline, “Plumped-Up Pesci Tries to Whack Gotti Filmmakers.”
Clean it up, E!. Whack means to kill, slap, or masturbate. It doesn’t mean “sue,” and it hasn’t, ever. You can’t just go around making up new meanings for words to seem clever. If Britney Spears scratched Alec Baldwin’s car on her bicycle, you can’t just put “BRITNEY SPEARS SHOOTS ALEC BALDWIN IN THE FACE WITH A CROSSBOW” in the headline, at that point you’ve transcended hyperbole. Anyway, this movie is never going to happen, and I’m okay with that. I feel like I know everything I could ever want to know about John Gotti, the Gotti specials that play every five minutes on the History Channel, John Gotti’s kids and their reality show, the mob wives of John Gotti’s associates from the VH-1 show, the 18 rappers with “Gotti” in their stage name… I don’t know how much more information a person could possibly need about a guy whose brilliant scams were 99% of the time based on the principle “give me money or I beat you up.” If Ocean’s 11 had been based on a Gotti heist, it would be 90 seconds long.