FBI Claims N.Y. Film Crew Member’s Credits Include Links to the Mob

The 1985 movie “Prizzi’s Honor” starred Jack Nicholson and Kathleen Turner as a husband-and-wife “hit” team for the Mafia.

Ironically, listed among the film’s published credits as “technical adviser” is Rocco Musacchia, whom the FBI claims is linked to the highest levels of New York’s Genovese crime family--reputedly the largest and most powerful organized crime group in the country.

Musacchia was employed by the production company, ABC Motion Pictures, while “Prizzi’s Honor” was filming in Brooklyn in the fall of 1984.

“I have no idea what (Musacchia) did on the movie; I didn’t hire him,” said John Foreman, the film’s producer. He added that Musacchia “works on most of the pictures that go to New York as sort of a local contact. He knows his way around Brooklyn.”

A spokesman for Capital Cities/ABC, the broadcasting company that no longer operates that film company, said: “Virtually no one connected with the movie is still connected with this company. All I can tell you is that he was not hired on the West Coast.” He said the company would not reveal how much Musacchia was paid.

Mussachia could not be reached for comment last week. But, according to copies of a number of sworn FBI affidavits obtained by The Times, he is an alleged “lieutenant” of Frederick (Fritzy) Giovanelli, a Genovese capo who reports directly to Vincent (the Chin) Gigante, the acting boss of the Genovese family.

The affidavits reveal that the three men are among key targets of a federal grand jury investigation in New York. According to the affidavits, which were filed in 1985 and 1986, the trio is allegedly involved in loan-sharking, gambling and extortion.

Giovanelli presently is on trial in Brooklyn, charged with murdering a New York police detective who was part of a task force investigating the Genovese family. He has pleaded not guilty.

In addition to “Prizzi’s Honor,” Musacchia also worked on “Brighton Beach Memoirs,” a 1986 film version of Neil Simon’s play produced by Rastar Productions. Published credits for that movie list Mussachia as assistant location manager.

While “Brighton Beach Memoirs” was filming in the summer of 1985, Musacchia’s telephone conversations were intercepted by federal agents acting on a court order. He was overheard on several occasions handing out jobs on the movie set, according to the FBI documents. Giovanelli’s conversations were also tapped at the same time, and in one intercepted phone call, a transcript of which was read by a Times reporter, Giovanelli was heard guaranteeing a job on the movie for the ex-wife of a friend.

The FBI affidavits were filed as part of a federal criminal case in Camden, N.J., where Roulette Records President Morris Levy and a number of alleged organized crime figures are scheduled to go on trial in September on charges of racketeering and extortion. According to one affidavit filed in the case, “electronic surveillance conducted to date has continued to illustrate the illegal control exercised by the Genovese . . . family, through Vincent Gigante, over a variety of activities, including the movie industry, various unions and gambling.”

According to Sylvia Fay, who was in charge of casting extras on both “Prizzi’s Honor” and “Brighton Beach Memoirs,” Musacchia sometimes helped find people for possible jobs on the films. She denied that he had any say in the ultimate hiring, however. “Rocky knows that Sylvia does not get pushed around,” she said. “I know him as a very nice guy, Mr. Wonderful; whatever his other life style is, I know nothing about it.”

Asked what else Musacchia did during production of the films, Fay said: “He helped people get into certain neighborhoods where they might not have been able to go otherwise. He knows a lot of people.”

Joseph M. Caracciolo, associate producer and production manager of “Brighton Beach Memoirs” and an employee of Rastar Productions, said he hired Musacchia, with whom he had worked on “The Pope of Greenwich Village,” a film released in 1984.

“My association with him goes back to years ago, when he was working in the (film production) business with his uncle and I was doing prop work. After his uncle died, he was out of the business for awhile. He’s called me many times looking for work and the (“Brighton Beach”) job fit the bill because it was near his home.”

Caracciolo said he was unaware of Musacchia’s alleged organized crime ties.

Law enforcement sources said Musacchia also is under investigation in Los Angeles and Newark, N.J., for his part in an alleged extortion of a Philadelphia-area budget record distributor in 1985. The distributor, John LaMonte, joined the government’s witness protection program in 1986 after he allegedly was beaten for refusing to pay for a load of 4 million out-of-date records originally purchased from Los Angeles-based MCA Records.

Morris Levy was indicted in that case, along with Thomas Vastola, allegedly a member of New Jersey’s DeCavalcante crime family, and Dominick Canterino, described as Vincent Gigante’s “right-hand man” in FBI documents obtained by The Times.

According to one FBI affidavit filed in court, “Thomas Vastola and Morris Levy, the latter of whom is under the direction and control of Vincent Gigante, Dominick Canterino and Frederick Giovanelli, have been exacting extortionate payments of money and other property from John LaMonte with the assistance of Rocco Musacchia.”

Musacchia has not been charged in any of the investigations.