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[gentle, somber music]
[Tom] As it's happening, you're thinking something's wrong,
but you don't face right up to it
because either you don't care or you don't want to know.
[man] The damage done to the community and families,
it'll last for a generation.
[John Marchese] It was a great dream.
It was a beautiful dream.
[Richie] I was thinking I was going to become the next, uh,
I don't know, Paul Newman or something.
I thought I'd be in the country. I wanted to live like that.
Why? Read my scripts, turned out to be nothing but a disaster.
[Jocelyne] At first, there is only two sides to the story.
And then there are so many sides,
you don't know where the truth, where the lies are.
And it's get very confusing.
But the truth is somewhere.
[light upbeat rock music]
[engine hums]
[Zac] I grew up in Narrowsburg, New York.
It 's a very small town in the upper Delaware.
It 's actually a hamlet and it's one block long,
post office, bank, Chinese restaurant, pizza place.
My life sort of centered around Main Street...
which is nice and also stifling when you're a kid.
[engine rumbles]
[water rushes]
-[Tom] The car looks nice in the sun, don't it? -[Cecilia] Yeah.
[Tom] Nice and bright.
[Cecilia] It's a quaint friendly town.
Where everybody knows everybody.
Everybody knows everybody.
You walk into the coffee shop
and everybody says good morning
whether they know you or not.
If you don't recognize someone,
that's the stranger thing
other than what you do. [chuckles]
-[dark playful music] -[projector whirs]
[John Marchese] When Richie and Jocelyne first showed up,
it was like some people from outer space
had landed in Narrowsburg.
Are you new in town?
[Richie] Could be.
[John Marchese] They were Hollywood people
and they were like these busy bees of self-promotion
and publicity for themselves.
Hi, how are you? So, my name is Richard Castellano.
I like this beautiful woman I'm with.
Don't look, huh?
Here's Jocelyne.
-[Richie smooches] -[Jocelyne giggles]
[Cecilia] I think I met them first.
They came into the store
and they were looking to buy a gun.
They talked that they had just moved up to the area.
They bought a house.
You could tell right away he was from Brooklyn.
I mean, he had this real thick New York accent.
[John Marchese] Richie talked about being a hitman for the mob.
He would come in to the Chatterbox Cafe
and it was like he had purchased the Chatterbox.
He would walk and, "Hey, how are you doing?
Hey, yo, how is everybody? How is everybody?" [mumbles]
He would just get his own coffee.
He wouldn't pay for it.
He would wave to everybody.
And he would walk out.
[Tom] Right away, he got to know everybody.
-He was one of us, you know, one of the community. -He was never awkward.
It was like he'd been here all his life.
[upbeat, rhythmic music]
The first time I heard about Richie is like 1998.
I was probably 14 or 15 at the time.
And I remember hearing that he was going to be
in this movie called Analyze This
with Robert De Niro.
I watched the screening and then the lights came up
and there he was standing there.
It was incredible that he was here in this small town
and there he was, and I've just seen him in a movie.
[man hums]
[bangs]
-[car trunk thuds] -What are you, some kind of moron?
[Zac] It was probably soon after that that I heard that
Jocelyne was going to start a film festival.
That was sort of what she did.
And they had big plans for Narrowsburg.
They were going to put it on the map.
[forklift beeps]
Oh, yeah, it was topic of the conversation, yeah,
properly made the barbershop, um, post office, all the big spots, yeah.
Yeah, and it was a big deal for a small town to,
to have a legitimate film festival.
This is a nice place to live but a hard place to make a living.
And most of the people that make a living here
have two or three jobs or drive 40, 50 miles one way to work.
We saw what happened in Sundance and other places
that had film festivals and we thought,
you know, why not here?
I wanted to be an actor. That was sort of my deal.
And here I am growing up in this super small town,
this guy comes,
what are the chances that this is happening?
Like, this is crazy, like, this is my big break.
I remember Richie and Jocelyne
came to my mom's house for dinner.
They got there and I remember,
I remember looking out the driveway,
"They're here, they're here, they're here!"
You know, I'm very excited about this.
I'm this young kid and I really want to, like, get this guy to like me.
I'm running around, I'm whatever complimenting him.
Richie was like The Music Mancomes to town
making people excited about something.
Folks, listen!
I'm Professor Harold Hill.
And I'm here to organize the River City boys band.
[Zac] I think he liked making people feel good.
I think he liked telling people that they were going to be a big star.
It was like when he would talk,
it just seemed possible
whatever he was talking about.
And, and if you can be around that,
I mean, that's a nice thing to be around,
especially in a small town where not a lot seems possible.
He really made you believe that you were going to be something.
You could do anything.
And the first thing you were going to do is be in this movie
that was going to get shot.
The way he pitched the story was a movie
about a guy who tries to get out of a gangster world,
and move upstate to a small town with his son.
Gangsters from the city follow him up there
and kill his wife.
And then somehow he gets charged with the murder
and ends up in jail.
And, and everyone's after his son.
The most important thing about the pitch
was that it's all going to take place in Narrowsburg
and is going to put the city on the map.
This was an opportunity.
You know, I was going to get in that movie.
I mean, there was no question in my mind.
And I started, like, hanging out in the office with him
and Jocelyne and everyone.
Richie was like, "Joss, why aren't you--
you should be paying this kid."
Like, "This kid's here all the time,"
like, "you got to pay him something."
-[man] I'm going ahead, Jeff. -[man 2] Good morning, Jocelyne.
-[man] What, moving up already? -[woman] Look what you've found.
[man] I know nothing yet.
[Zac] Jocelyne...
was just sort of around in the background.
And they were like a good couple. They seemed like a good couple.
Jocelyne was, according to reputation,
this woman who had run the Hollywood film festival.
And now she was going to bring Hollywood
to this little town of Narrowsburg.
The only thing I ever knew about her was she was from France.
No, she was actually from South Africa
-she told me at one time. -Was it?
-Well, I know she had-- -Or I found out later on
she was from South Africa.
-She told me France. -But she sounded like she--
okay, well, she sounded like,
to me, like, she was French.
But I heard she was from South Africa somehow.
[laughs] You're doing good with that.
[interviewer] Can you first of all just tell us your name?
Okay, should I say it in French or in English?
Should I work, I mean, um, the accent,
because now I'm in between the both accents,
so how do you want me to say my name?
In American way, a French way?
-[interviewer] However you feel more comfortable. -Okay.
My name is Marie Jocelyne Plante. I was born, I was born Plante
and in a small island called Reunion Island.
It's a very small community.
Everyone know each other.
Uh, I wanted to establish my own rules, you know,
and, and to be free to think and to do what I wanted to do
and to think for myself, you know, so.
[light, gentle music]
I knew it was a world out there.
When I was young, I love Western,
I love cowboys movies, cowboys, the cowgirls, the open space.
-Is it a pretty place, Steve? -Uh-huh.
It's the old Jamison place,
about 40 miles outside of Tascosa.
Can we move right in and start living there?
[Jocelyne] When you're a child, America, it's a, it's dream, you know,
every child, you know, in this world
somehow dreams of going to America.
I came here in 1989.
I do know when I landed in Los Angeles,
I felt, I felt like more home, you know.
I met Richard, um...
at the Hollywood Film Festival that I was part of.
Before him, I never met anyone really, uh,
criminal, so... [chuckles]
You know, being Italian-American, uh,
coming from, I don't know if he comes from the mob
or what but I was fascinated by it, I have to admit.
[light, playful music]
[Rich] My father is an American dream story.
My father's dream was always to be a superstar.
It was always to be famous.
You know, I was in his movie Whacking Cows.
I looked up to him a lot and I feel like he was almost like a superhero to me.
He didn't need De Niro to say, "All right.
You-- You're the star of a movie."
He was a star already.
Come on, get out.
The methology has risen, let's go.
I love the camera.
You know, I was growing up the way I did, you know,
I was always looking for attention.
How much more attention can you get than this? [chuckles]
My mother winged up in a mental institution,
and my father who once again doing time.
And my life just felt complete
when I hang out with the, uh, the tough guys
or good fellas as we say, you know, in our world.
I started robbing banks, uh, armored car heists.
[man] Your fucking gun. Drop the fucking gun!
Get on the ground.
[Richie] And before you knew it, I was in Attica
doing 12 years.
I got sentenced on a, uh, a payroll robbery that I did.
[tires screech]
I wanted to get out of that life.
If you saw Whacking Cows,
it's a story of a guy
trying to make his life better.
I'm just tired of this life. I want to do something different.
And everybody I spoke would just naturally would say,
"You got a nice personality, I like that.
You should become an actor.
You can live your life on film
and not have all these people chasing you for real."
And I say, "Hey, that's a great idea, man."
[upbeat music]
[gun bangs]
[siren wails]
And that's how my career started in acting.
And then an agent said, "Listen, De Niro's doing a film,
and I got you in.
You know, go read for them."
I went in and Bobby was sitting there.
He said, "Were you ever on film before?"
I said, "A thousand times!"
I said, "At the police station had all my number."
He said, "I like this guy."
You're good.
No, no, you're good, Doc.
He said, "I'm going to make you Jimmy Boots."
And I looked at like 15 pages.
Well, that was relatively painless.
-[slaps] -Shut the fuck up.
That hurt.
[Richie] Every breath I took
on that set, I enjoyed it.
I loved working with Robert De Niro.
It was like being with God.
When we wrapped, I started crying
because I felt bad about leaving Jimmy Boots,
the character that I had played for three months.
I actually felt like two different people.
That's what happens in every movie I'm in.
I become the character, and the character comes to life.
[siren wails]
[producer] Can you talk about meeting Jocelyne?
I thought she was a wonderful lady.
And I wanted to hold onto it,
and that's how I got deeply involved with her,
because I liked her that much.
[Jocelyne] I was attracted to Richard by his fun side.
He had a very fun side about him, always joking.
But my age, I don't think so,
you just have a relationship just to have a relationship, you know?
You have to be in love. Yes, I was in love with him.
Actually, it happened very, on the spur of the moment
that he proposed to me.
One morning he woke up and he said,
"Let's go and get married."
And I said, "Okay."
[Richie] I don't know if this is too personal to tell the world,
but making love to her,
I probably cried like a girl sometimes
because I'm an emotional guy,
and especially when I make love
and when I care about the person.
I've always been loyal to a girl I was with.
And they'll all tell you. Right, girls? You out there?
You know, I tell the truth.
[dark, playful music]
Hey, Isaac, do you ever think of getting out of here?
-And go where? -I don't know.
Maybe we'll start a farm or something.
Raise some cows, who knows?
[Jocelyne] We wanted to get out of New York
to start over again.
We wanted that little tranquil life, you know?
And I just wanted to see the, the, you know the nice side of Narrowsburg.
[dark, playful music]
-Hey, what's up, Mike? -[Mike] What's up, Richie?
-You got that money? -What money?
-So now you forgot? -I paid you last night. What are you talking about?
-Forget about it. -I got a bad memory.
[Mike] Yeah, well, let's work on it.
[Zac] Me and him hit it off fairly quickly.
One day, he started talking about starting an acting school.
And I'm going to be the first student
in the Richard Castellano School of Acting.
Every single morning I would see him and, "Come on.
Come to my acting classes." I said, "Are you kidding me?
I don't need no acting class.
I can act fine all on my own." [chuckles]
That's how it started out with him, and
before you knew it, he had a thing on Main Street there,
and everybody and their brothers we're coming down here to take acting classes.
[John Cirelli] I think it was $20, $25 a weekend.
My granddaughter learned to be an actress.
She learned to talk in front of people.
She didn't-- She wasn't afraid after that.
It helped her in school.
[Zac] I watched the class grow into 25,
30 people, 35 people.
And then I got a camera.
[man] Action!
[Zac] I don't remember there being a script,
but it was all kind of coming out of his head.
[man] Action.
You fucking bitch. [chuckles]
You're supposed to be a cop? Aren't you a little young to be a cop?
[chuckles] You never saw 21 Jump Street?
[Zac] There's like a detective, and there's a murder, and there's a camp
because there was a lot of young kids in the class.
I asked you, what's the matter?
[Zac] There's grandparents.
There was like a crazy lady, and it was just
the story would just get bigger and bigger and bigger.
It was totally improv.
It was like, "You're the brother, you're the sister.
Your mom just got killed,
and you think that it's your father's fault
and she thinks it's your fault; go!"
But there wasn't a whole lot to do in Narrowsburg.
And it was a-- It was fun.
[laughs]
[John Marchese] And there was these people who, they were farmers,
and, uh, kids from the local high school
shouting like, "Fuck you!" "No, fuck you!"
"No, hey, fuck you, fuck you!"
And that was [chuckles] the Richie Castellano School of Acting.
That's it, what can you do?
[John Marchese] They would put on this act
where Jocelyne would pick up the phone and say, you know,
"It's Bobby" [chuckles].
And Richie would come and start talking on the phone.
Of course, everybody thought he had a call
from Robert De Niro, you know, who else?
Um, I think that was just part of the, uh, promotion.
[bells ring]
[man] Can anybody join this parade or what?
-How are you? -[woman] Is that Richie?
It's the film festival.
Beat it, kids, you're [mumbles].
[Zac] I made a commercial for the first film festival.
And it was this like huge production, and it was on TV.
[clock ticks]
[narrator] Don't sleep through your dream. Live it
at the Narrowsburg International Independent Film Festival,
August 2nd through the 6th.
Meet producers, actors, screenwriters, and directors.
Attend daily seminars, screenings, and nightly events.
Learn and celebrate the art of indie film
in the beautiful Catskill Mountains.
For information visit our website
at narrowsburgfilmfestival.com.
[Zac] The first film festival was amazing.
I mean, it was a big deal and there were real movies.
The whole place was covered with balloons,
and the ceiling. And Mekhi Phifer was there.
Linda Hopkins, who was this jazz singer, performed.
It was really happening in a lot of ways.
[John Marchese] There were people around packing that little theater.
[Richie] We were the talk of the town.
There's the Castellanos!
They had it in the papers.
They call us, uh, real McCoy. [chuckles]
[Richie] They loved us so much in Narrowsburg,
they named a hamburger after me!
They had the Castellano Burger.
I actually thought that they would change the name
of Narrowsburg to Castellanosburg.
Thank you so much. I'm so happy that you're all here.
Please have a nice night. God bless everyone and all my fellow actors.
My wonderful wife who keeps me on the straight narrow.
My brother chose those words.
So thank you once again.
God bless everybody, okay? Thank you.
[audience cheers]
I have to thank right out of the gate...
Jocelyne and Richard Castellano.
They told me about a dream that they had.
[audience cheers]
Believe me, it will be a Sundance on the East Coast.
[audience cheers]
[sings in foreign language]
[Jocelyne] I just wanted to do a good festival.
I just wanted to do something good. And I felt that, you know,
having this kind of attention would make him believe
that he can be someone. He can be somebody.
He can, he can really change his life
from mob wannabe to, you know,
have a, have a good Hollywood story.
That's what I wanted for him.
You know, like, like in the movies, you know? [chuckles]
[sings in foreign language]
[Zac] Soon after the festival,
Richard was always talking about
making the movie Four Deadly Reasons,
and, "You're all going to be invited to be in it."
[dark, playful music]
[Tom] I tell you exactly what he said to me.
"We're making this movie in Narrowsburg."
And he said, "We're going to use a lot of local people."
But this came with more than just making a film.
It came with putting the town on the map.
[Jocelyne] I've never produced a film before, before that one.
Richard is no organizer.
[chuckles] And so, uh, he said, "Organize it, make it happen,
and I will find the finance for it."
I asked, "Do you want to be in the movie? Come and audition."
"You want to invest in the movie? Let me know."
"You want to invest? Yeah, I'll take 5,000."
[Dr. Paul] I saw the movie Analyze This.
I was very impressed by it.
He wanted to know if I'd be interested
in giving him some money for this venture.
"Hey, Doc, how are you? We need your help.
You're a good guy, let's get it together, come on!"
Richie used to go down here every day, telling people, "Come over, come over,
and, you know, do some acting. I'll get you in a movie."
He said people are going to be movie stars.
Everybody wants to be a part of that Hollywood glitz and glamor.
People began to talk, and I think they were lining up to give Richie money.
[soft chatter]
[woman] Yeah, bring everything.
Great, once you go into the camp and, uh...
[Zac] He held a very large audition,
and everybody I knew probably was there.
I mean, it was packed.
Do you wanted me to fill this out, but what does this stuff mean?
Social Security number.
Over here put question mark.
You're playing Dominic.
Okay, I don't know my Social Security number.
Okay, just put-- I don't know [laughs].
[audience cheers]
[whistles]
[Paul] Cut. Okay, good. Okay, that was really good.
Guys, I know it doesn't look natural.
Background action, everybody here starts cheering
and doing your thing. Cheerleaders start cheering.
And then we call action.
Then we kind of look to you.
Okay, one more rehearsal.
[dark, playful music]
[Zac] I was cast as his son.
I'm Dominic, I'm this, like, basketball star.
And I was really excited to have this opportunity
that was seemingly like once in a lifetime.
That's when I smoked my first cigarette
and that's when I had my first beer.
It was really happening.
I mean, there's big trucks there
with real professionals and gangsters.
All of them had been in, like, Analyze Thisor Casino.
Richie was taking it very seriously. He loved that movie.
I want you four guys to start sticking together.
I want you to start creating a little bit of attitude.
And I want you to start feeling like the Four Deadly Reasons.
[Paul] I had submitted a documentary
to the Narrowsburg Film Festival.
Jocelyne, said, "Well, I love your documentary.
Would you be interested in directing this?"
Okay, so, so Zac.
[Joe] My friend, Paul Borghese, great director,
he says, "I want to shoot this movie
in Narrowsburg, New York."
When I had the opportunity to write, uh, a mob film
with, you know, it's in my blood.
I wanted to prove that I could write more
than what people thought I was capable.
That I could see everything coming
if I got involved in Hollywood.
[Paul] All right, I'm going to,
go through this with you guys a little bit.
[man 2] All right, do it, shall we?
Yeah, yeah, dog face.
Why don't you get another tattoo?
Mad dog, mad dog face.
When are you going to get it right, Tommy?
Yo, Jesus Christ, we're trying to talk over here.
Yeah, asshole, I'm trying to read.
So you guys are a little funny almost.
Like you talk, I mean, you're a little funny. A little bit of, okay?
[Paul] We were making what was supposed to be mob comedy,
and the funny thing was that almost everybody that went up there,
Richie would go, "Yeah.
You're good, you're good, yeah, I like you.
I got something for you in this movie.
You're going to be in my movie."
[laugh]
In all honesty, in all honesty,
I wish everybody had this man's heart, because I know,
if it was up to him, everybody in this county will be working on this film,
including, including my parents, their parents,
my cousins, my cousins' cousins.
-That's right. -He's a good man.
And that-- I mean that.
Uh, Chris, can you make sure we aren't,
the officers' communication with someone, yeah.
-[Chris] They're doing it right now. -[Jocelyne] Okay.
You're going to be in a cop car, in the passenger side.
Hey, Richie, you see this bank?
-Right. -We talked about this before.
Okay, make sure you're hitting.
Roll sound!
[woman] Sounds rolling.
[man] Action!
[Paul] Action caught.
Trooper, Bobby Venuti just escaped.
I want the bridge blocked.
[man] All right, we're in the set here for two excellent characters
-in Four Deadly Reasons. -Thank you.
[man] How do you like the people on the shoot here?
-Everyone's excellent. Yeah. -It's a great filmy atmosphere here.
You know, you have a cast from other, other, other movies we did,
Analyze This,and this and that, or whatever it is.
Analyze there, here, anywhere.
-[man] Hey, little Vitti. -[Joe] Say hello, Vitti.
[man] You were in Analyze This, weren't you?
-Yeah. -What did you play?
The little son.
We'd like to say hello Mister and Missis Castellano
for bringing this whole thing together.
[man] All right, where are they?
-We don't know where they are. -Richie and Jocelyne
but they're around--
[man] I have to go find them too.
[man] Chris, what part are you planning in the picture?
Right now I'm playing a minor role
as, uh, a patron at a coffee shop.
[man] And, uh, you like the people on the set?
The people on the set are really great,
especially Rich-- Richard Castellano.
He does a great job with everybody.
And I think it's going to really be a good movie.
I'm staying here from, uh, New York City.
I came up to, uh, Narrowsburg.
You know, it's a pretty nice town up here.
You know, it's a little quiet, you know?
You know, I thought, uh, I thought it was a ghost town
but there are, there are really people living here, you know?
And what do people do up here, actually do?
[man] They canoe down at Delaware.
They canoe down-- I knew a few guys that canoed.
But that-- Those were guys that, you know, uh,
like, escaped from prisons that were near the water.
It's scripted.
We're going to have to, I, I, I,
I wrote the scenes, uh, yesterday,
and she's typing it this morning.
Do you have a light that you put, like one of those lights
that people put on their unmarked cars?
-No. -No?
I wanted but, you know what,
we're going to lose the light.
And they go down at the same time?
-[Larry] I don't know, Paul. -Where's Richie?
I have no idea.
Things started to go bad while we were shooting that movie.
You know, Richie was constantly missing.
Nobody knew where he was.
[Larry] Where the problem started to show up,
people were showing up constantly saying,
"Richie told me I could be in the film,"
and the production manager had the job of saying to them,
uh, "I'm really sorry."
Richie told everybody they could be in the film.
And then after the first week, all the checks bounced.
[eerie music]
I called Richie and said, "Richie, you know, the check bounced.
I'm going to go to the police." He said, "You go to the police,
I'm-- you're going to the morgue."
Fucking you, wasn't it?
You're a fucking dead man, Paulie!
[eerie music]
Practically, everybody who was employed by them
knew, phew, this is not going well.
And my understanding is a couple of them threatened to quit,
and he threatened them with bodily harm [chuckles]
if they quit.
This is the file that I started keeping on Castellano
when things started going south [chuckles],
when we started hearing all these rumors
that maybe, that this guy wasn't all he was supposed to be.
[Steve] I remember he needed cash,
and that's when he started to sweat.
I don't know what he needed it for
but he'd come out to my clinic,
and I remember we had to throw him out a couple times,
because he just wanted cash.
You know, he just wanted a loan, a loan.
Cash was his drug.
[Zac] A lot of it was like, I got this shipment of sneakers
that I'm going to buy for this amount of money
and sell it for this amount of money,
and if you give me this amount of money,
I'll give you this amount of money.
[John Conway] He said he had a truckload of VCRs,
and that if I would invest a certain amount of money,
he said he would double the, the money in 48 hours.
I know he's a very good talker, because when I first met him,
he got money from me, so... [chuckles]
He told me that he was going to go to jail
if he didn't have money to pay his probation.
And, of course, I found out way later
that that was a total made up story, you know?
[dark, playful music]
I think he was not in control
of a little bit of stardom that he was getting,
and that fed his ego,
and then I think it got out of control.
[Richard] As time passed, people began to question
just what was going on.
And there were so many rumors around Castellano
that you couldn't separate fact from fiction.
At that point, there was, uh, essentially a work stoppage.
Most of the crew did not want to continue working.
[Paul] So the crew's waiting around,
and all of a sudden, you know,
here comes Richard on a golf cart.
Ta-tara-tara, it was almost like Caddyshack.
So he comes out, he gets off the cart
with a, with a, with a brown paper bag.
[Richie] I came there with 300,000 cash.
"How many hours you worked? Here, here's your money."
And I paid everybody down the line.
Like, kind of, you know, mobster kind of payday. [chuckles]
But I didn't knew where his money was coming from.
And my, my mistake was not to try to find out.
[dark, playful music]
[Zac] Even after everything just fell apart,
a lot of the people were still hanging on.
And I was definitely, like, in the hanging on camp.
I kept going to the acting classes,
and I kept doing all these things with the hope of,
the movie's going to come out, and I'm going to have this movie that I was in.
It wasn't until they started the second film festival
where you started seeing the headline stories shifted.
I had two movies in the Narrowsburg Film Festival.
One of them opened the festival,
and the other one closed the festival.
You know, closing night movie, it was Blue Moon.
I do love you. You know I love you.
It's the end of the world.
It must be the end the world.
[Brian] And the other was in the opening night movie,
that's Under Hellgate Bridge.
Brian, I knew you're going to be here, man.
Hey! [chuckles]
[Brian] I called my agent, uh, Sarah Fargo at Paradigm,
and I said, "I've got two movies in this festival."
And she's like, "Oh, that's great! What is it?"
And I said, "It's called Narrowsburg International Film Festival."
And she said, "Well, when you find out what that is,
let me know." [laughs]
I remember that I had written down
what had happened to me there.
And in here is the Narrowsburg Film Festival
as it happened to me. I was there every day.
And some of this is actually written down in dialogue
because when I hear really good dialogue, I like to write it down.
[dark, whimsical music]
When we got into town,
the town was not what I expected at all.
It was kind of like a scary movie set.
There wasn't one banner
over a little tiny theater.
In the theater, it was kind of a little sad auditorium.
Even the screen was askew.
I saw Richie, and Richie goes, "Hey, Brian Vincent,
welcome to the Sundance of the East."
Then there was like a blur of motion
of like this guy right behind him came up suddenly,
and he turned around and grabbed this guy
by the lapel of his shirt and dragged him into an alley,
and he start beating him.
And it was like, [puffs]
the guy was like, "No, no!"
And Richie goes, "Motherfucker!"
And Jocelyne ushered me into the office
while all that was happening.
She just acted like it didn't happen.
I think she'd make a great poker player.
Then Richie comes back, and he's shaking out his hands,
and he goes, "We can't have any bums in this town.
We got a festival to run here."
He looked very worried actually.
Pretty quickly after, somebody took me aside
and they said, "I gave some money,
quite a lot of money to this guy Richie Castellano for my SAG card.
Did you ever do that before or did you go to the union?"
That was a very odd question.
It was like what else could possibly go wrong?
Because it probably is going to. I mean, the food was late for the dinner,
and so and so didn't show up and this person's going to walk if they don't get their money,
and, I mean, it just became a total--
it was total train wreck.
And now let's have some fun.
And I would like to call on the stage someone, uh, someone
that everybody is expecting tonight.
Pat, where are you?
Pat Cooper.
[audience cheers]
Ladies and gentlemen, I have never been so bored in my life.
[audience laughs]
I have never, never saw actors give themselves
accolades that nobody gives a goddamn.
I wound up going to this goddamn small town, Narrowsville,
Narrowscot, and I don't know how they call the goddamn place.
I said hello to Richie Castellani.
We talk about a man that said he make movie after movie.
I only seen him in one goddamn movie,
but the way he talked, it's like Gone with the Wind.
[audience laughs]
Little Rosalyn, Jocelyne, Jeesalyn,
or what her goddamn name is, who spoke here for ten minutes,
and I swear to Christ nobody knew what she said.
[audience laughs]
Moving on, ladies and gentlemen,
standing on a stage with actors that nobody knows.
[audience laughs]
Richard Castellano, you dear man, ladies and gentlemen,
who tries to give lessons on acting.
[audience laughs]
What a joke.
[audience laughs]
I made a movie with him.
This guy couldn't find the fucking door.
[audience laughs]
But I love him, and I love this kind of situation
because nobody cares.
[audience laughs]
What are you making, a movie?
No! Get away, no more.
That's it, stop. Stop!
Stop, that's it, no more, no more.
-Oh. -[man] Close-up.
-Stop. -Close-up.
-Stop. Stop. -Are you serious?
[uneasy music]
[Brian] So on Sunday was when they showed Blue Moon.
And then they were going to give out all the awards.
And I won the dubious honor of the Rising Star Award
at the Narrowsburg International Film Festival.
And I got caught up in it.
It made me cry, and I realize as I was crying
how ridiculous it was,
because I knew that the festival was a sch-- sham,
and I'm crying over... a sham.
[uneasy music]
The next day, they were showing Four Deadly Reasons.
What I had heard was that the town had produced the movie,
which sounded kind of intriguing to me, actually.
Like, could a town produce a whole movie
and it'd be a hit? Yeah, of course, they could.
It's a great story. [chuckles]
[Zac] We had heard about it through the premier
for weeks and weeks and weeks.
It was going to be like a Hollywood premier.
I expected to see a great movie with local people in it.
Some famous actors mixing with the local people.
Putting the small town of Narrowsburg on the map.
I bought a suit.
I was going to, like, roll up
and make a grand entrance in a town car.
I mean, I had a big plan.
It was the film festival, you know?
I was counting down the days.
I was so excited. Tickets sold out immediately.
Everyone wanted to see what this movie was going to be.
[Brian] When we got there, the town was all dressed up.
And they were so happy.
They all felt like professional actors.
But [stutters] what was amazing to me was that Richie,
he was still on a throne, you know,
and people were just, they loved him.
I set up my camera in the back. I was standing in the back.
I was going to capture this moment.
And, uh, Joe Dinki gets up there.
[audience applauds]
All right, um, I, um...
wrote the screenplay for Four Deadly Reasons from an original story
by, uh, Richard's son and another person.
And, uh, we took it and we made it into a--
I think a very viable, very sellable, very fun mob film.
So let's all applaud Narrowsburg for their participation.
-Thank you. -[audience cheers]
Now, uh, the hard part.
Um, halfway, we started the, um, editing,
post-production on this film in July.
And, uh, lo and behold, we hit a few problems.
And, uh, sadly, we don't have the whole film here today.
And I really do apologize. But what you will see is 15 minutes,
sorry, of the film that shows exactly what we were doing
and how much fun it is and how great your area looks
and all the people that were in this film.
Uh, I don't want to belay to the point and keep apologizing
because you guys are great and I think it's a fun film
and I know it's going to go places.
And I'm having one of those really bad summers, so...
and I apologize. If I was more energetic, I could've made this happen.
But, um, I'm going to turn it over to, uh, to see it, right?
And then if you have any questions,
I'd be glad to answer those afterwards
about where this is going and what happened to it
and everything that's going on.
-Thank you. -[audience applauds]
[upbeat music]
♪ Oh, amazing
♪ I can't get ahead no, without trying ♪
♪ Everything is out-of-pocket somebody do something ♪
♪ The perfect situation is abstract ♪
-[splashes] -♪ Listen
[man] Oh, yeah.
Go on.
Oh, yeah, we got him, we got the money.
[Tom] It was chopped up pieces of movie that I couldn't make no sense of.
I don't know if it was to be deceitful
or just to put something in front of you,
but there was nothing there.
[Zac] I had invited a bunch of people, my family was there.
I'm just watching these scenes go by,
waiting to catch a glimpse of myself.
And it was like nothing.
No shots of me.
No shots of Narrowsburg at all.
Just these terrible scenes with these gangsters.
Fuck, you're in a fucking country club.
Show some class.
[Jocelyne] I was feeling so ashamed,
and I think I left the theater.
Everyone was so furious about it.
Nobody move!
Hands in the air!
[high tone]
[uneasy music]
[Brian] And then the lights came up
and then they were like, "That's it.
Okay, you know, you can get out of here or whatever."
[Tom] There was that, uh, horrific silence
that nobody says nothing.
Some people in the crowd gasped.
And I said to myself, "They're the investors."
It hit me, I said, "If it ain't a scam,
it's something that went really, really wrong."
[Joe] The kid, Zac, he's almost in tears.
I had no idea the amount of money
or the amount of emotion that his family put into this movie.
I felt horrible.
And his father, he's got like this,
yeah, I can tell with his face, his face is all tense,
and he's drawing these steel eyes at me,
and he just wanted, he want--
he wanted to take his anger out on me.
I mean, taking out Richard and his wife and Jocelyne
and Richard, go, complain to them.
I was trying to save that movie.
And I was trying to get it done
so those people would have something
and I would have something.
What was overarching was the fact
that I was not going to do this.
I was not, I wasn't going to be an actor, that was it.
I could not deal with that... sort of thing
happening to me again.
[Brian] We all went out on the street
and there were people just, like,
running like, "Look, where-- what the hell? Where is Richie?
Where is Jo, where are they?" And that's when the town...
went from "We love you" to "We hate you."
And that, you know, there was real violence in the air.
Search every ravine, every crevice,
but the fiend must be found!
[crowd clamors]
[dogs bark]
[uneasy music]
[Cecilia] There were people knocking on the office door after the film.
[knocking on door]
Never anybody there.
It's like they, in the middle of the night--
They disappeared.
So then I knew,
I says, "The jig is up."
Now everybody knows something's wrong with this whole picture.
[man] The man's a by god spellbinder.
I want my money back!
I want his hide!
Find him and bring him over to the high school,
roped and hogtied if you have to.
[Brian] When we woke up in the morning,
we drove to the main office,
and there was nobody in the office,
the computers, they were gone.
There was nothing left there.
There was someone there that said,
the police were looking for Jocelyne
or maybe they were just saying Richie.
But they-- they had found a passport with the picture
that had been cut out. [chuckles]
I don't know what to make of that.
They found a passport with a picture cut out.
[Cecilia] I think there was one in here...
when the story first broke, right?
In The Times Herald-Record.
This is the one from, uh, Times Herald-Record.
I think this was the front page, headline.
Then it started snowballing.
[Cecilia] It grows quickly in a small town.
[Tom] Everybody said they were con artists.
Every couple of days you see somebody else
came out of the woodwork.
[man] Hundreds of thousands of dollars
that he had gotten from people,
where did all this money go?
[uneasy, somber music]
[Lurch] He playing the whole damn thing, top to bottom.
I mean, come on. They did a couple little scenes on Main Street,
a cop car go up and down.
I think he gave everybody a big fucking farce.
And he came up here deliberately to fuck everybody.
Things started to come out about him, you know.
It wasn't a bank that he robbed.
It was like a shoe store.
It was, like, the story shifted,
and it was no longer glamorous.
It was, like, he was, he had been lying.
My name is Detective Wyatt.
[Larry] His real name is Castaldo,
okay? The key there with Richie was
that he used Castellano as the name.
Paul Castellano was head of the Gambinos, you know.
But he had been dead for years,
so what's he going to do, you know?
Say, "You can't use my name?"
[slow relaxed music]
[Brian] After the festival,
I saw there was a newspaper article,
and on the front page was Richie.
And it says, "Fallen Star's Film Fiasco."
Finally, Richie showed up in the town and he goes,
"Hey, did you see I made the papers' front page?
They call me a star, a fallen star, but a star, right?"
[Zac] He was on Main Street, wasted.
He's not in his suit anymore, he's in, like, sweatpants and like a wifebeater,
and, like, he's just chain smoking and screaming.
"I'm a fallen star, star, star."
He was, like, at the end of his rope, you know.
And he's been in a fight.
[tense music]
Get the fuck, get the fuck off,
get the fucking [mumbles].
[tense music]
[car crashing]
[dramatic opera music]
[Zac] I think he knew it was over at that point.
I don't think there was much to do
besides get drunk and just wait
for all the bad stuff that was about to come.
I mean, I think he knew it was going to crash down.
[Bobby] Officer, what are you doing, officer?
Wait a second [mumbles].
-[Bobby] Go inside! -[police officer] Shut up, Bobby.
[Bobby] No, don't tell me to shut up!
[siren wails]
[police radio chatter]
[dramatic music]
[Tracy] I'll be in sight to the Richard Castellano story
-in Sullivan County. -It does appear to be on its way.
The actor featured in the movie Analyze This,
Richard Castellano, who was brought to the county jail
last night, face Judge Frank LaBuda in court today.
Castellano was charged with grand larceny
after promising people Screen Actors Guild cards.
Sentencing and restitution will be discussed tomorrow.
There were many charges pending against Richard.
But the charges that ultimately appeared
in an indictment were several felony charges
for taking money from would-be actors
and promising them a union card,
and a fraud charge where he obtained
substantial money from a local farmer.
I could say when he appeared in court, he was an actor.
[Ralph] When he tried to convince the court of something,
he acted like he was starring in a movie,
and he's always looking around to make sure
that he had the audience.
I believe at times, he
could not tell the difference between reality...
uh, and, and a movie that he was creating in his own mind.
On his judgment day, so to speak,
case was called and there was no Richard Castellano.
The attorney stated that, uh, he had had a psychiatric breakdown.
He made a good faith effort to repay the money,
but he hasn't paid it all yet, um,
mostly because of his medical problems. He's been in the hospital.
Victims should be made whole because of the scam he pulled.
[Ralph] There was one time where he tried to feint a heart attack.
He stands up and he starts to say something,
then he goes into one of his, "Oh, something's wrong,
something's wrong, I, oh, I feel, oh, I feel weak.
I can't see. Oh, oh, something's, oh, something's awful wrong."
And he gropes around, found the chair.
I looked at the deputy and he said,
"He does this all the time in the jail."
[Dawn] Aside of a plea deal,
Castellano promised to pay them back,
and would be sentenced to a year behind bars.
This morning, Castellano apologized.
You've been very respectable judge.
I appreciate that, it's almost good to [mumbles]
so, I, I have no, no complaints,
and I'm sorry for what happened.
[Dawn] Judge LaBuda says Jeffrey Schwartz, Castellano's attorney,
doesn't want to represent his client anymore.
LaBuda says that is still long with the...
Bang, they locked me up.
And I wind up in mother effing jail.
Like, they were saying we had no film in the camera.
There were people saying we had no film in the camera!
I get mad when I think of it,
because they were trying to hurt me so bad.
The DA, he thought he had a big fish
in a small pond, you know?
Richie Castellano, the ex-mobster-turned-actor.
They thought they had the big one.
Well, open your eyes.
You got nobody!
That you got nobody but a regular innocent actor.
I'll see you guys, try to snap up my cell before I leave, all right?
-Of course. -Be good and remember, write me.
Take care, Bobby.
To me, it's nothing to hold people money,
so that's why maybe I don't get excited like kids do.
You think it's a good story, I think it's a fucking boring story.
Maybe I'm interesting.
The story sucks.
That's all I can say.
[producer] Can you tell me about, um, uh,
the premiere of the--
what was supposed to be the premier of Four Deadly Reasons...
-Yeah. -...and, but the editor had only
been able to edit maybe ten minutes of footage?
We had to-- we had to, uh, what do you call that?
A premiere, yeah.
Where you got dressed with tuxedos and everything.
[producer] But then I have, like, only ten minutes of footage was,
was ready? Do you remember that?
No, I don't remember that. I remember seeing the whole movie.
What are you talking about?
Are you sure you know what you're talking about?
When I went there, I watched the whole movie.
I don't know which fence you went to.
Never heard of that.
Ten minutes of the movie?
Are you sure?
I really can't answer that, I don't know what that--
what happened with that ten minutes.
I don't remember that.
[projector whirs]
[somber, whimsical music]
[John Conway] To read about some of these people
who had given their life savings to this man,
and just ended up with absolutely nothing
to show for, um, I can only imagine
what it must have done to them.
I lent him a lot of money.
I think I lent him close to 15-20,000.
It probably was not more than 50,000.
[Steve] I remember going to the bank,
I used a couple of Visa cards to get the cash.
I walked out the door and I gave it to him,
and I just remember the smile he had on his, his, uh, you know,
"Oh, you're amazing, Doc," you know.
To give someone money like that,
you have to hope and then dream or believe.
He said, "You're going to get a part in the movie,"
and that was the hook.
He made me feel like I was going to go some place.
[Dr. Paul] It was like a very fast thing, like, they needed cash.
I said, "I, I'm not going to give you that amount."
He said, "You have to, we really need it."
"Okay, I'll give you a check."
But when I went to cash the check,
there was no money in the account.
I felt at that point
that I was had, and that these people were swindlers.
[uneasy music]
[pensive string music]
-[man] We're making a documentary over here. -[woman] There we go.
-This is the man. -[man] All right.
I respect him, I love him like a father,
This guys never wannabe--
[Tom] Now, I don't know everybody that gave him money.
The only guy I know for sure was John Borg.
And, uh, he thought he was going to be in the movie.
[Lurch] That was, that was over a $100,000.
He was having a heart attack, "Oh, my God,
I gave him almost my entire fucking life savings."
And he died, he died a few months right after that. That was it.
Gloria is a retired music teacher.
Whether he knew that there were dementia issues going on,
I don't know, but she gave him over a $120,000.
This note says, "Keep it quiet because I'll go to jail.
We don't need their investigating you."
I think as she got deeper and deeper,
it just became, like, her little secret
because she didn't, she didn't share with her husband,
she didn't share with anybody.
[birds chirp]
[John Marchese] I'm a writer and journalist,
and I thought this has to be written about.
Uh, I went in to see Richie,
and he was feeling,
obviously, that he had been caught and trapped at that point.
And I remember he showed me, I think,
this notebook he had been keeping,
or something like kind of legal pad
where he had been writing stuff.
And on that pad, he had written,
"I'm Richie Castellano, a fallen star."
So I have to admit that there was something charming about him.
And I don't think that his charm
was completely based on fraud.
[man] So what are you going to do if you get out?
[Richie] Make love to my wife, Jocelyne, the whole day.
-[man] All right.[chuckles] -[Richie] But-- and what's funny is
as long as I've been here, I miss her more and more, and I love her more and more.
It took me three months, uh, two and a half months to get this girl in bed.
-[man] Wow! -[Richie] And that's why I love her, Sam and Joe,
a lot of guys, they were thinking, "I don't worry about that with my wife."
When I said that, "You're not going to run away on me, are you?"
"Are you crazy? Because again, I'm your wife, why would I leave you now?"
I don't think she's ever run away from me.
[John Marchese] Jocelyne was being hounded, too,
but I was trying to find her.
All I knew was that she had gone into hiding.
She was just the mystery woman all along.
Everybody could talk about Richie.
No one really could talk about Jocelyne.
I, I don't think his wife was involved with the schemes
and she was never, uh, charged at any level
with being involved in the schemes to defraud.
I think a lot of people thought she was just along for the ride.
You know, what people told me?
That she was the brains of the operation.
He was along for the ride.
I don't know if that's true or not,
but that's what I heard.
I do recall having a conversation with, with Jocelyne,
where she, uh, told me that she was a descendant of the Habsburg dynasty,
and, uh, how she escaped in the middle of the night
with, with some of their fortune.
Some of the things that she said
didn't historically add up.
[Dr. Paul] I do remember something like Jocelyne
having some royalty in her, like royalty in France
or in one of those countries.
[Rich] She told me that her family owned an island,
her family was like billionaires.
She said she owned Mustang Films
and it was a big film company.
[Zac] I'm organizing some of her files.
I remember pamphlets of movies
that she had supposedly produced
without her name on them.
She was a lot harder to pin down than he was.
[Brian] I think Richie had dreams of making a movie.
I think Richie wanted to be the center of attention
at a film festival, and Jocelyne probably being
the much more intelligent,
knew the reality of it would just be so much easier
to just take the money and run.
[somber music]
I know I do not leave men, uh, indifferent
one way or another,
and I think this has been my curse a little, you know.
I was not involved, really I was,
you know, you can be guilty by association
but you need to prove that.
I was not accused of anything in Narrowsburg, you know.
And believe me, the DA was looking, he was looking.
In Narrowsburg I did not understand
where did all this money go?
And, you know, one day did my own detective work,
you know, and I found out Richard had problem with gambling.
I did confront, I did confront Richard
regarding horse's affairs and horse's money issues,
but Richard is a very smooth talker,
and he would always say that was crazy,
you know, just kind of answers
that men sometimes can say to woman, you know.
I had a hunch, I thought we could turn this dollar
into some real money, pay off Sapiro
and have some left for ourselves and the kid.
Nobody's coming looking for us, okay?
[Jocelyne] You are in a corner and where do you go from there?
There is a lion in front of you and, you know,
and you can't move, you know.
That's how I was feeling at that time,
most of the time I was with Richard.
[uneasy music]
I mean, after leaving that drama in Narrowsburg
and everything else that goes with it,
the DA, the police, um, the shame.
I think I was at my lowest. [laughs]
And, um, I think I cried.
I cried for months.
I didn't want to exist anymore either, you know.
[somber music]
[rails clatter]
[siren wails]
[Isil] We went to the Narrowsburg Film Festival
with our film Under Hellgate Bridge,
and that's how we met Jocelyne.
After that festival, uh, some years went by,
I don't remember exactly how many years,
but we did hear from her via email
when she started the Queens Film Festival.
I thought, "Hey, you know,
maybe this is a new fresh beginning for her.
And I want to thank all of our filmmakers,
our sponsors and member of the advisory board
in making this film festival the best
I hope that we have broken new ground
and set the tone for another five years
of the best of independent film.
[Larry] I didn't know about the Queens Festival,
until I saw a friend from the movie.
He said, um, "You want to hear something funny?"
He said, "Jocelyne is running the Queens Film Festival now."
Festival has not only grown in size but in depth.
We were just like, "Wow, you know, she pulled herself together.
She survived that whole Narrowsburg fiasco.
Maybe this is, you know, a new beginning for her."
But what was so odd was when I saw her
for the first time, her name was no longer Jocelyne,
her name was now Marie.
[Larry] He said, "Yeah, she's using the same picture
that she used in Narrowsburg,
but she's using a different name under the same picture." [chuckles]
[Isil] We were standing in the lobby of the festival
and that's when somebody came up to us and said,
you know, they got conned by her and that she owed them money.
I always felt like there's something
not a hundred percent with Jocelyne.
I kind of started Googling her,
and, and then I found out something in California
about a check being bounced
for like a large amount of money.
And I started putting two and two together
and was like, "Wow, Jocelyne wasn't this big producer.
That Jocelyne has, you know, a criminal past."
It was surprising, I couldn't believe it.
Isn't that also the festival where that "Shame on you, guys, shame, shame."
-Chases her down the street. -Yes.
[news reporter] Marie Castaldo is the founder
and director of the Queens International Film Festival
but some say she's a con artist.
[man] They're ripping off, uh, four vendors of some $14,000.
You had the Narrowsburg Film Festival.
-You left a trail of bad debts there? -No, that's not me.
[news reporter] And before Narrowsburg
she was in California calling herself
Marie Rousseau, and Marie Jocelyne Plante.
She left owing $40,000 in unpaid judgments
at the Hollywood Film Festival.
Actually, can I tell you something?
-Yes. -You do not know much,
uh, and I'm really sorry to see
that you're a reporter.
She has zeroed in on the fact that
filmmakers want to show their films and they're even willing to pay.
-We bought, uh, the C package. I figured that-- -How much--
-How much is it? -It was like $200 for the C package.
-200 dollars? -Yeah.
Okay, to see your own film?
-To see our own film! -[both laughs]
If you get good enough people
that are willing to pay to show their films,
you can have a festival and if you have a festival,
then you can get sponsors.
And if you've got sponsors,
then you can charge ticket admission,
and the money just keeps coming in.
This is her specialty.
[Michael] I think she had a genuine wish
of wanting to be important in the film world.
I don't think she did film festivals to con people.
I think she wound up conning people
because, you know, we're in the indie film world.
There's always dreams out of more and bigger
than there is reality of making it happen.
[dark whimsical music]
I can honestly say, you fooled me.
Everybody invested, I gave her the money.
It's gone, I can't say how she did it.
[somber music]
[producer] Do you feel like you actively deceived anyone?
That I actively deceived anyone? No.
So I understand that, you know,
there is all this money, or there is a pattern
but do not try to make me feel like I am the evil person.
Mistake were made from all party,
so everyone needs to take their responsibility.
These people call themself my friends
when the wind was shifting the wrong way,
they were gone but then when the wind was shifting back the good way,
then they were back.
I am sorry, I prefer myself...
even so all of these look bad, I prefer myself,
I do not shift winds, okay?
And stop saying that I am that evil person
because I can say a lot more
about each and every one of them.
I am a nice person.
I'm just going to stop at that.
[light music]
We want to think that if a disaster happen, you know,
we will help on each other
but I do not believe, I think everyone just run for themself, you know.
Coming from Africa, doesn't surprise me at all,
the strong eats the weak, uh, you know, lion, uh,
you know, zebra that is wounded and you will go for it.
That's how I see people, you know.
When you're strong, people go with you,
and when you're weak, they go against you.
[soft, dark music]
[birds chirp]
The first time I saw Four Deadly Reasons was long after we had shot it.
It was screening at the Tribeca Screening Room.
It was above the Tribeca Bar and Grill.
[dreamy chorus music]
[uneasy music]
The life, you know what I'm talking about.
Sooner or later, it either puts you behind a wall
or under the ground.
[Paul] So I called up the Tribeca Screening Room and said,
"Hey, I'd like to book such and such date and,
you know, 7:00 p.m. or whatever it was."
It was the opening night of the Tribeca Film Festival.
I never told anybody that it was
part of the Tribeca Film Festival, I never lied,
I just said we're having a premiere at the Tribeca Film Center.
It's opening night of the Tribeca Film Festival.
I paid, I think, $200 for an actual red carpet.
And we played it for a packed audience, 300 people.
[uneasy, whimsical music]
I just wanted to be a filmmaker and get a movie made
but it got so much more complex.
Richie, he was in jail.
So I made a deal with the Castellanos,
where Joe Dinki and I did some rewrites
without him in order to make it work.
Plans, they never seem to work out.
Paul and I both put our own money in it, trying to save that movie.
But I said, "No, I want to get this finished, we're going to do it,
we're going to do the right thing by everybody."
And it has five scenes that I'm very proud of.
Bank robbery, there's strippers,
there's mob actors eating ice cream.
Shit!
[Paul] And I had this whole thing about palindromes.
[Bobby] You're named Otto? That's a palindrome.
You call me a fucking what?
[Bobby] You figure it out for yourself.
A pa-- a palindrome?
You don't walk away after calling me a fucking palindrome!
Hey!
[Zac] Oh, I was, um, the only person from Narrowsburg
at the screening.
Richie and Jocelyne weren't there. Richie might-- I don't think--
I think Richie was out of jail at that point, but he was definitely not showing his face,
or-- where the-- you know, in, in this crowd.
And then the last thing I heard about Richie,
he called me and said he was thinking about,
like, starting another acting school
and, and whether or not I would be interested
in, like, helping him out and doing it with him.
I mean, had I been like, "Yeah, man, that would be awesome, let's do it!"
I mean, I think that maybe there would be another sort of chapter in this story.
[chuckles]
[pensive, whimsical music]
I don't think it was malicious
when he told me that I was going to be a movie star.
I mean, I think it was to try to make me feel good.
And I think he, he liked conning people.
I mean, he-- to trick somebody is, is addicting
and he was certainly like a trickster
and a con artist, that is absolutely true.
But that's different than the excitement
that he got from telling people
that he was going to put them in a movie.
Richie and Jocelyne awakened this thing
and this love for making movies.
-Is this where we are? -Right here, okay?
-We're right here, we're good? -Okay.
That I believe that these things are possible
is something that Richie taught me.
[slow, pensive music]
[engine rumbles]
[Joe] The blur between fantasy and reality,
we all fall prey to it.
There's a little bit of Richard Castellano in all of us.
There's a little bit of flimflam,
there's a little bit of wanting
so much and not knowing how to get it...
and there's a little bit of, of all this chicanery
that we all pull from time to time.
[Brian] Had it been ready, Four Deadly Reasons,
would he have been arrested and put in prison?
I don't think so.
Sometimes, people dream something
and because they're dream, they just keep saying it,
and it suddenly starts to become true.
So when is it a lie,
and when does the lie become a real movie, a real thing?
[slow, pensive music]
[Zac] I often describe it as, like, The Music Man
without the magical happy ending.
Suddenly, there were things to do
and things to be proud of.
Surely some of you can be grateful
for what this man has brought to us.
[Zac] The truth didn't matter.
It was just the possibility.
Possibility that these things could happen.
[slow, pensive music]
[John Marchese] I mean, I really have this theory that
the entire film business is built on a scam.
There's still people who are going to say,
"We lost money, we were embarrassed,
yet we'll be able to tell this story
for the rest of our lives.
We were ripped off in such a bizarre and unusual way
that it was worth it."
How often do you get to tell a story like that?
[Richie] Narrowsburg is a sleepy, beautiful town,
I love, I still love it.
And there's still people want me to come back,
they said, "We wish Castellano, Richie was back up here.
He made the place alive."
Like people say, "Rich, how many people in this world
can say they've done what you've done?"
You know, if I should die walking out this door,
I'd die with a smile on my face,
I'm not afraid of death.
You make movies and they live on, and on, and on,
so when you do pass on, you go hang out with God,
you're still alive down here.
[slow, pensive music]
[upbeat orchestral music]
[upbeat, playful music]
The story is so fascinating
that there were like a jillion different ways
that it could be told. And I...
Feeling fucking lucky now, Sapiro?
Dad, stop, please don't do this.
I got four fucking reasons for you.
Four fucking deadly reasons.
[dark, playful music]