Once Upon a Time in America - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of Once Upon a Time in America or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to Once Upon a Time in America

[lonnie]

It's reported that part of the coffee scene was invented by Robert De Niro as an homage to Sergio Leone.

[phyllis]

One of many collaborations between Robert De Niro and Chuck Low. They also appeared in The King of Comedy (1982), The Mission (1986), Goodfellas (1990), Night and the City (1992), Mistress (1992), and Sleepers (1996).

[miriam]

According to an interview with Stuart Kaminsky on the Special Edition DVD, the outline that was given to him was around two hundred pages. Kaminsky was asked by Sergio Leone to fill in the dialogue in the two hundred-page outline. Kaminsky came back with a draft that was four hundred pages long, and Leone read all four hundred pages of the draft in front of Kaminsky as soon as it was given to him.

[clayton]

Fat Moe's 1968 bar was based on an actual location where Sergio Leone met Harry Grey. This bar, which was Grey's recommendation, was situated near New York City's New Calvary Cemetery, just off Greenpoint Avenue, and was, as Leone described, "dark and sordid, with people sitting at little tables in the shadows having secret conversations in whispers." Leone claimed the bartender even looked like Fat Moe himself.

[sophie]

This was Jennifer Connelly's first feature film role, aged twelve at the time of principal photography in 1982/83.

[bessie]

The opera symphony "Amapola", can be heard on several occasions in the film: Deborah dances to a jazzy version on the gramophone, Fat Moe's band plays the tune (also jazzed-up) in the speakeasy, and a strings version is heard during David "Noodles" Aaronson's date with Deborah.

[riley]

Police Chief Aiello is played by an actor with the same last name, Danny Aiello.

[marc]

Sergio Leone had refused the offer to direct The Godfather (1972), an opportunity he deeply regretted. This may have partly inspired him to try a gangster film. Leone has also notably used the flashback technique pioneered in The Godfather: Part II (1974).

[claude]

Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and James Woods appeared in Casino (1995).

[kenneth]

In the early 1960s, Sergio Leone's brother-in-law Fulvio Morsella read an Italian translation of Harry Grey's book, "The Hoods", to him. The book claimed to be "an autobiographical account" of the life of a Jewish gangster in New York City's Lower East Side, and written by Grey while he was incarcerated in Sing Sing prison. Leone was very taken with the book, and it served as his major inspiration in making a gangster film that would capture the spirit of America.

[camila]

Sergio Leone was thrilled at meeting the "real" David "Noodles" Aaronson, Harry Grey, and said he resembled Edward G. Robinson: "The grotesque realism of this elderly gangster who, at the end of his life, couldn't stop himself using a repertoire of cinematic citations, of gestures and words seen and heard thousands of times on the big screen, stimulated my curiosity and amused me. I was struck by the vanity of this attempt, and by the grandeur of its bankruptcy."

[michele]

In October 1975, Sergio Leone visited Canada to scout locations around Montreal, where there were more 1930s décor and architecture than New York City (and also has a history, as the epicenter of Prohibition). During this time, he declared that part of the story would be set in Canada, with an important role prepared for Robert Charlebois.

[leo]

Two (perhaps deliberate) musical anachronisms are present in the film: the song "God Bless America", heard at the beginning and end of the film (in 1933), is the version from This Is the Army (1943); and the song "Summertime" played by a jazz band at the beach when Prohibition is repealed, was composed in 1935, two to three years after the repeal.

[linda]

Robert De Niro and Danny Aiello appeared in The Godfather: Part II (1974) and Mistress (1992).

[jesse]

This film was a box office flop, earning only $5,300,000 on a film budgeted at $30,000,000, and it nearly bankrupted The Ladd Company, founded in part by Alan Ladd Jr. in 1979.

[marc]

In 1968, Deborah is acting in William Shakespeare's "Antony and Cleopatra". This sums up David "Noodles" Aaronson and Deborah's relationship: David "Noodles" Aaronson is enchanted and frustrated by Deborah, as she leads him on, and turns him down; and it is not until the play's conclusion, that she reveals her true feelings for him.

[jessie]

Tonino Delli Colli shot some tests in the 2.35:1 format. Sergio Leone determined that too many of the new multiplexes, which were replacing the full size movie theaters at that time, could not show the format in its full width. This was the only time he shot one of his films in the matted spherical widescreen format of 1.85:1.

[duane]

According to James Woods, a critic dubbed the film (in its two hour and twenty-four minute version) the worst of 1984. Several years later, that same critic watched the original three hour and forty-nine minute version, and called it the best of the 1980s.

[bernard]

The script was written in Italian by Leonardo Benvenuti. In 1981, writing partners Piero De Bernardi and Enrico Medioli, and Stuart Kaminsky were brought in to appropriately translate it into English. According to Kaminsky, Benvenuti was primarily responsible for devising the visual scenes, Medioli maintained the epic nature of the film, and Kaminsky wrote all of the dialogue (Kaminsky also collaborated with Robert De Niro to ensure the characterization between Max and David "Noodles" Aaronson was both similar and distinct).