Frank D’Amico: Big, Tall and Proud

(www.bigfrank.tv)

Summer 2004

By M.L. Zambrana

Frank D’Amico is having a wonderful year.

In his seventh film, “Hitters,” D’Amico was given the opportunity to work

opposite his mentor and friend, actor/producer Robert Davi, whom D'Amico calls “the

Humphrey Bogart of his generation.” As the “Best Feature Film Award” winner at the

2003 Westchester International Film Festival, “Hitters” was just released on DVD this

past summer.

D’Amico’s latest film, “Fly Boys,” has him starring opposite veteran actor Tom

Sizemore in a coming-of-age family adventure, which is due to hit theaters in late 2004.

And he is looking forward to his role in the upcoming film “Eight to Eight,” where he’ll

be playing the role of a psychotic henchman.

The best news is that his first book, “Stand Up Guy: The ‘Larger’ Than Life

Stories of a Candy Store Gangster,” is being entertained by Hollywood producers Phillip

Krupp and Zev Braun of Braun Entertainment, who are interested in turning it into either

a feature film or a sitcom. “Stand Up Guy” is a “slightly embellished autobiography” that

was released in August to coincide with D’Amico’s national stand-up comedy tour.

“I always kick off my tours in my hometown,” D’Amico says with pride. “I

always go back to where I started doing comedy, in small rooms, and from there I work

out my stuff. I’ll do a couple of dinner shows, then move on to the major venues like the

Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa, which has become the hottest spot in Atlantic City. We’re

in the big room, and that’s exciting.”

Frank D’Amico Jr. was born on December 20, 1955 in Mt. Vernon, New York.

This outgoing Italian developed his most unique characteristics as he passed into

adulthood: his height (6’5”) and his weight (around 400 pounds). Even though he could

hit a baseball further then the other kids, he was such a slow runner that he hardly ever

made it safe to first base. However, D’Amico discovered that he had a certain grace and

talent for another form of recreation.

“When I was younger,” he says, “I was a disco dance instructor. I was 6’5 and 375

pounds, but I was a great dancer. I was the heaviest dancer to ever glide across a lit-

paneled floor. I can still here them whisper in envy, ‘Look at that fat man dance.’ People

will tell you that I was a legend in New York. I had the whole get-up from the white

‘Saturday Night Fever’ outfit to the ten-inch platform shoes—I looked eight feet tall

when I walked onto the dance floor with those shoes. And I loved it.”

But as he soon found that even conforming to the fashions of the day didn’t help

him to blend into the social scene—his size always set him apart.

“I used to do everything to try to fit in,” he confesses. “And I fit in, but I really

didn’t fit in. What I was doing was, I made myself out to be the mark for people to point

at and go, ‘Look! He’s into disco, but he’s like Herman Munster in a white outfit trying to

be John Travolta.’ So I was exposing even more my height and my size. But when they

realized I was comfortable with myself, it drew them into my world, which in turn made

them comfortable being around me.”

“When I bought a house, the first thing I did was to put a fence around it. I

needed privacy near my pool. It was like I couldn’t escape the experiences on the beach

during my childhood of being… let’s say a little more well-rounded and much taller then

most other kids my age, and I learned at a very young age that kids can sometimes be

cruel. I seemed to work out my insecurities by the time I bought my second house.

Deciding that it was time to battle back and stop discriminating against myself, I put the

ball in my new neighbor’s court. I daringly put on the best thong I could buy at the big

and tall men’s shop and proudly walked to the un-fenced property line, while they were

having a holiday barbeque, and yelled, ‘Hey, what do you got on the grill? It smells

delicious;’ like I was their new friend.

“Two days later, there was a beautiful fence around my house, and they paid for it.

I thought, hey, if they don’t want to look at me, than let them pay for the fence. So I let

them do the work for me. I’m making my height and my weight work for me. I’m large.

I’m big, I’m tall, and I’m fat. Let other people get comfortable around me, instead of me

trying to be skinny or trying to fit in. And once they got to know me, we became great

friends, and today I’m godfather to their youngest child. The fence is opened and we

share some great barbeques and laugh about my thong that raised a fence.”

Like many people of above-average height, one of D’Amico’s most difficult tasks

has been shopping for clothes. For him, however, the problem is finding a clothing

manufacturer that will accommodate those with the additional burden of being both big

and tall.

“Either you’re tall and you can get the best suits at the tall man’s shop, or you’re

big and stout…which is just a polite way of saying short and fat. So if I want to get a suit

that’s long, it doesn’t fit (around me). If I get a suit that fits, it’s too short. So I get ‘em

custom-made. Being a character actor, I look for mob shirts reminiscent to the classy

Gotti-style, and may find one off the rack every couple of months that would fit me

properly… and I go shopping every week. But when you get ‘em custom-made, there’s

nothing like it. I go to an Italian tailor in New York and he takes my measurements, and

the beauty is that no matter what size you are or how tall you are, your shirt is going to fit

just perfect and puts you back into the mainstream fashion world.”

Despite his serious concerns about his wardrobe, this well-dressed performer still

finds time to work in some humor on the topic.

“When you go to a big man’s shop, they have these special mirrors like they have

in the funhouse at carnivals that make you look skinnier and taller then you rally are. I’m

already 6’5”, so, you add another few inches with my kisser and you’d think the results

would be creature-esque, to say the least. But that wasn’t the case when I tried suits on. I

looked every bit like Lou Ferrigno or Arnold Schwartzenegger—not an ounce of fat on

me. So I’m lookin’ in the mirror going, ‘Wow these suits are cut nice’ and telling the

salesman, ‘I’ll take four of them.’ I head home and I’m all excited. Wait ‘til everybody

sees how skinny I look! Then once home, I put ‘em on, go in front of my own mirror in

my house, and I’m fat again. I knew right then that the mirrors were tricky, so I went

back to the store. The salesperson ran up to me and asked, ‘More suits sir?’ and I reply,

‘The hell with the suits. Gimme four of those mirrors.’”

Acting hadn’t always been the first goal D’Amico wanted to achieve. Early on,

he longed to be a part of the mob—La Cosa Nostra, the Greater Family—but his

irrepressible sweetness and big heart got in the way, coupled with a phobia of little people

(which stemmed from a childhood incident when he got lost at the circus). He used to go

to collect money from people, only to find himself invited to family get-togethers,

weddings and birthday parties; they always fed him, and he eventually found himself

unable to demand payments because he felt like part of their families. It cost him his

tough-guy persona and his job during his tenor as a wiseguy bodyguard. In short, he

flunked out of the mob. And no one ever tried to pull him back in.

The final straw to his days as a bodyguard came after an incident that D’Amico

describes in his book, “Stand-Up Guy,” when he had to organize a children’s birthday

party for a well-connected mob boss in New York. D’Amico convinced the Mafioso

grandfather to hire a clown friend of his who had a unicycle for entertainment. The mob

boss asked if his grandson would be allowed to ride on it. “I’ve heard of them. I’d like

to see one,” the mob boss said. He agreed to hire the clown, telling D’Amico to make

sure the clown would give the kid a ride. D’Amico reassured him that it wouldn’t be a

problem.

It turned out that there had been a miscommunication between D’Amico and the

child’s grandfather. The grandfather thought that D’Amico had said “unicorn,” and he

became outraged the day of the party when “the winged horse” could not be produced to

amuse his grandson; he didn’t know the difference between a unicycle, a unicorn and a

Pegasus, but any humor in the situation evaporated when they wanted him to kill the

innocent clown.

“So they told me, ‘You’re out. You can’t collect money from people because they

feed you and invite you to weddings. You can’t be a bodyguard because you’re scared of

midgets! And now you refuse to kill clowns who cheat us. You better find another line

of work.”

After his unsuccessful bid at a gangster’s life, D’Amico become a part of the

community as a teamster in Local 456 in Elmsford, New York, where his fellow workers

recognized his unique sense of humor and urged him to try stand-up comedy. Comedy

gigs led to acting, and D’Amico finally got to play the role that he’d been practicing all

his life: that of the classic Italian gangster.

“I was on the picket line telling jokes. I was making everyone laugh and someone

said, ‘Why don’t you go to the comedy club just opened up?’ And they all dared me, and

so I went on. The owner saw me and he came up and said, ‘You’re very funny. Come

back Saturday. I’ll put you on for five minutes.’ The show headliners were Angel

Salazar, who played Chi-Chi in “Scarface,” and Martin Lawrence. That was my first

professional show. Within a year, I was touring as a headliner and being billed as “The

Hitman of Comedy” all over the country. Four years after that, I owned the club where I

started.

The “Hitman of Comedy” billing has since retired, ever since actor Robert Davi

introduced D’Amico as “The Kong of Comedy” during a charity fundraising event.

Over his 18-year span in comedy, a sign of D’Amico’s diversified appeal is

evident in the performers that he has worked with. He has opened for a variety of acts

including Charlie Daniels, Bruce Willis and the Accelerators, Pat Cooper, and the Statler

Brothers. In what he describes as the highlight of his stand-up career, he received a

special invitation to perform at ventriloquist Senor Wences’ 100th birthday bash, along

with great Catskills comedians like Henny Youngman and Freddie Roman.

Success as a stand-up comedian, however, did not come without some personal

heartbreak… but even one of D’Amico’s most painful moments ended up propelling his

career forward. 

“I was doing the 92 K-Rock Howard Stern contest at a club called Catch a Rising

Star in New York,” he recalls. “I was the last performer, and it was one of the best sets I

ever had. I got a standing ovation and I had the time of my life. Everyone, including one

of the judges, told me that I got this one. Just then, a big-name comedian comes in, goes

on stage and does a few minutes while the judges are figuring the vote. That comedian

happened to be friends with one of the comedians who was up against me for the $10,000

prize and the fanfare.”

D’Amico did not win the competition.

“I was approached by the club’s manager, who told me, ‘Frank, you know, this is

wrong… this is all politics… but they’re picking the other guy.’”

Shaken by the turn of events, D’Amico snapped, “Let me tell you something.

Your best bet is for you to get away from me before I put you in the trunk of my car—“

he pointed to a brand-new black Lincoln Town car parked in front of the club—“and

leave you at Kennedy Airport to rot!”

“The truth is,” D’Amico confessed, “I really owned an old Ford LTD that was

parked around the corner. But I had my pride and image to protect!”

The evening grew worse when the winning comedian came out to use the phone.

“So I’m standing there up front,” D’Amico continues, “and I’m really upset… and this

guy picks up the phone and he goes, ‘Mom! Hey, Dad! I won!’ And I’m there thinking to

myself, ‘That should be me calling my parents.’ I got in my car and left, and for eight

years, I didn’t do comedy in the city.”

The club manager moved on in his career and became the manager of Caroline’s

Comedy Club on Broadway. At that time, in the mid-1990s, director Roger Nygard was

looking for a large comedian he had seen performing on Comedy Central’s “Stand Up,

Stand Up” show that he felt was right for the lead mob boss role in his upcoming feature

film “Back To Back.” On the manager’s first day in his new job, the very first phone call

that he received inquired about “a big comedian that’s very scary and intimidating.”

The manager immediately replied, “You want Frank D’Amico.”

“How can you be so sure he’s my guy?” he was asked.

“Trust me. It’s Frank.”

D’Amico was on tour in Alabama at the time, with his then-girlfriend and fellow

comedian Lisa Lampanelli, a.k.a. “The Queen of Mean,” when he received a call from

comedy agent Roger Paul in New York to give him the good news. Moments after he

was contacted him with the offer, D’Amico said nothing to either his girlfriend Lisa or his

mother, who were in the other room. Instead, he got on the phone, called his manager

and told him, “I got a movie! We’re going Hollywood!”

“It was just like God set it up,” he recalled with a smile. “I ended up doing the

casting at an on-camera audition right in Alabama. Once I returned home to New York a

conference call was arranged at the request of director Roger Nygard, and I auditioned

for producers from NEO Motion Pictures over the phone, which sealed me the role.”

D’Amico says, “Pat was the only one I trusted to finalize my movie deal. When I

met Pat, he was an agent working with recording artists, and we realized we both had the

same unwavering dedication and drive of commitment, which is essential to get beyond

the drama and succeed in this business. So we teamed up. He became my personal

business manager and I became his exclusive artist. From that day all he did was preach,

‘We should be in Hollywood. That’s the natural progression.’ So we set out working

towards that common goal, and now we were finally getting there.”

The phone call by Nygard marked the start of their great working relationship.

After filming the movie, D’Amico decided that acting was for him, so he joined HB

Acting Studios in New York City, where he studied with acting coach William Hickey.

Hollywood brought new-found vigor to his professional life with television appearances

in prime-time programs like “Martial Law,” recurring roles on “Becker” with Ted Danson

and “Grounded for Life,” as well as parts on Emeril Lagasse’s short-lived sitcom

“Emeril,” “The Parkers,” “NYPD Blue” and “The In-Laws.” He has played various

character roles on the “Tonight Show with Jay Leno,” has appeared on HBO, Showtime

and Comedy Central, and has also popped up in a stand-up cameo for the 1997 movie

“Trekkies.”

D’Amico won’t deny that he plays a lot of mobsters. “I like the parts,” he admits,

“but I don’t like playing the goumba mobster any more. ‘Hey, Tony, What’s a-madda for

you?’ On TV, I get a break when I play the blue-collar stuff. Now they’re starting to

think of me as maybe a rugged lawyer, so it’s getting exciting to play out of the box. I

owe thanks to Robert Davi for taking the time to teach me that every role doesn’t have to

be played with the goumba mentality. Most actors are hams,” Frank adds with a grin.

“I’m the whole pig.”

And D’Amico’s new-found literary career has him just as excited as the subtle

changes in his acting roles.

“’Stand Up Guy,’” he continues, “touched on the morality of how my father

taught me to never give up, and how my mother taught me the meaning of integrity, and

so I’m always on the borderline. I’ve never crossed that line to really be considered as

corrupt. You know its sick logic but when you read the twelve stories in the book, you’ll

see.”

His high standards of morality and integrity also extend into D’Amico’s personal

life. He and his manager, Pat Reale, have never drawn up a contract between them and

continue to do business strictly on a handshake.

“As I always like to say,” Reale remarks, “a piece of paper is made for honest

men to remember what they promised, so if your word’s no good, the paper is no good.”

“All my life I’ve looked for the Big Score, but over the years I’ve learned that the

Big Score in life for me was learning the meaning of integrity. My next book is going to

be called ‘Spaghetti and Meatballs for the Soul,’ and it’s gonna have stories and will have

a deeper meaning to everyone that reads it. Plus it’ll have a secret family recipe after

every story.”

The pleasure that he has discovered in writing and performing, however, will

always come second to his favorite activity.

“I love fishing. The way I spell success is a glass of Guinea red wine in one hand,

and my trademark full-bodied Camacho cigar in the other, sitting on my boat with my

friends, telling stories about the ones that got away. That’s success to me, nothing more,

nothing less. I don’t need mansions and all that stuff. For me, that’s life. I would live for

that every day. My father always told me, a man measures his success by the values he

embraces in life. And to me, that’s exactly what it’s about.”

Best of all, D’Amico is happy to be in his own skin.

“I’m comfortable being big,” he says. “That’s one thing: I’m very comfortable.

Do you know what it comes down to? Attitude… It’s coming to grips with who I am. It

used to be when we would go to a restaurant, I would be in fear… and say, ‘Oh my God,

what if the seats have sides and I don’t fit? It’ll be embarrassing.’ Forget about the food,

how’s the chair? That’s what mattered to me. But not any more, now I’ll go to a

restaurant and look around, and if there’s not a chair that fits me, I’ll either ask ‘em to

accommodate me or I’ll leave. Either way, I’ll always find a place for me.”

And so, it seems, will Hollywood.