''Mad Dog Coll'' is a 1961 biographical movie directed by

Burt Balaban Burt Balaban (March 6, 1922 – October 14, 1965) was an American film producer and director. Biography Balaban was born to a Jewish family, the son of Tillie (nee Urkov) from her first marriage, and stepson of Barney Balaban. He was the nephew ...

. It marked the film debuts of both

Telly Savalas Aristotelis "Telly" Savalas (January 21, 1922 – January 22, 1994) was an American actor and singer whose career spanned four decades. Noted for his bald head and deep, resonant voice, he is perhaps best known for portraying Lt. Theo Kojak on th ...

and Gene Hackman.

Plot

The film is a heavily fictionalized treatment of the life of Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll Curran, who was born in 1908 in

County Donegal County Donegal ( ; ga, Contae Dhún na nGall) is a county of Ireland in the province of Ulster and in the Northern and Western Region. It is named after the town of Donegal in the south of the county. It has also been known as County Tyrconn ...

, Ireland. In the film, Coll is depicted as growing up with an abusive father who beats and ridicules him (the film opens with him machine-gunning his father's gravestone), and started a street gang at a very young age, which led in turn to organized crime. He is portrayed as a psychopath, incapable of fear or compassion, who is never more happy than when he is recklessly shooting people with his

tommy gun The Thompson submachine gun (also known as the "Tommy Gun", "Chicago Typewriter", "Chicago Piano", “Trench Sweeper” or "Trench Broom") is a blowback-operated, air-cooled, magazine-fed selective-fire submachine gun, invented by United Sta ...

or feuding with the fellow mobster

Dutch Schultz Dutch Schultz (born Arthur Simon Flegenheimer; August 6, 1901October 24, 1935) was an American mobster. Based in New York City in the 1920s and 1930s, he made his fortune in organized crime-related activities, including bootlegging and the n ...

over whisky hijacking. The film ends with Coll being shot down by the police after Schultz puts a contract on him, but in fact he was arrested, tried, released, then later killed by associates of Lucky Luciano because he was making too much trouble for the syndicate. The incident where he allegedly was involved in the accidental shooting of a five-year-old boy (which led to his nickname in the press) is incorrectly associated with him shooting his way out of an attempt on his life (two boys hanging around the docks are killed), when in fact it happened as a result of a kidnapping he was accused of being part of. Dutch Schultz is depicted by Vincent Gardenia, who was 15 years older than Chandler—Coll was only seven years younger than Schultz.

Cast

John Davis Chandler John Davis Chandler (January 28, 1935 – February 16, 2010) was an American actor. Life Chandler was born in Hinton, West Virginia. He died at age 75 in Toluca Lake, California from cancer. Career In two films in 1961, he portrayed the gangs ...

Mad Dog Coll Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll (born Uinseann Ó Colla, July 20, 1908 – February 8, 1932) was an Irish-American mob hitman in the 1920s and early 1930s in New York City. Coll gained notoriety for the allegedly accidental killing of a young child dur ...

* Kay Doubleday as Clio *

Brooke Hayward Brooke Hayward (born July 5, 1937) is an American actress and model. Her memoir, '' Haywire'' was a best-seller. Early life and education Born in Los Angeles, Hayward is the eldest of three children born to agent turned film, television, and s ...

as Elizabeth *

Neil Nephew Neil Burstyn (July 17, 1939 – November 9, 1978), known as Neil Nephew, was an American actor, writer and story editor. His works as an actor include '' Panic in Year Zero!'' (1962), ''The Rebel Rousers'' (1970) and ''Alex in Wonderland'' (19 ...

as Rocco *

Jerry Orbach Jerome Bernard Orbach (October 20, 1935 – December 28, 2004) was an American actor and singer, described at the time of his death as "one of the last'' bona fide'' leading men of the Broadway musical and global celebrity on television" and a " ...

as Joe Clegg *

Vincent Gardenia Vincent Gardenia (born Vincenzo Scognamiglio; January 7, 1920 – December 9, 1992) was an Italian-American stage, film, and television actor. He was nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, first for ''Bang the Drum Slow ...

as Lt. Darro * Glenn Cannon as Harry * Gene Hackman as Policeman (

Uncredited In general, the term credit in the artistic or intellectual sense refers to an acknowledgment of those who contributed to a work, whether through ideas or in a more direct sense. Credit in the arts In the creative arts, credits are an acknowledg ...

)

Production

Brook Hayward was cast in October 1960. The film was distributed by Columbia.

Novelization

In June, 1961, Monarch Books released a paperback novelization of the screenplay, by Frank Castle, writing under the pseudonym Steve Thurman. The cover featured a black-and-white still of the movie and an associate standing over the bedroom "rub-out" of a bullet-ridden married couple.

Reception

The ''New York Times'' wrote that the film "belongs back in the pound."'Underworld, U.S.A.' and 'Mad Dog Coll', Thompson, Howard, ''New York Times'', 13 May 1961: 10.

References

External links

* 1960s biographical films 1961 films 1960s English-language films American crime films American biographical films Biographical films about gangsters Biographical films about Depression-era gangsters 1961 crime films Columbia Pictures films Films directed by Burt Balaban Films set in the 1920s Films set in the 1930s Cultural depictions of Mad Dog Coll Cultural depictions of Dutch Schultz Films scored by Stu Phillips 1960s American films {{bio-film-stub