Prizzi's Family
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''Prizzi's Family'' is a satirical, semi-humorous crime novel by
Richard Condon Richard Thomas Condon (March 18, 1915 – April 9, 1996) was an American political novelist. Though his works were satire, they were generally transformed into thrillers or semi-thrillers in other media, such as cinema. All 26 books were writte ...
published in 1986. It is the second of four novels featuring the Prizzis, a powerful family of Mafiosi in New York City. In all four novels the main protagonist is a top member of the family named Charley Partanna. It is a
prequel A prequel is a literary, dramatic or cinematic work whose story precedes that of a previous work, by focusing on events that occur before the original narrative. A prequel is a work that forms part of a backstory to the preceding work. The term ...
to the very successful ''
Prizzi's Honor ''Prizzi's Honor'' is a 1985 American black comedy crime film directed by John Huston, starring Jack Nicholson and Kathleen Turner as two highly skilled mob assassins who, after falling in love, are hired to kill each other. The screenplay co- ...
'' of 1982, which was also adapted into an award-winning
film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...
.


Plot summary

The time is 1969, about ten years before the events of Prizzi's Honor. Charley Partanna, the top hitman for Don Carraro's family, meets an enormous, but very beautiful blonde dancer in one of the Family's nightclubs. She calls herself Mardell La Tour and says that she is English and is partially guided through life by radio waves emanating from Buckingham Palace. The tough but gullible Charley is ignorant enough to believe her. Actually she is Grace Willand Crowell, daughter of an immensely wealthy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs whose family lives in Georgetown. To help a friend of hers who is striving for a master's degree in sociology, Mardell, an aspiring actress, has assumed a number of off-beat real-life identities in the last year in order to provide insights about different levels of society for her friend. Her latest role is that of a naive showgirl trying to get established in nightclubs. At the same time that Charley begins a highly emotional but also sexual affair with Mardell, Maerose Prizzi, a granddaughter of the powerful Don, has been mapping out her future career in which she aims to become the first female Don of a family. A key element in her plans, for both tactical and strategic reasons, is marriage to Charley. She soon begins a sexual affair with the hapless Charley, who is now buffeted between the increasingly strident emotional demands of the two women—as well as carrying out his primary duties, that of eliminating various people across the United States seen as threats to various high-ranking members of the Prizzi family. Events come to a surreal semi-climax at an enormous engagement party that Don Carraro has organized for Maerose and Charley—to the stupefaction of her family, Maerose becomes embarrassingly drunk and runs off to Mexico City with one of the male guests. After that, it only remains for Charley to carry out another multiple homicide for the family, to bring back four thumbs to the Don, and to allow Mardell to withdraw herself from his life.


Condon's style

Condon attacked his targets, usually gangsters, financiers, and politicians, wholeheartedly but with a uniquely original style and wit that made almost any paragraph from one of his books instantly recognizable. Reviewing one of his works in the ''International Herald Tribune'', the well-known playwright
George Axelrod George Axelrod (June 9, 1922 – June 21, 2003) was an American screenwriter and producer. His play '' The Seven Year Itch'' (1952), was adapted into a film of the same name starring Marilyn Monroe. Axelrod was nominated for an Academy Award ...
(''
The Seven-Year Itch ''The Seven Year Itch'' is a 1955 American romantic comedy film directed by Billy Wilder, who co-wrote the screenplay with George Axelrod. Based on Axelrod's 1952 play of the same name, the film stars Marilyn Monroe and Tom Ewell, with the l ...
'', ''
Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter ''Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?'' is an original stage comedy in three acts and four scenes by George Axelrod. After a try-out run at the Plymouth Theatre in Boston from 26 September 1955, it opened at the Belasco Theatre on Broadway on 13 ...
''), who had collaborated with Condon on the screenplay for the film adaptation of ''The Manchurian Candidate'', wrote:
"The arrival of a new novel by Richard Condon is like an invitation to a party.... the sheer gusto of the prose, the madness of his similies, the lunacy of his metaphors, his infectious, almost child-like joy in composing complex sentences that go bang at the end in the manner of exploding cigars is both exhilarating and as exhausting as any good party ought to be."
In Prizzi's Honor, Condon's normal exuberance was somewhat curbed by choosing to narrate the events through the viewpoints of its various semi-literate gangsters, which limited the scope of his imagery. In Family, however, he returns to being his usual
omniscient narrator Narration is the use of a written or spoken commentary to convey a story to an audience. Narration is conveyed by a narrator: a specific person, or unspecified literary voice, developed by the creator of the story to deliver information to the ...
and we have: A description of Maerose's father, Vincent Prizzi, son of the Don, and Boss of the family: "Vincent conspired with his own ignorance. He was a perpetually baffled man who chewed on pieces of himself and then spat them out at the world." The Don makes a speech to an enormous family gathering: "The way he did this was whisper into Vincent's ear in Sicilian, then Vincent spoke it into the microphone in Brooklynese, dumping the words out of the depths of his stomach the way a piled wheelbarrow is emptied by upending it." Charley makes love for the first time with Maerose: "It was like being locked in a mailbag with eleven boa constrictors."


Real-life names in the book

All of Condon's books have, to an unknown degree, the names of real people in them as characters, generally very minor or peripheral. The most common, which appears in most of his books, is some variation of Franklin M. Heller. The real-life Heller was a television director in New York City in the 1950s, '60s, and 70s, who initially lived on
Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land are ...
and then moved to a house on Rockrimmon Road in
Stamford, Connecticut Stamford () is a city in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, outside of New York City. It is the sixth-most populous city in New England. Stamford is also the largest city in the Western Connecticut Planning Region, Connecticut, Weste ...
. In this book Franklin Heller is the mayor of New York.
A.H. Weiler Abraham H. Weiler (December 10, 1908 – January 22, 2002) was an American writer and critic best known for being a film critic and motion picture editor for ''The New York Times''. He also served a term as chairman of the New York Film Critics ...
, a film critic for ''The New York Times'', was another friend of Condon's who in this book is Dr. Abraham Weiler, the best orthopedic surgeon in the Northwest.


Reception

''
Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of ...
'' liked it:
Obsessed with Mardell yet pulled by loyalty and lust to Maerose, Charley is trapped between them, all the while carrying out his regular duties as the Prizzi enforcer. Condon serves up this zesty mix with good humor, broadside slams at politicians and evangelism, and generous helpings of Sicilian food.
''
Kirkus Reviews ''Kirkus Reviews'' is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus. The magazine's publisher, Kirkus Media, is headquartered in New York City. ''Kirkus Reviews'' confers the annual Kirkus Prize to authors of fiction, no ...
'' had mixed feelings about it:
...the sketches of Mafia viciousness and hypocrisy are often deliciously mordant; and, with those movie characterizations to bolster Charley and Maerose in the reader's mind, there's enough dark whimsy and oafish pathos here to provide earthy, quirky, fast-moving entertainment.
Jimmie Breslin James Earle Breslin (October 17, 1928 – March 19, 2017) was an American journalist and author. Until the time of his death, he wrote a column for the New York ''Daily News'' Sunday edition.''Current Biography 1942'', pp. 648–51: "Patterson, ...
, however, in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', definitely did not like it:
At first the ''prequel'' seemed to be satire and then appeared to be heading toward spoof. Complainant waited to laugh and was surprised and disappointed when he did not. Complainant Breslin states that he is certain he heard Defendant Condon laugh. Defendant then delivered a felonious assault, using characters with no sense of reality to them who were involved in story lines that have more holes than a shooting victim. Defendant Condon probably will earn handsome pay and honors when they turn ''Prizzi's Family'' into a movie. But Defendant Condon did enter bookstores in disdain of criminal code 155.40 (grand larceny, first degree) in that he enticed people who trust his name and loved his past successes and that in doing so, he committed the crime of grand larceny, first degree.Jimmy Breslin, ''The New York Times'', Sept. 28, 1986, Section 7, Page 13 of the National edition with the headline: CHARLEY AND MAEROSE: THE EARLY YEARS, a

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Adaptation

In June 1990, it was announced
Sidney Lumet Sidney Arthur Lumet ( ; June 25, 1924 – April 9, 2011) was an American film director. Lumet started his career in theatre before moving to film, where he gained a reputation for making realistic and gritty New York City, New York dramas w ...
had signed on to direct an adaptation of ''Prizzi's Family'' from a script written by
William Richert William Richert (1942 – July 19, 2022) was an American film director, producer, screenwriter and actor. He is known for writing and directing the feature films '' Winter Kills'', '' The American Success Company'', and '' A Night in the Life ...
. However, the film was never made.


References


External links

:{{Citizendium, title=Prizzi's Family 1986 American novels