7/20/23
Newsletter #402
The Crack of Dawn
So, Joseph P. Kennedy, father of John and Robert Kennedy, seeing that his son John’s attempt at running for president is failing, goes to mob boss, Sam Giancana, and asks for a favor: please get me the votes of Illinois and West Virginia, and Sam does. The Kennedy-Nixon election is the closest presidential race in history, with Kennedy winning by one-tenth of one percent, easily attributable to his surprise victory in Illinois. Even though Joe Kennedy promised Sam Giancana that his son the Attorney-General, Robert Kennedy, would ease up on his senate investigations of the mob, instead Bobby Kennedy increased them. Giancana’s friends, Jimmy Hoffa, head of the United Auto Workers, and Carlos Marcello, head of the Texas and Louisiana mobs, were both brought under indictment. And so, in my script Head Shot, Sam Giancana, the biggest, most powerful mob boss in the world, has to go “hat in hand” to see Joe Kennedy.
EXT. THE PLAZA HOTEL, NYC – DAY
A Cadillac limo pulls up in front of the Plaza Hotel in New York City. Sam Giancana and two of his men get out and enter the hotel.
INT. PRESIDENTIAL SUITE – DAY
There is a knock at the door of the vast presidential suite which is answered by a butler. Sam and his men are shown inside and the butler takes their hats and coats. The butler then shows Sam into the living room.
Joe Kennedy sits in an easy chair surrounded by newspapers. He stands up and shakes Joe’s hand.
JOE
Sam. Come on in.
SAM
Thanks. How ya doin’?
JOE
Couldn’t be better. So, Sam, what can I do for you?
SAM
Well, you can call your son, Bobby, off, that’s what
you can do.
JOE
(surprised)
What do you mean?
SAM
What do I mean? You know what I mean. Dragging
Sal Marcello and Jimmy Hoffa in front of Senate sub-
committees. Putting ‘em on trial. Feds following me
night and day. That’s what I mean.
JOE
(throws his hands in the air)
What can I do?
SAM
You can call him off, that’s what you can do.
JOE
Kids these days. They just don’t listen anymore.
SAM
Well, you really ought to try to get Bobby to listen
to you, particularly on this subject.
JOE
(shrugs)
Sorry, Sam, Bobby’s the Attorney-General of the
United States, my hands are tied.
SAM
Then untie them. Get Bobby to lay off Sal and
Jimmy and me. Really. Just do it. Don’t question
me, just do it.
JOE
Are you telling me, Sam?
SAM
I’m doing my very best not to, Joe, but you’re not
cooperating.
JOE
Well, on this subject, I’m sorry, but I can’t intervene.
SAM
You have to intervene.
JOE
No, I don’t. And I won’t.
SAM
(getting angry)
Joe. You came to me for a favor. I got your son
elected, remember?
JOE
Well . . . It took a lot to get him elected, you were
just a part of it.
SAM
It was the closest presidential race in history. The
votes I brought in got him elected.
(Joe shrugs)
Joe, you owe me.
JOE
I don’t know about that.
SAM
Don’t you? Well, I’m tellin’ ya you do. You owe
me and I’m callin’ it in. Get Bobby to lay off me
and my friends. Do it. Do it now.
JOE
Sorry, no can do.
SAM
(eyes blazing)
All right, now I’m not askin’, I’m tellin’. Get Bobby
to stop, and do it now! Joe, you’re makin’ me mad.
JOE
(simply)
Sam, my son is the President of the United States.
You don’t tell me anything.
SAM
(angry)
I don’t, huh? Well, I don’t give a fuck who your
son is. I’m tellin’ you to make it stop!
JOE
No.
SAM
No? No? Joe, you fuckin’ owe me.
JOE
No, I don’t. I don’t owe you anything.
SAM
(gasps)
You must’ve lost your fuckin’ mind, Joe. Remember
who you’re talkin’ to here.
JOE
I remember, Sam, and don’t swear at me.
SAM
(takes a breath)
All right, I’m gonna try this one more time. Please
ask your son Bobby to stop picking on my friends.
JOE
No.
Sam jumps to his feet and points his finger in Joe’s face.
SAM
(goes berserk)
You fuckin’ cocksucker! If you don’t do what I’m
tellin’ you, I’m gonna make you sorry you ever had
kids! I’m gonna make you sorry you was ever born!
JOE
Don’t threaten me. Nobody talks to me that way!
SAM
(points)
Listen, you Boston blue blood fuck! You ask for a
favor, I give it to you, then you turn on me like this?
Who the fuck do you think you are?
Joe Kennedy stands and pokes himself in the chest.
JOE
(righteously)
I am the father of the President of the United States!
And you’d better watch yourself, my old friend,
because after Jack serves his eight years, Bobby will
be president, and that’s eight more years. And that’s
just the beginning. This is the start of a new dynasty!
The Kennedys are going to be just like the Windsors,
only bigger, and go on longer. So now I’m telling you,
Momo, fuck off!
It’s like someone hit Sam in the head with a hammer. He is completely stunned.
SAM
(amazed)
You’re telling me to fuck off?
JOE
Fuck you and fuck off!
SAM
You say ‘fuck you’ to me? Sam Giancana?
JOE
That’s right, fuck you! And don’t come back!
Sam puts on his hat, turns on his heel, and he and his men leave.
INT. PLAZA HOTEL LOBBY – DAY
Sam and his two men step out of the elevator. Sam is fuming, goes directly to a phone booth, gets in and slams the door. His two men stand guard outside.
Sam calls Sal Marcello in New Orleans.
SAM
(into phone)
Sal, you know what that piece o’ shit, Joe Kennedy,
just said to me? ‘Fuck you,’ that’s what he said to
me.
SAL
(shocked)
He said that?
SAM
He sure did.
SAL
He thinks ‘cause his kid is president that he’s
untouchable.
SAM
It was the fuckin’ votes we got him that got his kid
elected, the prick! Closest fuckin’ election in history!
Well, no one has ever fucked me like this and gotten
away with it. Never! And that cheap bootlegger
Kennedy ain’t gonna be the first!
SAL
OK. You wanna do Joe Kennedy? That’s easy.
Just say the word and I’ll take care of it.
SAM
(thinks, grins)
No. Uh-uh. The motherfucker’s in his seventies.
Doin’ him won’t teach him shit, or make him suffer
the way he needs to suffer.
SAL
So, what’re you sayin’, Sam?
SAM
No, not Joe, Jack.
SAL
(long silence)
Jack? He’s the President of the United States.
SAM
So what?
SAL
You can’t whack the president.
SAM
Yeah? Tell that to Lincoln.
SAL
Hold on a second, Sam. Let’s look at the big
picture here. What about the rest of us? The
family?
SAM
(seething)
I got Jack elected and I can get rid of him if I want
to. Joe thinks he’s king shit of turd mountain, but, you
wanna know what? That’s me. I’m the fuckin’ king
and I say Jack’s gotta go, and maybe his little brother,
too.
SAL
(hesitant)
Well . . . If that’s what it is—
SAM
—That’s what it is! I want Joe to eat shit, and he’s
gotta be alive to taste it and suffer. Once his son ain’t
president no more then he’ll just have to see what a
complete ignorant asshole he is.
SAL
(considers)
Y’know, Sam. It’s kind of a coincidence, really, but
I was just discussing this very subject with a fella I
Know [Clay Shaw], and he had some very interesting
ideas. President Kennedy is not a well-liked man in
some circles. I think you and me need to sit down and
have a talk with this fella.
SAM
You trust this guy?
SAL
Yeah, I do. He’s very smart, and he’s got some very
interesting ideas. A whole plan, actually. Maybe you
ought to come on down and visit us sometime.
SAM
How about now?
SAL
Now’s good.
SAM
I’ll be right there.
Sam hangs up the phone, exits the phone booth and stomps away. His men glance at each other, then quickly follow along after him.
*
I didn’t come up with the idea that Sam Giancana was behind John Kennedy’s assassination. Hell, he bragged about it afterward. It’s the main supposition of that documentary I recommended, The Men Who Killed Kennedy. My addition to the story was having Clay Shaw (Tommy Lee Jones in JFK) conceive the plan, which includes pinning the murder on the CIA by using a CIA informer as the patsy.
This is where reality steps in and all of the pieces fit together. These facts make it all too clear why it’s not LBJ, Castro or the CIA behind Kennedy’s assassination.
Carlos Marcello, the number two mob boss, was the head of organized crime in Louisiana and Texas, and lived in New Orleans. Lee Harvey Oswald lived in New Orleans, and Marcello knew Oswald’s father. Not long before the assassination, Oswald moved to Dallas, which Marcello also controlled. His man in Dallas was Jack Ruby (formerly Rubenstein), who was from Chicago and had previously worked for, guess who, Sam Giancana. Jack Ruby owned strip clubs and was tight with the Dallas police, which is how he got into the Dallas police station to shoot Oswald. Kennedy was killed in Dealey Plaza. Jack Ruby died mysteriously of “cancer” in a hospital in Dealey Plaza, overlooking the book depository and the grassy knoll.
Sam Giancana was himself murdered in June of 1975. Five bullets to the head. Just as he was about to testify before a hearing regarding the CIA’s involvement in the Kennedy assassination.
About six weeks later, Jimmy Hoffa disappeared from the Machus Red Fox Restaurant just up the street from where I lived. My buddy Steve was the restaurant’s floor manager at the time. As Clemenza says in The Godfather, “Paulie? Ain’t gonna see him no more.” Jimmy Hoffa was just about to testify at the same hearings that Sam Giancana had been scheduled to testify.
And to keep everything firmly tied to movies, Jimmy Hoffa’s assassination was presented quite believably in Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman (2019). Al Pacino made a great Jimmy Hoffa. Since I grew up here in Detroit and Jimmy Hoffa was all over the local news all the time, right up until the moment he wasn’t, he’s really lucky to have gotten Al Pacino to portray him. Honestly, he was unworthy of Pacino; he didn’t seem anywhere near that smart.
It’s well before the crack of dawn.
The nighttime is a good time to write.
May we all have a good day.