Frank Costello - Popular Culture

Popular Culture

• Costello has been portrayed in several movies by actors James Andronica in Gangster Wars (1981), Carmine Caridi in Bugsy (1991), Costas Mandylor in Mobsters (1991), and by Kirk Baltz in the television movie Kingfish: A Story of Huey P. Long (1995).
• The character of "Vito Corleone" in the book and 1972 film The Godfather is based on a composite of mid-20th Century New York Mafia figures, perhaps chief among them Frank Costello. The Corleone character featured similar mannerisms (including a raspy voice) and political connections, as well as many events from his real life. (Like Costello, Don Corleone voices disapproval of the drug traffic, which he labels a "dirty business"). Marlon Brando, who played Corleone, apparently used tapes of Costello from the Kefauver hearings as the basis for the character's accent.
• Costello was the godfather to ABC News reporter and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Assistant Director for the Office of Public Affairs John Miller. Miller's father and Costello were close friends.
• Referenced in Allen Ginsberg's poem, "Hadda Be Playing on the Jukebox". The line is written, "It had to be FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover / and Frank Costello syndicate mouthpiece / meeting in Central Park, New York weekends, / reported Time magazine". The poem was later performed live (with music) by the band Rage Against The Machine on the album Live & Rare.
• The film The Departed features an Irish mob boss named "Frank Costello" (played by Jack Nicholson) in present-day Boston. Nicholson's character is not related to the real-life Costello except in name; the character was based on Boston mobster "Whitey" Bulger.