Crime Story is an American crime drama television series, created by Chuck Adamson and Gustave Reininger and executive produced by Michael Mann, that aired on NBC, where it ran for two seasons from September 18, 1986, to May 10, 1988.
Set in the early 1960s, the series depicted two men—Lt. Mike Torello (Dennis Farina) and mobster Ray Luca (Anthony Denison)—with an obsessive drive to destroy each other. As Luca started with street crime in Chicago, was "made" in the Chicago Outfit and then sent to Las Vegas to monitor their casinos, Torello pursued Luca as head of a special Organized Crime Strike Force. Torello, his friend Ted Kehoe, and Luca had grown up in Chicago's "The Patch" (Smith Park) neighborhood, also called "Little Italy" or "Little Sicily" and the haunt of the Forty-Two Gang.
The show premiered with a two-hour pilot—a film which had been exhibited theatrically—and was watched by over 30 million viewers. NBC scheduled the show to Tuesdays at 9 p.m. opposite ABC's Moonlighting on its fall schedule but moved it to Fridays at 10 p.m. in December. It moved to Tuesdays at 10 p.m. in fall 1987 before being cancelled after two seasons.
Crime Story attracted both acclaim and controversy for its serialized format, in which a continuing storyline was told over an entire season, rather than being episodic, as was the case with most shows at the time.
Contents
Plot
Season 1
The first season follows Chicago Police Detective Lieutenant Mike Torello and his pursuit of organized crime from Chicago to Las Vegas, circa 1963–64. At the beginning of the series Torello is the head of the Major Crimes Unit (MCU), a squad of hard-boiled cops that includes Detective Sgt. Danny Krychek of the local Chicago Polonia, Det. Walter Clemmons, Det. Nate Grossman and Det. Joey Indelli.
At the center of Torello's crosshairs is rising young Italian-American mobster Ray Luca. Initially Luca is an independent thief and killer whose crew, which includes Italian-American gangster Pauli Taglia and Jewish-American gangster Frank Holman, specializes in robberies, burglaries, and home invasions. Through his connection to Chicago crime boss Phil Bartoli, a boss or capo within the Italian-American Chicago Outfit, Luca catches the attention of not only the local Italian-American Mafia but also national crime figure Manny Weisbord, the head of a Jewish Mob organization and a character inspired by the legendary gangster Meyer Lansky. Luca impresses Weisbord with his desire to leave the streets and move up in the management ranks of organized crime. Weisbord assigns one of his men, Max Goldman, to be a middleman between himself and Luca.
Luca tells Weisbord and Bartoli of his plan to take over the Las Vegas bookmaking operation of Noah Ganz. He is told to negotiate a deal, but instead instigates the theft of Ganz's gambling book. However, this backfires when Torello gets wind of it and catches Frank Holman in the act, which results in the book falling into the hands of MCU. When a crime war threatens to break out with Ganz's organization, Weisbord and Bartoli order Luca to clean up his mess. In typical fashion Luca solves the problem by massacring Ganz and his thugs.
Torello finally manages to get a solid murder indictment against Luca. Meanwhile, Holman, who escaped custody only to be hunted down again, has made a deal with U.S. federal prosecutor Harry Breitel to provide information about the mob in exchange for immunity. Among his lies is a made-up story that he paid off Chicago cop Mike Torello. The murders of Ted Kehoe, a childhood friend of Torello with ties to the organization, and his associate Marilyn Stewart convince Breitel to take Luca, Taglia and Bartoli to trial. Torello finds himself being investigated by Breitel and the feds for corruption, based primarily on the testimony of Holman.
At a bar Luca casually asks strait-laced public defender David Abrams, whose father once had mob connections, for advice. That advice leads Luca to subpoena Torello to testify for the defense at his trial. Abrams is furious when he discovers the result of his conversation with Luca, who has also tried to convince Abrams to work for him. When Luca learns that Abrams is applying for a job as a Justice Department attorney, he worries that Abrams will now come after him. He orders Abrams killed—but by mistake the car bomb intended for the lawyer kills Abrams's father instead.
Season 2
In the second season, Torello and his cops are shocked when Ray Luca and Pauli Taglia reappear in Las Vegas alive and well... and even more shocked to learn that the U.S. government has made a secret deal with Luca and given him immunity in exchange for his cooperation. Assistant Attorney General Hallahan tells Torello that elements within the government have made a marriage of convenience for their own political agenda. If they continue their pursuit of Luca, they will be operating without official sanction.
Despite Luca's outward appearance of propriety, Torello is convinced the gangster chieftain is anything but. When the Strike Force puts him under surveillance, Luca goes to court to get a restraining order. David Abrams argues that Luca's history of violence justifies the surveillance, but his personal vendetta against Luca for his father's death becomes obvious, and the judge grants the injunction.
Torello and his men aren't the only ones angered by Luca's return to Las Vegas. His abrupt reappearance doesn't sit well with Max Goldman and Steve Kordo. In Luca's absence they now run the mob's Vegas casino interests, and despite Luca's assurances that he has no intention of pushing them out, they feel threatened. Publicly they welcome him back with open arms, but privately they begin to plot against him. Kordo tries to hire a hitman to kill Luca, but is instead warned that the Outfit wants Luca alive because he is too valuable to its operations.
Abrams is so embittered by the failure of the system he believes in that he resigns from the Justice Dept. Though he says he is leaving Las Vegas, Torello discovers he actually intends to kill Luca. Torello and Krychek rush to Luca's house just in time to prevent the killing. Luca thanks Torello, who says he did it for Abrams.
Abrams descends into a haze of alcohol and drugs. Luca finds him strung out on peyote and lies that it was Chicago crime boss Phil Bartoli who ordered the hit that accidentally killed Abrams's father. He tells Abrams he was born to be part of the Outfit and offers him a job as his personal lawyer if he ever decides to clean himself up. Soon after, to the Strike Force's disbelief, Abrams shows up at Luca's door and takes the job.
When Manny Weisbord is stricken by a heart attack and lies near death, Luca flies an internationally known South African surgeon to Las Vegas to secretly perform the first heart transplant—with a heart from a murder victim supplied by Taglia. With Weisbord lying near death, Goldman and Kordo meet to discuss their uncertain future. Concerned Luca will take them both out if the old man dies, Goldman argues for killing Luca preemptively and insists Kordo is the only one who can get close enough to do it.
Cast
Notable guest appearances
Like Miami Vice, Crime Story featured heavy use of up-and-coming actors; a number of them made appearances in both shows. Lead actors Dennis Farina, Bill Smitrovich, and John Santucci all appeared in multiple episodes of Miami Vice (though only Farina played a recurring character).
David Caruso appeared as Johnny O'Donnel, a friend of Ray Luca, in the pilot (episodes 1 and 2). He appeared in flashback scenes in episode 12, and in episode 19 of the second season.
Julia Roberts appeared as a juvenile rape victim in the Season 1 episode "The Survivor". It was her first TV appearance.
Kevin Spacey appeared in second-season premiere as a crusading, Kennedy-esque Senator. This was his first major television appearance.
Deborah Harry appeared in the penultimate episode of season 1, "Top of the World", as one of the girlfriends of Ray Luca. She did not sing.
Paul Anka appeared in the penultimate episode of season 1, "Top of the World", as Anthony 'Tony' Dio. He did not sing in character, although his 1959 recording "Put Your Head On My Shoulder" in heard as incidental music during the episode.
Gary Sinise appeared in the season 1 episode "For Love or Money" as Howie Dressler, a husband forced to steal to pay for his wife's iron lung. He also directed two episodes, credited as "Gary A. Sinise".
Ving Rhames appeared in the season 1 episode "Abrams For The Defense" as Hector Lincoln, a husband and father accused of assaulting his landlord. This was Rhames's second television appearance.
William Russ was occasionally featured during the opening credits of Season 1's first half, even though his character (an MCU detective) was murdered in the pilot.
Production
After the success of the first season of Miami Vice, television producer Michael Mann had complete freedom from NBC to produce another show. Originally, Universal Pictures was going to finance Crime Story but decided against it because of the projected costs (Miami Vice, a Universal show, was already being produced for higher than the average $1 million per episode rate). New World Pictures agreed to finance the show, with a chance to sell it overseas while Universal retained the domestic syndication rights.
According to Mann, the genesis of the project was to follow a group of police officers in a major crimes unit in 1963 and how they change over 20 hours of television, "in 1980, with very different occupations, in a different city and in a different time". He was influenced by the television series Police Story, and based Crime Story largely on the experiences of Chuck Adamson, a former Chicago police detective of 17 years. Mann asked Adamson and Gustave Reininger to write the series pilot and a show bible. Reininger was a former Wall Street international investment banker who had come to Mann's attention based on a screenplay he had written about arson investigators, and a French film that he had written and produced. Reininger researched Crime Story by winning the confidence of Detective William Hanhardt, who put him in touch with undercover officers in Chicago. They sent him on meetings with organized crime figures. Reininger risked wearing a body microphone and recorder. After visiting the crime scene of the gangland slaying of bookmaker Al Brown, Reininger backed off his Mob interviews. Adamson claimed that the stories depicted in the series were composites rather than actual events that happened, "but they'll be accurate".
In a June 1986 press conference, Mann said that the first season of the show would go from Chicago in 1963 to Las Vegas in 1980. He said, "It's a serial in the sense that we have continuing stories, and in that sense the show is one big novel". Mann and Reininger's inspiration for the 1963–1980 arc came from their mutual admiration of the epic 15+ hour film, Berlin Alexanderplatz, by German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Mann said, "The pace of our story is like the speed of light compared to that, but that's the idea—if you put it all together at the end you've got one hell of a 22-hour movie". Mann predicted a five-year network run for the show. However, due to budgetary constraints, the need for four sets of period cars proved to be too expensive. Tartikoff eventually allowed their series to move to Las Vegas for the last quarter of the 22 episodes. Ultimately, the show encompasses only the years 1963–64.
Episodes
Reaction
When the show debuted on September 18, 1986, the two-hour pilot had a 20.1 national Nielsen rating and a 32 percent audience share. The ratings dipped when it was counter-programmed against ABC's Moonlighting. By October, the show was dropping in the ratings. The show was moved to Friday nights after Miami Vice on December 5, 1986, where its ratings improved but it still lost to Falcon Crest. NBC temporarily pulled Crime Story off the schedule after the season finale on March 13, 1987. In order to get more people to watch, Farina and other cast members promoted the show in five U.S. cities.
The New York Times wrote, "With its first-rate cast, Crime Story might have had the offbeat, compelling authenticity of an Elmore Leonard novel. But the show looks suspiciously as if it would be more than willing to settle for the mindless glitz of Miami Vice". In his review for The Washington Post, Tom Shales wrote, "When the smoke clears away, a viewer may feel impressed yet unmoved. But then, if all the smoke cleared away, there'd be no show".
John Haslett Cuff, in his review for The Globe and Mail, wrote, "The characters and locales are as greasy as the rain-soaked streets, and in the show's best moments there is a dangerous glitter that happily transcends the cartoon violence of too much television".
Time magazine's Richard Zoglin praised the show for being "the most realistic TV cop show in years, yet the emotions reach almost baroque heights".
Legacy
Time ranked Crime Story as one of the best television programs of 1986 and of the 1980s.
In their 1988 book, The Critics' Choice — The Best of Crime and Detective TV, authors Max Allan Collins and John Javna chose Crime Story as one of the "Top 10 Best Police TV Series (Police Procedurals) of All Time".
Influence
Crime Story and Wiseguy were the prototypes for later arc-driven television series, such as 24 and The Sopranos that have continuing story lines over multiple episodes. In addition, in another measure of this series' influence, numerous actors and actresses that originated on Crime Story in recurring or guest-starring roles later ended up on Wiseguy, including Ray Sharkey, Steve Ryan, Debbie Harry, William Russ, Anthony Denison, Stanley Tucci, Ted Levine, Patricia Charbonneau, Darlanne Fleugel, and Kevin Spacey.
After the first season, the show was nominated for three Emmys, all in technical categories.
Home media
Unusually for a television show at the time, the entire series (except for the unaired episode) was released on a series of VHS tapes in 1991 from Starmaker. This is the only official release which has the original music.
Anchor Bay Entertainment released the entire series on DVD in Region 1 between 2003 and 2005.
On November 15, 2011, Image Entertainment released Crime Story- The Complete Series: 25th Anniversary Edition on DVD in Region 1. The 9-disc set contains all 44 episodes of the series. However, it has been criticized for having a visual quality no better than when the episodes were originally broadcast, and for removing songs from the soundtrack because they were too expensive to license.
In Region 4, Shock Entertainment released the complete series on DVD in Australia on March 7, 2012.
As of May 1, 2019, the entire series is available on Amazon's Prime Video except in some regions like Australia. The previous music licensing issues have not been resolved, with original songs still replaced on the soundtrack.