While CASINO isn’t quite the runaway success that GOODFELLAS was, it nevertheless stands apart as its own triumph and ranks amongst Scorsese’s very best work.ĬASINO depicts the freewheeling golden days of Las Vegas, circa 1973-1983-before the corporations took over the Strip and turned it into a family-friendly Disneyland in the desert. Before Pileggi could finish his non-fiction book on the subject, Scorsese already had him collaborating on a screenplay that would serve as something of a spiritual sequel to GOODFELLAS.
The project was inspired by a newspaper article about a car bombing that nearly claimed the life of Stardust Casino boss Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal- an event which was only the latest salvo in a long-standing war between the organized crime families that ran Las Vegas. So when Scorsese heard that Pileggi was sniffing around a story on the golden heyday of Las Vegas and the mafiosos who ran it, a second collaboration seemed inevitable. Their shared affinity and thorough knowledge of Italian American culture as focused through the prism of organized crime created one of the best films of the 1990’s. Director Martin Scorsese’s collaboration with author Nicholas Pileggi on GOODFELLAS (1990) led to arguably the biggest success of either man’s careers.
