STACK #164 June 2018

EXTRAS FEATURE

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continued

George Raft with the love of his life, Betty Grable

The end of Bugsy Siegel

“Where did ya pick up that cheap trick?” George Raft in Some Like It Hot  (1959)

many memorable scenes. One of the best involved Raft hamming it up as a caricature of himself in his break-out movie  Scarface ; flipped by a young punk and snarls, “Where did ya pick up that cheap trick?” Although his film career was now minimal, Raft's His character “Spats” snatches a coin being

name still had cash value and he was offered the post of entertainment director for the Casino de Capri in Havana, Cuba, where his job would be to pull in visiting Americans. However, the work unexpectedly became extremely dangerous for Raft when Fidel Castro and his revolutionaries ousted the Batista government and took over the country. Following a week of

In 1947, much to his chagrin, Raft found himself back in the media headlines when his friend “Bugsy” Siegel was assassinated whilst sitting in the living room of his girlfriend’s Beverly Hills home. With mob money, Siegel had the Flamingo Hotel and casino built in Las Vegas at a total cost of $6 million – triple the budget he had promised the Syndicate. The grand opening on 26 th December 1946 was a total disaster, as apart from Raft and Jimmy Durante, all of Hollywood’s glitterati and other high-rolling customers stayed away. Siegel was now unable to demonstrate a return on the mob’s investment. On the direct instructions of “Lucky” Luciano, a hit was ordered on Siegel, which was carried out on the 20 th June 1947. That same night, associates of Luciano and Meyer Lansky took control of the Flamingo and the following year would turn a profit of $4 million. Following Siegel’s death, Raft was continually hounded by the press for a statement on who he thought had shot his friend. Concerned with his own safety and being fully aware that you never cross the mob, Raft kept his own counsel. His film career now took a definite downturn with the majority of his films being screened as supporting features and his own billing slipping to either third or fourth in the cast list. By the mid-1950s the only roles that he was offered were mere cameos in films such as Around the World in Eighty Days (1956),

Although Raft's film career was now minimal, his name still had cash value

close house arrest, Raft was finally allowed to leave Havana. When he landed at Miami he got down on his knees and kissed the ground. In 1966 he accepted a similar job with The Colony Club in London, England. But during one of his trips back to the States, and because of his suspected mafia connections, he was declared a 'persona non grata' by the British government and barred from re-entering the country. George Raft was not a real- life mafia gangster but during his early days in Hollywood he revelled in the fact that he was the friend of mobsters such as Siegel, Lansky and Capone. That early bravado came back time and time again to haunt him throughout his film career.  Raft’s final film appearance was a small part in the

George Raft poster advertising the Casino de Capri in Havana just before the Cuban revolution

where he had a two-minute scene playing a Barbary Coast saloon bouncer. Then in 1959, Billy Wilder offered him a feature role in his comedy movie, Some Like It Hot , where he played Chicago mob boss,“Spats” Columbo. The film became a bona fide hit that contained

comedy crime mystery The Man with Bogart’s Face  (1980). No doubt George Raft saw the

Join STACK ’s resident filmhistorian Bob J and our community of cinema buffs to have your say eachmonth in ' Bob J’s Classic Movie Club ' Facebook group.

cruel irony in that. He died a few weeks after the film’s release.

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JUNE 2018

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