Tony Lo Bianco
Charles Eshelman/FilmMagic
Tony Lo Bianco, the Brooklyn actor who oozed criminal charm in the gritty 1970s New York City dramas The French Connection and The Seven-Ups, has died. He was 87.
Lo Bianco died Tuesday night of prostate cancer at his horse farm in Poolesville, Maryland, his wife, Alyse, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Lo Bianco was also memorable as a smooth-talking con man with a lonely nurse (Shirley Stoler) for a girlfriend/accomplice in Leonard Kastle’s documentary-style The Honeymoon Killers (1970), which Francois Truffaut once said was his favorite American film.
In another cult classic, the horror thriller God Told Me To (1976), directed by Larry Cohen, Lo Bianco starred as a New York cop who investigates a series of bizarre murders orchestrated by the leader of a religious group (Richard Lynch).
He received a best actor Tony nomination in 1983 for playing Eddie Carbone in a revival of Arthur Miller’s A View From the Bridge, but he was best known on the stage for portraying Fiorello La Guardia, a fellow Italian-American and the popular mayor of New York from 1934-45, in several productions.
In the best picture winner The French Connection (1971), directed by William Friedkin, Lo Bianco was Sal Boca, a flashy guy who as the owner of a modest luncheonette seemed to have a lot of cash on hand. Of course, he was involved in an illegal narcotics operation.
Two years later, Lo Bianco was back in another New York-set crime thriller, The Seven-Ups (1973), appearing again with French Connection co-star Roy Scheider. His character, Vito Lucia, is a crooked undertaker and underworld informant who backstabs his childhood pal, Scheider’s cop, Buddy.
(Philip D’Antoni produced The French Connection and produced and directed The Seven-Ups, the only movie he ever helmed. Both films feature classic car chases.)
One of three sons, Lo Bianco was born in Brooklyn on Oct. 19, 1936. His grandparents were from Sicily, and his parents — his father was a taxi driver who owned his own cab, his mother a housewife — were native New Yorkers.
Lo Bianco went to a vocational high school, boxed in the Golden Gloves tournament and had a tryout with the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field.
He came in second in a declamation contest that featured students from all over New York City, then went to an acting school, The Dramatic Workshop, in Manhattan; in his first class, he did a scene as boxer Joe Bonaparte from Clifford Odete’s Golden Boy.
Lo Bianco co-founded the Triangle Theater in 1963 and served as its artistic director for six years, during which time Broadway lighting designer Jules Fisher, playwright-actor Jason Miller (The Exorcist) and Scheider came through. He also directed and produced several plays during his time there.
Also in 1963, he made his onscreen debut on an episode of The Doctors and later appeared on Get Smart (as a KAOS agent) and N.Y.P.D. In the 1970s, he had a recurring role as a cop on the acclaimed NBC drama Police Story.
Lo Bianco went on to play heavyweight champion Rocky Marciano in a 1979 ABC telefilm and another cop opposite Lindsay Wagner as a psychiatrist on the short-lived 1984 ABC drama Jessie.
In miniseries, he worked for Franco Zeffirelli on 1977’s Jesus of Nazareth and starred with Gina Lollabrigida in 1988’s La Romana.
Lo Bianco’s big-screen résumé also included Bloodbrothers (1978), F.I.S.T. (1978), City Heat (1984), City of Hope (1991), Oliver Stone’s Nixon (1995), The Juror (1996) and Kill the Irishman (2011), and he directed a 1984 feature, Too Scared to Scream, that starred Mannix great Mike Connors.
Lo Bianco first played La Guardia in 1984 in Albany, New York, in Hizzoner!, which was commissioned by New York PBS station WNET. He and the one-man show — which has the mayor reminiscing during his final day in office — made it to Broadway in 1989 but lasted just 12 performances.
However, Lo Bianco reworked Paul Shyre’s original script over the years for new versions that were titled The Little Flower, and he took the show to Italy, Moscow and other spots around the world.
In addition his wife — they were married for nine years — survivors include his children, Yummy and Nina; his step-children, Tristan and Lanah; six grandchildren; and four step-grandchildren. His daughter Ana died in 2006.
