Ray Liotta died on Thursday, at 67, while filming ‘Dangerous Waters’ in the Dominican Republic. The Newark, New Jersey, native who stumbled upon an acting career accidentally, became best known for playing Henry Hill in Martin Scorsese’s 1990 mob classic ‘Goodfellas’. 

In one of the most quotable movies of all time, Liotta plays a half Italian half Irish who decides that a life of crime is the way to achieve his goals, in a distortion of the American Dream. 

“As far back as I can remember I always wanted to be a gangster”, the narration begins. Liotta’s character even asserts that he wanted to be a gangster more than wanting to be the President of the United States. 

Been spendin’ most their lives livin’ in the gangsta’s paradise

The term “American Dream”, coined by James Truslow Adams in 1931, implies that every American has equal opportunities, and the highest aspirations and goals can be achieved. While many immigrants moved to the US believing it to be a land of opportunities, the reality was very different, which eventually led to the creation of the American mafia. 

Speaking of his boss, Paulie, and the function of the mob, Hill comments “Hundreds of guys depended on Paulie and he got a piece of everything they made. And it was tribute, just like in the old country, except they were doing it here in America. And all they got from Paulie was protection from other guys looking to rip them off. And that’s what it’s all about. That’s what the FBI could never understand. That what Paulie and the organization does is offer protection for people who can’t go to the cops. That’s it.” 

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In a capitalist American society which often discriminates against migrants, the ever-elusive “American Dream” became the end, and ‘Goodfellas’ shows that the means to that end didn’t matter for some. 

“For us to live any other way was nuts. Uh, to us, those goody-good people who worked shitty jobs for bum paychecks and took the subway to work every day, and worried about their bills, were dead. I mean, they were suckers. They had no balls. If we wanted something, we just took it. If anyone complained twice they got hit so bad, believe me, they never complained again”, Henry Hill narrates in the movie. 

Hill’s wife, Karen, played by Lorraine Bracco, observes elsewhere in the film “It was more like Henry was enterprising, and that he and the guys were making a few bucks hustling, while all the other guys were sitting on their asses, waiting for handouts. Our husbands weren’t brain surgeons, they were blue-collar guys. The only way they could make extra money, real extra money, was to go out and cut a few corners.” 

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Karen’s observation shines a light on how actualizing the American Dream led to a degree of saturation, where upward mobility became harder for some more than others. With so many people on every rung of the socioeconomic ladder, climbing up meant stepping on some heads. Of course, in ‘Goodfellas’, it also includes bashing someone’s skull or shooting someone in the head to get ahead. 

However, to someone like Henry, achieving this dream, even via a life of crime, became a core aspect of their identity – to become somebody from a nobody. Early in the movie, Hill says “To me, it meant being somebody in a neighbourhood that was full of nobodies. They weren’t like anybody else. I mean, they did whatever they wanted. They double-parked in front of a hydrant and nobody ever gave them a ticket. In the summer when they played cards all night, nobody ever called the cops.” 

A most likeable criminal 

Hill never shied away from a life of crime, rather embracing it. Thus, it came down to the portrayal of the character to make it likeable. 

Nicholas Pileggi, who wrote ‘Wiseguy’, Hill’s story which got made into ‘Goodfellas’, told GQ “As bizarre as it sounds, Henry is the moral centre of the movie. He is with a collection of totally amoral, aberrational sociopaths.” 

This is seen time and again through Liotta’s performance. We catch a hot flash of it when Hill beats Karen’s neighbour who behaved inappropriately with her. 

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Liotta, in a 2012 interview noted, “Henry Hill isn’t that edgy of a character. It’s really the other guys who are doing all the actual killings. The one physical thing he does do, when he goes after the guy who went after Karen — you know, most audiences, they actually like him for that”, as per ABC. 

Hill’s moral compass also becomes evident in the crucial moment of the movie where Tommy, played by Joe Pesci, decides to kill a “made man” Billy Batts. Robert De Niro’s Jimmy Conway goes along with the plan, but Hill initially is reluctant – partly because of Tommy’s overreaction, and partly realizing the consequences of killing a made guy in the mob. 

In the mafia, being made is to be officially included in the crime family, and killing a made man requires prior approval of those higher up in the chain of command, often needing a greenlight from more than one crime family. 

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Much like Hill was aware he’d never get made because of being an outsider in Paulie’s family, due to his part Irish heritage, Liotta was acutely aware of being on the outside with Pesci and De Niro on set. 

Speaking to GQ, the actor had said “I always felt like an outsider with those guys, I never felt that close to joke around. But sometimes during a movie, the most important thing is to service the story, and maybe that’s what they were doing: If you’re not supposed to be friends, keep that person on edge.” 

Chance encounters and the making of a mob epic 

Liotta came into the movie after a protracted struggle, at a time when director Martin Scorsese was in turbulent waters over his film ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’ which had been denounced, and seen protests in its wake, with the Oscar-winning filmmaker also receiving death threats. [honestly, I’d protest Judas speaking in a Brooklyn accent thanks to Harvey Keitel’s portrayal too!]

Of course, ‘Goodfellas’ would change all this, and restore Scorsese’s position in American cinema. 

However, the film could have gone a very different way if Scorsese and Liotta didn’t manage to convince those controlling the purse strings. 

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Executive producer Barbara De Fina told GQ “I don’t remember there being a lot of choices about who could play Henry Hill. There weren’t a lot of actors who could pull it off. He had to do terrible things, and yet you had to somehow care about him. But Ray wasn’t a big star.” Meanwhile, producer Irwin Winkler chipped in, “Tom Cruise was discussed”. 

Scorsese himself opened up about the moment he decided to cast Liotta in the role. He told GQ, “I’d seen Ray in Something Wild, Jonathan Demme’s film; I really liked him. And then I met him. I was walking across the lobby of the hotel on the Lido that houses the Venice Film Festival, and I was there with The Last Temptation of Christ. I had a lot of bodyguards around me. Ray approached me in the lobby and the bodyguards moved toward him, and he had an interesting way of reacting, which was he held his ground but made them understand he was no threat. I liked his behaviour at that moment, and I saw, Oh, he understands that kind of situation. That’s something you wouldn’t have to explain to him.” 

Speaking to Vulture in a video interview, Liotta explained how Hill’s character was someone who didn’t ask too many questions of his crime bosses, rather keeping his head down. When Liotta had his hands raised and was telling Scorsese’s guards he meant no harm, the director probably saw a flash of how the actor would come across, playing the real-life gangster, as per the interview. 

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In the interview with GQ, Liotta explained how the studio was willing to go every other way except for choosing him. He said, “I think I was the first person that Marty met, but it took maybe a year. It was a very, very long process, not knowing anything and really wanting to do this. I was new. I’d only done three movies at the time. All I heard was that the studio wanted somebody else—”What about this?” “What about Eddie Murphy?” 

Winkler added that he tried to get Scorsese to put off casting Liotta, feeling they could get someone way better. However, when the producer accidentally met Liotta at a restaurant, the actor convinced him over the course of an evening to cast him as Hill. 

“I called Marty the next morning and I said, ‘I see what you mean.'”, Winkler told GQ. 

Channelling a crisis – Liotta and his mother’s fight with cancer

Filming ‘Goodfellas’ was a tough time for Liotta. Apart from feeling like an outsider on set, he had a family crisis since his mother was battling cancer at the time. 

Illeana Douglas, who plays one of the mafia wives in the film, told GQ “Ray was on the fast track to becoming a movie star, but I think that real-life insecurities and family things that he was experiencing were playing out in real time on-camera. And I’m sure Marty was aware of that, and not being mean but using it to his advantage.”

Liotta added, “You’re dealing with real anger. My mom had cancer, and she was dying. There was a lot of anger about her being sick.”

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Joseph P. Reidy, the first assistant director of the movie, described how Hill pistol-whipping Karen’s neighbour remains his favourite scene. 

Liotta commented, “I was wound up. I might have gotten a phone call about my mom.”

Mark Evan Jacobs, who plays the neighbour, Bruce, added “Ray was boiling with rage. He stayed away from me, across the street, and he kept that going for take after take. We tried to keep the anger controlled, but one take got a little too close and I got hit.”

Michael Ballhaus, the cinematographer on the project said “I think it’s the most violent scene I’ve ever filmed. There’s so much energy in this shot. The violence is shocking, it comes out of nowhere.”

Another troubling scene was when Karen is on top of Hill, pointing the gun. Eventually, Hill distracts her to grab the gun and throw her off him. 

Speaking of the scene, Liotta told GQ, “I grab the gun and push her away. Lorraine said Harvey [Keitel, her then husband] told her, ‘Make sure Ray takes it easy and doesn’t go too far.’I grabbed her or something, and that left a mark.”

Ballhaus added “He threw her to the floor, and she was crying there, desperately, and it was very emotional. And I think that was because he did something that was not planned. It was something she really felt, not only as an actress in the scene but as a person.”

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Liotta’s mother died while he was filming ‘Goodfellas’. 

Deborah Lupard, the second second assistant director, told GQ about the day Liotta heard the news. “I remember we were in the club shooting when somebody got the phone call and had to tell him. I remember how stoic he was about it, and how professional. I think he left the set until he could breathe and get on with it, and then he finished working”, she noted. 

The partnership that never happened 

Despite the wild success and persistence of ‘Goodfellas’ as a movie in American film history and popular culture, Scorsese and Liotta never worked on a project together again. 

The Guardian asked him why the director, who is in the habit of working with a set bunch of actors, hadn’t collaborated with Liotta after the 1990 movie. “I don’t know, you’d have to ask him. But I’d love to”, Liotta had said at the time. 

Although another Scorsese-Liotta movie didn’t materialize, the director told the Associated Press “I’m absolutely shocked and devastated by the sudden, unexpected death of Ray Liotta”, adding, “He was so uniquely gifted, so adventurous, so courageous as an actor.” 

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Scorsese praised Liotta for his work in ‘Goodfellas’ saying “Playing Henry Hill in ‘Goodfellas’ was a tall order, because the character had so many different facets, so many complicated layers, and Ray was in almost every scene of a long, tough shoot”, and added, “He absolutely amazed me, and I’ll always be proud of the work we did together on that picture.”

The director concluded, “My heart goes out to his loved ones, and it aches for his loss, way too early.”

Ray Liotta finished filming the movie ‘Cocaine Bear’ and ‘Black Bird’, Apple’s true-crime series, before his death – making these two projects the actor’s final works.