Author Tom Folsom Doesn’t Care to Get Whacked
Tom Folsom’s new book The Mad Ones keeps the author on the safe side of history. It tells the detailed story of Crazy Joe Gallo, a gangster from Red Hook who took on the establishment – the Costa Nostra – in the 1960s.
Gallo, with a taste for rebellion and beatnik coffee shops in Greenwich Village, armed himself with Mao, Lenin and Marx and became entrenched with militant black nationals while in prison. Fed up with the traditions of the five mafia families, Crazy Joe wanted to "do it like Fidel" and rebel against the Don.
Gallo emerged to captivate New York society, mingle at exclusive parties and have a spread in Life Magazine. Introduced to the Elaine’s set towards the end of his life by actor Jerry Orbach, Gallo was shot dead the night of his forty third birthday, after a spectacular party ended with a late night dinner on Mulberry Street.
We caught up with Folsom to ask a few questions in advance of his appearance at Brooklyn The Borough’s first literary event this Thursday, June 25, 7pm at Manhattans bar in Prospect Heights, with author Mike Edison and musician Andy Shernoff.
Brooklyn The Borough: What are a few of the differences and similarities between the days of Joe Gallo and the present day criminal contingent in Brooklyn?
Tom Folsom: I like to tell my stories with some safe historical distance, where I’m less likely to get whacked, so I can’t really comment on today’s criminal contingent in Brooklyn.
Is there a parallel between Gallo’s anti-establishment idealism and the bohemian bastion that Brooklyn is today?
Tom Folsom: Hopefully the present-day hipsters living in Red Hook won’t hole up with shotguns and grenades and take on the local IKEA, but the Gallos did just that when taking on their respective establishment, the Mafia.
What do you think fuels America’s obsession with mafia culture?
Tom Folsom: After six seasons of The Sopranos and three Godfathers, you’d think America would have its fill of mobsters, but the gangster tale is our remaining indigenous genre. The western is gone with every inch of frontier mapped out on Google satellites and the musical has fallen out of favor, with no one well versed in that art anymore, but the gangster tale is still vibrant with American Gangster and the upcoming Public Enemies. In our celebrity obsessed culture, we’ll always enjoy tales of nobodies wanting to rise to the top of the streets, the naked ambition celebrated in gangster pictures like Scarface. The Mafia tale adds the element of Shakespearean power struggle in a familial setting that is hard to resist in our increasingly isolated culture.
