Remembering New York's Hawaii Kai with Vincent Pastore

The acclaimed actor and playwright talks about GoodFellas, The Sopranos, Gravesend, and more

GoodFellas is, absolutely, one of the great classics of the cinematic form. Every cell and frame and every scene adds to the greater whole, and that greater whole is a major work of art.

One of my favorite scenes was shot at the Hawaii Kai, during in its final days in 1989. On top of the Winter Garden at 50th and Broadway, the Hawaii Kai was New York City’s best and most elaborate tiki temple of all time, with the sensational Lounge Of Seven Pleasures, Frederick Fox-designed bamboo-and-rattan interiors, and a bar with a huge backlit diorama of Waikiki’s Diamond Head that would constantly rotate from dusk to dawn.

The scene rolls out in one long pan, just as the longer, celebrated shot does at The Copacabana. The Hawaii Kai scene is set in the Bamboo Lounge in Brooklyn. For much of the film, Martin Scorsese was going after the early 60s Phil Spector sound. In the background of this scene is Mina Mazzini’s masterful 1960 vocal take on Gino Paoli’s “Il Cielo in Una Stanza,” an absolute smash hit in Italy, and the song indeed is one of the lasting achievements of the neo-Beat Genoese school. The scene is freaking perfect in every way, and is one of those lengths of celluloid that can roll out and repeat over and over again.

A few weeks ago I had a sitdown with veteran actor Vincent Pastore, where we talked about his role in that scene. We hit on a lot of other big topics, too, including The Sopranos, Spinning Gold, Gravesend, and his play The Crazy Horse, based on the live-music rock club he ran in the 80s.