So who do you think was a better charecter Clemenza from part one or Five angels from part 2. My vote goes to Clemenza.

Capo single choice
	Fat Clemena
	Frankie Pantangilie
Votes accepted starting: 01/13/08 11:58 PM
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Clemenza also has an advantage in the sense that since he was in the novel we gain additional insight into his character. Heck, I liked both characters alot, but I'll pick Clemenza. Loyal to a fault he is one of the most trusted men in the Corleone Family always up to do the most important jobs.

Tough choice but i think both are equal, so i havent voted.

Strange question in fact. What do you mean by "better character". After all they are murderers despite of what their boss thinks.

Nevertheless, I think that the Clemenza character is more complete, more interesting, because he embodies both - heartful warmth and animalic mercilessness.
Also, Castellano was acting far better. And it's a shame that in the end he rejected his role in GF2. Has anybody here read Ardell Sheridan-Castellano's "Divine intervention and a dash of magic"? Castellano's wife describes the negotiations for Castellano's role with FCC. And I think she became kind of paranoid. FCC had demanded of Castellano to gain weight. So in GF1 his weight was 260 pounds! Obviously this caused his diabetes. So she got furious. Also, she was admitted the post of advisor of the director, but she wouldn't accept that FCC had the last word about the script. Poor Castellano, poor Ardell.

Frankie Pantangilie got my vote.

Wow its like asking who is your favorite child. But in the end I voted for Frank.

Clemenza was the more appealing character because of his loyalty and earthy, jolly nature. But Frankie Pentangeli was a more complex, intriguing character--"everyman as caporegime," a guy pinioned between the old Mafia and the new corporate gangland. Michael V. Gazzo makes GFII IMO.

I can not vote one or the other, I love Frankie! I agree with Turnbull, Michael V Gazzo makes GFII.
Two different times!

I went with Clemenza. I also think he can make a better sauce.

Castellano wasn't pleased with the sauce recipe. You'd use sugar only to camouflage a bad sauce.
So according to his wife he mumbled his phrase:
"a little bit urine (!) An' a little bit o' sugar..."
But I have to admit I don't hear him saying "urine".

What he actually said was "scheisse."

My sauce is pretty good and I put sugar in it. My mother and sisters do also.

According to Ardell Sheridan, Richard Castellano said to her, referring to the sugar ingredient: "You won't believe the recipe that Francis (Coppolla) came up for the Cooking Scene. He expects me to "poison" people because that's the way his mother cooked."

Pentangeli was a more interesting character.
I liked Clemenza a lot but Michael V Gazzo gave us some better acting.

Clemenza looks a lot like my grandfather so he gets my personal vote. However, I gotta agree with the forum elders that Michael Gazzo is a big part of GF2's success. His scene with the meeting in Tahoe is priceless. It's like the spirit of Michael's father channeling through Frankie Five Angels to warn Michael about Roth and Ola. Pentangeli hands down. "Cicc. a porta!"

By the way, what is so "Taboo" about putting sugar in gravy? I put it in my gravy and my wife and kids say it is better than Olive Garden's sauce. (Insert a proud dad smiley face here!) All of my mother's family has done it for decades? Sorry, maybe this should be in another subject/post?

Mark, as I posted above I, my mother, and sisters put sugar in our sauces.

Oli, I'm sure they all taste great and are very popular with your family, but why do some Italians think it is a "sin" to add sugar to gravy? I must admit it has puzzled me for a long time...

I'm not sure why. If you boil the tomatos, much of the tomatos sweetness will boil away also. Then you'll probably want to add sugar. But I think that many Italians cook their sauce with pork and other ingredients that add sweetness and other flavors. So, those who do that may not need to add sugar. Therein lies the sin.

If you add pork or chicken to a sauce, you will definitely get a sweeter sauce. However, I find nothing wrong with adding sugar to sauce. While I may not do it every time I make sauce, I do it often enough.

I never remove the seeds from the tomatoes when I make my own sauce. The seeds tend to leave a bitter taste and a little sugar helps a lot. Also, a nice piece of braziole is always good in the sauce.

Mark, FWIW - this has been discussed in the Food forum.

As I wrote above, the thing about the sugar as well as many other details can be found in the book of Ardell Sheridan-Castellano (Richard Castellano's wife) who plays Clemenza's wife in GF ("Don't forget the cannoli").
" Divine Intervention and a Dash of Magic unraveling The Mystery of "The Method" (Behind the scenes of Godfather ) http://www.amazon.com/Divine-Interventio...9950&sr=1-1 ."
I'm sure she became very bitter after her husband's death which she blamed to a certain degree on FFC. Anyway, I can recommend the book, because it provides some interesting details about the production of GF which you can't find anywhere else.

Tomato paste is often added to a sauce to thicken it. Tomato paste is inherently bitter. I always add sugar to my tomato sauce if I'm using paste with it.

The seeds do make it bitter. I always put my tomatoes through a foley strainer to get the seeds out.

All the sauce response has been great, thanks! However, with all respect to mercop I feel its my responsibility to change the tide back to Clemenza vs Frankie...I love the part when Frankie Five Angels rants about the food at the communion party. We went to my parents 50th wedding anniversary last year and it was the same rant from me...where's the peppers and sausage?!? The only pasta they had there was the macaroni salad a girl scooped from a plastic tub to replenish the sald bar! My father is a WASPY farm boy from Kentucky and my mother is a 100% Italian girl from Chicago. When I gave the final congratulations toast I said: "Salute' Y'all!" Frankie Pentangeli, I felt your pain! Bottom line, my vote still goes to Frankie!

BUT: since Pentangeli replaced Clemenza in GF2 because Castellano withdrew, it makes sense to imagine Clemenza in the same situations. In GF it was Clemenza who danced the Tarantella enthusiastically and drank wine like an elephant drinks water. Neither wine nor Tarantellas he could enjoy at Anthony's communion party.
And a lot of the tragedy-impact got lost. Because with GF and GF 2 we would have seen all stages of Clemenza's development from a young criminal until his suicide. The court room scene included a noteable parallel to Castellanos real life who had family relations to the Mafia: When the wedding scene in GF was shot, a man appeared at the set. He talked shortly to Castellano, and it turned out later that this happened to be his uncle - Paul Castellano who told him that the family approved of his appearance in the movie.
Clemenza would have been the one to be strangled by the Rosatos, just as he did to so many others, most notably Carlo.
A misbehaving Pentangeli at the party is just a funny guy. A misbehaving Clemenza would have been a tragic character, especially because he had so much self control in GF.
As far as I can tell from Ardell Castellano's book she talked him into withdrawing. Coppolla had written two very friendly, personal letters which she interpretes crudely. To me it seems to be obvious that she wanted the job as an editor of the script who has the final say about the lines, which of course FFC could not accept.

if castellanio had appeared in g2, would clemenza's character have been written different than pentangeli's due to clemenza being so popular and pentangeli's was a hurried stand in character because ffc wouldn't meet castellano's "demands" to be in g2?

I imagine that it would have been written quite differently. Keep in mind that we were familar with Clemenza, but unfamiliar with Pentangeli. FFC would have had to take that into account. Even with the same plot line, Clemenza would have been more traditional in his relationship with Michael. Obviously, with Clemenza still living, Michael's conversation in the old house would have been modified. Clemenza would not have gone to the meeting with Rosatos alone. I imagine they would have come to him. Clemenza's presence at Tahoe would have been more formal than Pentangeli's and he would have been taken into greater confidence by Michael than Pentangeli.

If Castellano had appeared in II as Clemenza, and betrayed Michael, Fredo's betrayal would not have been necessary. That alone would have dramatically changed the thrust of II, and of what we thought of Michael.

but, clemenza would have never betrayed mike, rocco maybe, clemenza never. imagine how much different the plot would have been with this minor character change ( clemenza for pentangeli ). clemenza possibley a capo for mike - possibley a don in new york. fredo possibley a stronger character in the family maybe in charge of mike's business in cuba - had roth been whacked successfully. neri wouldn't have taken fredo fishing. cicci possibley upset about being passed over for a capo position, does snitch entirely on the family and gets whacked by neri - something a little more imaginative than fishing.