1. What made you decide to direct this film? Had you always wanted to direct?

I didn’t really even make the decision to direct the film it naturally evolved and before I knew it I was directing the film and it feels as though it was always meant to be that way.

I was initially producing and starring in the film. I was going to play the role of Billy, which ended up being played by Jonathan Tucker who did fantastic work and I couldn’t have found anyone more perfect for the role. Once I added the director hat I knew I couldn’t act in it as well because I am such a crazed freak when it comes to my work. I need to focus on one thing and one thing only and for me that was directing.

2. Your background as an actor, how did it help with directing? What other elements did you feel you had that prepared you during the film?

I have always had the urge to direct and I come from a film background. My father ran the AFI film school for around 14 years and now runs the film school at Chapman University. He has been a director all his life and I think it has always been in my blood. Working on set as an actor, I always watched whenever I could to see what methods and techniques the director was using. I would watch on the monitor, always soaking in whatever knowledge I could… So yes I always had the urge to direct.

My background as an actor helped so much during the filming of Flying Lessons. I was able to really connect deeply with each and everyone of my actors. I know what actors need, when they need encouragement, when they need the camera rolling because I have the keen sense to know when the actor is at the breaking point of finding something beautiful and exciting in the scene. I know when an actor isn’t getting what they want or need from another actor, I can see it in the body language and in the face and eyes.

I know actors so well since I have been doing it for 19 years now that I think I was able to create a deep layer of trust between the talent and myself and for this film, nothing was more important! This was my first time behind the lens and I know and understand when actors of caliber, which I am blessed to have had work with me, become weary of a first time director, no matter who is executive producing or who says what.

I gained the trust of all my actors quickly and that was key for me because I needed them to trust my vision and trust I knew and know what is best for this film as I see it.

I was as prepared as humanly possible to direct this film. I did storyboards of the entire film prior to principal. Going into filming I knew in my head how I saw every shot, every scene, every angle, and every line of dialogue in the scene and how I wanted every frame to look. I was and will always be open to new ideas because I do believe filmmaking is a team effort.

I owe so much of the actual preparation to direct Flying Lessons to my father first and foremost. He was with me every step of the way during prep and really guided me on how to make my film the best it can be and then left it in my hands to create my own life force which is Flying Lessons because as my dad would say, “at the end of the day, it is you who calls the shots, you who yells action, you who controls the energy and flow on set, you.” I don’t think I could have done it without him. I am so grateful and humbled by everyone’s belief in the film and me.

3. How would you differentiate yourself from other directors, is there a specific vision and or genre of films that you are going after?

Differentiating myself from other filmmakers is a tricky question and always a tricky thing to do. In Flying Lessons specifically it wasn’t about the creativity as far as camera work and angles were concerned, it was much more about finding the right place for the camera to sit and letting the scene unfold and the actors unfold within their loose structure. This is a character drama piece and to me it was and is most important in that genre that the audience has every possibility to connect with the characters and become involved in the journey.

The next film I am going to do is a combination of a character drama but also has a huge element of being a thriller at the same time and I find that exciting because I can really go there cinematically.

I find that the truth about how directors define themselves is always a bit obscured and if i’m going to go against that grain and be honest, I am different from any other filmmaker in the sense the is my heart and soul that defines the projects I do.

As far as camera work and shots, I take little pieces from everyone I know and everyone I admire as an artist and director. Pieces from Scorsese, Malick, Kubrick, Kazan, Greengrass, Cassavettes, Cohen Brothers, Paul Thomas Anderson and Darren Arrenofsky.

4. Will you direct again and what about your future in acting?

I will always continue to act as its something that lives in me and I love very much.

5. What were some of your highlights and or memorable moments as a director during production? Please elaborate on any of the talent you worked with.

Working with Hal Holbrook was the biggest and most memorable highlight for me during this process. He is a brilliant actor and a wonderful human being.. I found him to be inspiring to me in so many ways above and beyond how brilliant he is as Harry Pleasant. By the 2^nd day on set he knew everyone’s name and would test himself and almost always was right! He never complained once working in heat that was grueling hitting as high as 103degrees! He is a true solider and warrior and he should be recognized for that in every way possible. I wish there were more people in the world like him and more artists in the world like him. I would be honored to work with him again and am blessed to have had this opportunity to work with him.

6. With how far you have come and opening for the Santa Barbara Film Festival, how was the overall experience. How do you feel people will react to this film?

Being asked to open the 25^th anniversary Santa Barbara International Film Festival is such as honor. I feel so grateful and humbled to be recognized in this manner and to be the first film in the festivals history to open that isn’t a studio film! It feels like it was meant to be and we have come full circle seeing as we shot almost the entire film in the Santa Ynez Valley which is part of Santa Barbara County. I am so excited and nervous for Feb 4^th and I hope what people take with them after watching this film is that they found something within this film and is interwoven story lines that they can relate to and connect to.

I hope people love the film and leave the theatre moved and with a sense of hope and freedom, that through all difficult things there is always a light at the end of the tunnel and we have to fight and struggle and stew in it sometimes to get there but we can and will get there if we try hard enough and if we believe in ourselves and in others. Sometimes it takes a friend to show you the way, a family member, a lover or a stranger but seeing the light and knowing its worth finding is what I hope people feel from this movie.

Dalit Gwenna Fashion Stylist & Costume Designer

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Los Angeles, CA – Sometimes you have to go deeper to find the truth, and then come to terms with the unexpected results. Cris D’Annunzio, emotionally and physically outgunned in childhood, investigates his past with LOL revelations, and suspenseful twists in places that are otherwise safe. The mysterious circumstances surrounding his father’s death seem to indicate Mob involvement…and whether digging up Hoffa or Nuzzo, the journey is full of surprises.

CRIS D’ANNUNZIO was raised in a traditional East Coast nuclear family - in the sense that his grandparents, both Italian immigrants, lived in the house and there were always bombs going off! He survived to attend Princeton University, where he played football. Cris got his start in acting when he was ‘discovered’ by the John Houseman Acting Company while moving instruments for the symphony orchestra at Chautauqua Institute in upstate NY - his summer job during college. The experience of riding his bike to the theatre and performing stuck with him. After a brief stint in the NFL with the Buffalo Bills, Cris embarked on an acting and writing career that has taken him from the stage to the screen - both big and small. LA Stage appearances include COBB at the Falcon Theater, award winning COCKRAOCH NATION at LATC, and the World Premiere of Beth Henley’s SISTERS OF THE WINTER MADRIGAL. NY credits include MISS JULIE at Manhattan Theatre Club. Selected FILM credits include Ridley Scott’s AMERICAN GANGSTER and CHASING 3000 with Ray Liotta, which Cris wrote. Cris has had numerous TV roles which include appearances on WITHOUT A TRACE, and LAW AND ORDER.

Mike Myers Director/Producer– helmed the critically acclaimed production of FAITHFUL at the Ruskin last season. Other directing credits include THE COMPLEATE WORKS OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE (Abridged), THAT MAY WELL BE TRUE, MITIGATING FACTORS, PICASSO AT THE LAPIN AGILE, LA CAFÉ PLAYS, SGNARELLE-THE IMAGINARY CUCKOLD and BEYOND THERAPY. He has produced more than 50 projects since 2002 and is a co-creator of the Ruskin’s critically acclaimed CAFÉ PLAYS, a monthly offering of one-acts that are done in 10 ½ hours from conception to staging. Mr. Myers is also a Santa Monica Arts Commissioner.

Brandon Baruch LIGHTING DESIGN
Recent Los Angeles Designs: Orpheus Descending at Theatre/Theater, PROJECT: Wonderland, Doomsday Kiss, and Ken Roht’s 99 Cent Only Calendar Girl Competition at Bootleg Theater; Scarcity, Mercury Fur, and Fatboy with NeedTheater; Son of Semele Ensemble’s Tragedy: A Tragedy; and Celebration Theater’s A Christmas Carol. Other productions include the West Coast Premieres of The Big Random, A Beautiful View, and Say You Love Satan; and the World-Premieres of Fafalo, Muscles in Our Toes, and Wildboy ‘74 (which Brandon also designed at the 2008 NYC Fringe Festival.) Brandon is the Resident Lighting Designer for NeedTheater.

There are certain rules — explicit rules — that all made members of the mob are meant to follow: No beards. No sleeping with another gangster’s wife. No cooperation with the government in accordance with “omertà,” the Mafia code of silence.

But then there are those customs that are so engrained as part of the mob way that they never need to actually be spoken. High among them — perhaps right at the top — is the ban on being gay.

So when Robert Mormando, a confessed Gambino family gunman, appeared on Monday for a hearing on his sentence for his role in the shooting of a Queens bagel store owner in 2003, he seemed to indicate that La Cosa Nostra’s laws may sometimes be honored less while being practiced than they are while being breached. Mr. Mormando, 44, not only confessed to acting as a government informer, but he also took the extra — and, it should be said, perilous — step of outing himself in court.

The unusual admission was made in a 10th-floor courtroom of Federal District Court in Brooklyn, though it was clearly more an act of self-interest than one of self-expression. He had already pleaded guilty to taking part in the shooting of the bagel store owner, Angelo Mugnolo, and was trying to obtain a lower sentence by persuading Judge Jack B. Weinstein that his cooperation was riskier than most, since he had lived for many years as a closeted homosexual in the mob.

“He didn’t want to make an announcement to the world,” said one person with knowledge of the case who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the dangers facing Mr. Mormando. “He wanted the judge to know what risks he took — why he wasn’t just your average cooperator, someone who had simply broken the code.”

Mr. Mormando’s hearing was, in fact, cloaked in secrecy, listed on the daily court calendar under the name “John Doe.” The documents in his case are under seal and even Pacer, the online federal court archive, has been scrubbed clean of anything related to the matter.

“He’s in an absolute state of fright,” said the person with knowledge of the case. “You have to understand that his partner is totally freaking out. His partner has no connection to any of this. You can just imagine how fraught the whole thing is.”

A divorced father of two, Mr. Mormando was born and raised in Ozone Park, a neighborhood in southern Queens long associated with John J. Gotti, the former (now deceased) Gambino family don. “At 16 or 17, he befriended them all,” said the knowledgeable person. “They made him feel important. He knows them all. They accepted him into their midst.”

Complicating matters is that Mr. Mormando had a close personal friendship with Richard G. Gotti, Mr. Gotti’s nephew, who is currently in prison on a federal racketeering charge. While there is no suggestion that the friendship was anything more than that, the mere fact that an avowed gay man was once “inseparable” from a Gotti is “an intolerable stain on their name,” said the person who has knowledge of the case.

Indeed, that type of “stain” has led to acts of violence in the past. In 1992, for instance, John D’Amato, a former boss of the DeCavalcante crime family, was murdered by an underling when, after an argument, his girlfriend told his cronies he was gay. “Nobody’s going to respect us if we have a gay homosexual boss sitting down discussing La Cosa Nostra business,” the gunman, Anthony Capo, testified at a murder trial in 2003.

There are, nonetheless, certain gay men who prospered in proximity to the mob — perhaps most notably the lawyer Roy Cohn, who represented dons like Anthony Salerno and Carmine Galante. The mob was also known for running gay bars and night clubs, including the Stonewall Inn, at a time when they were still considered part of the underworld.

Psychologically, of course, the Mafia is built upon a traditional view of manhood, one it shares with the military, wherein “gayness” is considered not only unconventional, but also weak. “The mob is all about men respecting men,” said Gerald L. Shargel, who was John J. Gotti’s lawyer. “That obviously introduces a high level of machismo.”

The case of Mr. D’Amato, in particular, was such a breach of protocol that “The Sopranos” stole his story, introducing a character named Vito Spatafore who was killed after two of his fellow gangsters saw him at a gay bar. Joseph R. Gannascoli, who played the role on TV, suggested in an interview on Tuesday that the Mafia and homosexuality were not an easy mix.

“Having never been gay or a mobster, I can still tell you that it’s got to be hard,” he said, “almost like a kind of triple life.

“Still, you’d figure even mobsters would be getting with the times. My feeling is it doesn’t really matter if they’re gay. So long as they earn.”

Karen Zraick contributed reporting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/nyregion/21gaymob.html?hp

By Cris D’Annunzio - http://www.cdannunzio.com/blog/

Chazz Palminteri is currently performing his terrific one-man show, “A Bronx Tale”, at the Venetian in Las Vegas.  This, of course, is the show he performed decades ago that got Robert DeNiro’s attention and led to the film by the same name – not to mention launching Chazz’s career.  I saw the more recent performance of this show that Chazz has been touring, both in New York and Los Angeles, and I highly recommend it – particularly if you can see it in Vegas.

Why particularly in Vegas?  Well, because the story Chazz tells is about his relationship with – what the audience can only assume is – a mob boss.  I say, “what the audience can only assume is a mob boss” due to the fact that there is never any mention of the mob – which is interesting in and of itself (more on that later) but particularly here, since the last time Vegas, Baby was actually Vegas, Baby was when the purported “mob” ran the place.

What you see in “A Bronx Tale” is a boy – Cologero or simply, ‘C’ – learning to be a man.  From his father, yes, but also and especially, from our “mob” boss – Sonny.  Sonny teaches C the value of community and how to conduct himself as a gentleman.  And whether they love him or fear him because of what he does, everyone – including C’s father – respects Sonny for the man he is.

The qualities that Sonny exhibits – and passes on to C – are rarely seen in today’s so-called men.  But that’s an entirely different diatribe.  My point is, that when Vegas was supposedly run by guys like Sonny it at least had class.  It was an adult playground where you could dress up, see a show, have a nice meal and do a little gambling.  Now it’s a poor excuse for Disneyland where flip-flop and t-shirt wearing parents drag their ragamuffin kids around at all hours of the night and day.  An interesting contradiction for Chazz’s show.

What happened?  Sadly, Corporate America took over.  And the same can be said for the Mob.

Now before I go any further, let’s get one thing straight:  according to yours truly, there is no such thing as the Mob or the Mafia or La Cosa Nostra or any of the other euphemisms used to describe an alleged group of predominantly Italian-Americans involved in “organized crime”.  Never was.  First of all, organized crime is somewhat oxymoronic, isn’t it?  But that’s beside the point.  Like Chazz Palminteri, I too grew up in a neighborhood that was heavily populated with those of my own ethnic heritage.  The reason there is no mention of the Mob in “A Bronx Tale” is because we never used that kind of terminology.  I should know.  My father – for lack of any other way of describing him that you may understand – knew people, was supposedly connected, whatever.  According to my mother, he was simply a good-for-nothing dago bastard, but that too is an entirely different story.  To the best of my knowledge and observations, there were no secret societies, no hierarchies, no bosses, under bosses, capos, etc…  There was never even talk of “This Thing of Ours”.  All that stuff was invented by Hollywood and the Government to sell tickets and justify some G-man’s salary.  But I digress.

What’s for sure is that if there ever was anything such as the Mob, it certainly doesn’t exist anymore.   For all the supposed indiscretions and illegalities that the Mob is reported to be involved with, what people fail to recognize is that its essential function was to provide security and protection.  If you didn’t have deep pockets or couldn’t speak English very well, the Mob was your insurance company.  And unlike premiums, you got something for your payola.  If there was every an accident or a need, there was always money, flowers or food generously donated by your local ghoomba.

But then, Corporate America took over and it all went downhill – just like Vegas.

Case in point:  A seventeen year old girl needs a liver transplant but her insurance company – Cigna – refuses to pay for it.  She dies.

Now the girl’s mother is obviously upset so she pays a visit to the Cigna headquarters in Philadelphia – where the CEO of the insurance company no doubt lives in a mansion on the mainline and sends his kids to Haverford thanks to all the premium payments this mother and others like her have paid.  Does the mother go there seeking money, retribution?  No, she goes simply asking for an apology.  What happens?  She gets heckled, flipped off and is summarily shown to the door by the capos, underbosses, soldiers and other ghoombas otherwise known as the Cigna employees.

All I can say is, this would have never happened in the neighborhood I grew up in.  Or where Chazz grew up either.  But like he says in the conclusion of his show, maybe this is just another Bronx Tale.

By Cris D’Annunzio - http://www.cdannunzio.com/blog/

If this happened to anyone else, it would just be a punch line.

David Letterman, who built his career skewering philandering politicians and show business “weasels” and “boneheads,” finds himself in the middle of his own celebrity scandal, after he admitted having multiple affairs with employees of his production company, Worldwide Pants.

For the intensely private Mr. Letterman, the revelations, which resulted from a bizarre extortion attempt, are sure to be extremely embarrassing, especially as he tries to extend his lead in the late-night contest. ”I have had sex with women who work for me on this show,” he told his audience on Thursday night, calling himself “creepy.” He added that he hoped “to protect my job.”

More seriously, they raised questions for both his company and CBS about whether his actions constituted sexual harassment or at least abuse of a power relationship over employees.

A central figure in the case — one of the women who did have a sexual relationship with Mr. Letterman, according to representatives of the show — is Mr. Letterman’s longtime personal assistant, Stephanie Birkitt, who also often appeared on the air. The sexual relationships had ended before Mr. Letterman was married in March, a Worldwide Pants executive said.

For CBS, the episode is doubly embarrassing. The network has been put in a precarious position of trying to steer clear of fallout from some highly questionable activities engaged in by its biggest star, who is experiencing his biggest surge in popularity (and ratings) in years.

At the same time, the man accused in the case, Robert Joel Halderman, known as Joe, who until last month shared a residence in Connecticut with Ms. Birkitt, is a longtime and well-respected producer for the CBS News program “48 Hours Mystery.”

Mr. Halderman, 51, pleaded not guilty to one count of attempted larceny, after he reportedly threatened to expose Mr. Letterman. According to prosecutors, Mr. Halderman gave Mr. Letterman, 62, a one-page screenplay treatment depicting the talk-show host as a great success whose “world is about to collapse around him” with revelations of his trysts. Mr. Halderman also handed over photographs, correspondence and a page of the personal diary of Ms. Birkitt.

Even by the frenzied standards of today’s tabloid media, the scandal has moved remarkably quickly. On Thursday, Mr. Halderman deposited Mr. Letterman’s check for $2 million (so he thought — it was a fake), then went to work at CBS News on the far West Side of Manhattan, where he sat in a story meeting before being met by arresting officers outside.

CBS executives, including Leslie Moonves, the chairman of CBS Corporation, knew nothing about the attempted plot and were informed of the matter only several hours before the taping of his Thursday show. Inside CBS’s headquarters, where employees can usually watch the Letterman show live on closed circuit, the extortion segment was not transmitted.

In private, CBS executives have told the Worldwide Pants executives that they continue to be supportive of Mr. Letterman. But they have included a note of caution in their supportive position, saying that would change only if information of a more damning nature were to emerge.

According to one person inside the company, CBS executives did quietly seek and receive assurances that none of the women Mr. Letterman was talking about were under age and that no woman who was involved with him had felt threatened about her job.

Many who commented on the case requested anonymity either because of the continuing legal action or because of the private nature of Mr. Letterman’s admissions.

Mr. Halderman and Ms. Birkitt did not respond to telephone messages left at their residences.

According to the indictment, Mr. Halderman waited outside Mr. Letterman’s Manhattan home before sunrise on Sept. 9, then gave Mr. Letterman’s limousine driver a one-page draft of a proposed screenplay about the talk show host’s love life.

Mr. Letterman appeared resolved from the beginning of the episode to go to the authorities. “He was very worried — frightened, scared — and there was a resolve from the beginning to do the right thing here,” said a person with knowledge of the matter.

The indictment said that after initially demanding a response from Mr. Letterman by 8 a.m. that day, Mr. Halderman met the host’s personal lawyer, Jim Jackoway, at the Jumeirah Essex House hotel on Sept. 15, where a $2 million demand was conveyed. At another meeting at the same hotel a week later, Mr. Halderman cataloged Mr. Letterman’s trysts and repeated his demands — but this time Mr. Jackoway wore a wire and recorded the conversation.

The two men returned to Jumeirah Essex House one more time, on Wednesday, ostensibly to exchange the $2 million check. Arranged with police help, the check was intended to bounce, and Mr. Halderman was arrested the next day.

The Manhattan district attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, said the fake check was a tactic to strengthen the evidence that blackmail had occurred. Yesterday afternoon, Mr. Halderman posted bail of $200,000 and left without talking to reporters. Two people with knowledge of the matter said Ms. Birkitt, 34, is not under scrutiny.

While colleagues at CBS News described Mr. Halderman as hard-working and well respected, his personal life has been plagued by problems. A bitter divorce in 2004 left him with a $6,800 monthly alimony payment, according to court filings.

According to documents filed in Stamford Superior Court in 2007, he made an annual salary of $214,000, but that salary, along with assets and debts, came up in a dispute over the amount of alimony he was paying to his ex-wife, Patty Montet, who lives with their two children.

Mr. Halderman’s lawyer, Gerald L. Shargel, said his client denied wrongdoing.

“He pled not guilty, and he stands by that plea,” Mr. Shargel said after the arraignment in a telephone interview. “My position is that, even upon a superficial glance, there is another side of this story and I’m working on it.”

He said that the prosecutor’s remarks in court about Mr. Halderman’s debts showed that “they’re obviously searching for a motive.”

He added, “If that were a motive, you’d have to supply new jails.”

Both Mr. Letterman and CBS tried to get control of the story Friday, with representatives of Mr. Letterman’s company making a point — which they said he should have raised during his confession of the plot’s details on Thursday’s show — that his affairs with his employees had all taken place before he married his longtime girlfriend, Regina Lasko.

CBS executives declined to comment on the record and released an official statement that the network was cooperating with the investigation. But representatives of Worldwide Pants noted that CBS does not employ Mr. Letterman, and CBS representatives affirmed that point.

That distinction seemed to be made to underscore that Mr. Letterman was not subject to any of the CBS policies regarding harassment on the job. Worldwide Pants does have a policy. A spokesman issued a statement that read: “Dave is not in violation of our policy and no one has ever raised a complaint against him.” The spokesman said the policy “does not prohibit relationships within the company — only that they cannot be tied to an employee’s performance.”

Mr. Letterman himself seemed to acknowledge how messy his conduct had been. On Thursday’s show he told his audience that the extortion letter stated, “I know that you do some terrible, terrible things.”

Mr. Letterman said to laughter from the audience, “Sure enough, contained in the package was stuff to prove that I do terrible things.” He also said his affairs with women in the office were “creepy.”

Debra S. Katz, a civil rights lawyer who specializes in sexual harassment cases, said it would be “reckless” for CBS not to conduct an internal investigation.

“CBS is definitely going to have to speak with him and find out who he had relationships with,” she said. “They’re going to have to reach back and see if these women think that the relationships were welcome.”

Several longtime associates of Mr. Letterman said he has a long history of pursuing relationships with employees, dating to his first days on television on NBC in the early 1980s. At that time he was known to frequently date interns and other young women connected to his show, one associate said.

His first longtime relationship was with Merrill Markoe, who was his head writer on his NBC show, “Late Night With David Letterman,” and before they became a couple, Mr. Letterman and Ms. Lasko worked together on his show. Some veterans of the show said it was well-known inside the production that he had also had a close relationship at one time with another previous assistant.

Beyond any potential legal trouble, there is the open question about how fans will receive Mr. Letterman, who has long used his stance as a sarcastic comic commentator to ridicule the behavior of politicians and celebrities. “Today, The L.A. Times accused Arnold Schwarzenegger of groping six women,” he once said in a monologue. “I’m telling you, this guy is presidential material.”

The audience seemed to respond Thursday night: “The Late Show” ratings increased about 20 percent over his average. Mr. Letterman’s rivals began responding with jokes on Friday night, including references to his famous Top 10 lists. Jay Leno told his audience, “This guy who was trying to blackmail Letterman was a producer from the show ‘48 Hours.’ It could’ve been worse, at least it wasn’t a producer from ‘To Catch a Predator.’ ”

Robert Thompson, a professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University, said that barring any sexual harassment complaints from Mr. Letterman’s unknown number of former sexual partners, “The Late Show” could skate by.

“His core viewers are not the kind that are going to say, ‘He did what? I’m never going to watch again.’ He was not the host of a Disney Channel talk show,” he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/03/business/media/03extort.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

Confessions have become something of a staple for guests on late-night comedy shows. Stars as varied as Hugh Grant, Michael Richards and Kanye West have made appearances to talk about — and publicly apologize for — their mistakes. But the guy twisting in the spotlight on last night’s Late Show with David Letterman was Letterman himself.

The 62-year-old comedian skipped his customary Top Ten list, telling his studio audience he wanted to tell them a “little story.” He then went on to describe a three-week ordeal in which a man had attempted to blackmail him to the tune of $2 million for sleeping with female members of his staff. (See the top 10 disastrous Letterman interviews.)

Sometimes humorous, sometimes serious and occasionally showing flashes of nerves, Letterman explained — to awkward clapping and giggles — that having received a threatening package in the back of his car early one morning, he and his lawyer had called in the Manhattan district attorney’s office.

The DA’s office ascertained that the alleged blackmailer was serious, then arranged to have a fake check cut, handed it over and then arrested its recipient, whom CBS has identified as one of its employees.

As a blackmailing scheme, it was almost comically bad: the alleged extortionist threatened to write a screenplay about Letterman’s affairs. “He’s going to take all of the terrible stuff he knows about my life — and there seems to be quite a lot of terrible stuff he knows about — and he’s going to put it in a movie,” explained Letterman on the show. Still, the host was clearly unnerved. “I want to reiterate how terrifying this is,” he said. “I am a seething mass of Lutheran Midwestern guilt.”

Apparently neither the extortion attempt, nor the fact that Letterman slept with women on his show, were news to Letterman’s wife of seven months, Regina Laskoe, who had told Letterman’s mother Dorothy Mengering about it earlier in the day. “I’m looking forward to seeing the show to see what he has to say,” Mengering told the New York Daily News. “I really just found out today.”

Laskoe and Letterman have a 5-year-old son, Harry, and have been dating since 1986. The comedian now wants to put the “bizarre experience” behind him. “I need to protect my family, I need to protect myself. I hope to protect my job,” he said in one of his serious moments, before making a joke about how nobody in the grand jury believed he had had sex.

While Letterman seems to be in no immediate risk of losing either his family or his job (ratings from last night’s telecast will likely be stratospheric), his troubles may not be over. Having sex with people who were his employees or whom he managed could leave him, or CBS, open to a sexual-harassment lawsuit. It’s certain the comedian has given the network’s lawyers plenty of reasons to be up at night.

Letterman has also probably given truckloads of material to other comedians — or even his own writers. Let’s just say he may come to regret calling his company Worldwide Pants.

“Sopranos” fans who are hoping to see their favorite gangsters come to the big screen can, well, fuhgeddaboudit.

“I don’t think there will be one,” Michael Imperioli confessed at Tuesday’s screening of his directorial debut, “The Hungry Ghosts,” in NYC.

Added his former “Sopranos” co-star Lorraine Bracco: “There is no movie. It’s never going to happen, as far as I know.”

Steven Van Zandt, an actor and musician known for his turns on “The Sopranos” and Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, is launching a music-themed social-networking site that he said will serve as a hub for insider information and advice directly from bands.

The site, Fuzztopia (currently in beta), is expected to launch in three to six months, Mr. Van Zandt said, and he is looking for funding in the low eight figures to get “from the present tense to the future.”

Mr. Van Zandt played the hyper-coiffed mobster Silvio Dante on “The Sopranos” and is a guitarist for the E Street Band. He and his team at Renegade Nation, the umbrella company for his music production and radio ventures, have sought to put all their business efforts online. He said he created Fuzztopia because he felt that there was no music site where experts and newbies could trade stories.

“It’s going to be like an insiders’ sort of Web site fans are welcome to peek in backstage,” he said. “It will be very revealing about what those musicians are thinking, where they get guitar strings at 2 a.m. in Cleveland, what’s their favorite diner in Oslo.”

Artists will be able to stream and sell their music on profiles and connect with their fans, as they can do on other sites such as MySpace and Last.fm. Fuzztopia will also host information on music classes and offer up tips from teachers, possibly a nod to Mr. Van Zandt’s Rock and Roll Forever Foundation, a nonprofit that aims to curb dropout rates by adding music curriculum to schools. Fuzztopia will be free initially but will eventually move to a subscription-based model, though those details are still in the works, he said.

Mr. Van Zandt, also known as “Little Steven,” has been busy building a career as a DJ and radio host to several Sirius satellite shows, including Little Steven’s Underground Garage, a syndicated weekly show celebrating garage rock. He also owns his own label, Wicked Cool Records, which has signed acts like the Charms, the Chesterfield Kings and the Cocktail Slippers.

He has also been critical of the quality of contemporary music and a rock evangelist of sorts, saying that young musicians need to rehearse more and play live shows, rather than learning an instrument in their bedrooms and putting their music on the Internet two weeks later.

“The truth of the matter is that greatness takes time,” Mr. Van Zandt said. “We have to learn to take that time again. Why not give the craft the credit it deserves and see how you can develop your potential, and be a little less promiscuous with your talent and actually spend a minute and learn something? Let’s learn how to write songs again!”

But Fuzztopia won’t be a promotional tool for his interests, he said. “We see the future as more of a cooperation than a competition,” he said. “We already have that philosophy with the radio show. Garage plays everybody; we don’t just play our own records. That’s our position in life, to support the music community, you know? That’s what the rock and roll world is all about.”