Summary
➡ The text is about a man named Sammy and his son Gerard who moved to Phoenix, Arizona. Gerard, under pressure and needing money, gets involved in the drug business with a man named Mike Papa, who is an ecstasy dealer. Despite Sammy’s disapproval and attempts to dissuade Gerard, Gerard continues with the business. The story also introduces Sean, a trader from the United Kingdom who gets involved in the ecstasy business after being drawn into the club scene.
➡ In the late 80s and early 90s, Sean and Gerard became involved in the ecstasy business, with Sean becoming a major player. A rivalry developed between them, leading to thefts and threats. As the drug scene grew, federal agents began investigating, eventually linking Sammy Gravano to the business. This led to arrests and the exposure of the entire operation.
➡ Sammy, a man involved in crime, gets arrested along with his family. He chooses to serve a 20-year sentence to protect his family from jail time. Meanwhile, Sean, Sammy’s associate, gets caught in a separate crime due to his partner, Schooley, and serves nine years. Both Sammy and Sean express regret for their actions and the impact on their families.
➡ The speaker shares a touching conversation with his father, reflecting on past regrets and the importance of family. He also recommends a family saga on HBO Max and appreciates the positive feedback on his documentary-style video about Carlo Gambino. He promotes his merchandise related to mob history and his membership platform, which offers resources on leadership and personal growth. Lastly, he invites everyone to join his Bible studies, emphasizing that they can be beneficial regardless of one’s faith.
Transcript
Hey, everyone. Welcome to another sit down with Michael Francis. Hope everybody is doing well. All is very good, very blessed on this end. And my friends, you know, I give all the praise, honor, glory and Thanksgiving to our God for that. Today we’re going to be reviewing the Sons of Ecstasy. It’s the new HBO Max streaming production featuring two of my friends, both Sean Atwood and Sammy Gravano. It was a very interesting documentary. I thought it was very well done. And before I get into it, you all know that both of these gentlemen are friends of mine.
I know Sean Atwood pretty well. I know Sammy very well, and I like them both. Sean and I did some business together in the last year in the United Kingdom. He actually opened up a number of my shows. I was on tour there. I sat down with him for an interview. He sat down with me for an interview. It’s up on one of my videos from way back. I met his wife, I met his child. Wonderful people, in my opinion. And they’re good friends of mine. And we stay in touch. Sammy, you know the relationship. Sammy and I have had a friendship now for a couple of years.
I know his family well. I happen to like them very much. I love Sharon, I love Gerard. They’re good people. I don’t have bias, because I’m going to be honest with you. If I thought this wasn’t a good show and you shouldn’t watch it, I would tell you because Sammy would want me to say it. You know, if I said it was great and it wasn’t, he’d say, come on, what are you lying for? Tell him the truth, whatever. He’s honest in that way. And I’m sure Sean would feel the same. But I think they’re both happy with how it came out.
I didn’t tell them I was doing this review. This is what I do. So I’m doing it for you and really not for them. I’m not in business with either of them anymore. I’m not getting paid for the review. I’m just doing it because I know you guys want to hear it. That’s it. My followers like these reviews. And you showed me that with, with a couple of things that we’ve done in the past, my friends. You want to hear something crazy? Yesterday, alone on my phone, I got 23 spam calls. 23. And that’s. That’s on a good day.
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Look, HBO did it. HBO Max, they do everything well. You got to like, you got to have the platform, the HBO Max app, in order to watch it. I believe it’s streamer, but I, I really encourage you to do it. You’re going to enjoy it. For those of you that are into the mob stuff, you’re into crime, you’re going to enjoy it again. Very well done. And you get kind of an inside look at both of these people and their families. Well, not so much Sean’s family, but for sure Sammy’s family. And let me tell you this, I interviewed Karen Gravano.
I thought she was one of my best interviews. She was straightforward, she was very honest, she didn’t hold anything back. You know, I really related to her because she talked about her inner feelings for her dad. You know, early on when she found out what his business was all about, you know, she said a lot of things that were just true and honest and I really enjoyed it. My wife enjoyed, you know, listening to it also. They were just very honest. Gerard, I happen to like him very much. As a matter of fact, I teased Sammy.
I say, Sammy, if we ever get back on the street, I’m taking Gerard with me. So maybe we’re going to fight about it, we’re going to argue about it, but he’ll come with me too. You know, he’s a good young man. He’s a stand up guy and I liked him very much. I met Sammy’s former wife. You know, they’re still friends, the family is still close. And I think you’re going to see that in this, in this show. I took some notes because I don’t want to miss anything. But you’re going to hear it from both points of view.
You have Sean Atwood, you have Sammy, you have Gerard Gravano, you have Karen Gravano. They’ll all be talking about their experience. And this really deals with the whole ecstasy situation that they had back in the late 80s, early 90s in Phoenix, Arizona. And honestly, Sean told me more about it than Sammy did. Sammy didn’t really talk too much about it. Sammy told me, michael, look, I wasn’t really involved in this thing, you know, that we weren’t involved in drugs. I don’t like that business. It’s a dangerous business. I tried to discourage my son from being involved in it and he wasn’t really that involved in it.
That’s what he told me. And you’re going to see what he says and, and what the family says in this show. And Sean, on the other hand, was deeply involved in it. And you know, it’s funny because I had a club, this was back in 1990, I had just gotten out of prison, you know, for my first bit, and I think was 90, late 90, I had a club called Billboard Live in Los Angeles, West Hollywood actually. And it was a hot club. And during the course of that we were finding that there was some ecstasy business going on in the club, and I wanted to get rid of it right away.
I was on parole. I didn’t want any of that stuff, any of that stuff going on in my club, especially with me being in there. So I did some inquiry, and Sammy’s name came up, and that was it. You know, I didn’t hear anything more about it. I’m trying to remember if Sean’s name came up. I think I might have mentioned that he did, but, you know, it’s a long time ago. I don’t remember. But Sammy’s name did come up. I didn’t pursue it. Didn’t know anything about it. Didn’t know if it was real or true or not, whatever.
But his name did come up as one of the suppliers. So, you know, who knows? And I didn’t ask Sammy about it back then. But anyway, here’s how it starts off. It starts off with Sammy, and they go both back and forth. You know, Sammy and Sean, they’re both telling their stories, and Sammy talks about what happened with him and John Gotti and how he decided to join the government. At that point, we all know that we don’t have to be redundant there. And after he took his plea, he went into the witness protection program. His family did not.
They stayed back in Brooklyn because, like I’ve said many times, we never worried about our families, okay? They never retaliated against our families. I never worry about my three kids that were still in New York. You know, later on, when all this stuff came out about me, I wasn’t worried about it. First of all, I knew the extent of what was going on with me. I knew people weren’t that really upset with me. Some of them were. Some of them weren’t the ones that knew the truth. But anyway, we didn’t worry about our family. So Sammy didn’t worry about it.
He didn’t make his family enter the witness protection program. They were there. Sammy makes his deal, goes off to prison. Well, at some point in time, the FBI, I believe, and this is in the show, comes to Sami and says, through our informants, we heard that there’s a hit out on Jerrod. Now, Jerrad was kind of a street kid, and his story is mostly the story that’s being told here. Him and Sean, not so much Sammy. It’s really Jarrod’s story being told. But anyway, is it true or not? I never asked Sammy about it. I don’t know if Sammy believed it to be true or not.
I’m not sure. I don’t know if he ever verified it. Is it out of the question? No. Remember, Sammy was a huge figure at that point in time. He had a lot of publicity. It was Gotti’s crew. Who knows if they were going to retaliate at that point? I don’t know. I didn’t ask Sammy about it and haven’t asked him up till this point either. But anyway, at that point in time, when the family learns about it, they decide to leave town. Why take a chance and move out to Phoenix, Arizona? So they were out there and Gerard starts telling his story and he says, you know, you know, I had a lot of pressure on me as a young man because of who my father was.
You know, he loved his father. He idolized his father the same way Karen loved her father at the time. I relate to that. You know, I was a kid, my father was, you know, a pretty well known guy at that point in time. I thought he was a good dad. I idolized my dad. I didn’t want to get into the life. I think Gerard says at one point he was thinking about getting involved in the life. He didn’t know if this was for him, but he was thinking about it. He had pressure on him being Sammy’s son.
I get it. I understand it. I didn’t want to be in the life. But people, once I got in, I wanted to please my father. I wanted to be the best possible mob guy I could be. That’s just how I was made up. And that’s what I tried to do. And he motivated me in that direction. I wanted my father to be proud. And I think throughout this, you’re going to see that Jerrod really wanted his father to be proud of him. And, you know, I got to say this, and you’re going to see this as the show goes on.
Sammy was a good father. Now I know people are going to come back and say, come on, how could you say that? How could you say your father was a good father? Look, they were good fathers. If we loved our fathers, there was a reason we loved our fathers. Gerard says he loved his father. Karen says she loved her dad. He was a good dad. You know, it’s not a Jekyll and Hyde. You have two different lives. You’re out on the street, you’re taking an oath for. Sometimes you think you’re doing the right thing because you’re part of a brotherhood, whatever.
I’m not making excuses. I’m not saying it’s a great life. I’m not saying anything like that. But it doesn’t mean you’re going to be a bad father in the house. And Sammy, by all accounts, was a good dad. And he loved his family life. That was it. And you’re going to see it throughout this video, not only coming from him, but coming from his kids. So they move out to Arizona, and they’re like fish out of water there when they go out. I get that. When I moved out of California, I was like a fish out of water.
So different than being back home in Brooklyn, New York. Different atmosphere, different people, different everything. And you got to get yourself going and acclimate yourself to the surroundings. So Gerard is out there. He’s feeling some pressure. He’s not making some money, whatever. And what happens? He meets up with a guy by the name of Mike Pappa. And at the time, too, you know, he was starting to get into the club life a little bit. Gerard, he didn’t. Wasn’t really into it too much. But that’s when the raves were going on back then. Late 80s, early 90s.
So he started to, you know, visit some of the clubs a little bit. And he meets this guy, Mike Papa. And Mike Papa is the ecstasy dealer. So they start to get to know each other a little bit, you know, before you know it, they’re in business together. Because Mike Papa needed distribution. He needed somebody to sell to because he had the connection to get the ecstasy. But he needed sales. Gerard needed money. They weren’t into the drug business before, but it seemed like something he could do. So what does he do? He starts to get involved with this guy and.
And that’s when things start to happen. So now by that time, Sammy is out in Arizona also. And he starts to see that Jerrod was getting involved with this guy. Poppet. Because Gerard had to go back to New York to do a couple of things involving the business. Sammy didn’t like that. He didn’t want him going back. He knew that that story was out there. So he confronts Jarod and he actually tries to talk Gerard out of being in the drug business. And you know what? I believe this. There’s a lot of people say, oh, Sammy was the drug dealer.
He was the main guy. I don’t believe he was. He wasn’t involved in drugs back East. And I didn’t think he liked the business out here. As a matter of fact, I know he didn’t. So he’s trying to talk to Jerrod out of it. And Jarrod is getting kind of obstinate because he’s saying, hey, I’m not a kid anymore. I’m a man. This is what I want to do. If you don’t want to support me, that’s up to you. So they have a little bit of a confrontation, father and son style, involved with this. Sammy kind of backed off.
He said, hey, if this is what you want, I don’t like it. But you know what you do? What you do. When Karen finds out, she hears through the grapevine, through the conversations, when she finds out that Gerard is going back to New York, she gets kind of nervous about it because she knew that the word was out on Jerrod. At least they thought they knew. This is what they heard. So she kind of gets involved a little bit to kind of protect her brother and try to make some contacts to protect her brother. And so she gets a little bit involved in the business, not in the main way, but just really trying to shield Jerrod, the way I see it in this documentary.
So that’s how this thing started. Sammy is really not into it. He’s against it. And they start to do this business, Gerard and this Mike Poppa. Now we get to Sean Atwood’s story. Sean a little bit different. He was from the United Kingdom, an English guy. They actually called him English Sean. As this thing got going, Sean starts to talk about how Wall street, you know, the movie Wall street was very motivating to him. He wanted to be a stockbroker. He wanted to make a million dollars. This was what really encouraged him. It’s amazing sometimes how movies can put something in your head, how they can encourage you, motivate you, influence you to do something.
So now, as a result of that, he comes out to Arizona. He gets his degree. He comes out to Arizona, he starts to get involved in as a trader, you know, and he’s doing pretty good, but he’s working very hard. Doing good. Working hard. Well, he happens to stumble upon somebody again by going to these clubs. Sean’s thing is a little bit different because Sean really got into the club scene. He got into the rage. He loved it. It was a high for him. When he started going, he started seeing that these were ecstasy dens, and they were back at that time at that date.
So he starts to use the ecstasy and he starts to ask around. Before you know it, he finds out that it’s being sold. It’s a lucrative business. There’s a lot of money in it. So he starts to make some inquiries and he gets involved at some point. Yeah, there was a place, I think, called the Ice House, which was kind of the main place where the ecstasy was, was being sold. It was big back in the late 80s, early 90s, through that whole rage scene. Ecstasy was like, that was the drug at the time. So Sean starts to get involved in the business and he starts to get involved in a big way.
But Sean’s story, he starts to tell you. He really got caught up in this thing. You know, he thought he was Superman. He thought he was, you know, all powerful. You know, that drugs started to go to his head, the money started to go to his head. And actually he’s kind of competing with Jarrod at that time. But they didn’t really understand it, they didn’t know it, they didn’t make contact with each other at that time. And then they find out, or Gerard finds out that there’s another player in town and it’s Sean. And Sean is actually doing more business than Jarrod was at that time.
So now Jarod, in a pretty bold move, wants to find out who Sean is. And he goes to one of these clubs and he starts to ask around a little bit about the drug. And he approaches one of Sean’s guys and tells him, look, I want all you can get and I’ll pay you whatever you want to pay you in the club. So the guy goes out, he comes back with a bunch of ecstasy pills. Gerard takes it off of him and now says, f you, I’m not paying you. Tell your boss I got it and if he wants his money, come and see me.
Something to that effect. So Sean’s guy runs back to him. Sean then finds out that this is Gerard and later finds out that it’s Sammy Guavano. He didn’t find out right away, he found out later on. So now this competition between the two of them, and as it continues to go, they start to get a little bit heated with one another. I think Sean at that point is still really doing the major business, more than Gerard was doing. I got to have a glass of wine, by the way, this is my non alcoholic wine. It’s right here.
And you know what? It tastes really good, people. I really enjoy it. So don’t think that I’m, you know, drinking through all my podcasts. This is nonalcoholic. We have them both. But at night I enjoy a sip of this. So now they start to find out about each other. It’s a competition and Gerard wants to bring this to, to a head. He really wants to knock Sean out of business. So after Gerard pulls this, you know, this theft, I Would say of the drugs on Sean’s guy. Sean gets very upset, and they go rob a house.
They go rob one of the houses of one of Gerard’s guys. They knock on the door, they steal everything out of there. Gerard finds out about it. He’s very upset. And what he wants to do at this point is he says it. He said, I wanted to go find Sean and I wanted to kill him. I was going to bring him out in the desert and kill him. Now, was Gerard really a killer? We’ll see. So they go out. He gets his crew together. They go out looking for Sean. They go to a club where they heard he was.
They get into the club. Sean finds out a little bit about it. He’s gone. He’s gone. So they miss him. But now Sean finds out or hears that Sammy Gravano is involved and that Sammy has put a hit out on him. So Sean’s worried. Now he knows Sammy’s reputation. He doesn’t want to mess with this. Sean’s not really a gangster. He’s not a tough guy. Even though he thought he was. He really wasn’t at that point. He wasn’t looking to do that. He had some guys around him, the wild men and a couple of people that were, you know, street guys, But Sean himself wasn’t.
Now he hears Sammy Gravano is after him. He’s scared. Sammy’s got a reputation, okay? So now things really start to get testy at the same time because ecstasy was getting big. The feds start to get onto this, and they start to realize that something is going on. So they start to put their undercover agents all about. One of them was a woman, and they start having her go to the. To the clubs where these raves are going on. And she starts talking about ecstasy. They’re bringing it to her, and one way or the other, it leads to Sammy Gravano.
They find out that Sammy is involved. And Sammy was at his construction company. He had two legitimate businesses at that time. He had a pool company and he had a construction company. And somehow Sammy’s name is mentioned, and obviously that lights up law enforcement. Sammy Gravano, wow. You know, they do some research. What’s Sammy doing out here? Because the locals didn’t know he was out there. You know, the feds had. I don’t know if the feds encouraged him to go out to Arizona. I don’t know what the story was, but the locals didn’t know that. But now they hear his name, they’re really interested because they think he he must be the kingpin, right? So they start a real thorough investigation on this.
So Sean gets scared. He goes into hiding. He hears that Sammy’s got a hit on him, he goes into hiding. And Gerard continues in the business. But something happens. He meets up with his dad. And his dad says, look, I want you out of this. There’s gotta be some heat going on. I want you out of this. In the meantime, the Feds do have some bugs. They are getting some information. They’re gathering some stuff on both Sean and Gerard’s crew and Sammy. So Sammy again confronts Gerard, said, I want you out of this. And Gerard says, okay, I promise your dad I’ll get out, but I got to make some more money.
I got to do a couple of more big buys, and then I’m out. Sammy says to him, look, I’ll finance, I think three or four buys for you. I’ll put up the money. He says, but I’m going to charge you vig. I want to get my cut out of it. You know, Sammy’s charging his son vig. But you know what? Hey, he’s a grown man. He’s in business. I’m going to lend you the money. You give me something, you know, give me some interest on it. So Sammy was getting interested, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.
I’ll tell you the truth. You know, my son. You know what? If you want to teach these kids something, they borrow money, they should pay it back and they should pay a little interest. That’s how you teach them, right? But anyway, Sammy agreed to finance three or four deals, and then Gerard was going to be out of the business. That’s it at the time. What happens is Mike Poppa gets a little bit sloppy, and the feds are all over him. And what happens? He gets arrested. But before that, before he gets arrested, somehow they had a bug and they got Sammy on the bug.
Something about him counting some money. They had him. I think they had his ex wife. I think they had Karen on it. And it was about counting money that was allegedly from one of the drug deals. And that’s what the Feds needed, in their opinion, to tie Sammy and his family into this deal. Gerard had some issues. I think they might have had him on some more wiretaps or something, who knows? But he was more heavily involved. And of course, Mike Popper was involving him. He became a snitch right away. And Gerard tells you in the end that he believes that Mike Papa, you know, believed this all along.
That Sammy and Gerard were his ticket out if he ever got caught. That from the beginning, he knew that he had a meal ticket to get out. You know something? I had the same deal with Larry Iorizo, my partner in the gas business. I believe Larry knew from day one, because he was trying to keep records on me. That we would make money together. And that if push ever came to shove and we got busted. He knew that I was his meal ticket out. And in the end, it was when he turned informant and he flipped on me.
He got very little time. He got a lot of money back that the feds gave him. They relocated him, and he was out. And because I was the target. Well, the same here. You know, Mike Popper figured, you know what? If I ever go down on this. I got Sammy involved, I got Gerard involved. That’s who they want. They don’t want me, so I can buy myself out of this thing. That’s what Gerard believes, and he says so in the documentary. So this thing blows up. Sammy, he describes it. He’s home one night, you know, early in the morning.
He is some ruffling outside. He’s got a.357 Magnum by his bed. He goes to the curtain. He opens it up. He sees a SWAT team out there. They storm into the house. They throw him down. You know, the whole bit. Sammy describes it cool. He had his dog with him. It’s really cool the way he describes it. And they take him away. Then they lock up Jarod. Then they lock up Karen. Then they lock up his. His former wife. And Sammy’s in the precinct. And he said, hey, what’s going on here? You know, like he made like he didn’t know.
And he’s kind of looking at the desk to see if he can see any information. When the cops got his documents spread out. Anyway, they’re taking Sammy away. And I like the way he. Well, I don’t like the way he describes it, but I understand the way he describes it. As he was going through the lockup. He’s passing by all the cells. He calls them cages. And he sees his son. He sees his daughter. He sees his wife. And he was devastated. It broke him up to see his family in there. And, of course, I don’t care who you are on the street.
You don’t want to see your family in a situation like that. And like I said, he was a good family guy. So he was devastated over this. He said to the point that if he would have had Mike Poppa in front of him. He would have Blew his brains out. I get it. I would want to do the same to anybody that hurt my family. I get it. Now they start to, you know, sit down with Sammy. The feds get involved. And the feds are livid when they heard about this because they looked at it as, what did Sammy do? You know, he cooperated with us.
Now he’s out there, he’s committing another crime. He’s in the drug business. They were upset with him. They took over the case. Long story short, Sammy is sitting down, what do you want over here? He says, well, they wanted Sammy. They didn’t really want the family too bad. They did want Gerard, but they didn’t want anybody else. And they told Sammy straight out, you’re going to take a hit on this and if you don’t, this is what his lawyer is telling him. Your son’s going to go down for 40 years. Your daughter’s going to get time, your wife is going to get time.
Either that or you got to take 20 years. Sammy didn’t blink an eye. He said, give me the 20, I’ll do it. Now, Sammy has said this before. He’s told this to me. He said, michael, I took that hit because I didn’t want to see my family go to jail. I wanted to protect my son. Why wouldn’t you believe that? I know some people have questioned that. I don’t. I understand that. I would do it. I would take it on the chin for my family in one minute. I don’t want to see my kids go to jail.
I don’t want to see my wife go to jail. I take it in one minute. So Sammy took a 20 year bid and did 17 on the 20, really, to protect his family. Could he afford the case in 1 and 1? They didn’t seem to have too much on him, honestly. They had one snitch, you know, Mike Pompa. How involved Mike Pompa was with Sammy, I don’t know, maybe he never met him. Maybe he met him once or twice, I don’t know. They had that one recording with Sammy. I don’t know if they had anything else.
But the bottom line, he did take it on a chin for his family and he ended up doing 17 on the 20. So that’s how that goes. Sean Atwood, on the other hand, he thought he escaped everything for a while, but then his good guy, his good friend, you know, again, this guy Schooley I think they called him, he was the one that he originally started this with. Schooley leaves town and he ends up getting Caught up in a case for passing bad checks. And for some reason, they were all broke on this thing. They had no money.
I don’t know what happened with. I don’t know where they spent it all. It wasn’t really that lucrative. I really don’t know. But this guy Schooley runs away. Sean is actually in hiding. He’s not doing too much more business. This guy Schooley, who is Sean’s right hand man, he gets busted for passing bad checks. He’s looking to buy himself out. He starts to mention the drug ring, the Ecstasy ring. They want proof, the law enforcement does. He shows him proof of all the plane tickets I think, that he had going back and forth to L. A where he was buying the drugs from at that point in time.
Long story short, he gets Sean indicted. And Sean goes down on that too. As a result of the Schoolie, if you listen to Schoolie, he says, you know, normal, you know, he said that, you know, Sean didn’t stand up for me, why should I stand up for him? Meanwhile, he’s got a tattoo on his left arm saying, loyalty. Loyal to what? You know, a lot of people are loyal until they’re facing, you know, the prison time. But anyway, Sean goes down and at the end, Sean ends up doing, I think he got nine years. And after his nine years, he can’t return to the United States.
I know that because, you know, I’ve met with Sean several times in the United Kingdom. So he can’t go back. And now we get to the end, what happens? Sammy takes 20, Gerard takes 10. I don’t believe, you know, either Karen or his wife got any time at all, was a minor infraction on their end. And then we go to the end where we have Sean talking about just the entire experience. He was very open and honest about it. And he says, you know, straight out, look, I got caught up in this. I was using, I was making money.
I thought who the heck I was. I wanted to be a gangster. He called it gangsterism or he had gangsteritis. And he tells a story. He says he has regrets. And one of his deepest regrets he brings out at the end when he’s with his dad. He said it was so hard telling his mother or father, who had high expectations for him that he had gotten, you know, locked up on a drug case. And he even had to ask them for money for the attorney. And it hurt him. And I believe that. And he does his nine years.
And when he gets out and he goes back to the United Kingdom, his family welcomes him with open arms. And the last scene is with him talking to his dad. And I think he has a little breakdown. How bad he felt that he put his father and his mother through what they had to go through as a result of his behavior, which he says was wrong, you know, and it’s. It’s kind of touching, you know, And I believe that, you know, you don’t want to put your family through this stuff. Sometimes you just get carried away.
It’s the money, it’s the lifestyle. Who knows? You know what? I’m not justifying it, but it happens. We’re human. This is what happens. Sammy, on the other hand, the ending scene is really with Gerard talking about it. And I like what Gerard says. He says, you know, I was really gonna thinking about killing Sean because Sean busted into the house and he disrespected us. The house of one of my guys, and he disrespected me. And I know that on the street that’s what I was supposed to do, but he says, I don’t know if I really could have done it.
I don’t know. And he even brings up something where back when he was a kid in Brooklyn, they had pigeons, and they used to shoot the pigeons with a BB gun. And one day he shot one of the pigeons. It fell off the root, but it didn’t die, and he was going to shoot him again. And Sammy came out and said, no, don’t shoot him. I want you to go up to this pigeon, I want you to break his neck, and then throw him in the bag. And Gerard is looking at his dad and said, I can’t do that.
I can’t break the pigeon’s neck. And Sammy was using that as kind of a test to see if his son could really be involved in his life. And he didn’t want his son involved in a life. He didn’t want Gerard in the life. So Jarrad is talking about this and saying, you know, I might have brought Sean out into the desert, but I don’t know if I could have really killed him. And, you know, listen, people. Not easy to kill somebody. Trust me, it’s not. It’s tough. No matter who you are, you got to be a little bit insane.
You got to be psychotic. You know, it’s not an easy deal. Even soldiers in the army tell you that. That’s why so many of them have ptsd. It’s not an easy deal. So the end scene is with Sami and Gerard talking, and it’s a very warm scene. And Gerard is saying, Listen, you know, Dad, I love you, I really do. No matter what went down, whatever he said, you’ve always been there for me. You’ve been a great father and I really love you. And he said, I’m just blessed and happy that I have you around till today to talk to me and to teach me.
I can still learn from you. And, you know, he was looking back, Gerard, feeling bad about what he did. And Sammy is telling him, don’t feel bad, don’t look back, you know, let’s live for today, let’s look for the future. I’ll always be there for you. And it’s a very, you know, to me, touching scene. You know, I had similar talks with my dad, you know, towards the end of his life, you know, after things that went down with me and my dad, you know, when I walked away from the life, he wasn’t happy. We patched it up afterwards, he was getting old and we had some really heart to heart talks, which I’m not going to get into now.
But I told him about some of my regrets. You know, we had, you know, we put each other on the spot a little bit. I can say that. So I understand that conversation. And for those of you that, you know, can’t understand it and want to say, well, you know, Sammy’s this, Sammy’s that. Michael, you’re this, you’re that. And Sean did the wrong thing, I get it. But we still love our families, you know, and I can speak for myself and I know you know Sammy’s feelings and, and I know Sean, I think I know them well enough to speak for them in that regard.
That’s how it ends. So, you know, it’s kind of a, in a way a family saga, but very well done and I really suggest that you watch it again. It’s on HBO Max. That’s the streaming platform. I think it’s, you know, you pay a monthly fee like anything else. But, you know, it’s not only this, they have a lot of good shows on there, so I encourage you to watch it. So I think it was well done. And that’s it, people. So you got another review. I want to thank all of you for really enjoying the video style documentary, or I should say the documentary style video that we did on Carlo Gambino.
People loved it, the comments were great. I told you if this went off well that we would continue and I would do all 49 that are on this tapestry in the back of me now. You really loved it. So we’re going to do them all there’s 51 of us on there, but I’m not including myself or my dad. So you love that. We’re going to be doing Joe Colombo next, I think Frank Costello after that, Anthony Big Tuna Accardo. We’re going to be doing him also. And we’ll go through all of them there. I know you’re going to love it.
They’re documentary style, so there’s a lot of graphics in there, a lot of video, a lot of news footage. My team really did a good job. If you’re interested in the tapestry or any of the products that we have that feature these gentlemen up there, go to goldenera collections.com. we have cups, we have shoes, we’ve got bags. If you’re into the mob history and you like this stuff, just go to that website. I think a graphic or a link is up there and you can go purchase whatever you like. My membership platform michaelfrancis.com family it’s growing and people are loving it.
You want to be part of a family, part of a community. You want great resources in there on leadership, how to be a boss, you know, on personal conflicts in your life. We do Bible studies, we do Q and A’s, one on one. We’re doing zoom calls. It’s a platform that we’re trying to build into a vast community of like minded people. People need somebody. You know, there’s a run on Bibles right now. More Bibles are being sold now than they have been in the past several years and it’s mostly Gen X that are buying them.
They say, why are they buying them? Because they want to find purpose in their life. That’s what we’re doing in this platform. It’s going to benefit you. You’re going to be around like minded people. You’re going to hear a lot from me. I am very active in the platform. Go look at some of the comments in there. Michaelfrancis.com family 10 bucks a month. Not going to break the bank. You don’t sign a contract. You don’t like it, you leave. But I guarantee you’re not going to leave. Okay, The Bible studies free. Michael Francis Bible study. All you got to do is go in and register.
You’re going to get a special gift from me if you come in. It’s not only a gift, it’s a tool that you’re going to love. I’m telling you that. I’m not going to tell you what it is. You got to come in and see it. Michaelfrancis.combiblestudy. we have a schedule of when they’re going. I do two of them a month. My team does the other two. You’re going to love this. I’m telling you it’s going to help you. You don’t have to be a Christian. It doesn’t matter what you are. There’s good foundational principles in biblical scripture that can really help you.
Trust me, no matter what you’re doing in your life, no matter what’s going on, it can really help you. You don’t have to be a Christian to be helped by it. So that’s it for today. I hope to see you in either one of those platforms, hopefully both. How do I always leave you? Same way. Never going to change. Be safe, be healthy. God bless each and every one of you. Your family, your community, your neighborhoods. God bless all of you. And yes people, I’ll see you next time. Take care.
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