Crimetown: Chapter 3: The Making of a Mayor
November 29, 2016 3:52 AM - Subscribe
Buddy Cianci runs for mayor as the anti-corruption candidate, promising to change Providence. He's a novice Republican politician in a city ruled by Democrats and mobbed-up unions. As he struggles to get elected, he faces an impossible choice: stay clean and lose, or get a little dirty and win.
Wish the dudes making the show would either stop trying to narrate in that unconvincing pseudo-toughie hardboiled style or get someone who could pull it off better than them. Sarah Vowell doesn't seem to be too busy these days.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 1:13 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 1:13 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]
The accents make this. They're all fronting. Hard. You can tell, as what's halfway between South Boston and The Bronx? Rowe Dye Lun! BUT! They all have this little back-of-the-pallate high-pitched throttling. Sort of like Teddy from Bob's Burgers. I work with a retired Marine from not-a-good-part of Providence my age, he has that, and it kicked in my "Do Not Mess With" instincts, even from way down in Newport Town, which the Mob left largely alone. The Troubles were not entirely remote at the time, and Newport was clawing its way back from a dive-bar-and-tatoo-parlor Navy town into the fantastic tourist destination it now is. You can rent a wood racket, and play tennis on a grass lawn at the Newport Tennis Hall of Fame in your shiny white cardigan like you're Zelda herself! It's actually pretty nice to watch, no matter how hapless the tennis tourists, as there are grandstands.
Lotsa heads got broke making that happen. The Newport Historical Society is a thing. A thing with money. There's a reason a lot of the cops sound like Christopher Walken in this show. The cops are at war, and they love it.
The podcast never even once touched on Ed DiPrete. You should google him. Also his successor was nuts, competent and productive, but mostly nuts. Bruce got Primaried, and then misrule followed as she lost.
Providence is doing OK, now, just regular gang violence rather than... than... that. It's romantic, you figure out who's the wiseguy, and you imagine what it would be like to be that dangerous and connected. There are walking tours where you can inspect the spot on Atwells where the Coin-O-Matic used to be. Then you realize, there's this thing, this giant whirling mass of suck, and you'd really like for people like Ed Moriarty to be around more than Patriarca, who was pretty much the Professor X of crime. I got stone cold chills listening to "The Doctor Broad" unashamed and still on the side of Raymond, the man who corrupted her deliberately and completely.
If Crimetown ever wants to revisit New England and Providence? New Bedford. New Bedford is heralded by Boston as one of the "Gateway Cities" when pitching to investors. No. It's in another state, but it's part of Providence. Serious, it's in the Providence Metro Area, which is larger than places like the Milwaukee and New Orleans metro areas. New Bedford, Masschusetts, in the armpit of Cape Cod, is the largest, most profitable fishing port in the world. Squalor, poverty, petty crime, ecological devastation. "New Beige" - was true for Azorean immigrants, now true for folks from Brazil.
Plus, there's the "Cod Father" which is actually a thing and you should google him.
posted by Slap*Happy at 9:01 AM on May 13, 2019
Lotsa heads got broke making that happen. The Newport Historical Society is a thing. A thing with money. There's a reason a lot of the cops sound like Christopher Walken in this show. The cops are at war, and they love it.
The podcast never even once touched on Ed DiPrete. You should google him. Also his successor was nuts, competent and productive, but mostly nuts. Bruce got Primaried, and then misrule followed as she lost.
Providence is doing OK, now, just regular gang violence rather than... than... that. It's romantic, you figure out who's the wiseguy, and you imagine what it would be like to be that dangerous and connected. There are walking tours where you can inspect the spot on Atwells where the Coin-O-Matic used to be. Then you realize, there's this thing, this giant whirling mass of suck, and you'd really like for people like Ed Moriarty to be around more than Patriarca, who was pretty much the Professor X of crime. I got stone cold chills listening to "The Doctor Broad" unashamed and still on the side of Raymond, the man who corrupted her deliberately and completely.
If Crimetown ever wants to revisit New England and Providence? New Bedford. New Bedford is heralded by Boston as one of the "Gateway Cities" when pitching to investors. No. It's in another state, but it's part of Providence. Serious, it's in the Providence Metro Area, which is larger than places like the Milwaukee and New Orleans metro areas. New Bedford, Masschusetts, in the armpit of Cape Cod, is the largest, most profitable fishing port in the world. Squalor, poverty, petty crime, ecological devastation. "New Beige" - was true for Azorean immigrants, now true for folks from Brazil.
Plus, there's the "Cod Father" which is actually a thing and you should google him.
posted by Slap*Happy at 9:01 AM on May 13, 2019
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posted by ellieBOA at 3:53 AM on November 29, 2016