Chazz Palminteri Biography

Fast Facts

• Growing up in a tough Brooklyn neighborhood, witnessed a mob killing when he was 9 years old
• Following high school, sang at resorts in the Catskills and fronted the cover band Razzamachazz; also worked as a doorman at the New York City nightclub The Limelight
• First major big-screen role came with 1991 crime comedy Oscar, starring Sylvester Stallone
• Made his first foray into screenwriting by adapting his hit one-man play A Bronx Tale into a 1993 crime drama; the film also marked the directorial debut of star Robert De Niro
• Was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the Independent Spirit Awards and the Screen Actors Guild Awards for his performance in Woody Allen's Bullets Over Broadway (1994)
• Received the Leadership in Entertainment Award from the Coalition of Italo-American Associations in 1996, and was presented with a Special Achievement Award for the Performing Arts from the National Italian American Foundation
• Opened a restaurant called Chazz: A Bronx Original in Baltimore in 2011