Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel- The Gangster Who Had A Dream
Hollywood has a long history of glamorizing the gangster lifestyle on screen. From Depression-era films like “Public Enemy” and “Little Caesar”, through “The Godfather”, “Goodfellas”, and “The Sopranos”, filmmakers have found that audiences will flock to theaters to watch the exploits of fictionalized mobsters. While the most famous gangster of all, Al Capone, has been portrayed on film more times than any other real-life criminal, one of his contemporaries, Bugsy Siegel, runs a close second.
He has been played by actors ranging from Armand Assante to Richard Grieco to Warren Beatty, and in thinly-veiled aliases such as The Godfather’s Moe Greene (whose name was an amalgam of two Siegel cronies, Moe Sedway and Gus Greenbaum). Siegel’s unique personality, his hobnobbing with movie stars, and of course, his leading role in the development of Las Vegas as it currently exists all makes him an irresistible character for celluloid immortality.
