Sit Down with Michael Franzese

It’s not often I bring a guest back — but after our first sit-down hit over a million and a half views, Andrew Bustamante earned his seat at my table twice. Ex-CIA intelligence officer. His wife? Also CIA. And this time he brought his new book — and people, I don’t take notes on books. I took notes on this one. We get into the spy skills they don’t teach you anywhere else: how to detect a lie from a trained interrogator’s perspective, why you should trust NO ONE until they earn it — something the CIA and my old life agree on completely — how the CIA recruits people and how you can use the same psychology, the three resources that actually matter, and why there really is a system behind the system. An unfair advantage isn’t an illegal advantage, people. It’s only unfair to those who don’t have it. Now you can have it. Ex-CIA Agent Reveals the Spy Skills That Give You an Unfair Advantage Backbone Media Group 00:00:00 Introduction00:04:40 Interview Start00:11:41 Knowledge, Experience, Intelligence00:19:01 Japanese Screen Culture01:34:15 Outro Backbone Media Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🍝 Get the Goodfellas Bundle — 3 wines + my full Mob Movie Cookbook: https://franzesewine.com/goodfellas I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been asked about the cooking scene in Goodfellas. “Michael, did you really eat like that in prison?” People — I knew all those guys. All of them. And today I’m finally recreating that iconic prison dinner — the gravy (NOT sauce, and I’ll tell you why we called it gravy), the pasta, the whole scene. I’ll tell you what we REALLY ate on the inside, how close the movie got it, and the one thing they got completely wrong. While I’m cooking, I’m sipping my wine and answering your questions about the life. I did the time so you don’t have to — all you gotta do is watch. Salud! 0:00 — Did I Really Eat Like That in Good Fellas?1:04 — Gravy or Sauce? What My Family Called It1:51 — Paulie Vario's Razor Blade Was Real3:30 — Starting the Meat — Veal, Pork, and Beef5:13 — Al Dente — What Italy Taught Me About Pasta6:52 — Three Years in Solitary Living on Cup of Soup9:22 — The Garlic Scene From Good Fellas10:23 — The Time I Took My Wife to See Good Fellas13:04 — The Godfather "Went to the Mattresses" Scene17:22 — The Only Tomatoes I Use18:21 — I Started Drinking Wine at 10 in My Grandpa's Basement19:26 — What I Really Ate Behind Bars22:14 — Jeffrey MacDonald — What I Saw in His Eyes26:25 — The Year I Spent With the Menendez Brothers32:27 — The Most Authentic Mob Movie I've Ever Seen33:51 — Epstein Didn't Hang Himself — I Was in That Cell35:42 — Why the World Is So Intrigued With the Mob37:47 — The Gift Jimmy Burke Sent Me at Lewisburg40:53 — Diesel Therapy — The Worst Part of My Time Inside42:34 — Why My Wine Comes From Armenia47:07 — Digging In — In Prison, This Would Be Your Whole Day Ex-Mob Boss Recreates Goodfellas Prison Dinner While Telling Wild Prison Stories Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

People ask me all the time — Michael, if you started over today, what would you do differently? So let's have some fun with it. HYPOTHETICALLY. If I built a mob family in 2026, here's exactly how I'd run it. No drugs. No human trafficking — you're DONE. No phones — this thing in your pocket is a COP, and half the guys in prison put themselves there talking on it. I'd run it like a corporation. Quality people, vetted hard. Gambling? Our biggest business. The numbers, the unions, lawyers with clout on the payroll — and yeah, in the age of AI, I'd have the smartest tech guys in the room. We fell the first time because we got careless and the government got ahead of us. I wouldn't make that mistake twice. And I leave you with a question — everything that's illegal is not always immoral. Do you agree with that? Tell me in the comments. Faith-based, gut feeling, whatever it is — I want to hear your position. And people, let me say it one more time so nobody twists my words: I am NEVER going back to that life, and I'm not encouraging anybody — especially you young people — to go anywhere near it. This is entertainment. This is a hypothetical. That life only ends in prison or a grave. I know. I lived it. #Mafia #MichaelFranzese #Mob #OrganizedCrime #Hypothetical Former Mob Boss: How I'd Build a Family in 2026 0:00 Introduction & Personal Gratitude 1:03 Introduction & Personal Gratitude 1:43 The Downfall of the Mob 4:28 Mafia Origins 6:29 The Modern Framework 7:38 Personnel & Vetting 7:55 Tax Fraud & Community Support 9:08 Gambling & Numbers Operations 10:15 AI & Cyber Integration 10:53 Strict Family Rules 14:33 Leadership & Gotti (1996) 16:36 Fear vs. Love in Leadership 18:03 Handling Mob Envy 21:06 Union Control & Political Influence 24:01 Non-Negotiable Rules 25:52 Business Advice & Negotiation Backbone Media Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🍷 Have you tried my wine yet?: https://yt.franzesewine.com/ ✅ Take Control of Your Money and claim $10 in US Stablecoin (USD₮)! Download now at http://wallet.rumble.com/InnerCircle and use the code InnerCircle10. 💪🏼 Join Franzese Family: https://michaelfranzese.com/family/ This is a sad one, people. My friend Vinny Pastore passed away over the weekend. 80 years old. You knew him as Big Pussy on The Sopranos, and as Angelo Ruggiero — a man I knew personally — in the 1996 Gotti movie. He nailed that role. I told him so to his face. Vinny was the real deal. A good actor, a better man. Always had time for a fan, a photo, an autograph. Everybody who knew him will tell you the same thing. Back in 2021 we sat down together — and I’m glad we did. He told me stories you won’t hear anywhere else: how Armand Assante turned into John Gotti right in front of him at the audition, holding Anthony Quinn’s baby on set, his years with Tony Sirico, and how a guy from the Bronx who thought he’d be dead by 50 ended up in the greatest show ever made. We’ve lost too many of these guys the past few years — Ray Liotta, Jimmy Caan, Tony Sirico, Burt Young — and now Vinny. So watch this one, enjoy him the way I got to, and keep his family in your prayers. Rest easy, Vinny. See you on the other side, my friend. 00:00:00 — Introduction00:00:54 — A Sad Day — We Lost My Friend Vinny Pastore00:02:26 — The Great Ones We've Lost — Liotta, Caan, Sirico & More00:04:24 — My 2021 Interview With Vinny — In His Memory00:04:57 — How Vinny Became Angelo Ruggiero — I Knew the Real Angelo00:06:52 — Armand Assante, Anthony Quinn & the Baby on Set00:07:53 — The Bar Scene — Nobody Ever Played It Better00:08:41 — Wine Under the Table — The Freedom They Had on Gotti00:09:51 — Touring the World With the Sopranos Cast00:12:30 — The Secret Casablanca Records Movie00:13:23 — I Was in That Office With My Father — Casablanca & Buddah Records00:14:56 — The Disco Days — My Clubs, His Clubs, Old New York00:18:07 — Why Vinny Walked Away From the Nightlife00:18:52 — "You're Going to Be Dead at 50" — The Night He Chose Acting00:20:22 — Broadway, Chicago & Beating Tony Darrow for the Part00:22:26 — Vinny's Acting Lesson — Take the Two-Line Role00:24:09 — I Asked Him: How Do You Remember All Those Lines?00:27:41 — Tony Sirico — Best Friends From Episode Two00:28:41 — The Day David Chase Called ME About The Sopranos00:30:27 — Getting Whacked — The Truth Behind the Funhouse Episode00:31:51 — "I'm Not Getting Rid of Vinnie" — Tony Fought for Him00:32:30 — Jimmy Caan Told Him: "You Got Robbed at the Emmys"00:33:26 — When The Sopranos Was a Sunday Night Lifestyle00:34:12 — "Don't Beg" — How He Filmed His Final Scene00:34:47 — Liz Hurley Loved My Father — The Mickey Blue Eyes Days00:36:49 — We Made a Commitment On Camera — A Series Together00:41:16 — Vinny & Danny Provenzano — Getting Sick, Making Peace00:43:29 — "I Was Scared, Man" — Vinny Opens Up About Cancer00:46:01 — My Father at 103 — Still a Bull00:49:12 — I Challenged Him to a Pizza Face-Off — Slices vs. Mulberry Street00:53:32 — Two Old School Guys, Two Commitments00:58:44 — "So We Did Grow Up"01:00:13 — Our Goodbye — Mob Movie Monday & See You Soon01:02:02 — My Farewell to Vinny — I'll See You on the Other Side #VincentPastore #TheSopranos #BigPussy #RIP #michaelfranzese My Last Sit Down With Sopranos Actor Vincent Pastore - RIP Vinny 🤝 Book 1 on 1 Call With Me: https://michaelfranzese.com/book-1-on-1-call/ 🔥 Check out my store: https://store.michaelfranzese.com/ 🎙️ Michael Franzese Podcast on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3Eo39qb 📧 Interested in partnerships? [email protected] Backbone Media Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mamdani put out a map of New York's immigrant neighborhoods for the whole world to see — thirty of them. And he left MY people off of it. Little Italy. The Greeks. The Jewish neighborhoods. The Irish. Then he tells us it was an "accident." People — I got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. And that's not all he did. After 55 years, he denied the Italian-American Civil Rights League the license to celebrate Columbus Day. The league Joe Colombo started. My father was part of that fight. I take this PERSONALLY. We built the subways. We built the bridges. We built that city. And this clown wants to erase us from it? Not on my watch. In this one I get into all of it — the map, the permit, the socialism scam they're running on all of you, and what we would've done about a guy like this back in the day. Mamdani Is Erasing Italians From New York — Former Mob Boss Responds 0:00 — "He's a Clown" — The Cold Open0:36 — Greetings From Switzerland (Wedding on Lake Como)1:35 — What Mamdani Did to the Italians2:29 — Two Offenses: The Map + The Columbus Day Permit3:09 — A Word From Franzese Wine4:14 — Little Italy Reacts (Street Interviews)5:57 — "It Wasn't an Accident" — Who Got Left Off7:06 — The Socialism Scam — Bigger Than Any Mob Scam9:02 — Reagan Was Right10:14 — "Mamdani Is a Fraud" — A New Yorker Speaks10:29 — Joe Colombo, the League & 55 Years of Columbus Day11:44 — A Word From Rumble Wallet13:26 — Take Responsibility — Why He Won14:11 — $37 Trillion — The Politicians Did This15:05 — Pelosi & the Insider Trading Game16:53 — Would the Mob Have Stood For This?18:14 — Why Do We Resent Billionaires?19:45 — Newsom Out West, Mamdani Out East20:35 — "You Should Be Ashamed of Yourself"22:09 — Wrap-Up + Ministry Monday Announcement24:00 — One Last Salute From Franzese Wine Backbone Media Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices