The second part of our analysis focuses on the opening to Martin Scorsese and Nicholas Pileggi’s sprawling Las Vegas crime drama…
Director: Martin Scorsese
Screenwriters: Nicholas Pileggi and Martin Scorsese
Based on: The non-fiction book, Casino: Love and Honour in Las Vegas, by Nicholas Pileggi.
Script source: Daily Script
Synopisis: Las Vegas, 1970s. Sam ‘Ace’ Rothstein, a Chicago-based expert gambler with Mob ties, is given the opportunity to run Las Vegas casino The Tangiers. In Vegas, Ace quickly rises to prominence. He meets and marries beautiful hustler Ginger, who is still close with her lowlife pimp. Meanwhile, the arrival of Ace’s childhood friend, Nicky Santoro, a violent criminal and loose cannon who has plans to take over Las Vegas, spells trouble for Ace.
The opening
The first approximately 17 minutes / pages of the screen story explain ‘how things work’ in this world. This is achieved through scenes and sequences, of course, but also through Ace and Nicky’s voice-over (v/o), as they describe the set-up and add details that relay exposition and reveal character.
While there is lots of v/o used throughout Casino, it largely passes the ‘McKee test’. (Robert McKee suggests that v/o should only be used when it is not required to communicate the action or exposition. In other words, ‘if you take away the voice-over, is the action still clear?’).
Here is our breakdown of the opening of Casino with notes on how it was shaped from the source material:
Las Vegas, 1983
– Ace walks towards his car
– The car explodes when he gets in and turns the ignition
Note: This echoes the book, which opens with the car bomb (p1-2) and returns to it near the end (p372-4), providing a frame for the story.
– v/o: Ace tells us that he believed he had the kind of love with someone that meant he could trust them all the way
– v/o: Ace tells us he was a handicapper before being given The Tangiers to run by the Mob bosses
– We see the Mob bosses in Kansas City
Note: The book spends considerable time describing all the ‘outfit’ guys, their relationships and activities. However, while it’s important we get the Mob connection, for the screen story, we don’t need much more than an introduction. Indeed, Nicky dismisses them en masse in racially insensitive terms, but underlines that they ran Vegas.
– v/o: Nicky tells us he was watching Ace’s back and that Ace had the woman he loved on his arm
– Shot of Nicky with brother Dominick & Frank Marino
– Shot of Ace’s future wife, Ginger
– v/o: Nicky tells us it should have been sweet but they messed it all up
Note: While this is mentioned in the introduction to the book (p10), Nicky’s line about messing it all up was actually spoken by one of Tony Spilotro’s criminal gang, childhood friend Frank Cullotta (almost verbatim) and is the very last line of the book (p402). In the script, it prefaces what’s to come, hooking us into the screen story within a few pages/minutes.
– v/o: Ace and Nicky take turns in telling us about tourists coming to Vegas to gamble and about how problems are solved by burying them in the desert
Note: This prefaces Nicky’s end, as well as the real-life demise of Spilotro (p399). It also draws a sharp contrast between the tourists enjoying themselves and the violent underbelly of Vegas.
Las Vegas, 1973
– Ace walks through The Tangiers as the boss
– v/o: Ace tells us about Vegas’ ability to wash away the sins of guys like him
Note: This is referenced early on in the book as well (p4), as Pileggi discusses Vegas being a place where people go for a second chance. He also likens the place to Lourdes, a line spoken by Ace in the script. Religion is a common theme in Scorsese’s films (Lourdes is a Catholic pilgrimage site that reportedly heals the sick).
– Shot of coins moving through a conveyor system
– v/o: Ace tells us how everything In Vegas is arranged for casinos to get people’s money
– Mob guy Nance enters the count room with a suitcase
– v/o: Ace tells us the count room is sacred place where all the casino’s cash is funnelled
– Sequence showing the activity in the count room accompanied by v/o of Nicky telling us about how the money was skimmed
– Nance takes stacks of cash from the safe and leaves the count room, as the employees all look the other way
Note: While Ace talks of the legit casino operations, Nicky fills us in on the criminal aspects. This highlights and reinforces their characters.
– The sequence continues with Nance getting off the plane in Kansas City to deliver the skimmed cash
– v/o: Nicky tells us that Kansas City is as far as the bosses could get to Vegas without being arrested
– We see interactions between the bosses who travelled from all over to meet at the back of a store
Note: The source book first mentions the skim on p7-8, with a description of the count room and its activities. There is more detail on p197-200. The book returns to the subject several more times, including on p237-248 and p302. In reality, the skim covered more than just the cash passing through the count room, even though this was the main source. Overall, the book makes clear that the skim was a complex but (mostly) well-oiled operation that netted hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Mob bosses. The script simplifies it to a five-page sequence, using visuals and Nicky’s v/o, largely drawing from the source book’s introduction to give us the information we need.
– v/o: Nicky tells us the Mob controlled Vegas because it controlled the Teamsters’ Union that lent the money to buy casinos
– At The Tangiers, we are introduced to casino owner Philip Green and head of the Teamsters’ Pension Fund Andy Stone
– v/o: Ace tells us that Stone was a powerful and ostensibly legitimate figure
– Stone gives Green a $62.7m cheque for The Tangiers
– v/o: Ace tells us that Stone took orders from the Mob and was told to give the loan to Green
– v/o: Nicky tells us that Green was the perfect frontman because he didn’t know too much and didn’t want to know too much. He also tells us that they picked Ace to run the casino.
– Stone convinces Ace to run the casino. He explains about a loophole in the license application process to get around Ace’s criminal record. Ace is reluctant but agrees as long as he’s allowed to run things his way. Inciting incident: Ace takes over The Tangiers.
Note: In reality, the financing of the Stardust was a complicated matter that has a whole chapter devoted to it in the book (p129-154), with Allen Glick (Green’s real-life counterpart) getting involved with the union and learning about the Mob’s involvement. Again, the screenwriters draw out the essence, this time in a simple four-page sequence. We learn just enough to get the gist of how this world works and how that influences the story. Likewise, the ‘Lefty tries to get a casino licence’ saga is a lengthy one, but here, it’s enough to know that it’s an added complication.
– We see Ace running the casino in his exacting manner
– v/o: Nicky tells us how meticulous a gambler Ace has always been
– Flashback to ‘Back Home’: we see Ace several years previously in action as an influential oddsmaker
– v/o: Nicky tells us he made a lot of money for the Mob bosses
– Head Mob boss Gaggi asks Nicky to keep an eye on Ace as he’s making the ‘outfit’ a lot of money
Note: The book talks about Lefty’s attention to detail as a gambler on p14-25 and again on p51-57. In the earlier section, Lefty talks about knowing all the insider details such if a player’s girlfriend was pregnant or if he was on drugs. This is spoken by Nicky in v/o in the script. So, we see Ace in action, coupled with Nicky’s more colourful commentary, giving us an entertaining way of learning exposition, along with some strong characterisation. It also sets up the ‘Nicky protects Ace’ aspect of the narrative. A few pages later, we see the kind of thing Nicky does to protect his friend in a vivid scene involving a ballpoint pen, an unwise comment, and a lot of blood.
Final comments
Two words that keep coming to mind, especially when working with weighty source material, are clarify and simplify. Hopefully, our breakdown highlights how Casino is a good example of this in practice. Yes, this is a sprawling screen story largely comprised of vignettes, voice-over, the ‘wall of sound’ soundtrack, and dramatized anecdotes. But when you watch the produced film, it feels like a coherent whole.
Clarify
Find a central story thread that guides the narrative. Define the protagonist and their conflicts. Add in complementary sub-plots. Build towards a definite climax and resolution.
Ace takes over a Mob-linked casino in Vegas; Nicky and Ginger, et al, threaten his position; it all goes wrong; Ace ends up back where he started as ‘old Vegas’ implodes.
Simplify
Select the main threads of action to give us a sense of what’s going on without getting too bogged down in detail or repetitiveness.
Cash flows from punters into the casino; Mob guy walks in with a suitcase; count room staff look the other way as he takes the money and walks out; Mob guy delivers the cash to his bosses.
Mob controls union; union controls the casino investment cash; unwitting patsy buys casino; Mob controls casino and inserts its own manager.
Of course, the third word that’s relevant is creativity. Adaptation isn’t just about dramatizing what’s on the page of the book. As Linda Hutcheon suggests, it is a process of reinterpretation and recreation. Casino’s screenwriters employ a variety of screenwriting tools to present a standalone screen story that recreates the real-life events for the big screen:
- voice-over and flashback
- re-ordering events
- changing certain details
- altering real-life events
Throughout, real life serves the screen narrative, not the other way around.
Additional references:
- Robert McKee, Story: Substance, Structure, Style and the Principles of Screenwriting, p344
- Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation, p8