Locked In with Ian Bick - Exposing Murderer Robert Durst | The Man Behind HBO’s ‘The Jinx | Marc Smerling

Episode Date: February 9, 2025

Marc Smerling is an American film producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, and director. He co-wrote and produced the HBO documentary series The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, which delves into the life of real estate heir Robert Durst and his alleged involvement in multiple murders. Smerling also produced and shot the documentary Capturing the Friedmans, earning an Academy Award nomination. He co-created the podcast Crimetown, exploring the impact of organized crime in American cities. His work often focuses on true crime stories, providing in-depth examinations of complex criminal cases. #RobertDurst #TheJinx #TrueCrime #HBOdocuseries #MurderMystery #CrimeDocumentary #UnsolvedCases #RealCrimeStories Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Connect with Marc Smerling: IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0806830/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marc-smerling-05985934/ Website: https://truth.media/ Presented by Tyson 2.0 & Wooooo Energy: https://tyson20.com/ https://woooooenergy.com/ Buy Merch: https://www.ianbick.com/shop Use code lockedin at checkout to get 20% off your order Timestamps: 00:00:00 Growing Up in Westchester: Influences on Crime and Mob Interests 00:03:12 Meeting Mayor Buddy Cianci 00:06:31 The Creation of the Crimetown Podcast 00:09:31 The Enigmatic Life of Jerry Tillinghast 00:12:53 The Guilt that Led to a Confession 00:16:00 Investigative Documentary on Crime Reporting 00:19:04 Exploring Humanity in True Crime Narratives 00:22:15 Understanding Narcissism and its Impact 00:25:46 The Importance of Restaurant Meetings in Production 00:28:13 Heartbreak and Filmmaking: The Journey of Jesse 00:31:32 Humorous Encounters with Mobsters 00:34:45 The Influence of the Mob in Youngstown 00:38:06 The Journey of Creating "All Good Things" 00:41:25 Unearthing Buddy's Corruption 00:44:33 The Art of Storytelling in Crime Podcasting 00:47:53 Transition in Rap Music Video Directing Powered by: Just Media House : https://www.justmediahouse.com/ Creative direction, design, assets, support by FWRD: https://www.fwrd.co Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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My name's McKenzie, and I started to GoFundMe for the adoptive mother of a nonverbal autistic child. The mother had lost her job because she wasn't able to find adequate care for this autistic child. So she really needed some help with living expenses, paying some back bills. So I launched a GoFundMe to help support them during this crisis. And we raised about $10,000 within a newfoundment. in just a couple of months. I think that the surprising thing was by telling a clear story and just like really being very clear about what we needed,

we had some really generous donations from people who were really moved by the situation that this family was struggling with. GoFundMe is the world's number one fundraising platform trusted by over 200 million people. Start your Gofund me today at gofundme.com. That's gofundme.com. Gofundme.com. This podcast is supported by GofundMe. me. Mark, thank you for inviting me over to your house today. Absolutely. This is a really cool set.

I love doing like these remote interviews because it's just, well, I guess remote's not the right term, but being in different areas in different cities is really fun. Yeah, you get a little taste of who you're interviewing too by just looking at where they live, right? Yeah, yeah, definitely. And especially someone like you who you could find out so much about on, say, like Google or social media, you never really know who that person is, like behind, you know, the production behind the show, which is, and what I think is fascinating. Yeah, yeah. Did you grow up in Jersey? No. Well, kind of. I was born at St. Bartholomew's, which is not far from here. It's south orange. But I left New Jersey when I was eight, and my parents moved up to Westchester County in a town

called Harrison. And I grew up there. I went to, I went to Rite Country Day School. I'm a private school kid. Yeah, that's like 40 minutes. Yeah, 40 minutes from where I grew up in Danbury, Connecticut. Yeah, yeah. Now, because you grew up in Westchester, was that where like the interest in crime and mob came from? Because that was pretty prevalent back then. You know, I never thought about this, but I did want to be a cop. And my father was like, you're not going to be a cop. I'm not going to let that happen. And I always had sort of a pension for reading, crime stories. If you look at my bookshelf over there, you'll see the whole American crime, see the Black Lizard series and everything. You know, it's just, I was a big reader. People read back

then. So you didn't have all the options you have now. And it was always, you know, detective stories and mysteries and stuff like that. But true crime's really not that when you get into it, you know. I don't know where it ultimately came from, but my family, my father is. from Brooklyn and his father was with his brothers in the concession business. And if you know anything about the concession business, in the old days, it was a mob business. You know, it's all cash, cigarette machines and, you know, cigarettes fall off trucks and stuff like that, you know. So, you know, there was a little bit of interest because that whole side of my family is very much a mystery. So I think that also piqued my interest because my dad, you know, he was a very slick dude.

And I remember, you know, there was a lot of cash around and stuff like that. And he was always a high roller because all these guys, when they have money, they're high rollers. Fancy cars, big lots of cash in their pocket. But I guess he really started to come to the four when I started dating a woman who I met in college. And she was from Federal Hill. in, she was actually from Smith Hill, which is the hill next to Federal Hill, in Providence, Rhode Island.

And she had this wonderful, extended Italian family, one of which her brother-in-law had, when I was in college, had been carted off by the feds. And I started to kind of look around that area because my father-in-law, Amrico,

would take me to dinner on Federal Hill at Camille's or, you know, one of those fancy Italian restaurants. And you would look around, you would see things and you would kind of wonder how this all works. And then one day we went to the big hotel, the Biltmore Hotel, to have a drink, just he and I. And it was empty, the bar at the Biltmore.

And at the end of the bar was Buddy Siancy, who was the mayor of Providence. And he was sort of hunched over a martini smoking a cigarette, which was kind of forever in his hand. And he says, you want to meet the mayor? I'm like, okay. So I walked down and I sat with Buddy for a few hours and we just talked. And he was the kind of guy who could make you feel like the center of the world. And I was in a place in my life where I was studying journalism to be a newspaper reporter where I was sort of like trying to figure out who I was.

You know, I was still in college. And I really liked him. He was a quirky guy, bad toupee. But I really liked him. I think that was his gift. And then like a few months. Once later, he was, there was in the newspaper, there was this incident at his place on Power Street

where he had beaten a guy with a fireplace log. And there were other people from the city of Providence in the government who were president at the time. You know, like the head of every department. And I was like, wow, that was a guy I met in the bar at the bill bar with my father-in-law. That's weird. And I started following his sort of trajectory.

trajectory and I learned that he went, he got indicted on that. And I think he made a deal. And, you know, he got indicted again several years later on being corrupt, did four years in the federal system. And, and then got out, ran for mayor again and won, you know. And he was just sort of this sort of really interesting character to me. And the city that he was in charge of for a long time, he's mayor for quite a bit of time, was very supportive of him, even when he was in, you know, prison and when he did bad things. And that was one thing I started to realize about the Italian mafia, even though it's a very harsh place to sort of grow up as a young man and be inducted into, if you're in there, it's a very forgiving place too. It's a very realistic place. And these guys

were funny I met there. And they were, you know, they had real relationships with family and stuff like that. And they were also ruthless. So that whole world sort of became really interesting to me. And, you know, cut to several years, many years later. I went through many iterations, made other docs. And then I made the jinx. And when I was done with the jinx, I had sort of a blowup in my life. It was a very hard show to put. with the bed. And I just was like, everybody was like, what do you want to do? And all I wanted to do was Federal Hill, Buddy Ciancy, and the mafia. And nobody wanted that. You know, it was complicated. It was a sprawling story. But there was this new thing called the podcast. And I had lunch one day,

because my partner in Crimetown, which is the podcast we eventually made. He knew Alex Bloomberg, who was the head of Gimlet at the time. And I went to lunch with Alex because the first time I met Alex was because we had all this tape on Bob Durst from prison. You know, they tape recorded everything. And it was fascinating. We only used a little bit in the jinks. So I was like, you should make a podcast out of this.

And he was like, I don't wanna make a podcast out of it. I wanna make a podcast that you wanna make. And I'm like, bing. So I just started going up to Providence with Zach and recording these wise guys and you meet one, you meet another, you gain their trust. I had family connections, you know. And they started opening up.

to me and talking to me about their lives. And Crime Town was born, and I think Crime Town is probably the most popular thing I've ever done, including the Jinks. It's beloved worldwide. I mean, people, they reach out from all corners of the English-speaking world to talk about Crime Town. Because it's a story about the mafia

that you don't expect, which is about these people who make huge compromises in their lives, kind of what you told me you were doing, which is their childhoods are not the person. perfect childhoods. In some ways, they're the least desirable childhoods. And a lot of the guys I talked to weren't Italian. They were mob associates, but they were doing all the heavy lifting and all the violence. And they didn't really have a lot of choices in life. And when they got into the mafia and they went through their trajectory of violence and making relationships with people

who were Italian in the mafia, it didn't end up well for them. They almost all ended up in prison for long stints, 25, 30, 35 years. And now they're all out. So they had a real perspective on life. And I think what really surprised me is they had a real sense of humor about their lives. You know, they could really speak almost as if they'd been to, you know, the penal colony of therapy, you know. They had told their stories so many times in the prison yards and thought about their lives so deeply that they had a real perspective on life, you know. Yeah, that's interesting because the podcast we were talking about earlier. that I listened to, you said that these stories that they tell are like currency.

Yeah. Which was interesting to hear. And I think that's some of like the psychology behind these guys getting out and wanting to tell their story on a podcast like yours or like mine or doing like crime shows. They want to talk to someone. And I think that also goes back to the Bob Durst thing. He, from what I've, you know, learned about it and from what you have said on other interviews is that he, He was kind of like itching to be able to let that out and share his story. Yeah.

But I don't think he ever pictured himself getting caught in that way. But it's very fascinating the psychology behind it. Yeah, I've learned that there's a sort of spectrum of sociopathy, you know. Over time, you start to learn that some guys can be like Jerry Tillinghast, who can be very congenial, funny. He's a murderer, multiple time murderer. And he can seduce you. He can make you feel like you're good friends. And he's actually always been good to me.

He's died recently. But at the, at the, his core, there is, you know, a childhood of abuse that created a void, which for some reason, Raymond Patriarch at the head of the mafia in Providence was able to fill. And not a lot of people would allow that to be filled that way. You know, there's another way to do that, you know. But there's something missing with Jerry, you know. But Bob, Bob is really, I mean, this is going to sound trite, but Bob's crazy, you know. Just the fact that after we made the movie, All Good Things with Ryan Gosling, Kirsten Dunst, that he reached out to us to talk to us.

And then after we met him at the Peninsula Hotel in the bar there and we sat for hours talking to him, he said, you know, I want you guys to talk. tell my story is considering what he did and what he knew he did was, I guess, unwise in some ways and also a testimony to his level of psychopathy, you know, or sociopathy, where he thought he was going to be smart enough to tell his story and not get caught, you know, but nobody's that smart, you know? Unfortunately, if you're telling your story, you're probably exposing yourself in a way that you probably don't even know that you're exposing yourself in. And that's sort of kind of what happened.

And ultimately, there was a point when we were making it where I think he figured out that was happening. And he, I don't know how he figured it out. I think it was just because we wanted to do a second interview so badly. You know, and our insistence that we wanted to do it made him suspicious.

And I remember that we met with him to talk about doing the second interview. interview and he had told me he was going to go to Cuba on vacation. And he, you know, within a month and he couldn't do another interview until he came back from Cuba and blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay, so he went off to Cuba and he came back. And then we did that second interview and he started watching the show. And at some point, he started, you know, getting to four, three, four, we're getting to five and he's on the road. He throws away his cell phone. He goes on the run. Heads down to New Orleans.

He's eventually caught by the feds down there because they're tracking him. They're watching the show too, obviously. And they've also, we've been talking to them for quite a while. You know, you can watch that, I guess, in the second season. And then, you know, come to find out he was going to Cuba. So he was sort of like a very intelligent guy, but he had a blind spot. He didn't understand the simple fact that he was putting himself in harm's way, that he'd gotten away with three murders.

you know, and that doesn't happen a lot, you know, and that he had put himself right in front of a truck. So do you think he ever would have gotten caught if he never did your... Oh, absolutely not. He would have still been free to this day. He also had a compulsion to confess, which I'm sure you've run into it, and I've run into it quite a bit, where people have guilt. He was guilty. He's not a cold-blooded person. And I think he felt terrible about what he had done to Kathy and to Susan, and even to Morris, you know. And it just was bubbling out of him.

He just couldn't keep it down. You know, his guilt was really pushing him to tell his story. Would you have done that documentary if you didn't have him as the... Well, the whole documentary was instigated by him. In fact, I don't think Andrew, my partner at that time and I wanted to do because we had been through the ringer making the movie about him. And I, the whole... This is actually a funny story.

I'm sure that Andrew tells us, and if he didn't tell it, he may have told it in the second season. But when we did the interview, when we sat there at the Peninsula Hotel and we, all right, we'll do this. And then we went on that trip, I think it was, we went to a soundstage

and we showed him rough cuts of the episodes. And that's, I don't know if you remember those, and he's there and I'm recording it with one of those little tiny handcage. I mean, I just, whatever, I could dig up. And that was over. And then we made a date to do these interviews. And we spent three days, 26 hours of interview.

We spent three days with him in a hotel, the Lowe's Hotel. We did the interview. And I was sort of like, I just couldn't get back into it. You know, I'd made a friendship with Kathy's family. They live in New Jersey, Sparta. and I really I really felt bad for what that murder had had reeked upon them. I mean, they were, they were really had suffered because of what happened to Kathy. And the whole process of the movie was very difficult.

So I was sort of like, I don't know if I want to do this, Andrew was, I don't know if I want to do this. Let's go talk to, maybe we can sell it to Dateline. That's what we thought. I'm going to go talk to Diane Sawyer and show her a reel. So I made a reel of like the highlights of the 26. hours plus some of the stuff from the, uh, from the screening room. Um, and, um, and she watched it. She's sitting there. And Mike Nichols watched it. And, um, and, uh, she kind of turns it off. She goes, you, you got to make this. You can't, wait. Date line. It's just not right. I mean, yeah,

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the first crime thing that I did. Not that I didn't write about crime when I was in the newspaper world. I am, why did I end up doing it? One was because it was going to get done. And, And it was going to get done. Andrew decided he wanted to do it. He was financing it. It was his choice. I needed to go on loan for the ride. I would hurry to done, you know,

it was like going up the roller coaster and not going down the other side. You know, I already had been to the top of the roller coaster and I'm looking over the edge and I'm like, all right, I'll go down the other side. And, you know, then we spent three years. I mean, who gets to do that for another two years? You know, just digging into everything.

every facet of Bob Durst life and every facet of those crimes, making relationships with all the police officers involved, which isn't easy as you know, you know, and trying to get into the evidence room in LA, the Rampart Division. And, you know, and just trying to get people to trust you enough so that they'll tell you

the little pieces of the evidence and the story that they, it's not in the files, not in the investigative files, not the court earing files and all the motions and all that stuff. So you can understand it a deeper level what was going on. A lot of people think of that doc. They're like, oh, wow, you really blew the doors off Bob Durst and documentaries.

But the reality is there were 27 documentaries about on television, including the, you know, the discovery stuff and the, you know, the stuff on, you know, Dateline before that and all those shows about Bob Durst. But no one had spent those two years, you know, making those relationships and digging into that. into the stuff, you know, and no one had Bob. Yeah, that's actually a great topic. How do you feel about the documentaries that come out prematurely?

Like when something breaks the news and, like, they put a diddy dock out right away, yeah, which seemed kind of silly with like the attorney and stuff, but the case isn't anywhere near concluded. There's so much more. And they're going to do that with Wade Wilson and other like serial killer type people. Yeah, we used to call that news. Yeah. Right? Now we don't really watch news as much as we used to. We listen to maybe news on the

radio we read a newspaper. But what do I think about that? Honestly, there are a lot of people that I've worked with or I've been represented by who are like, why aren't you doing that? You can make a lot of money doing that. So what I think is if you're making these things because you want to make money and that's all you're doing it for, I mean, God be with you, but you're really fucking with people's lives, you know? And if you're not doing the work, then basically all you're doing is amplifying the salacious quality of these stories

without finding the humanity in them, you know? I mean, the thing about crime is, crime is an amplification of normal life. People who are criminals are doing what we all kind of think about doing or we're doing in our real lives, but they're amplifying it to a level that's criminal. It's like they've gone way too far, you know?

And, you know, that's what makes it interesting. You know, is the humanity of it, you know, not just the salacious details of, like, I watched that, Dahmer. Oh, I'm going to get in trouble. I don't know if you watched it. Yeah, the Netflix. I watched it. I mean, like, I just, I was like, I was like, why does this exist, you know? What about the families of the victims of these people, of this guy?

You know, what is adding to the knowledge about what happened here or that there's some sort of escape hatch for people. so they can understand something. There was nothing that I understood watching that. Then I watched the Menendez. And I'm like, oh, wow. Now, this is a whole different level. I'm learning so much. That's a good example of like just digging so deep

into the crime and the characters who perpetrated it that, you know, that you understand them. Even though you don't agree with what they did, but you understand them at some level. And that's what we did with the jinx. And that's why the jinx is a big, deal. Not just because at the end, he, you know, sort of admitted that he did it. He went to the bathroom and spoke to himself in an unfiltered way. It's because I truly believe it's because

the second episode, people fell in love with Bob a little bit. They understood him another level that no, no those 27 documentaries had ever done before. And then they gone to ride with him for this whole story and these other people that, all these people that have been dancing, damaged by this. And when you come out at the end, you're like, you've learned something very deep about humanity and about that story. Do you find yourself having compassion for those types of individuals when you're meeting with them and talking with them? Absolutely. And it's not the kind of compassion where you're saying, oh, it's too bad this guy went to prison or it's too bad this or that. It's more a compassion of like, oh, wow, this is a human being here. That's why I'm

against the death penalty. I know people do terrible, terrible things, and there's a lot of desire for some sort of retribution, you know, but I don't think it really solves anything. And I don't think it recognizes that this person is a human being who has a history of their own, and they got there to that place for probably for a reason, you know, and I'm not really sure it really deters anybody from anything. So, you know, for me, you know, talking to Jerry Till, or Robert Durst or Bobby Wallachin or any of these guys, even, you know, Buddy Ciancy. It's a sort of education in humanity more than it is a desire to figure out how bloody the corpse is.

Do you see a common trait among these individuals that you talk to? Like something that they all share. Yeah, there's a piece missing. We talked a little about this. There's just a piece missing. You know, there's a gating factor that you and I might have, or maybe you wouldn't have. from what you've told me. But, you know, where we would, you know,

the gate would come down. And we wouldn't go beyond the gate. For these guys, there isn't a gate that comes down, you know. There's a narcissism to it. It would be silly to deny that because, you know, they're capable of killing somebody, murdering somebody and not really feeling what the loss is

for that person or their families, the people they love. you know, Luca. Sorry. No, that's okay. He's having a dream. He's like half on the bed right now. He made a guest appearance.

That's an Italian dog right there. That's funny. Anyway, so, you know, I feel like, you know, there's a narcissism and there's just a piece missing. Do you ever get scared being in the room with him? Because I got that question all the time. And I always say, like, well, if they're taking time to, like, a murderer is taking his time to, schedule an interview with me two months out, he's not coming to kill or rob me. He's coming just to let something off his chest.

Yeah, no, I've never gotten scared of anybody. Because once you meet him too, I'm sure you've had this experience, you realize how human they are. You know, no, Jerry's a towering guy. He's a big, bulky, you know, but when you sit with him, you know, you're like, this guy, it's not going to hurt me. He gets nothing out of it, you know, and he's here. There's a camera running or an audio kit going.

You know, this is not the four. for murder. Most of these people, they have a trigger. They're not just doing it because, you know, they feel like it. For a serial, it's just maybe sexual, you know, for Bob. He was angry at Kathy. They had been going through a very difficult relationship period, and to put it lightly, and he was angry at Susan. He was scared she might rat him out. And Morris obviously must have told him he knew he was and was going to rat him out. You know, so there's a motive. I don't know. what the motive for you and I would be, you know, unless halfway through the interview, they're like, I've decided I don't want to do this interview anymore. I don't want it to exist

in the world. But that would be hard to cover up. There are some people all sit down with where it's a little eerie, like a little creepy, like being in the presence. But then they eventually get comfortable and you warm up to them and vice versa. Yeah. You could kind of feel that vibe out. Yeah. And sometimes they use that vibe, right? Like, you know, I've sat down with heavy duty mob killers and, you know, for the first half of the conversation, you feel like he might actually do something bad to you. You know, there's this sort of cold stare and limited answers, but they, you know, like sometimes they'll make a joke

and that'll crack the ice and then, or you'll ask the right question, it's like a key turning. And all of a sudden they start talking to you. But, you know, what you're doing is a little different. I'm spending a lot of time with these people, even before I whip out the camera of the mic. You know, I do spend, you know, and often I'll say to them,

you know what, I don't want to talk about that over dinner. Let's talk about that when the camera's running because I don't want to get two answers and then, you know, you go home and think about the first answer and then you're spending all night, looking at the ceiling, think about how you made a mistake with that answer, so you're going to change that answer and make it a different answer.

You know, so, you know, but I'm glad to talk about my kids. I'm glad to hear about your kids. I'm glad to hear about your life and, you know, today and all that stuff. but I do spend a lot of time with people. Yeah, something you said in an interview was that you like to tell your producers the most important part is the restaurant meeting. And when HBO did the doc on me,

that's where they took me first. And it was like a three-hour dinner. Yeah. What's that mindset? Like, what do you go into that thinking? What's your like agenda and your plan? Well, first of all, communal eating is what we do with our family.

So all of a sudden, you know, you're with this person who probably has a very limited family. life and they feel like they're with other people and you're kind of in this family right and uh and it's you know eating is a very pleasurable process you know plus you're buying that's true right yeah so you know it's it's it's a sort of a fig leaf in a way so you're like we're breaking bread that it's biblical right we're breaking bread together you know what they say in prison yeah right so it's a it's a low easy to enjoy period of time that you can get to know somebody. Do you do those types of dinners or meetings or anything before you agree to actually take

something into production? Oh, yeah. Well, it's funny. I'm doing something right now where, you know, it's with the military. And I don't want to talk too deeply about it, but they're trying to throw a lot of, like, curveballs at me to try to prevent me from talking to people. And one of the curveballs is you need a studio behind. you and a budget and insurance.

I'm doing interviews. You know, it's a journalistic pursuit. I'm not making, you know, I mean, the list of things, it's like almost like, I'm Steven Spielberg making a battleship movie, you know? And I'm just like, I'm like, oh, this is a way that you don't,

to prevent people from talking to you. But what was the question? I kind of went off on a tangent. No, if you are meeting with these individuals before you get the green light. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes I'm meeting with them for years before they'll sit.

actually in front of a camera. There are times where I've met with people for a very long period of time, and I didn't succeed in getting them to sit for an interview. That happened with capturing the freedmen's. If you look into that case, there are two boys who were arrested. It was Jesse and his friend, who also worked in the classes, the computer classes. And the other young man, I spent a lot of time with him. I had lunches with his brother.

I just couldn't get him. I mean, obviously he's traumatized. He's wrongly convicted, for sure. And I couldn't get him to sit in front of the camera and do an interview. And I always, I mean, I was just heartbreak breaking to go through this process. Not that the film needed it

because the film didn't need it, but the fact that he didn't get the same sort of opportunity to tell his story. After capturing the Freedman's was done and Jesse was out of prison. prison. And it was getting the accolades. It was getting and won the grand jury prize and it was nominated and HBO was putting it on TV. There was a moment where Jesse had buyer's remorse for lack of a better way of putting it. And he was angry. And then, you know, we stuck in with him. There's a

440 motion. I don't know if you know what that is, but it's a motion to have the case looked at again. and, you know, we really worked with him as best we could to get him as much relief as he could have. At that point, Ron Kuby came on board as his lawyer and he calmed down. And then I spoke to him a couple years later. And, you know, he's living under Megan's law. He didn't get any relief. And he's a bookseller on Amazon. And, you know, his life is very limited and very hard.

And I'm sure he didn't do these things that he was arrested for and convicted of. And, you know, he lost his wife. You know, he had met after prison. She couldn't live that life, you know. They can't live near a school. She wants to have children. And I said to him, you know, so how are you dealing with us? He said, well, at least there's a film.

I can tell people when they ask me, what happened to you? I can say, there's a film. You can watch it. So I don't have to tell the story over and over again, you know. So, you know, there is some sort of like, value in doing these things. But these relationships, they go on forever. You know the Maisel brothers are?

No, it sounds familiar though. It's the two guys who made, you know, they were sort of the grandfather of the Verite documentary going around with a camera and just following people. And they would stick with people for a very long time. And they made a bunch of great films. And one time, Albert Maisels told me that when you make these type of documentaries, these people are part of your life forever, forever. And that's sort of proven true.

I mean, I did this USG that got us connected, a podcast about this mobster, this Colombo Crime family mobster from Brooklyn, who's a very interesting character, Anthony Ramundi. And he calls me all the time. We talk all the time, you know, and he's got a lot of great stories. But, you know.

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Do you ever go into something with an opinion already made and then it changes after you've gotten to know the subject? That's a good question. Well, are we talking about innocence and guilt? Anything. Anything. So on the level of innocence and guilt, no. I thought Bob was guilty, just from reporting on him when I was a newspaper guy.

It was hard to believe he wasn't. It was hard to believe that he was still out there walking around, to be honest. But, you know, he had covered his tracks and he had a lot of money. On who that person is, yes, definitely. And humor is a big part of that. Bob was funny. You know, the time I spent with him, he would, he was very dry, but he was very funny and personable and anxious. And I didn't expect that, you know.

I mean, super anxious, you know. I care my stomach rumble. And then, you know, most of the mobsters I've met after that cold stare, once you get to know them, they're very personal. And I would say that they would do anything for me. You know, if I was in trouble and I needed someone to move my house on a short notice, one of them is a now mover. Bobby, he's a great guy. He would come down in his trucks from Providence, Rhode Island,

and move me for any, he probably would say it's on the house, you know? So, yeah, they surprise you. Is it hard to explain those types of relationships and friendships to your family or coworkers that have never understood that? Like, because me, like I was hanging out a couple weeks ago with like former mobsters and Hells Angels bikers that I shot a podcast with. And you say that casually to someone. They just, they don't understand. I mean, I've been doing it a long time.

So most people know what I do. And, you know, if I'm dating somebody, there's always that question. Do you think they'll show up in the middle of the night and kill us both? But no. I mean, my dad is kind of a guy grew up in that world. or adjacent to that world. It was so funny, I didn't know this for a long time, but, you know, I started suspecting it much later.

I would say like 10 years ago, how much that world was around him. And the other day when I worked, I have only been in Jersey City two years. I said, I'm moving to Jersey City. And I'm moving, oh, yeah, your grandfather used to send me with a bag of cash down to the mayor's office. And, you know, I'm like, oh, oh, that's how it was. You know, so I don't think he's surprised.

He knows exactly what these people are about, you know. You know, and obviously my former wife, I'm very close to still, and my kids, they're from Providence, Rhode Island at some level. And from an Italian family, they know what it's about. So, no, I don't get a lot. Now, you're telling me off camera that Providence, Rhode Island is one of the biggest, you know, mob cities in the world or the country. Right.

But how come that's not really showcased like that in a lot of these movies? Well, they made it, they, well, there's Crime Town. And they made an HBO series, oh, city on the hill, which is about Providence, Rhode Island. It's about the mob. But, you know, the New York mob is a much louder noise. I mean, the New York mob dominates everything,

and it's a much bigger mob story. I mean, New York's a much bigger city, not as many Italians per capita, but, you know, and not as dominated. The thing about a small city, like I did also Crooked City, about Youngstown, Ohio. It's now been picked up effects

for a scripted show. And anyway, so Crooked City is about Youngstown, Ohio. It's a smaller city, a big Italian population. In those cities, like Providence and Youngstown, Ohio, the mob, it really controlled everything.

Controlled every part of society. From the government to the unions, to the restaurants, to everything. It was just woven in to the fabric of those communities. You know, New York was different, right? New York, Brooklyn, obviously, was very mobbed up and Queens had its own mob.

But New York was big enough and diverse enough. And it's sort of, you know, who is living in New York. It's a big city, a lot of people, that the mob was more, you know, in tribes, the Columbo's, the Bonanos, the Genoveses, the Gambinos, you know. And they would spill into the public continent. when violence happened or a corrupt city official was found to have contacts.

But it wasn't like it is in those smaller cities where it's just given that you're going to, you know, that the world is is mobbed up. What do you think is the biggest misconception about the mob? Oh. I mean, it's been done so many. Obviously, the mob has been done in so many movies and so many docs and so many podcasts now. it's hard to think that there's something that's hidden from people at this point who are interested in the subject matter.

But I guess, and the Godfather did this, right? The big thing that people, I think, really don't understand is the number one thing, this is old school, is family, you know, and family is the driving force. If you go back to when Italians came here and they set up, they were working in the mills and they were, you know, they were at the bottom of the food chain in a lot of these communities. And they're treated very poorly. So they brought over this sort of tribal system

that had in Sicily because Sicily is also a place where people were treated poorly by a different class of Italian. And they built these families, and family was everything. and the families needed to survive. So they had these organized crimes that they were committing to help survive

and they got bigger and bigger and bigger. But there's not an Italian who's sort of wrapped up in the mafia who doesn't say to you at some point, I don't want my kids to be in this, right? So, you know, it is, it's not necessarily all about murder and mayhem. It's about survival, you know, for most people. I think that's probably true

in all organized crime, not just the Italian mafia or the Irish mafia, the Jewish mafia, but in, you know, drug families and stuff like that. Do you think that if you never had the jinx, you wouldn't be able to produce those, you know, mob type series that you're able to do now? Definitely. I mean, the jinx sort of was a big change in my life.

I mean, you would think capturing the freedmen's, which was, I think, nominated for like 20 awards worldwide, would have made a difference. And it did. It got me to make right it move. called all good things, which got me to meet Bob Durst, which made the jinks. It's all like a progression like you're going through. You know, we were just talking about it. You know, you're moving from one thing to the next thing. The next thing and it's growing and it's getting bigger. And, you know,

if you keep working hard at it, it's going to be, it's going to be something. Yeah. Do you ever think like, you know, like there's sometimes there's moments in life where something happens that doesn't have anything to do with you. Like in your case, the Bob Durst incident, you had no idea that that We're talking about luck. Yeah, but do you believe in luck? Do you believe in that? Of course. Or is that fate?

I'll tell you a good luck story. Okay. So when Buddy was arrested for this beating of the guy with the, he was actually, he never went to trial on it because there was a deal made. But there was a, you're going to have to cut this out because I'm having one of my elderly moments. But there was a grand jury. And the grand juries are always recorded, but nobody ever hears that. stuff. And that's the most private, private, private stuff in the justice system, right? Because nobody's been convicted of anything. Grand juries are, prosecutors are allowed to bring anybody

into a grand jury and they're allowed to say whatever they want. You know, there's no judge going or defense attorney going like, I object, you know, my rights are, you know, my client's rights are being abused. There's none of that. But there are tapes. I've never seen tapes from a grand jury. When we started making Crime Town, we went up, we recorded with Buddy for his portrait hanging. They hung his portrait after his federal prison sentence in City Hall. And he was there. He looked thin and not well. But he was his jovial funny self.

He made a speech. And we were sitting next to each other on the bench next to the podium. And he kind of slumped against me. And he had passed out. I didn't know, but he had cancer. took him out. And I had been working on him for a year to sit down and tell a story. And he, they put him in the back of the ambulance. He says, I'm going to call you. I'm fine. Don't worry. That's why I found out he had cancer. I'm driving back the next day in New York. He calls me.

He goes, I'm in the hospital, but I'm getting out in a few days and I'll be fine. He died. And I didn't have his voice other than the stuff that I was able to scrape off of archival and stuff like, I didn't have very much. And then, you know, there was an executor of his will, who was another kind of one of his, you know, captains, for lack of a better word. It was this old Jewish man. It was very nice.

But it was obvious to me after meeting him and doing an interview with him. He was very sickly too, that he was not going to give me any entree into buddies huge. I'd heard just one storage area after another of stuff, you know, and I thought there might be tapes in there, you know, or something I can use. I was never going to get by this guy. But before the funeral, he died. And then the executor became a dentist who was Buddy's nephew, who is the sweetest guy you ever want to meet.

Looks a lot like Buddy. I'm like, go to the Italian American club and on Federal Hill to meet him for lunch. I'm like, it's going to be another dead end. He's like, buddy, I got stories. Tells me all these crazy stories about how corrupt his uncle was. And he goes, here's the key. So I got everything. They had moved it all to an office building owned by a friend of buddies downtown in the basement.

I got the key. So you cannot imagine. You remember in Braves the Lost Ark at the end when they got the box with the covenant in it and they're going through and they widen out. There's all these boxes. And it's like endless boxes. some government warehouse somewhere. This was like buddies' storage area.

It was like there were keys of the city, like, you know, all kinds of crazy stuff. So Zach and I just alone go down. We spent, I don't know how many days down there, just digging, digging. One day I put my hands in a box and I pull out this rack of tapes, cassette tapes. And it's the grand jury tapes.

That's the best podcast episode I've ever made. It's episode 10, I think, of Crime Town. And it's just the great thing. grand jury testimony. It's like the head of department of transportation. They're all there and they're describing it. And it's funny because, you know, they were like, it was, they were probably all drunk.

But it was just, it's like outrageous what Buddy did. And they're all sympathetic to him. And but they're all, the guy was, Buddy thought that the guy was having an affair with his wife. Wow. So that's what makes you believe in the luck aspect. So lucky. I mean, that was multiple levels of luck.

Two people had to die. Right? And I had to meet the dentist, who was the greatest guy ever. And then I had to find that box. I'm talking this was Raiders of the Lost Ark. There were a thousand boxes in there. And we went through probably 600 of them. A lot of them were like full of like, you know, chotchkes, you know.

But do you think it's like the universe or your timing or that's your purpose? No, I think it's hard work and sticking in. I used to think if I stuck into a story long enough, it would always turn out good. Since I've been doing this for a while, I know that's not entirely true. And I've tortured people sticking into stories, studios and minor studios and gone over budget once. I learned a very serious lesson. I'm very sorry, Jason. But just trying to make something good out of something that was lacking,

you know, lacking the right source, or not lacking the right, mostly it's sourcing, you know, getting people to talk. I've learned not to take documentaries that are old enough. Like the era of the great mob documentary is coming to a close because everybody's passed. That era is gone. And I was very lucky to make a huge contribution at the end with Crime Town and Crooked City.

But I'm not so sure I could dig up those stories anymore because nobody can talk about them, you know. And you could make a podcast where you kind of clean material from Wikipedia and you can clean material from books and do a little research and be a good writer and write it. But you'll never get beyond the story. You'll never see the human. beyond the story.

That you've got to sit across from somebody and actually draw it out, you know? So, you know, yeah, I think luck has a lot to do with it and sticking into the story long enough so that you can get lucky. Do you ever think about if you had become a cop what your life would look like now? Do you ever ponder?

Because I always think about like, what if I didn't make this move or didn't do this or didn't go to prison? Right. I wouldn't be here with you right now. Right, right. Um, no. Next. I mean, I'm a very firm believer that I am on the course that I was supposed to be on.

Um, and, uh, and I've been just rolling along, you know, I hear a lot from young people that, you know, they have to have it all figured out. And they're going to, it's going to, you know, it's all got to be figured out in a straight line to a goal. That's just not how life really works. You end up doing a lot of lefts and rights. I've had jobs I didn't really love, you know. I worked for a network anchor, you know, in the 80s, you know, and it was not a job that I was particularly suited for. I guess I was good enough to keep the job.

I worked for Italian TV for several years as a senior producer. I don't even speak Italian. So, you know, I've had some jobs in my life. I've edited shows and stuff where I would. I need the money. I worked as a waiter. I've done this. I've done that.

You know, but ultimately, I was sort of moving forward, you know, and getting closer and closer to it. So to say, hey, if I hadn't been a cop,

you know, would have been, I just, I never looked back. I didn't have time. I was always just trying to get down to the next thing. And then I was lucky enough

to partner with Andrew Durecki. And, I made music videos, dude. you know, Kulji rap and Wycliffe Jean and the Fugis. I made all kinds of crazy music videos, shot stuff. I had so many iterations of myself to get to this point. There was just no time to go, oh.

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Another? We definitely need more space. To more practical homes. Yes, Mayflower has been there for it all and we'll always have your back. Every moment, every move, every step of the way. Schedule your move now by going to Mayflower.com. I made so many fucking wrong turns. So whatever. When you were doing those music videos, because I know that's a big part of like your early

beginnings to ever envision you'd be doing what you're doing now. I was always a documentary filmmaker. I started that way and I knew I'd probably get back to it. And I was making music docs. Made a music doc for Avril Levine. Is that crazy? That's a throwback. Yeah.

And Bella Fleck. I don't know who that is. Destiny's Child. I know who Destiny's Child is. And I saw you didn't marry El Blige too. Yeah. Yeah. She's in power.

You ever watch Power? No. Oh, you never got into that? That's a good show. I should watch that show. Yeah. She's in it. Yeah.

No, I did a lot of gangster rap stuff. I actually got out of the whole world of, of doing rap music videos for two reasons. One is honestly, there were a lot of young black directors who needed to be doing the rap music videos I was doing. And they just didn't have the chops at that time because it was a whole new thing. And all these young Jewish nerdy guys

who were filmmaker guys where, you know, I had my own cameras, it was cheap, I could make music videos. The other thing is that Puffy Combs got into the business. And when Puffy, I remember going to a styling meeting where at Uptown Records, where Puffy was the head stylist, he was young. And I was like, oh my God, this is a disaster.

The guy, he was so arrogant, so just annoying. And so much about like the bling, you know, and the booty and all that. I was sort of like, oh, this is, because I was doing cool gyroact and Scarface, and those guys were telling stories, you know, and then we would just make the story in a little film and, you know, find a cool way. to present the actual sinking of the song. And it was just a great journey to be on.

But when it became that, it just became something else. And I'm not saying it's not a valid way to express yourself. I'm just saying for me, it was not a story anymore. When do you think you realize that you were doing your life's purpose and following your actual passion? Capturing the Freedments. I'm so good at digging and digging and sticking in and digging and thank you for Andrew because Andrew had the wherewithal to fund it for many, many years

so we could actually talk to everybody and go through every court record. And, you know, I was very lucky. Awesome. Yeah. Well, Mark, thank you so much, man, for taking the time out of your day today to sit down with me. Yeah, absolutely. It's been a pleasure. Yeah, I like meeting you and talking you and then, you know, seeing your place and your creative

spot and, you know, just getting to know you. Yeah. I'm getting to know you has been great too. I mean, you seem like you're on a good trajectory. I'm trying. Every day's a grind. You know how it is. Yeah.

And now you're going to catch that flight, right? Yep. I'm off to the flight and you're going to L.A. this weekend. You know, you know how it is. And I respect that. Like, you with the gear and moving it all on your own, like people don't see that behind the scenes. There's real. But yes.

Yeah. There's one other person. Yeah. But still, like they just think it's different. Yeah. Should we take 20 minutes to talk about how much it cost to get that stuff on a plane? Oh, that's why I got two suitcases. I perfected it. I spent $500 the first time I was telling your wife that $500 both ways,

like each way, that was a grand in gear, never doing this again. And I was going to give up traveling. And then I was like, let me try this. Two suitcases, all the gear, I'm good to go. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah. Well, you got to keep it under 50 pounds. That's, you know, that makes it a lot. You could have three bags as long as they're under, you know, 50 pounds each. But thanks again, Mark. And yeah, I'll talk to you soon. Oh, I'll talk to you soon.