Mike Starr has done his share of mob movies. The veteran character actor and onetime Chicagoan starred in the local “Osso Bucco” and has done supporting turns in “Goodfellas” and dozens of features and TV shows.
When the young filmmakers of Beverly Ridge Pictures approached him in 2007 to co-star in their take on the genre, “Chicago Overcoat,” everything clicked.
“I liked the chance to play a South Side guy who talked like people I knew, to put another regionalism on film,” Starr says. Plus he’d get to work again with old friends Frank Vincent, Armand Assante, and Danny Goldring. And he’d get to play a boss for once.
“Chicago Overcoat” on Tuesday opened the 2010 season of the Midwest Independent Film Festival.
Starr plays the presiding underboss of the Outfit’s Bridgeport crew, running things while the boss (Armand Assante) is incarcerated pending trial. Frank Vincent stars as a former hitman working his first contract in years, to eliminate witnesses against Assante and finance his Vegas retirement.
Danny Goldring is the obsessive, alcoholic detective who picks up the scent when Vincent gets back in the game.
“I joked with Frank about how I was the boss this time and he had to come and work for me,” says Starr, who’s better known for playing muscle.
