Joe Grifasi Filmography

The Bronx is Burning

Actors: John Turturro, Oliver Platt, Daniel Sunjata

Synopsis: Filmed on location in New York and Connecticut, the ESPN miniseries The Bronx is Burning was a vivid (if not overly expensive) retelling of the New York Yankees' championship year of 1977. Heading the enormous cast of celebrity lookalikes were Oliver Platt as Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and Read More

Creating Karma

Actors: Carol Lee Sirugo, Karen Gorney, Jill Wisoff, Rahad Coulter-Stevenson, Joe Grifasi, Roland Sands

A Crime

Actors: Harvey Keitel, Emmanuelle Béart, Norman Reedus, Joe Grifasi, Lily Rabe

Synopsis: The devastated life of a man haunted by the unsolved murder of his beloved wife is strangely complicated by the mysterious neighbor who loves him from afar in a dark noir thriller directed by Manuel Pradal and starring Norman Reedus, Emmanuelle Béart and Harvey Keitel. Vincent (Reedus)' wife has Read More

Bought & Sold

Actors: Rafael Sardina, David Margulies, Joe Grifasi, Marjan Neshat, Frank Harts

Synopsis: Directed by Michael Tolajian, Bought & Sold is set in New Jersey, where aspiring deejay Ray Ray (Rafael Sardina) agrees to spy on a pawnshop proprietor who supposedly owes his new boss, "Chunks" (Joe Grifasi), money. They get more than they bargain for, however, when the proprietor, Kutty (David Margulies Read More

13 Going on 30

Actors: Jennifer Garner, Mark Ruffalo, Judy Greer, Andy Serkis, Kathy Baker

Synopsis: Thirteen-year-old Jenna (Shana Dowdeswell) has had enough with the trials of adolescence. In addition to being saddled with a devoted-but-nerdy best friend, Matt (Sean Marquette), she falls victim to one of the dangers of playing Seven Minutes in Heaven with the coolest kids in school: being Read More

Changing Lanes

Actors: Ben Affleck, Samuel L. Jackson, Toni Collette, Sydney Pollack, William Hurt

Synopsis: Director Roger Michell follows up the hit romantic comedy Notting Hill (1999) with this thought-provoking thriller. Ben Affleck and Samuel L. Jackson star, respectively, as Gavin Banek and Doyle Gibson, two New York men whose lives become accidentally intertwined in a Good Friday fender bender on Read More

Queenie In Love

Actors: Victor Argo, Louise Lasser, Mark Margolis, Austin Pendleton

Synopsis: An elderly man falls in love with a woman young enough to be his daughter -- and that's not the least of their differences -- in this offbeat romantic comedy. Horace (Victor Argo) is a retired police officer who now works for a travel agency. Outwardly gruff, Horace is at heart a gentle soul, and Read More

61*

Actors: Barry Pepper, Thomas Jane, Anthony Michael Hall, Richard Masur, Bruce McGill

Synopsis: Noted baseball fan Billy Crystal directed this made-for-cable drama set in the summer of 1961, as two of the strongest hitters in the major leagues, Mickey Mantle (Thomas Jane) and Roger Maris (Barry Pepper), find themselves neck and neck in a battle to break Babe Ruth's long-standing record for Read More

Law & Order: Deep Vote

Synopsis: The election of State Senator Anne Benton (Deborah Hedwall) may have been the cause of a mistaken-identity murder. The actual target, a reporter (Kate Jennings Grant) who had dug up evidence that the election had been fixed, refuses to reveal her sources. The outcome hinges upon a possible mob Read More

Looking For An Echo

Actors: Armand Assante, Diane Venora, Joe Grifasi, Tom Mason, Tony Denison

Synopsis: Co-writer director Martin Davidson, who previously made a name for himself in rock-fuelled features such as The Lords of Flatbush (1974) and Eddie and the Cruisers (1983), creates this wistful melodrama about a middle-aged widower looking back with tinges of regret at his abandoned musical career. Armand Assante Read More

The Deal

Actors: Joe Grifasi, Larry Pine

Law & Order: Cherished

Synopsis: Angie Harmon joins the cast as A.D.A. Abbie Carmichael in the opening episode of Law & Order's ninth season. The focus is on the "ethics" of foreign adoptions, and the catalyst is the suspicious death of a baby girl. The detectives are puzzled by the secretive attitude of the infant's parents, who Read More

Blood on Her Hands

Synopsis: The treachery of seduction takes hold when, after manipulating her lover to do away with her faithful husband, a scheming black widow stealthily begins plotting her next deadly move in a steamy erotic thriller starring Susan Lucci and Philip Casnoff. Isabelle Collins (Lucci) has been married to Read More

Sunday

Actors: David Suchet, Lisa Harrow, Jared Harris

Synopsis: Writer-director Jonathan Nossiter's first feature film is a moody exploration of assaults upon, and shifts in, personal identity. The movie's action all takes place on a Sunday in a poor section of the New York City borough of Queens. Oliver (David Suchet) is a newly homeless middle-aged man who Read More

Law & Order: Corpus Delicti

Synopsis: Detectives Briscoe (Jerry Orbach) and Curtis (Benjamin Bratt) find themselves traveling in illustrious company when they investigate the mysterious death of a valuable show horse. The animal was killed during an apparently unforeseen delay in Manhattan, leading Briscoe to quip that "New York is Read More

One Fine Day

Actors: Michelle Pfeiffer, George Clooney, Mae Whitman, Alex D. Linz, Charles Durning, Robert Klein

Synopsis: Even without money problems, many divorced single parents have a hard row to hoe. At the drop of a hat, a competent, responsible professional person can be reduced to a frazzled, bumbling parent, when his or her children become unexpected daytime wards. This is what happens to Jack Taylor (George Clooney Read More

Undue Influence

Actors: Brian Dennehy, Patricia Richardson, Jean Smart, Alan Rosenberg, Joe Grifasi

Synopsis: Just in case the title didn't spill the beans, this made-for-TV nail-biter was based on a novel by Steve Martini. In the midst of a bitter child-custody battle with her former husband, Jack (Richard Masur), Laurel Vega (Patricia Richardson) is accused of murdering Jack's new, pregnant wife Read More

Batman Forever

Actors: Val Kilmer, Tommy Lee Jones, Jim Carrey, Nicole Kidman, Chris O'Donnell

Synopsis: Director Joel Schumacher inherited the Batman franchise from Tim Burton and began steering it in the campier direction of the Sixties television show with this third installment. First-time Batman/Bruce Wayne (Val Kilmer), in his only outing as the Caped Crusader, is effectively brooding as he Read More

Money Train

Actors: Wesley Snipes, Woody Harrelson, Jennifer Lopez, Robert Blake, Chris Cooper

Synopsis: A pair of New York City cops collaborate on a plan to rob a cash-packed subway train in this action-comedy. Charlie (Woody Harrelson) and John (Wesley Snipes) are not just co-workers and close friends but also foster brothers. Because of this family connection, the reluctant John becomes involved Read More

Heavy

Actors: Pruitt Taylor Vince, Liv Tyler, Shelley Winters, Deborah Harry, Joe Grifasi, Evan Dando

Synopsis: This character drama, set in a local pub in rural New York State, focuses on the lives, thoughts, and emotions of a group of social outcasts. The lead misfit is Victor, a shy and very rotund man in his '30s who works as a pizza maker in a roadside inn. His mother, Dolly owns the establishment. She Read More

Tall Tale

Actors: Patrick Swayze, Oliver Platt, Roger Aaron Brown, Nick Stahl, Scott Glenn

Synopsis: This ambitious Disney movie uses a remarkable screenplay from Steven L. Bloom and Robert Rodat to tell a rollicking tale of America's transition from a close-to-the-land culture of mythic heroes to a corporate world of real estate tycoons. The strong theme about the decline of folk culture is Read More

Jack Reed: A Search for Justice

Actors: Brian Dennehy, Charles S. Dutton, Kevin Dunn, Miguel Ferrer, Susan Ruttan, Suki Kaiser, Joe Grifasi

Synopsis: Chicago's most dedicated police officer Jack Reed (Brian Dennehy) returns in this police drama to solve a murder and to clean up his own corrupt department. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

The Hudsucker Proxy

Actors: Tim Robbins, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Paul Newman, Charles Durning, John Mahoney

Synopsis: Joel Coen and Ethan Coen concocted this stylish screwball comedic amalgam of Frank Capra and Howard Hawks. Tim Robbins stars as Norville Barnes, a dull-wit from Muncie, Indiana who wrangles a job with the big Hudsucker Industries. He has a singular idea for a new children's toy that he wants to Read More

Two Bits

Actors: Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Jerry Barone, Al Pacino, Joe Grifasi, Joanna Merlin, Andy Romano

Synopsis: This nostalgic drama is based upon the childhood memories of screenwriter Joseph Stefano. Set in South Philadelphia in 1933 it centers on both a wise grandfather, and his single-minded grandson. The film opens in a garden on a beautiful day. In the garden is the Italian grandpa telling anyone who Read More

Natural Born Killers

Actors: Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey, Jr., Tommy Lee Jones, Tom Sizemore

Synopsis: A frenetic, bloody look at mass murder and the mass media, director Oliver Stone's extremely controversial film divided critics and audiences with its mixture of over-the-top violence and bitter cultural satire. At the center of the film, written by Stone and Quentin Tarantino, among others, are Read More

The Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult

Actors: Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson, Fred Ward

Synopsis: The further misadventures of bumbling Los Angeles police Lieutenant Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) are chronicled in this third installment in the popular Naked Gun comedy series. This by-the-numbers entry begins with Drebin as a happily retired house-husband called back into action when an evil Read More

Benny & Joon

Actors: Johnny Depp, Mary Stuart Masterson, Aidan Quinn, Julianne Moore, Oliver Platt

Synopsis: Johnny Depp was nominated for a Golden Globe for his astonishing performance in Benny & Joon, though the entire cast is equally impressive. Benny (Aidan Quinn) runs a small car repair shop. He must also take care of his mentally ill sister Juniper, better known as Joon (Mary Stuart Masterson). Read More

Household Saints

Actors: Tracey Ullman, Vincent D'Onofrio, Lili Taylor, Judith Malina, Michael Rispoli

Synopsis: Household Saints is a leisurely-paced portrait of three different generations of working-class, New York-based, Italian women. Carmela Santangelo (Judith Malina) is an elderly immigrant whose son (Vincent D'Onofrio) wins a wife, Catherine Falconetti (Tracey Ullman), during a pinochle game. The Read More

Taking the Heat

Actors: Lynn Whitfield, Tony Goldwyn, Alan Arkin

Synopsis: Following up the goofy big-screen comedies Dragnet and Delirious, director Tom Mankiewicz delivered this made-for-cable thriller starring Tony Goldwyn and Lynn Whitfield. After witnessing a murder, Goldwyn finds himself pursued by a group of thugs led by mafia boss Alan Arkin. Whitfield stars as Read More

Sinatra

Synopsis: Developed by Tina Sinatra and approved by Frank himself, Sinatra is a made-for-television mini-series following the life and times of Frank Sinatra, one of the most popular and acclaimed singers of the 20th century. Opening with his childhood in Hoboken, New Jersey, the film follows Sinatra's (Philip Casnoff Read More

Primary Motive

Actors: Judd Nelson, Justine Bateman, Richard Jordan, John Savage, Malachi Throne

Synopsis: In this political thriller, an ambitious press secretary discovers that the opposing political candidate has feathered the nest of his campaigns with terrible lies. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Citizen Cohn

Actors: James Woods, Joe Don Baker, Lee Grant, Joseph Bologna, Ed Flanders

Synopsis: Frank Pierson's made-for-cable adaptation of Nicholas VonHoffman's biography, Citizen Cohn stars James Woods as the controversial lawyer Roy Cohn. The film is structured as a series of flashbacks while Cohn lies in a New York hospital dying of AIDS. In the 1940s and early '50s, Cohn became one of Read More

City of Hope

Actors: Vincent Spano, Joe Morton, Tony Lo Bianco, Anthony John Denison, Barbara Williams

Synopsis: A city pulses with racial problems, political corruption, and small-time crime in this ambitious microcosm of urban life, written and directed by John Sayles. Nick Rinaldi (Vincent Spano), a lost soul usually high on drink and drugs, has spent his life in one New Jersey city, getting free rides Read More

Law & Order: Out of Control

Synopsis: College sophomore Andrea Fermi (Noelle Parker) claims she was gang-raped after attending a Halloween party at a boys' fraternity house. Anxious to bring those responsible to justice, Assistant D.A. Robinette (Richard Brooks) utilizes questionable tactics to nail a confession. This may prove to be Read More

Presumed Innocent

Actors: Harrison Ford, Brian Dennehy, Raul Julia, Bonnie Bedelia, Paul Winfield

Synopsis: Rusty Sabich (Harrison Ford) is a bland, oppressed man who burns with a quiet, corrosive intensity that can flare uncontrollably. A Philadelphia prosecutor, Sabich's fire seems to have one outlet: his job. He loves prosecuting people. Otherwise, his life is dead-ended. He has a loveless marriage Read More

The Feud

Actors: René Auberjonois, Ron McLarty, Joe Grifasi, Scott Allegrucci, Gale Mayron

Synopsis: Based on a novel by Thomas Berger, The Feud is a lampoonish look at 1950s manners and mores. There is no love lost between the neighboring communities of Milville and Hornbeck. This is largely due to the animosity between two large and demonstrative families: the Bullards and the Bealers. In the Read More

Chances Are

Actors: Cybill Shepherd, Robert Downey, Jr., Ryan O'Neal, Mary Stuart Masterson, Christopher McDonald

Synopsis: Handsome young Washington attorney Louie Jeffries (Chris McDonald) has it all: a promising career, a beautiful wife, and a baby on the way. But after discovering a local judge is in cahoots with the Mob, Louie bites it in a car crash and finds himself in Heaven. Unsatisfied with the customer Read More

Kojak: Ariana

Actors: Telly Savalas

Synopsis: Kojak is sidetracked by a lovely girl while investigating the activities of a corrupt drug lord. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

Moonlighting: Lunar Eclipse

Synopsis: This final episode of Moonlighting finds Bert (Curtis Armstrong) and Agnes (Allyce Beasley) getting married, just as David (Bruce Willis) is breaking up with Annie (Virginia Madsen), the cousin of his partner and former lover Maddie (Cybill Shepherd). At the same time, the Blue Moon Detective Read More

Perfect Witness

Actors: Brian Dennehy, Aidan Quinn, Stockard Channing, Laura Harrington, Joe Grifasi

Synopsis: The Perfect Witness is New York restaurant owner Aidan Quinn. After witnessing a mob murder, Quinn does his civic duty by reporting the incident to the authorities. This plunks Quinn into the middle of a power play between the DA and ambitious US attorney Brian Dennehy, who won't let up on the Read More

Beaches

Actors: Bette Midler, Barbara Hershey, John Heard, Spalding Gray, Lainie Kazan

Synopsis: Based on a novel by Iris Rainer Dart, Beaches traces the 30-year oil-and-water friendship between free-spirited Bronx Jew CC Bloom (Bette Midler) and uptight San Francisco WASP Hillary Essex (Barbara Hershey). The two meet as children in Atlantic City (played by Mayim Bialik and Marcie Leeds) and Read More

The Naked Gun

Actors: Leslie Nielsen, George Kennedy, Priscilla Presley, Ricardo Montalban, O.J. Simpson

Synopsis: We know we're in a 1988 film when we're invited to laugh at O.J. Simpson in an opening slapstick sequence. We can also pinpoint the year of production when hard-nosed cop Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen), during a scuffle with the world's leading dictators, wipes the wine-colored birthmark off the Read More

Big Business

Actors: Bette Midler, Lily Tomlin, Fred Ward, Edward Herrmann, Michele Placido

Synopsis: Thanks to a mix-up at birth, two sets of twins are separated and grow up in radically different social circles. The four baby girls grow up to be Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin-and Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin. One of the Midlers is a ruthless New York CEO, while one of the Tomlins is her air-headed Read More

Ironweed

Actors: Jack Nicholson, Meryl Streep, Carroll Baker, Michael O'Keefe, Diane Venora

Synopsis: Based on the William Kennedy novel of the same name Ironweed is set in the waning years of the Depression. Jack Nicholson plays Francis Phelan, a washed-up ballplayer (a onetime infielder for the Washington Senators) who deserted his family back in the 1910s when he accidentally killed his infant Read More

Moonstruck

Actors: Cher, Nicolas Cage, Vincent Gardenia, Olympia Dukakis, Danny Aiello

Synopsis: When there's a full moon over Brooklyn, anything can happen, and everything happens in the neighborhood where widowed bookkeeper Loretta Castorini (Cher) lives. First, Loretta agrees to marry a man she does not love, Johnny Cammareri (Danny Aiello), simply because he knows how to propose properly. Read More

Matewan

Actors: Chris Cooper, Will Oldham, Mary McDonnell, Bob Gunton, James Earl Jones

Synopsis: Independent filmmaker John Sayles creates one of his more artistic works with this period feature about a volatile 1920s labor dispute in the town of Matewan, West Virginia. Matewan is a coal town where the local miners' lives are controlled by the powerful Stone Mountain Coal Company. The company Read More

F/X

Actors: Bryan Brown, Brian Dennehy, Diane Venora, Cliff De Young, Mason Adams

Synopsis: A man who simulates death for a living finds himself unwittingly tied into the real thing in this New York-based suspense drama. Special effects man Rollie Tyler (Bryan Brown) makes his living simulating gory mayhem and photogenic violence for movies such as "I Dismember Mama." Tyler is given a Read More

One Police Plaza

Actors: Robert Conrad

Synopsis: Robert Conrad stars in One Police Plaza as a New York homicide detective. A case on which he's working, involving the murder of a beautiful woman, is ordered closed by Conrad's superiors. Refusing to give up, the detective probes deeper, and unearths a hotbed of crooked cops, dirty "brass" and Read More

Brewster's Millions

Actors: Richard Pryor, John Candy, Lonette McKee, Stephen Collins, Jerry Orbach

Synopsis: The seventh cinema adaptation of the venerable stage farce Brewster's Millions stars Richard Pryor as Montgomery Brewster, a third-rate baseball player. Much to his amazement, Brewster discovers that he is related to deceased millionaire Rupert Horn (Hume Cronyn, who appears only in a videotaped Read More

Bad Medicine

Actors: Steve Guttenberg, Alan Arkin, Julie Hagerty, Bill Macy, Curtis Armstrong

Synopsis: A couple of med-school wannabes (Steve Guttenburg and Julie Hagerty) can't get admitted to any U.S. medical schools so they end up in a small Central American school run by a dictator director (Alan Arkin). When the students become aware of the medical needs of the local peasants, they swipe drugs Read More

SCTV Channel: Oliver Grimley

Actors: Joe Grifasi, Patrick Sinclair, John McAndrew

Synopsis: Dr. Cheryl Kinsey (Andrea Martin) hosts her new live special "Loving, Learning, and Letting Go" from the ballroom of the Statler Hilton. Nerdish Ed Grimley (Martin Short) stars in the SCTV Family Classic "Oliver Grimley," with Sid Dithers (Eugene Levy) as Fagin and Tommy Lasorda (Joe Grifasi) as Read More

The Flamingo Kid

Actors: Matt Dillon, Richard Crenna, Hector Elizondo, Jessica Walter, Fisher Stevens, Janet Jones

Synopsis: Set in 1963, The Flamingo Kid finds 18-year-old Brooklynite Matt Dillon, the son of blue-collar Hector Elizondo, getting a taste of the Good Life by joining several of his friends at "El Flamingo", a swank Long Island beach club. Wealthy car salesman Richard Crenna, the uncle of Matt's girl friend Janet Jones Read More

Splash

Actors: Tom Hanks, Daryl Hannah, John Candy, Eugene Levy, Dody Goodman

Synopsis: "I'm in love with a mermaid!" read the opening line of Leonard Maltin's original review for Splash. And with the delightful Darryl Hannah in the lead, who could fault Maltin for his public declaration of ardor? The story begins in 1959, when a young boy is rescued from a watery grave by an Read More

The Pope of Greenwich Village

Actors: Eric Roberts, Mickey Rourke, Daryl Hannah, Geraldine Page, Kenneth McMillan

Synopsis: Set on the streets of New York's Little Italy, this dramatic series of character studies chronicles the lives and relationships between a disparate pair of Italian American cousins. Both of them want to leave the poverty of ghetto life, but each takes a dramatically different route when one of Read More

Still of the Night

Actors: Roy Scheider, Meryl Streep, Jessica Tandy, Joe Grifasi, Sara Botsford

Synopsis: In Still of the Night, a mystery thriller written and directed by Robert Benton, a psychiatrist falls in love with a woman who is suspected of the murder of one of his patients. Dr. Sam Rice (Roy Scheider) is treating a married museum curator. When the man is killed, Sam is visited by his dead Read More

The Gentleman Bandit

Actors: Ralph Waite

Synopsis: Made for television, The Gentleman Bandit stars Ralph Waite as a popular priest whose life is shattered by a case of mistaken identity. Waite is fingered by a witness as a holdup man; during a lineup, several other witnesses confirm this. Despite his protestations, Waite cannot account for his Read More

Honky Tonk Freeway

Actors: Beau Bridges, Hume Cronyn, Beverly D'Angelo, William Devane, George Dzundza

Synopsis: In this involved send-up of two American icons -- the automobile and the tourist trap -- the tiny Florida town of Ticlaw strives desperately for success after it has been denied the most essential of all tourist amenities -- a freeway exit. The insane, and mostly successful, schemes of the mayor (William Devane Read More

Hide in Plain Sight

Actors: James Caan, Jill Eikenberry, Danny Aiello, Robert Viharo, Joe Grifasi

Synopsis: Star James Caan made his directorial debut in the fact-based Hide in Plain Sight. Caan plays a divorced husband and father who comes to visit his ex-wife and children, only to discover that they've evidently disappeared from the face of the earth. Running up against the stonewall tactics of the