Harlem to Hollywood North: Grosso Talks about Santa Claus Routine & Poughkeepsie
It was holiday season in Toronto, and producer Sonny Grosso was celebrating while holding court at Carlo and Adelina’s Place in Mirvish Village. His excellent and hand-picked production crew and cast were deep into filming Night Heat on the streets of Toronto (1985–1989) — the show, whose leads were Scott Hylands and Jeff Wincott, had already won back-to-back Gemini awards for Best Dramatic Series, and for the Most Popular Program Award.
Celebrated former NYPD Det. Grosso had every right to be happy, as he’d brought his “magic sauce” to Canada, creating a must-see show that had become the highest-rated Canadian-produced original series, attracting a million viewers weekly in Canada. Similarly, in its late night slot in the US, Night Heat often topped the Johnny Carson show in key markets like New York and Chicago.
But this night, Sonny Grosso was smelling something else, the homemade “sauce” at Carlo and Adelina’s Place, which he’d say, reminded him of his childhood. He grew up poor in the tough neighborhood of Italian Harlem, where “the smell of rich Sunday sauce mixed with the sounds of Jimmy Roselli, singing ‘Mala Femmena’ — every Italian guy’s anthem back then and a song they used on The Sopranos.”
So, while celebrating the holiday season, Sonny got to talking about Christmas in New York and some of the policing tactics he and his partner Eddie Egan used in real life. One of these tactics got turned into a “real-to-reel” scene in The French Connection movie, the 5-time Oscar-winning crime thriller that helped Grosso segue from decorated real cop to award-winning producer.
An early scene in the movie has Det. “Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman) dressed as Santa Claus, and he and his partner, “Cloudy” Russo (Roy Scheider), roust then chase down a drug dealer. The scene was based on a real-life strategy used by Egan and Grosso, who topped the yearly ranks with the most narcotics arrests in the NYPD.
Sonny explained how they’d go on stakeouts in Bedford-Stuyvesant, but soon figured out drug dealers could easily spot undercover cops, and they’d split the scene before the cops could arrest them. One Christmas, Egan came up with the idea of going in costume, figuring the dealers would never suspect Santa Claus of being a cop. As shown in the film, Egan walked the neighborhood streets as Santa Claus, singing Christmas carols with local kids. When he saw a drug deal going down, he’d sing “Jingle Bells” as a signal to Sonny to move in and make the arrest. The tactic worked beautifully, and they made dozens of Christmas arrests over several years. But the first time Egan pulled this stunt off, is an interesting holiday story in itself.
Remembering his buddy, whom Sonny called the bravest cop he met, Grosso recalled: “There was no 50–50 with Eddie, never. And, there was only one way for a guy like me to go if I had any brains. You didn’t try to outdo Eddie Egan. My attitude was always to try to keep him in tow. He was always doing something. He didn’t tell me beforehand about his ‘Christmas surprise’. One day we go to the garage and take the police unmarked car we used, in case they threw bricks off the roof — so, it wouldn’t be on our own cars. And I’m waiting and waiting and asking the garage guy if he’d seen Eddie. Next thing I knew this guy comes out of the bathroom wearing a Santa Claus suit and I didn’t know who it was. And he’s going ‘Merry Christmas’ and I’m saying, ‘Right, okay, Santa!’ Again, he says, ‘Merry Christmas.’ And I say, ‘Santa, have you been smoking something?’ And he pulls his beard down and it’s Eddie and I go, ‘You freakin’ moron!’
“Then we went out and did that whole routine — everywhere he went on the street, he was giving kids lollipops. Watching everything. When he moved the bell from one hand to the other, that meant that the person he was pointing the bell to, that’s the guy who had the drugs. Then he’d sing ‘Jingle Bells’ and we’d move in for the arrest. So, it worked. But Eddie would come out in the wildest outfits. He was one colorful character.”
By the way, The French Connection director Billy Friedkin filmed another Egan/Grosso strategy at the end of the “Santa Claus” scene in the movie. Doyle, in his Santa outfit, and Russo chase down and trap the dealer with Gene Hackman, as Popeye, shouting out his famous question — “Did you ever pick your feet in Poughkeepsie?”
It was part of the “good cop/bad cop” interrogations by Grosso and Egan, and Friedkin recalled, “Egan and Grosso were a dynamic and clever duo. Sonny would calmly ask a suspect direct questions about his crimes. Then Egan would always butt in and yell unusual questions like the ‘Poughkeepsie’ one. The suspect would get so rattled by Egan’s offbeat questioning that he felt more comfortable answering Grosso’s, thus tending to eventually incriminate himself.”
Happy Holidays from Sonny Grosso in the Great Precinct in the Sky, so check out this hyperlink to that Santa Claus scene from The French Connection, and the movie’s Trailer. Drop in on the Night Heat trailer/music theme. Also, check out Det. Sonny Grosso’s story “Harlem to Hollywood — My Real-to-Reel Life” now discounted for the Holidays, on Amazon, in the United States, and Canada.
