The Sopranos star Michael Imperioli revisits the mob world with The History Channel’s American Godfathers: The Five Families. Imperioli serves as narrator and executive producer on the six-hour documentary series premiering on Sunday, August 11, 2024 at 8pm ET/PT.
Part two airs on August 12th, followed by part three on August 13th. The docuseries is based on Selwyn Raab’s Five Families: The Rise, Decline and Resurgence of America’s Most Powerful Mafia Empires, published in 2005.
“American Godfathers: The Five Families traces the extensive history of the Mafia beginning with its early ties to Sicily. In 1931, Charles ‘Lucky’ Luciano, a Sicilian-born gangster, created The Commission which acted as the governing body for the American Mafia and appointed the original ‘New York Five’ – the Bonanno, Gagliano, Luciano, Mangano, and Profaci families,” reads History’s synopsis. “They lived by an honor code or set of rules; the most important was omertá meaning ‘silence.’ For a generation, omertá, the key to the Mafia’s success, kept the families safe from law enforcement and public view as they made millions through wartime, depression, and changes in legislation to seamlessly move from one racket to the next.
Over time, the uniquely American values of greed and celebrity, coupled with the relentless pursuit by federal law enforcement, proved too great a match. From the heyday of Lucky Luciano, the 1963 Valachi hearings and the brutal and public slayings of Albert Anastasia, Joey ‘Crazy Joe’ Gallo, Paul Castellano, and Carmine Galante, to name a few, to the media storm that ensued when Joseph ‘Big Joey’ Massino flipped on his own family in 2005, the history and subsequent breakdown of the code coupled with the ever-changing violent power struggles within each of the five families is vividly chronicled throughout each two-hour episode. Through investigative archival images, footage, audio recordings, and recreation as well as new, candid on-camera interviews with authors including Raab himself, historians, experts, law enforcement, witnesses, and former mafia affiliates, viewers will get an inside look at the inner workings of the most powerful criminal organization of the twentieth century.”
The three-part documentary series is produced by Propagate and the Barnicle Brothers. Executive producers include Propagate’s Ben Silverman, Howard T. Owens, and Chelsea Friedland, and Barnicle Brothers’ Nick Barnicle and Colin Barnicle. The History Channel’s Mary E. Donahue and Zachary Behr also executive produce.
