By Jeanne Sager
CALLICOON –April 29, 2002— The “Sopranos” were singing a different tune Sunday night.
The stars of the hit HBO show left their mob mentality behind for a trip to the Villa Roma Resort in Callicoon to raise money for St. Peter’s Regional Catholic School in Liberty.
The stars were the primary draw to Sunday’s St. Peter’s Variety Show, which also starred comedians Frankie Pace and Jack Fontana and musical performers Frank Tenalgia and Larry Chance and the Earls.
Most made the three hour trip up from New York City just for the variety show.
“It’s a good cause – the Catholic church,” explained Federico Castelluccio, who plays Furio Giunta on The Sopranos.
Castelluccio grew up in Patterson, NJ attending the Roman Catholic church, even serving as an altar boy.
“Imagine that,” he laughed, “from altar boy to hitman.”
When he and Vincent Pastore who plays Big Pussy on the show got a call from fellow Soprano’s star Tony Darrow, they jumped at a chance to help out a good cause.
Darrow has been coming to Sullivan County for 40 years – first as a performer in the area’s resorts and now as a Kiamesha Lake resident.
He and wife Christine send their son to St. Peter’s, and Darrow has seen the school’s need.
Sunday’s event raised more than $30,000, Darrow said, drawing more than 800 people to enjoy the acts and get a picture with the Sopranos stars.
That tally doesn’t even include the sale of raffle tickets for some high ticket items, including business class airline tickets to anywhere in the continental United States, and Movado and Swiss Army watches.
“This is more successful than I ever though it would be,” Darrow noted. “But this is a wonderful school – it’s the only Catholic school in Sullivan County.”
The funds will be donated to the PTO at St. Peter’s, Darrow said, not to the archdiocese.
The PTO will then be able to use the money to make improvements throughout the school, purchasing desks, computers, toys for the pre-kindergartners or whatever teachers need.
Darrow called in a lot of favors for the show, he said, joking with the crowd that he was “going to be obligated to people for the rest of my life.”
But the event was well worth it, he noted.
“I’d just really like to thank all the people who came,” he noted.
Pace, a comedian who has appeared on MTV and other high profile settings, has been to the Villa Roma before and performed throughout Sullivan County.
And when he got a call from Darrow, he knew he’d have to stop by.
“Tony’s an old friend,” Pace said. “I’d do anything for him.”
“Tony’s such a giving person,” Castelluccio added. “And we like to support good causes.”