E109 - Inside The Mafia: Violent Stories & Most Feared Bosses | Michael Franzese

26:23I mean, I was in solitary for almost three years. The feds were really upset with me. They tried to get me to cooperate, and I wouldn't. And they really took vengeance on me. So they did two things, which probably the worst part of being in prison. They put me on diesel therapy. You know what that is? That's when they, you know, the feds have prisons all over the country. So what they do is they take you out in the middle of the night, throw you on some plane that the marshal's confiscated from a drug dealer, and they ship you to another prison. You don't know where you're going. You have no idea how long you're going to be there.

26:56You can't get on the phone. You can't tell your family. They don't tell your family because of security reasons. You get to the new prison. They keep you there for three days, pick you up, put you on a plane again. And they'll run you around. They did that for me for almost eight months. Just ran me ragged. And it's the worst part of being in prison because you never get settled. You can't get a visit. It's hard to get on a phone. And they put you in solitary when you're there. So, I mean, they ran me there for about eight months, and then they put me in a hole for almost three years. This was because they were trying to make you crack.

27:28Yeah. Yeah, they were pretty upset with me. So that was tough, no doubt about it. Solitary is rough, especially for that length of time. But when you're in the yard, it's fine. You know, you do your thing. Is this when you found a militant during the study? During solitary, yeah. I mean, my wife and my mother-in-law were very strong Christians, so I obviously respected them for their beliefs, but I wasn't buying into it. But I became a person of faith in solitary. Yeah, I can imagine before prison, you probably weren't going to give that any attention. No, I believed in God, and that's about it, but that was it.

28:12Mm-hmm. So when you come out, what's the first thing that you do? Figure out what I was going to do from that point, because I still had, you know, you don't walk away from that life and just say, hey, I'm done. You know, my boss was very upset with me because number one, you know, I cut out. I was giving them$2 million a week. And that ended when I left. It was really your fault. No, but, well, it wasn't for that that they were mad. They knew that was going down, but by my not coming back, yeah, that was the end of that. So my boss took it very personal. He was very upset with me, and everybody thought I was going to become this major witness against people because when guys leave, that's what they do.

28:59They make a deal with the government. They go into the witness protection program. Next thing you know, they're testifying. But I wasn't doing that. But so they were really upset with me. So I had some things I had to navigate. Yeah, but who's not happy that you didn't snitch? Yeah, but initially they didn't know what was going to happen. Oh, okay. Who walks away? That doesn't happen. He must have made a deal. And of course, I'm telling my father, I said, Dad, don't listen to that. I'm not doing it. I'm not going to hurt anybody. But, you know, then the feds did me really dirty. They put my name on a witness list of trials that were coming up.

29:34They really pressured me. And so they're saying my name on a witness list, but I'm saying, don't believe it. I'm not coming. And it wasn't only this took years because these trials come up. I don't show up. And then I was I did five years. I got out on parole and then they violated my parole. So now I go back into prison. So now everybody's saying, wait a minute. Why would they put him back in jail if he's hurting people? Something's wrong. So then they finally, OK, he's not. But he's not allowed to walk away anyway. You know, so, I mean, I had it both ways. everybody was just like what the hell's going on yeah what's going on what is this guy doing you know and uh you know it was it was it was a tough time that was more stressful than being in person honestly just dealing you know then my father he and i didn't talk for 10 years because he didn't know what was going on you know the feds said came into prison they said hey we got word from an informant you know junior put a hit out on you you're a dead man anyway you know come with us We'll put you in a program.

30:33We'll protect you and your family. I said, I don't need you. I don't want the program. I'm not doing that. And so that's when they started pressuring me. You're a dead man anyway. Your father even went against you. He said, he okayed the hit. I said, let me worry about my dad, you know. But my dad, you know, what are you doing? I said, dad, don't listen to these people. I'm not going to hurt anybody, you know. But even he had questions because he said, something's going wrong here. And I understand. I understand. And, you know, why would they, you know, I understand what they were thinking. So it took a long time to navigate through all of this.

31:09And when I got out, when I was on parole, I mean, I had to move two or three times. You know, the feds did. They're obligated to tell you if they believe your life is in danger. So, you know, I was on parole. I come home one day and there's unmarked cars in front of my house. I said, oh, they're going to lock me up. I go in the house and my wife is crying. But they told her, if your husband doesn't leave this weekend, he's going to be a dead man. We got, there's people out here to kill them. So I told her, don't worry about that. She's crying. I said, all right, pack up. Let's go. So we left for a couple of days, you know.

31:40And. How did the police find out about that? They got informants. Okay. Yeah, the informants tell them everything. Believe me, they know more than you think they know. Yeah, there's so many. This is surprising. So many people are talking to them. It's terrible. It really is. I found out things afterwards that I was stunned that they knew. and you know even guys around me that I thought and I can't pinpoint any one of them but people were talking there's no question about it because they knew things that I was shocked every state has a different type of police because I don't know much about the American police well the feds have the FBI yeah and they're the federal police they go anywhere and everywhere and they're the ones that normally investigate you so you know I always had the FBI on me it was always federal so Uh, how, how did you, how do most people not get the ability to leave that life?

32:35Cause I imagine a lot of people want to, at some point they're like, nah, I'm done. I'm out. I want to, I want to leave it behind. Has anybody that you know of, I mean, obviously apart from yourself, being able to successfully do it? Well, Frank Costello, I don't know if you know his story, but there was a, they tried to kill him. Genovese tried to kill him. And at that point in time, he said, look, I'm done. because he was the boss. Genevieve wanted to take over. He was acting boss, Costello was, for Luciano. And Genevieve wanted to take him out because he wanted to be the boss. So he tried to kill him.

33:07Unbelievable. Guy's walking out of an elevator. Shoot at him point blank, point blank, but somehow just grazed the side of his head. He goes down. They thought he was dead and they left. They only grazed him. So after that, he went and he said, look, I'm done. you know but he was in his late 50s 60s i'm done well they let him go because they didn't want him around anyway they said just don't say i'm done i'm not talking about doing anything so i let him go but uh other than that the only guy that i know that left because he had to leave was joe banano because he uh he just he betrayed and they were going to kill him too um and they said because or a boss will give you the courtesy of leaving New York.

33:53You're not part of us anymore, but if you ever come back here, you're a dead man. So he went out to Arizona. Other than that, I don't know anybody that just walked away. It must be harder the more successful and talented of a businessman you are. If you're making the family more money and you're even making yourself more money, it must be difficult. Because everybody wants you to stay in the game because everybody he wins. Listen, I'll be honest with you. Up until a few years ago, I had guys say, hey, come on back. It's okay. You didn't hurt anybody. I'm done. Yeah. And I don't know these new guys that are there now.

34:29I wouldn't even think of it. Don't get me wrong. But I'm just saying, you know, look, it's like any other organization. You know, if you don't have money, you don't survive. And, you know, people think you come into that life right away, you're making big money. It's just the opposite. You know, you got to pay up. And we had 115 guys in a Colombo family during my time, about 115. Out of the 115, 20 of us were earners. The other guys were just, you know, who had a no-show job, who had a little gambling operation, whatever. But they didn't know how to use the life to benefit them in business. So the guys that are making money, you got to try to protect them because that's how the family survives.

35:07Without money, I don't care who you are, you don't survive. Those guys end up being like the muscle. like do they realize hmm i'm probably like not that good at earning money maybe i could be of some use they were the guys that had to do most of the the work let's put it that way i mean you look you're a captain i was a captain you got to get your hands dirty too but the guys that are you know that are benefiting from the life without them paying back they had to do a lot of work and rightfully so so how did you still upon going from that to doing what you're doing now did was the first thing you started doing social media no i i did not want to do social media at all i mean i i became a speaker don't ask me how that happened but i became a speaker and so i've been speaking for the last 30 years around the world and i wrote a couple of books and um what was the first talk my first talk how did that work well i mean first my first ever talk was uh because the pastor of my church asked me to come and speak to his congregation and i couldn't refuse him because when i was in a hole he used to send me commissary money he would send me books he was really not i hardly knew the guy but he was really nice to me the church was great to my family so he said you know you got a great testimony will you come and give it to the church I didn't even know what he was talking about.

36:34I thought testimony he gave it from a witness stand, right, in trial. So, I mean, I just told people about my life, and it just caught on. And then all the pro athletes, all the pro leagues, Major League Baseball, the NBA, they approached me because they knew I had a big gambling operation. And they said, you know the problem we have in pro sports, because a lot of athletes were gambling with us. I said, yeah, I know the problem. will you come and talk to our athletes about it and teach them how to stay away from it not to get in trouble I said okay I'll do that and turn my life around I'll do some good and so that was in 1996 when I got out of prison I've been doing it ever since I just left the University of Georgia and spoke to the whole football team and told them how guys like me will put you in trouble And I've spoken at over 300 universities, you know, at this point.

37:25So, I mean, and it just caught on. Honestly, I never promoted it. Just it was word of mouth. And it caught on. Because, look, I'm different. You know, when you're different, you have a story, and you can relate. You know, people will want you to come in. You can communicate. Yeah, if you can communicate properly. I mean, it works. And I just got very fortunate that way. and then I started to get involved in business again, here we are. You were the first one or the first major on the pizza business. Yes and no. I mean, I had some things going on, but I really felt a moral and spiritual obligation to continue speaking in the way I was because, to be quite honest, I've had an impact on people.

38:17I really have. You know, when they hear my story and they hear that I've been able to transform my life and that I survived that life, people are encouraged by it. So I felt an obligation and I still feel it. I'll never give that up to go out and be an encouragement to people, especially men. And so I do a lot of that. I've been doing that for 30 years. I've spoken at over 2000 events to this point. And then obviously write a couple of books. That always happens. Right now they're doing a movie on my life. After 20 some odd years, I finally gave a green light to that. And I think it's going to be a good film.

38:54I'm encouraged by what I've seen because in this business, you never know. But I'm encouraged by what I've seen in the team that's working it. And, you know, it was only recently, it was in the last, I started getting involved in a piece of business. Maybe it's been about five years. Because the guy that I'm partners with, I know him for 40 years. He's one of the guys from my former life, but he was pretty much legit and tremendous chef. And we had a couple of restaurants together. He operated them. I just got involved and we sold our restaurants. And I said, what do you want to do now? He said, I want to be in the pizza business.

39:32And I said, Tony, come on. Everybody and their brother's into pizza. What are we going to do differently? And he said, watch, I'll show you. So we went to Italy for six months and he came back with a tremendous formula for pizza. so um and did you both go no he went yeah i mean i visited him but he went and yeah and uh to make a very long story short we uh we have without a doubt the best frozen pizza that you're ever going to taste and now we have these vending machines our pizza comes out of a vending machine the way it comes out of an oven it's that good and now we're putting them in uh markets frozen food markets and then we have i don't want to mention it here yet because it's premature but i'll be making a big announcement i believe about where our peach is going to be offered something that people are going to be very familiar with and that should happen i i believe in the next week or two it's amazing quick interruption guys have you noticed how a lot of guests that i've been speaking to on this podcast have taken the leap and built something meaningful for themselves.

40:37They didn't just think about it or make excuses. They took a risk and they made it happen. I don't want to hear about why you can't do it and why your situation is different. It's exactly why I have created the digital playbook for you. This is a step-by-step guide to you building your online presence, your social media following, and ultimately monetizing that following so you can live a life of freedom, both financially and geographically. I guess what's really powerful about the speaking, going back to that, is not only can you try and inspire people to maybe step away from a bad path that they've chosen, but also the young people who are kind of undecided on which route to go down.

41:19and there's the temptation to go down the evil route, sell drugs, or get into shady business, you can be the one that inspires them to not do that. Yeah. And you know, you know how that impacted me when I was in prison, a lot of young kids came into the system, mostly black kids, the same way, out of the neighborhoods, black kids, Mexican kids. Because, you know, back in New York, we didn't have a lot of Mexicans. I only met Mexicans when I came out here to California. My wife is Mexican. First Mexican I met, I married, right? But in prison out here, there was a lot of them. And these young kids getting in trouble because they were gang-related.

41:59They come in with the feds, mostly drugs. They get 20 years, mandatory minimum sentence. These kids are in their 20s, 20 years. No parole. You got to do 85 % of your time. So they come in. They were attracted to me because, you know, the mob thing is big in there. and I started talking to them and you could write the same script for every one of them. Broken home, no father figure in the house. Mom is normally young, two or three kids trying to do her best. They gravitate to the local gangbanger, local drug dealer before you know it, they're in prison. Something worse. And I used to talk to them, you know, and really I see how they were inspired by me.

42:39And I got, look, I got a heart for kids. I have seven kids. I have seven grandkids. I got a heart for kids. So when I really felt for these kids, I said, man, what chance do they have? You know, they come in a tough neighborhood. They don't have a dad in the house. They're going to make some money to help their mother out. So they get to the street. I get it. And then they see a movie like Goodfellas. Oh, you guys had it all, man. Come on. You had the cars. You had the women. You had the power. You dressed so good. I said, where'd you see that? Well, Goodfellas. I said, did you leave halfway through the movie?

43:10You didn't see the end of the movie. What do you mean? Who went to jail? Who became an informant? Who got killed? How come you didn't see that part? They don't even see that part. They only see all the glamour. So I used to try to tell them, you're going to get used to this because this is where you're going to die, right here. If it's not on the street, you're going to die right here. And I tried to encourage them. So when I got out, I started doing a lot of that. I went to a lot of juvenile halls. I do a lot of men's group. I speak to a lot of young kids. And it's inspirational because look, you got to have credibility with these kids.

43:40You can't be a cop and come in and talk to them. They turn you right off in most cases. But somebody who's been there and done that, then look, everybody looks at the mafia as the biggest gang in the world. And I use that. I said, don't tell me you can't leave the street. I left the biggest gang in the world. Don't tell me you can't do it. We'll tell you how. And so I've been involved in that for 20 some odd years now, you know, and we helped a lot of kids, no doubt. But, uh, I mean, it's just, it's, it's the way things evolve in your life. You don't plan on these things and they just happen, you know, and then you see something is working, you stay with it.

44:17So what would you say to somebody who's in that situation, who was a teenager, broken family, no real, seemingly obvious opportunity, what would you tell them to do? I tell these kids two things, and I believe this, and I think this applies to everybody, but especially to our young people. If you want a good shot in life of getting somewhere, two things very important. Number one, we are who we hang out with. You hang with the wrong crowd. You're not going to fix them. You're going to be influenced by them. You're going to go in the wrong direction. You must surround yourself with the right people.

44:53Number two, who you are accountable to in life is going to direct the path that your life goes down. When I was on the street, I was accountable to my oath, to my boss. I was a criminal. Ended up in jail. Could have gotten killed. Who knows? Now I'm accountable to my God first, my family, people that rely on me, you know, to make sure I stay on the right path. And my life is a lot better, straightened out. So I told him, you got to get these two things right. And if you don't know how to get them right, we'll help you. And anytime I go speak to these kids, the only time I'll talk is if there's a program I can send them to.

45:26Because I personally don't have that program. But I said, look, when I leave these kids, I am going to encourage them. It's what I do. But I can't just leave and give them no place to go. We have to have a program that I can get them involved with, that I believe is credible, and that'll do something for them. You can't tell one of these kids, come out of their life and go back to your neighborhood. Kid's not going to survive. You've got to give them a plan of action. And that's what we do. And it's been successful. We've helped a lot of kids and continue to do that. so but that's what they have to understand who you're accountable to who you hang out with get that right you got a good shot and you spoke about the the movies the ones that they watch and they seemingly see all the glories stuff like oh i want that yeah how how good are the movies at representing the the mob life well listen the greatest two movies ever made in that life were Godfather 1 and 2, no doubt.

46:26They were brilliant. They weren't, they were fictional, you know, but they were brilliantly done, no question about it. But if you want to get authentic movies of that life, you have to go to Goodfellas, very authentic, well-acted, very authentic. I mean, some things weren't exactly accurate, but it's the movies. But the way the life was portrayed was accurate. Donnie Brasco, very accurate. I knew all those guys. Bronx Tale, even though it wasn't so much of a mob movie, the way it was depicted, very, very accurate. Casino, accurate. The best mob movie, the most realistic and the most true to what really happened on the street, was the 1996 HBO Gotti movie with Armando Sante and Anthony Quinn.

47:14Have you seen it? I'm making a list of all these. No, no. Go on YouTube and watch it. Watch it for free. It's on there. Not the recent Gotti with John Travolta. Don't watch that. That was terrible. But the 1996 Gotti with Armand Asante, they wrote that script directly from the surveillance recordings. And Armand was terrific. And there was a scene in there that Anthony Quinn, I got the chills. It was so accurate. It was so realistic. Watch that movie. It was brilliant. So those are good depictions of the life. And, you know, people, these kids look at that and they go, wow. You know, I want to be that.

47:51I want to be involved. You don't blame them, especially if you grew up in a neighborhood. You know, you saw these guys, they had it going on. You said, I want to be that. So I guess with this film that's going to be made about you, you have to be taking a look and making sure that it's actually accurate. So I'm sure if you're not happy with it, they can't just put it out there. Well, first of all, you have to be happy with the team that's doing the film. You know, you have to trust. I don't have total control, but obviously what I say means a lot. Because they want to be as authentic as possible.

48:25I've had so many people approach me for a film that I just dismissed over the years. Just didn't like the vibe. But this is a good team, and the writer has got a good feel for the street. Because I said, look, if I can't write it, if I can't have an authentic movie about my life, why would I do it? It'd be foolish to me. I'd be embarrassed, practically. So I think they're capturing it right. They've been writing the script for about 13 months, and I've been contributing to that as far as sitting down and talking and going through my life. They've read my books. And for the first time, I read the script about a month ago.

49:04And when I read it, I said, okay, let me put it down, and let me read it a second time like it's not me. But you can't do that. You can't. I tried to detach myself, but I couldn't because I just wanted to, is this a good movie? Is this something I'd want to see? I couldn't do that, but I made my notes. And about three weeks ago, we had a sit down here with the production team. And I went through, we went through page for page. And now they're doing a final polish on it. They were very happy with, I was very happy with the script, but there were some things that I thought were a little cheesy. You know, I said, we wouldn't talk like that, you know?

49:41And, you know, this may sound crazy, but I asked them, I said, listen, what was the greatest mob movie ever made? They said, The Godfather. I said, how many curse words were in The Godfather? They said, you can't think of one. They said, no. I said, because there weren't any. I says, every other word here, you're cursing. Why? I said, you're demeaning the characters. If you want the characters to have integrity and stature, why are you demeaning them with every other word out of their mouth? There's a curse. Well, didn't you guys talk like that? I said, some of us did, but not all of us. I said, I'm not saying I never cursed.

50:16Don't get me wrong, but you don't need to put in somebody's face every other word. Took it all out. And it's a better script. It's a better script because if I want you to fear me, I don't have to curse you out. I don't have to say too much. You know, I should get that mentality because that's how my father was. my father said one or two words hey this guy means you have to say it too much you know i never heard my dad swear but what he did i was like whoa exactly he's pissed exactly so so they cleaned that up i i have a very good feeling about it um but i i never get ahead of myself with these things because you never know in this business but so far i'm feeling good they should uh they want to meet with me again in two weeks and if i say this is it and you know script always changes actor comes in well i want to do this but i think it's in at the point where they can start presenting it to cast yeah because that'll be a big thing he was going to be playing you yeah i don't know do you get to have some say in that i i think they would this guy ticks all the boxes but you something about me that like, you know, you know, because the business part of me, I detach myself and I want somebody that can carry a film.

51:34You know, I understand the business, the industry, like somebody said to me, who do you want to play you? I said, Denzel Washington. What? Yeah. Why? Because I know the film will be made with Denzel because you don't know, you know? So yeah. I mean, Leonardo DiCaprio, of course, you know, somebody of that stature, of course, because now you know you have a movie no question these guys make movies so my first answer to them they said who would you want to play you I said whoever can get the film made that's it let's let's let's not make this an exercise let's make it happen so I I'm not really particular with that honestly I know who they want to put I always forget his name I know who they want and he wants to roll terribly uh to hex his name.

52:19I always forget his name. He's a great actor and he looks so much like my father. I'll think of it. And he wants the role. They already spoke to me. He wants it badly. And he'd be great. He'd be terrific. So we'll see. That's exciting, though. Yeah. We'll see. What about the wine business? Wine business? How did that happen? I am really excited about the business. I got to tell you. I knew nothing about... I love wine. Don't get me wrong. I go to Napa, go to Italy, France. We love the wine. but I knew nothing about the business. So this young guy approaches me. He's Armenian. And I met him about six years ago.

52:57Young, he was 19. And we sat down, we had lunch. He emailed me, wanted to come and meet me. He said, Michael, I've been watching you on your podcast. I said, okay. Well, now, actually, I didn't have a podcast. He was just watching me, whatever I was doing. So we sat down for a couple hours, and I really took to this kid. And then two years later, he comes to me, and he said, my family has a winery in Armenia for 25 years. We want to introduce the wine to the United States, and we want you to be the brand. I said, why? Well, the story of wine is a transforming story, how wine goes from a grape to the process becomes wine.

53:36It's transformation. And the story behind the Armenian wine is that when Noah's Ark landed, it landed at the foot of Mount Ararat. that when the flood subsided, the first vineyards in the new civilization were planted in Armenia. Transformation. Your story is transformation, and I really like you. I said, well, let me look into it. So I looked into the wine. I looked into the pricing, obviously tasted the wine. I did a little of my homework on the vineyard, and I really wanted to meet this kid's family because I had found out he had a pizza franchise that was going bankrupt, and they bought it out and turned it into one of the best in all of California.

54:22I said, there's a hardworking family. So I said, let's do it. And that was three years ago. And we had to be very innovative because the wine business is down right now. It's down. It just is. People drinking less wine. I think it's a combination of things. I think people are wanting something new in the industry. The business is down and we're on a skyrocket. Last year at this time, we had 400 locations. Today we have 3 ,500. Put on 3 ,100 locations in 12 months. By the end of the year, we'll have 5 ,000. And we've been very innovative in our approach on how we're selling the wine. We're selling the story.

55:07When I first said to him, I said, listen, everything I do, I make sure people understand I'm approachable. I'm approachable on my YouTube. I'm approachable when I speak. I'm approachable. I don't want to sell a$300 bottle of wine. Our wine is priced great, and for the price, it's a great wine. So anybody can drink it. Anybody can afford it. And so we've really done some innovative things for people to want to try our wine. And once they try it, they like it. And obviously, I've used my social media platforms pretty well, but we've gone above and beyond. And we're in all the major change. We're in Walmart.

55:47I don't know if you're familiar with all of them here in the United States. Those are the big ones, yeah. Costco, Walmart, Albertsons, Kroger, Total Wines, Bedmo, we're in all of them. And the funny thing is you can't get into any of these without a national distributor, right? So we had a national distributor that we went and talked to two years ago, and they wanted to sign us. But I said, Sam, I got a bad feeling about these. I think they're going to sign us and put us on the back shelf. What do they need us for? They're just taking us out of the way. I said, I want to sign with them. He calls me Mr.

56:19Michael. Mr. Michael, we can't get any of these retail outlets unless we have it. So we tried something different. And I'm not going to say how we did it, but we got in to meet with every single wine buyer on every major, major retail chain. And when they said to us, who's your national distributor? I said, we don't have one. I said, but if you take our wine, we'll have a distributor. And we did that one by one. Everybody took us. And then we got the distributor. We did it. went in the back way and now we're expanding and all of the uh because you know they always test you out they'll put you in three stores if they have 3 500 stores they'll put you in three or four or five see how it goes and then you start to expand within the uh the chain and that's what's happening now that's so interesting because i always wondered how how does somebody get into the retailers because that must be the hardest part it's hard very hard with the amount of beverages, you know, that industry is competitive enough as it is.

57:19It's very hard. Trying to get into all the retailers. And then a lot of the time, there's no guarantee that, as you said, they're going to put you at the front of the shelf. Maybe they'll just put you at the back. Yeah. And if you sign a contract with them, you're stuck. So I wouldn't do it. So, but we figured it out. And, you know, the great thing about it now is I'm piggybacking the pizza because now we're in all the major chains for wine to have a relationship with us now we introduce the pizza and the pizza is an easy sell if i don't have any here but if i tasted it if you tasted it you'll say where can i get more yeah it sells itself and the formula we use it's just it's a given so now that we we're in all the major wine chains now i'm just introducing the pizza and that's it so why did i get into the industry number one because i like the challenge and number two i get into it to get out of it.

58:13They're two industries with big exits, big exits. And that was very attractive to me because look, I'm 74 years old. How much more am I going to work? And I look at it this way. I made a lot of money in the gas business, more money than I'll ever need, would have ever needed in my life, but I did it the wrong way. Depends on how you look at it. I don't mind stealing from the government. I'll be honest with you because they, they steal our money all day long, but let's put it, I did it the wrong way. And now I want to do it the right way. Do you think that when you were having a lot of these meetings with these distributors, retailers, a lot of what you would learn from that previous life came into play a little bit.

59:02negotiation. No doubt. No doubt. Let me tell you something. In that life, when you're one of the younger guys, especially, you have a lot of jealousy and envy. You have guys that have been in that life 20, 25 years. I'm 27 years old. I got a jet plane, a helicopter, an automobile dealership. And these guys are 20 years, 25 years on the street. And they don't have anywhere near that. I'm not demeaning them, but they're looking at you. Why is that not me? You don't only have that on the street. You have it in the real world too. There's resentment when you're younger and you're doing well. It's normal.

59:39It's natural. The problem on the street is it's different. The stakes are higher because it becomes envious and people are saying, I want what he has and I don't want him to have it. So what do you have to do? You have to learn how to pacify those people respectfully. Like even though I was a captain in that life, there were soldiers that were there for 20 years. I would make them feel good. You know, hey, I respect you. You've been around longer than I know I have the position, but you've been around. I can probably learn from you. You know, I always made them feel good. You have to treat people good in life.

1:00:16You know, my father taught me something once. I'll never forgot it. It just resonated with me. He says, son, always treat the little people well. Now, when he said little people, he didn't mean it to demean them. It's just the way he talked. He said, the valet Parker, treat him well, smile at him. Don't let him think he's your servant. The waitress, always have a kind word for her. And I watched my dad. He was that way. He said, these are the people that make you strong, not the people on top. They're looking to cut your legs off in this life. He said, treat the little people well. Watch. I used to go to the Copa with my father, Copacabana.

1:00:50You heard of that clue, right? Best club ever, ever, right? Loved it. I met everybody there from Sinatra on down. But I watched how my father treated people and how they treated him. He was a king when he walked in there. King. I mean, Julie Padel was the owner. Loved my dad because he was courteous. He was nice. He knew how to treat people. So it stuck with me. I always try to treat people respectfully, naturally, rightfully, give them a lot of courtesy, make them feel good. And it comes back in big ways. It really has. People have said to me, Michael, you're a brilliant businessman. You've created all this.

1:01:23And I said, no, I'm not. What do you mean? I'm not. I said, this thing's in business. I don't know how to work anything here. You ask me, I'm done. I'm finished. I go broke. I don't know what to do. Right. And I'm not going to learn because I have no interest in it. I'm not a good businessman in that sense, but I had two talents. Number one, I recognize a good opportunity. I was able to read things. Okay. This could work that I don't like. Number two, I knew how to hire the right people to do the job and motivate the hell out of them. So they really worked for me. So I always had this motto, do what you do best, delegate the rest.

1:02:02That's what's worked for me my whole life. Yeah. You know? And so even now, these people that we get in the room with them, you got a half an hour. Two hours later, we're still in the room talking to them, and then we have the deal, you know? And, you know, look, part of it is because they're intrigued by the story. I get it. I understand. Probably don't want to upset you too much. Well, you know, it's part of the package that I've been fortunate to have. Let's put it that way. Look, who would listen to me if I didn't have the mob background package? That's how I got started. I understand. It turned into something good for me in that regard.

1:02:32So you use what is given to you and try to use it as best you can. And that's what's worked for me. And you've got to be innovative in your approach in different things. And networking. I'm not telling you anything you don't know. I always try to – networking has been very good for me. I know guys – oh, this guy, I can't do anything with him now, but who knows? Maybe in the future. And then all of a sudden something pops up. Hey, I remember I met a guy and you can call him up because you left off on good terms. And before you know it, you're doing business together, you know? So it's those things that have worked for me in my life.

1:03:10And yeah, I learned them on the street. No question. Because that was my upbringing. I learned it on the street. And you carry it into this world. Have you had to say no or have you missed out on any potential business deals since coming out? Do you feel that you kind of wanted to get involved in? Yeah. Maybe this is not right. I'd made some stupid moves, honestly, when I came out. I mean, this may sound really stupid, but when I went into prison, my wife, she never drank coffee. Never. She didn't like coffee, right? During my prison term, she started talking to me about Starbucks. Yeah, Starbucks.

1:03:46What the heck is that, right? So when I came out, I said, man, she likes this thing. I got a couple of places. I'm going to buy some stock, right? I'm leery of the stock market because we used to do pump and dump things there. And, you know, I said, I'm not going to do it. Stupid. I was going to put some pretty money in there. I didn't do it. I'd probably be worth$20 million, maybe more right now. Who knows? Just from Starbucks alone. But, you know, some things that I should have done that I didn't do. So how do you count that? And I kicked myself a little bit. Yeah, I should have did that. But, you know, another thing, you know, I created this great musical that we did called The Mob Story in Vegas.

1:04:26He creates it a musical. Yeah, it's called A Mob Story. Rave Reviews. We put it in a hotel downtown, in the Plaza Hotel, back in 2019, right? We had a six-month run there. Did great. And then we're going up to the Strip in 2020. So you know what happens. I make a deal with a big club there to go up on the Strip. I make it in February. in March the whole town closed it down yeah and it was closed down for a year and a half and and uh I lost money because it was a an expensive production and then when it came time to start again when they opened up Vegas they said do you want to do this again I said no they said I lost enough money I got to spend another three four million dollars to put the show back together go through the whole thing because people move on at that point you know dancers and everything.

1:05:22So, I mean, I mean, you couldn't help it. It was a pandemic. I mean, who could have figured something like that out? You know? It's probably a good thing. I've heard less people go to Vegas, right? Absolutely. Yeah. Town is down right now. It's changed. Town was much better when we ran it. No doubt. I'm telling you, you get anybody during that era that knew and they'll tell you the same thing. It's too corporate now. Everything is by the book. It's just no fun. He's trying to suck as much money as possible. Everything is money. It's so expensive nowadays. It's ridiculous. I don't even like to go there anymore, honestly.

1:05:56I just enjoy it. Did you ever own a casino? No, I never. I was buying a casino, and we were going to turn it into a timeshare deal. And then the guy that I bought the Chevrolet dealership from, I had him being the guy that was getting the license. And the dumb guy lies on the application. They didn't give us a license. And, uh, and then I got in trouble right after that. So I pulled the, uh, the, the deal, but I would have owned something right, right next to the, uh, Tropicana. It's called the 20th century. Yeah. I didn't lose money on it because I was able to figure it out, but, uh, I, I really wanted that deal.

1:06:35My mistake put the wrong guy there. Yeah. So, so let's say you get two very good exits with these, these businesses. What are you gonna do after that? I keep saying this and I think I mean it. I don't want to say I've become lazy, but I really like just vacationing and not. I can relate to that. I really like not having to do anything. You know, like right now I have commitments and things that I have to do. I would like not having to do anything, do something if I want to do it. So look, I'm not looking to buy another building. I don't want to start another business. I mean, I'll help my kids out if they have something that they want to do.

1:07:21You know, I'll be charitable with my money. I really mean that. I think that's in me right now. And I do that now anyway. But I don't think I'll do anything. I really don't. I'm not consuming it. I love it too. Do you know what? You talk about stress. Stress, I don't know. anxiety I start to have because when I think I have to leave, I said, oh my God, I got to get on another plane. I think that's a form of anxiety. Like I'm thinking, cause I'm thinking about it in advance and not liking it. To me, that's what I consider anxiety. I just, I just spent any time not looking forward to something. Yes.

1:08:03Yes. So I want to eliminate that in my life, but I mean, I think I'm entitled to it. I'm 74 years old. I mean, I've been working hard. Other than the jail time, I mean, I've worked my entire life, you know, so, and I enjoy it. I enjoy the action. But I think I'm ready to say, okay, enough. Well, you even do all this social media, like it's... It's work. It's a lot of work. Yeah, people think it's not work. It's, you know, it's work. Yeah. And I imagine every time you open your mouth, you have to decide, can I share this story? Can I not share this story? Yeah. It must be so interesting because you, you'll have no doubt stories you have in your head that you can't share.

1:08:44So you have to decide like, okay, we can share this, but we can't share this part. Well, yeah, you know, and unlike some other guys that are on social media that have cooperated with the government and have immunity for crimes that they've committed in their path, I don't have that. You know, they can talk about, some guys talk about murders and stuff like that. I mean, I don't have immunity from anything. so I mean I'm you know I say what I can say and I don't say what I don't think I should say about the life but but you know fortunately on my platform now I've been able to do some other things I have a lot of interviews now that we do because after a while you know you run out of stories you know how it is I mean I've been telling stories for years I tell people I'm not going to make things up you know so you find different areas and and it works I think interviewing other people, that's the good place.

1:09:39That's the easy part, right? Yeah, yeah. Because they use their stories. That's easier to... Yeah. You know, one other thing I want to mention, you know, another thing, I have this platform. I think that, you know, one thing that I have found... How old are you? 35. 35. You're a youngster. You're half my age. One thing I found growing up, I loved the sense of community and family that we had in Brooklyn. I grew up, later on Long Island. But everybody knew everyone. Never locked your windows, locked your doors. I remember my sisters, if they were walking home at midnight, three or four guys walk around and make sure they get right to the door.

1:10:18That sense of family and community is something that is so lacking in this country. And so I created a platform, and it's the Michael Francis family, where we're trying to create that sense of community. We have about 1 ,000 members right now. and we're giving them that sense of community. I created courses on business and negotiation and different strategies that I might use to help people in different ways in their life, both personally and in business. And it's really growing. And what I'm finding, what I'm really thrilled with is they're starting to help each other. They're starting to get involved with one another and it's becoming a real good place.

1:10:58So the only reason I mention it, it's if you can post it, you know, we're trying to grow this. I think it should be a worldwide community. Yeah. Um, I look at it as part of a legacy, hopefully that I can leave behind if this thing works and grows the way, the way I see it. And I'm, I'm very active in it. I jump in, we do Q and A's, we do zoom calls, we're having live events and I'm really happy. I mean, we haven't really pushed it all over the place, but I'm going to start to give it more attention, try to really build this into something I think could be beneficial to people. Yeah. We'll put the link to that in this episode.

1:11:30What type of people do you find joining. All kinds. Yeah. I mean, we had people from corporate America. We had people, blue collar workers. I had one 14 year old kid that was, came on it. I was amazed at how smart this young kid was. We did a Q and A and he got very involved in it. And I said, you got to get some of your friends. If they're as smart as you or not smart as you bring them to this platform because they're going to learn from you and all of us. And he said, I will, you know, so we're attracting a lot of different people. Yeah. I think that's definitely in today's world, there's a lot of guys in particular, whether they be in their late teens or early twenties, that can be a very lonely chapter of your life.

1:12:11Especially if you're trying to, you know, you realize, okay, this group of people who I am hanging out with, they're not going anywhere. They're not doing anything. Like this is where I want to be. I can't hang out with these people anymore. But then you're in this transition period where you can't, those people who you do want to hang out with, you haven't reached the criteria where you can't actually hang out with them because you have to kind of build yourself up a little bit. So that transitional phase can be pretty difficult and pretty lonely. No doubt. So they can't give you a good thing.

1:12:43You know, people don't, I think they don't get it. Life is tough enough when everything is good. Things come out of nowhere. You don't know what's going to happen. When everything is good, when you start to put more baggage on your shoulders to carry around by doing the wrong thing, getting involved with the wrong people, making the mistakes, life becomes very difficult. And I can't tell you how many times I went into a prison and visited with guys that were in their fifties, sixties, and they'll turn around and say, Michael, I don't know. My life is over. I don't even know what I did, you know, and it's gone.

1:13:19And, and it's very, very sad because they say they don't even realize what they're doing to themselves until they reach a point where they finally do, and then they're old. And that's what I tell these young people. I said, you cannot see it right now, but time does go by. And if you keep wasting year after year after year, putting more baggage on your shoulders to carry around, life becomes very difficult. Because like I said, even when everything is good, God forbid you get sick or you're in an accident or your business fails or somebody close to you is gone you know you got to navigate that no matter what but if you make it harder for yourself this becomes a very tough life i had a question about this quote which is on the wall it's who's that by billy graham billy graham yeah becoming a christian is the work of a moment being a christian is the work of a lifetime yeah what does that mean well you you become a Christian by confessing your sins, sincerely confessing your sins to the Lord and accepting Jesus as your Savior.

1:14:26So it takes a moment to do that. It may take a long time to get to that point to do it, but it only takes a moment to do it. Once you are a Christian, you have an obligation for a lifetime. What is your obligation? Well, you don't have to become a preacher, you don't have to sing in the choir, and you don't have to be preaching every day on the street. But Jesus' last command to all of us was to go out and share the good word with all of creation. So you have to live as a Christian so that people see by example who you are. And when you can speak about it, you speak about it. And that's what it means.

1:15:02You have a lifelong responsibility to live your faith. And Billy Graham was the greatest guy that I ever witnessed preach. I mean, you know, one day I was in a small town hotel and I turned on the TV. It was black and white and he was preaching in a stadium in England, in England. I forget what stadium it was. And when he made a call for Christ for people to come down and confess and accept, the whole stadium came down. I couldn't believe it. Everybody in the stadium. And he didn't have a mob story. He was just preaching straight Jesus, but he was so dynamic. And so I was like, wow, this guy's amazing.

1:15:47That's the first time I really watched him preach. And this was on television. And he died in his 90s, but he was probably just the greatest ever. Was that moment for you, I imagine, was in jail? No, I was home. You were home with him? Yeah, I was home. I was actually in some town. I was speaking to someplace. It was a small town. just about 20 years ago. It was a small town and I just happened to turn the television on. I was in black and white with him there. So it caught my attention right away and I listened to him. It was amazing. Yeah, he said, if he was alive today with social media, he would have converted the whole world.

1:16:25That's how effective he was. I'm telling you, it was amazing. I really do wonder if that will happen to me at some point. Because at the moment, it's not that I don't believe, it's just I'm kind of like, I just, believe in being a good person. And obviously when you get in a position of having a bit of following, you have a responsibility to, you know, at least share some value and make the world a better place. Well, that's good. But let me, let me, and I had this conversation with Andrew. I had this conversation. Well, I can't convert you. That's, that's God's deal, but I can talk to you. You know, Andrew was a Christian that converted to Islam.

1:16:59He's now Islam. Andrew Taylor. Yeah, Muslim. Andrew Taylor, yeah. And so I said to him, why, Andrew? You know, I said, I'm not, I just ask him why. I never knock anybody for their faith, unless they're a Satanist, then I'll knock them. What other than that? No. You choose what you choose. But he said, you know, in the Western world, I watch people and they're not, they claim to be Christians, but they're not really Christians. They don't act their faith. And he said, yet as Muslims in Islam, people are very disciplined and they do. And I said, you know, you're right. I noticed that even in prison.

1:17:35Absolutely. I said, but let me ask you a question. Why would you judge a perfect God by his imperfect people? I said, people are not going to get you to heaven. And he said, okay. He thought about it for a minute. I said, Andrew, let me tell you something. This life is very significant, but we're all going to die. We're all going to die. If you believe that there's a heaven in a hell, then you got to get right to get to the right place. I said, now here's how I look at it. It's very good to have a healthy fear of things that are no good for you. I got a very healthy fear of drugs. My sister died of an overdose.

1:18:10My brother was a junkie. I hate anything to do. I have never taken a drug in my life other than prescription antibiotic, aspirin. That's it. I hate drugs. It's good to have a healthy fear of gambling. I saw more guys destroy their their lives for gambling. I'd participate in that by having gambling operations. Alcohol. Guys on the street, you did something wrong because you were drunk, no excuse. You're in more trouble. Why'd you get drunk? I have a healthy fear of going down those paths. I'm in solitary. I got a healthy fear of hell. I said, man, if this is what it's like, 24-7 sitting in a room like this, separated from the people I love, living in somebody else's underwear with some 33-year-old guard telling me what to do, eating garbage food that they send in here and nothing else, but a million times worse, if what I read in scripture is true, I don't want any part of that.

1:19:11So yes, it motivated me to, because I believe there is an eternity. So not only do we got to worry about this life, but eternity is forever, forever. So you got to get yourself right. It's not only being a good person here because, you know, Christians say good people don't get to heaven. Saved people get to heaven. You got to stop thinking about that. I'm not trying to convince you which way to go because if I spend time with you, I may, because it's a responsibility that I have not to impose my faith on you and not to turn you into a Christian, but to share. And then you make your own mind up, but you got to start thinking about where you're going after you get here.

1:19:55I'm 74. I'm thinking about it. Yeah. Well, I've spoken to some very smart, older people on the podcast and And they say it's the best thing you'll ever do. Is what? Finding religion. No question. Look, you know that more people are turning to, more young people now are turning to Christ than ever before. Bible sales are at an all-time high. More men are coming to the Lord than ever before. And the reason? They're trying to find their purpose in life. That's what we're hearing. And I'm very into this. trying to find their purpose. You know, and I tell them, I said, listen, I'm not here to scare you anything else, but you're going to die.

1:20:37That's a fact. And you're going to go somewhere when you're dead. Unless you believe that you just turn into dust and it's all over, then you'll find out later on. But what if you're wrong? What if you're wrong? Doesn't that scare you? It scares the hell out of me, you know, and I'm not, I don't scare easy, but that scares the hell out of me. So, So, and what it doesn't, it doesn't, it motivates you to search for the truth. Because what that did to me, it didn't say, oh, I better become a Christian. I said, no, I got to make sure that's correct also. Because you can't just tell me that. I have to know that it's real.

1:21:14And that's what motivated me to really research. You know, I read, I, if, if I'm, I probably read 35 to 40 books on different faiths when I was in solitary. Because I had my wife send me in. I said, I want to read about Islam. I want to read about Mormonism. I want to read about Hinduism. I want to read about it all. I can help them with time. And I'll make my own decision from that point. And then I was reading the scripture and I had her send me in some Christian books too. Just made the most sense to me. I said, this is real. These others, I don't feel it. Because believe me, if I would have thought, you know, Mormonism was right, I would have come out of there a Mormon.

1:21:53Yeah. Nobody made me become a Christian. This is my own research. So why should somebody start like me, who's thinking about it? Pick up a Bible. The Bible, yes, absolutely. But you also need to be able to interpret scripture. Sometimes they have new translations that are very good. The new international version is very good. But I had it to go deeper. How do I know that the Bible is reliable? I'm very into apologetics, defending my faith. Because first you have to believe it and then you've got to be able to defend it. Because you can't, it's hard to defend something you don't really believe.

1:22:30So I had to really search and believe. So I had them send me books in on apologetics, defending your faith, finding evidence to prove that it was real. And so I absorbed all of that. One of the books that I, one of the authors that I love, you've got to forgive me. My old age shows up when I can't remember a name. And this is so bad because he's a friend of mine. So what do I want to speak to? Wesley Huff. Oh, he's quite big. No. What's his name? Anyway, I'll think of it. But he wrote a series of books. He was an organized crime journalist out of Chicago. Stone atheist. Atheist, right? And hated Christianity.

1:23:18His wife started going to church, and they almost got a divorce over it. And he said to her, I'm going to prove to you I am a journalist. I'm going to do the research, and I'm going to prove to you what an idiot you are. So he told his wife, yeah. So he starts doing his research. He's become probably the strongest Christian that there is out there. Yes. I cannot believe I can't think of his name. I'm so embarrassed. But anyway, I will. And he's a friend of mine. I can't think of his name. He's still in Chicago. about. But anyway, he's written a series of books, a case for Christ, a case for creation, a case for the real God that you really should read.

1:23:55I really mean that because he will provide evidence and you'll take it from there and say, is this reliable or not? And I think you'll come to the same conclusion. Now, I didn't read those books then because he hadn't written them yet, But I recommend these books a lot. But prove it to yourself, because it's hard to believe in something that you don't really know if it's true. Now you say, well, Michael, we've really never seen God. I know, but there's enough evidence that people have. And Scripture is very definite in things. And remember something, too, about Old Testament prophecy. Every prophet that prophesied, every prophecy has been fulfilled so far.

1:24:39There's still those that haven't, but everyone that predicted has come true. A prophet is only a prophet if he's true, if he's accurate, one million percent of the time. If he's ever not accurate, he's not a prophet because God is speaking through him. God can't be inaccurate. it. So, so far, every prophecy has come true that has been prophesied, and there's still more to come, some of them scary. But the evidence is overwhelming. It's overwhelming. It's not even, I don't understand how people don't believe. I really don't. I don't understand it. But again, I have the advantage of doing all the work and research.

1:25:22It's not everybody that has the advantage of spending 29 months and seven days in solitary with nothing else to do. but research. When you think of somebody who came to your 25-year-old self saying these things, what would he have done? What did he just say? Sure. I may not have paid attention. Probably not. I was too involved in everything that I was doing. But now I'm saying I want to shake somebody and say, wake up, man. Eternity is forever. It's scary. It's scary. and look everybody's afraid of death there's no question because it's the unknown but you get a lot more secure when you have pretty strong beliefs based upon evidence do you think well two questions to finish yourself first one what is your what do you feel like your purpose is yeah second of all do you think you'll be forgiven for things that being done in the past Well, number one, I know I have been forgiven because without that, that's the basis of our faith.

1:26:27If you don't believe that Jesus died on the cross for the forgiveness of your sins, then we don't have no faith. I mean, it's a waste of time. So I 100 % believe that. And I believe that I'm sincere. Because look, I know how to pull a scam. But I also know you can't pull a scam on God. So either I'm real or I'm not. If I'm not, there's four words in the Bible that scare the hell out of me. And you probably didn't know. It's in the New Testament. And this was a parable that Jesus talked about. I love that he talked in stories. He talked in parables to make his point. And there was four guys that stood in front of him on Judgment Day.

1:27:14And they said, listen, you know, we drove out demons in your name. We did this in your name. We created miracles in your name, did this and that, and that. And he looked at them and he said these four words, I never knew you. Because everything they did, they did for themselves. They didn't do it for the Lord, for their own gratification. It wasn't about him, it was about them. So every time I get up and speak, listen, I've been up, I'm going to be honest with you, I came down once off the stage and you would have thought I just was the Beatles or something. People are trying to grab at me. I'm really serious when I'm doing ministry.

1:27:48I mean, I put it all out there. And I'll never forget my wife. God bless her. I walk down and she sees me and she says, just remember something. I said, what? She says, you're a lot more blessed than you are good. I said, I got it. In other words, don't get your head swelled. But I always check myself and say, who am I doing this for? Am I doing this for me or am I really doing it because I believe it? And, you know, fortunately, my answer is, no, I'm doing it because this is what I feel my obligation is, you know? And so I believe I've been forgiven and I believe I'm going to heaven. That's the basis of my faith, number one.

1:28:23Number two, my purpose is to continue doing this until I can't do it anymore. Because, look, I'm going to tell you this, and there's no ego involved in this. Look, you go to prison, your ego, if you don't lose your ego there, you're out of your mind. because I've seen the most powerful, the guys that have the power of life and death over you, in one second, hey, he goes, you're dead. And they died in prison answering to some 24-year-old guard that was telling them what to do. If we get full of ourselves and think we got it on, the next minute you could have nothing in this life. So you got to check yourself.

1:28:57So this is nothing about ego, but I will tell you this. I have never had a bad, at 2 ,000 events that I've been at, I've never had a bad event, never. because people are encouraged by the message. And so as long as I see that continuing, why would I stop? Then that's like, it's difficult because you kind of said you want to chill out a little bit. Well, no, I think God will say, okay, you've done a lot. You don't have to be doing this every week. You know, I think I can pick and choose now, but I still have to answer the bell. There's no question until I can't anymore. I mean, Billy Graham did it until he was in his 90s.

1:29:38You know, he was in a wheelchair and he was doing it. So, I mean, you feel an obligation, you know, to those who have been given much, much is expected in return. I've been given my freedom, my life. Do you know what I'm going to give you an example? Fortune, a couple of things. The night I got straightened out, the night I took my oath, there were six of us. I'm the only one alive today. The other five guys were all murdered. We had a big war in our family. A lot of, a bunch of guys got killed. And that happened. 1986, Fortune magazine writes this huge article, 50 biggest and most powerful mob bosses in the country, right?

1:30:14And they featured, it was half the magazine. They featured six of us. I'm one of the six. And then they had a chart with the 50 of us on there, according to rank, wealth, and power. I'm the youngest guy on the list, number 18, right? And I said, how do they make a list like this? They didn't ask for our tax returns. You know, it was just so stupid. Guys on there shouldn't have been. I was ridiculous. But here's what's not stupid about the list. Some 30-odd years later, out of the 50, 48 of them are dead. Number 49 is in prison. I'm the only one alive and free. Only one. So, come on. You think that's an accident?

1:30:50Yeah, that is actually pretty crazy. You think that's an accident? or I have a different purpose in life that's been given to me. One of the most precious things you can have in life is your freedom. You know this. People take your freedom. It's precious. So to be given my freedom and to be given my life, what more can I ask for? I'm blessed. No matter what happens now, I mean, I'm going to be three quarters of a century if I'm here next year. So, yeah. Amazing. I appreciate it. I enjoyed that conversation. Well, thank you. Same here. Where can people find the, wow, you've got a lot going on. You've got the pizza, you've got the wine.

1:31:32Yeah. School community. Yeah. We'll give you all the posts. Franzese Wine, we do direct-to-consumer. Also, we're in markets all over the country. FranzeseWine.com. The pizza, you'll find it in grocery stores everywhere. Hopefully in one major establishment that everybody knows all over the world. that might be happening soon and then we'll have these vending machines that are being placed all over in hotels and everywhere else that you'll be you'll hear about it slices pizza you'll hear about it soon but I'm easy to find I've got my YouTube channel I'm all over social media and hopefully it'll be a movie that's worth seeing in the next the next year or so we'll see thank you thank you very much