| MISSING & DELETED SCENES | |
A summary of missing and deleted scenes. The scene numbers are those given in the early script/screenplay.
SCENE 15 -
GRADE CROSSING ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF NEW YORK. (1933/1968)
(The unfilmed title scene)
TRUCKDRIVER
NOODLES
The TRUCKDRIVER sizes him up. He evidentally passes inspection; the TRUCKDRIVER gives him a nod, and he
climbs into the cab. We hear the sound of an APPROACHING TRAIN, and it whistles past, blocking the view,
an endless freight train loaded with Fords, each one just like the next.
The train keeps passing...but gradually the Fords change from '34 models to those of '68 in blazing pink
and turquoise and emerald green.
And, as if bridging the years, the title of the film fills the screen:
ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA
The train disappears, the rattle fades, and the barriers rise.
But we are no longer looking out over the open countryside. We see instead a canyon of cement high-rises.
Heading the row of cars that face us over the crossing is a '60 Chevvy. The driver is in his sixties
too...grey hair, a scar on his left ear...NOODLES, forty years later.
Where you heading?
Wherever you're going.
SCENE 38 - NOODLES' HOUSE. (1923) Interior. Evening.
NOODLES' family introduced. No food on table.
SCENE 41 - AMUSEMENT PARK. (1923) Exterior. Day.
NOODLES and the gang behaving like normal kids (probably not filmed)
SCENE 42 - STREET (1923) Exterior. Evening.
NOODLES and the gang exhibiting the dark side of growing up on Lower East Side
mugging - knife
SCENES 57 & 58 - MONKEY'S SPEAKEASY. (1923) Exterior. Day.
BUGSY arrested - MAX watches & lets BUGSY know it was down to him.
SCENES 72 & 73 - MAUSOLEUM & RIVERDALE CEMETARY (1968) Interior. Day.
NOODLES talks to director of the Riverdale cemetery (Louise Fletcher)
black limousine
SCENES 82 to 84
AIRPORT AT NEW YORK (1931) Exterior. Day.
AIRPLANE IN FLIGHT (1931) Interior. Day.
AIRPORT IN DETROIT (1931) Exterior. Day.
Airplane trip to VAN LINDEN's Office - diamond robbery (probably not filmed)
SCENE 93 - TURKISH BATH (1968) Interior. Day.
(probably not filmed)
SCENE 100 - LONG ISLAND MANSION (1968) Exterior. Day.
First appearance of a Garbage Truck
SCENE 103 - MAKE-SHIFT BEDROOM IN THE FACTORY (1932) Interior. Day.
SALVY/CHICKEN JOE shooting machine gun at a sheet on a bed
SCENE 106 - SHED IN THE FACTORY (1932) Interior. Day.
CAPTAIN/CHIEF AIELLO. In the movie Aiello has a captain's badge rather than a chief's. In the original script he is a captain and has additional scenes and dialog.
SCENE 114 - THEATER (1932) Interior. Evening.
Noodles watches Deborah on stage
SCENE 115 - STREET BY THE STAGE DOOR (1932) Exterior. Night.
Chauffeur (Milchan) had a longer scene and dialog with NOODLES
SCENE 120 - SPEAKEASY IN 52ND STREET (1932) Interior. Night.
NOODLES meets EVE
SCENE 121 - NOODLES' HOTEL ROOM (1932) Interior. Night.
NOODLES fantasizes that EVE Is DEBORAH - suffers a blackout
SCENE 122 - NOODLES' HOTEL ROOM (1932) Interior. Day/Sunset.
EVE's thank you note (as if signed by DEBORAH)
SCENE 123 - TRAIN STATION: RESTAURANT AND CENTRAL HALL (1932) Night.
DEBORAH waiting for train.
SCENE 133 - HOSPITAL ELEVATOR (1933) Interior. Day.
NOODLES meets EVE again unexpectedly
SCENE 134 - NOODLES' HOTEL ROOM (1933) Interior. Night.
EVE's falsies
SCENE 135 - NOODLES' HOTEL ROOM (1933) Interior. Day.
NOODLES & EVE in bed - MAX & CAROL surprise them - invite them to the beach
SCENE 136 - BEACH AT MIAMI (1933) Exterior. Day.
A lifeguard, having heard of the repeal of Prohibition, digs up a bottle of liquor from the beach and drinks it
SCENES 137 & 138 - REST HOME: GARDEN (1968) Exterior. Day.
REST HOME: PORCH, DININGROOM, HALLWAY (1968) Interior. Day.
CAROL tells NOODLES how EVE died alone.
SCENE 142 - THE BANK (1933) Interior. Day.
NOODLES & MAX check out robbing the Federal Reserve bank (may not have been filmed)
SCENE 148 - THE REST HOME: CAROL'S ROOM (1968) Interior. Evening.
CAROL
NOODLES
CAROL
Max made fools of us, Noodles. He set a trap, and we both walked right into it.
He wanted to die, I told
you he was sick. But he didn't want to end up in the nut house. He wanted to die on the job, with a gun
in his hand. So he gradually got us to think about turning him in. You and me.
When the cops stopped the
truck, he started shooting. There was no need to shoot. It was his way of killing himself.
What about Patsy...and Cockeye?
He didn't give a shit about them. But he wanted you to stay alive. He didn't want you involved in the
suicide.
SCENE 149 - THEATER (1968) Interior. Night.
NOODLES watching DEBORAH as Cleopatra with a snake.
SCENE 154 - SENATOR BAILEY'S STUDY (1968) Interior. Evening.
Discussion between MAX and JIMMY during which JIMMY persuades Max to sign some legal documents and
suggests that MAX should arrange his own demise.
The early script/screenplay can be downloaded from:
http://msb247.awardspace.com/docs/once.rtf (rtf file)
http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/Once_Upon_A_Time_In_America.pdf (pdf version)
The actual dialog from the movie and some scene details:
http://msb247.awardspace.com/docs/film.txt
Another scene which should be mentioned is the "underwater cemetery" idea which some say was inspired by a tale of Harry Grey's concerning how he had once eluded the mob by driving his car into the Hudson river and pretending to kill himself. The camera could follow the driver of the car as he plummets underwater and dwell upon the wrecks lining the river bottom, modern sports cars and a slow dissolve to antique cars.
According to Frayling, initially whenever Leone was discussing the project to prospective backers, he would
begin with the following scene. Two men have dragged a heavy corpse to the edge of a wharf at night. The
feet of the corpse are set in concrete - he is the victim of a gangland execution.
The camera follows the
corpse as it sinks to the bottom of the river. There we see other corpses: men chained to cars; women
still wearing jewels. Then the camera travels through a sewer to another underwater cemetery - this time
with more impoverished-looking corpses: one tied to a cart; another in rags. Clearly the bottom of the
river has neighborhoods just like New York. Finally the camera rises to the surface again and reveals the
Statue Of Liberty, reflected in the moonlight.
Title: Once Upon A Time in America
An adapted version of this scene was used in the opening of 99 and 44/100% Dead (1974) and the original idea was dropped.
According to Ernesto Gastaldi, Leone gave him a copy of The Hoods and introduced him to Grey, who
looked like Frank Sinatra. Gastaldi was especially taken with Grey's tale of being chased by the mob and
driving his car into the Hudson River and came up with the idea of the camera following the car and viewing
car wrecks lining the bottom of the river and a time transition.
Leone tells it a little differently claiming that he wrote the scene with American screenwriter Robert
Dillon who immediately afterwards practically stole the whole of the first part by giving it to 99 and
44/100% Dead... which had at the beginning the sequence Leone wanted to make, a cemetery under the water
of the Hudson River.
Some screencaps from John Frankenheimer's 99 and 44/100% Dead (1974)
A clip has been uploaded it to YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2tGUVaPMc4
It may not have been particularly suitable for Once Upon A Time In America but it would have been different with Morricone music and Leone would have undoubtedly made a better job of this scene.
The video case of 99 and
44/100% Dead says:
An amusing and thrilling send-up of the American gangster movie starring Richard Harris, Edmond O'Brien
(last film), Ann Turkel, Chuck Connors and Bradford Dillman. A unique movie that blends the James Bond
type of thriller with the Matt Helm kind of film and emerges with a cynical and pleasing style of its
own. Music by Henry Mancini.
There's tongue in cheek narration and voiceovers, cheesy music and apart from
the opening and some comic moments it's not a very good movie.
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