Still from Thom Andersen’s film “The Tony Longo Trilogy” (2014)
LOS ANGELES — “Who is Tony Longo?” my editor inquired, after I pitched her on this piece about Thom Andersen’s new short film “The Tony Longo Trilogy” (2014). It makes sense that Andersen, the director of Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003), which discusses how the city is portrayed on film, would fixate on a specific character type or actor, in this case a somewhat obscure one. The truth is that I, too, did not know who Tony Longo was until I watched Andersen’s piece at the Echo Park Film Center as part of the New Works Salon, which also included a selection of short films and video by Dana Berman Duff, Laida Lertxundi, Reza Monahan, Luciano Piazza, and Juan Daniel F. Molero.
Tony Longo is probably not a name that the average American moviegoer would recall, but his is a face they would likely recognize. A character actor who typically played big, dumb body or security guards in 1990s action films, Longo has a body type that fits the part (although he’s too much of a softie, according to the film’s synopsis). Longo is not incredibly recognizable or memorable. Andersen’s parody/tribute puts the face to the name. Kind of.
Read the full story on Hyperallergic: http://hyperallergic.com/153847/a-character-actor-gets-a-trilogy-of-his-own/
