Russo claims that he started a fledgling career in organized crime working as an errand boy and mob associate for Frank Costello[1] as an adolescent but later abandoned the dangerous and volatile lifestyle of organized crime. The Staten Island MafiosoTommy Bilotti was best man at Russo's wedding.[4]
Since the beginning of his acting career, Russo owned a Las Vegas restaurant called Gianni Russo's State Street at 2570 State Street in the Commercial Center (closed in 1988), and defeated 23 federal criminal indictments on a variety of charges stemming from alleged organized crime associations.[1]
In 1988, Russo killed a man inside the Las Vegas nightclub. When he tried to intervene to stop a man from harassing a female patron, the man stabbed him with a broken champagne bottle. Russo, a legal-carry owner, pulled his gun and shot him in the head. The man was a 30-year-old Cuban national. Russo was not charged with the killing because it was ruled a justifiable homicide by the Nevada District Attorney's Office.[5]
Russo is also a singer. In 2004, he released a CD called Reflections that pays homage to Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra.
Russo owns a wine brand, Gianni Russo Wines, which debuted in 2009.[6]
In 2019, he published his memoir, Hollywood Godfather: My Life in the Movies and the Mob.[7]
