Two Family House 2000

An unseen narrator reminisces about the year 1956, in the quaint Elm Park neighborhood of Staten Island, New York, focusing on one ambitious Italian man named Buddy Visalo. With aspirations akin to a Ralph Kramdenesque dreamer, Buddy yearns to be a crooner. A decade earlier, he nearly got his big break with Arthur Godfrey during a USO performance while serving in the military. However, his fiancée, Estelle, posed a challenging ultimatum: > “Who’s it gonna be, Buddy, Arthur Godfrey or me?” In a choice that haunts him for years to come, Buddy opts for Estelle, which leads him down a tumultuous path of various schemes to achieve success. His mantra is simple yet powerful: “I just wanna be somebody!”

Determined to carve out his own space, Buddy decides to purchase a run-down two-family house located in the Irish area of town. His plan is to live upstairs with his wife Estelle and operate a bar on the ground floor, where he could indulge in his passion for music, singing along to a jukebox featuring “Music Minus One.” Unfortunately, Estelle is skeptical of Buddy’s ambitions; she desires a reliable and conventional blue-collar husband who will not draw attention to himself, consistently undermining his plans at every turn.

To his dismay, Buddy finds that the upstairs tenants, Jim O’Neary—a belligerent drunk—and his very pregnant wife, Mary, have no intention of vacating the premises, and they refuse to pay rent. When their baby is finally born, it’s revealed that the child is of African descent, making the wayward Irish husband slink away in shame, fully aware that he is not the biological father. In an act of conscience, Buddy evicts Mary and her newborn, but he soon feels the weight of guilt and takes it upon himself to find her a new apartment while she navigates the adoption process.

The story weaves together themes of Estelle’s doubts, the narrow-mindedness and low aspirations of Buddy’s circle, the vibrant spirit of the Irish girl, Buddy’s enduring dreams, racial prejudice, and the ultimate fate of the child, presenting an engaging narrative filled with genuine chemistry among the characters. The tale encapsulates a message reminiscent of Joseph Campbell’s teachings: “Follow your bliss.”