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Wojtowicz's story was used as the basis for the film Dog Day Afternoon (released in 1975), starring Al Pacino as Wojtowicz (called "Sonny Wortzik" in the film) and John Cazale, one of Pacino's co-stars in The Godfather, as Naturile.
On August 22, 1972, first-time crook Sonny Wortzik, and his friends Salvatore "Sal" Naturile and Stevie attempt to rob the First Brooklyn Savings Bank. The plan immediately goes awry when Stevie loses his nerve and flees.
- Who Was John Wojtowicz?
- An Odd Robbery and The Hostage Situation That Followed
- The Aftermath of John Wojtowicz’S Heist and The Film It Inspired
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John Wojtowicz, born in New York City in 1945, was leading a basically “normal” life in the late 1960s. After graduating high school and serving in Vietnam, he returned home and began working for Chase Manhattan Bank, where he struck up a relationship with a coworker named Carmen Bifulco. The pair married in 1967, but Wojtowicz had been keeping a s...
Eager to get the money for Eden’s gender-reassignment surgery (although, according to the BBC, some claim that John Wojtowicz actually carried out the robbery to pay back money he’d borrowed from the Mafia), Wojtowicz soon put together a team that would help him rob a bank. He recruited Bobby Westenberg and Salvatore Naturile (both of whom he’d met...
Wojtowicz was sentenced to 20 years in prison but only wound up serving five and was released in 1978. While in prison, he actually was able to see Dog Day Afternoon and take in the lead performance of Al Pacino, who had, of course, also starred in The Godfather, which Wojtowicz had watched the day of the robbery. The warden initially objected to h...
John Wojtowicz was a gay activist who robbed a bank in 1972 to pay for his partner's gender-reassignment surgery. His botched heist and 14-hour standoff with police inspired the classic film 'Dog Day Afternoon'.
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Jan 25, 2024 · Sonny Wortzik was the main character of the 1975 film based on a 1972 bank robbery in Brooklyn. He was a complex and humanizing figure who had multiple motivations, volatile emotions, and a partner who wanted to transition.
Apr 5, 2022 · Sonny Wortzik was the alias of John Wojtowicz, a gay activist who robbed a bank in 1972 with his partner Sal Naturile. The film "Dog Day Afternoon" starring Al Pacino dramatized the heist and the hostage crisis that ensued.
Oct 11, 2022 · John Wojtowicz was a Vietnam vet who robbed a bank in Brooklyn in 1972 to get money for his transgender lover's surgery. His story was turned into a classic film starring Al Pacino, but he never got his happy ending.
Aug 4, 2014 · And when Al Pacino, playing the fictional bank robber Sonny Wortzik, dictated his will, he told a remarkably unfazed teller that he was leaving a $2,700 bequest to pay for a sex-change...
