Movies and Malice Are Now Playing

Eight dark short stories all with two things in common – Movies and Malice!

Available at Amazon. Click here!

  Below is the Introduction from the book!

It’s not surprising that I have written a collection of short stories that fall into a theme about movies. I’ve loved movies since I was young.

    I was born in New York City, which is one of the great places to live if you love movies.

   Back in those days, New York City television played an essential part in my movie development. New York TV was a treasure trove, a repertory theater filled with old films only with commercials. There was The Early Show, The Late Show, The Big Preview, The 4:30 Movie, The Late Movie, Five Star Movie, Chiller Theater, Picture for a Sunday Afternoon, Creature Features, and the best of all, Million Dollar Movie.

Though the timing of the editing was sometimes drastic and haphazard, you were exposed to many movies that otherwise would have been buried in the studio vaults and never seen.

   Many of the films Million Dollar Movie presented were from the RKO General vaults and was on every day. Each week MDM played the same movie sixteen times. Twice daily during the week and three times on weekends (when baseball was not in season). Its opening anthem was Tara’s Theme from Gone with the Wind (1939). I drove my mother crazy watching King Kong (1933) one week, Mighty Joe Young (1949) the next, soon followed by Godzilla (1956).   

   Television was also my introduction to the gangster/crime films I love, particularly the Warner Brothers flicks with its cadre of underworld stars: James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, George Raft, and so many others. The first time I went to a movie theater on my own,

   I saw Baby Face Nelson with Mickey Rooney. The theater was the Loew’s Commodore (later to become the Fillmore East). The Commodore was located a few blocks from where we lived. All this activity led to my life of cinematic crime! 

   When I began writing, it seemed like a natural extension to write the type of stories I liked to watch and read. One of my earliest tales, The Green Light (a revised version is included here), was film-related. More recently, while working on my next short story collection, I realized about half of my new stories involved a movie theme. I soon had enough stories to put a book together with a movie-related theme. Out of this came the book you are reading, The Late Show and Other Tales of Celluloid Malice.    Of the eight stories included six are brand new. Two were previously published; the aforementioned, The Green Light (initially appeared in Murder with a Twist which is no longer available.). Finally, there is Benny and Slaughter originally included in Bitter Ends. I took the liberty of including it so that this collection of film-related themed tales is complete. Plus, I like the story and hope it will find new readers. I hope you enjoy it.


My Father Moves Mountains

One of my photographs is featured in a new documentary by filmmaker Andria Litto. MY FATHER MOVES MOUNTAINS tells the story of agent and producer George Litto who in the early 1960s represented several of the Hollywood 10 and put them back to work under their own names for the first time since being blacklisted. As director/wiriter Andria Litto writes A profile in courage, integrity of a great supporter of the “artistic rebels with a cause” of Hollywood.

George Litto’s films as a producer include “Dressed to Kill, Blow Out, Obssession, Thieves Like Us and Night Game.

My Latest Five Star Review for TRANSGRESSIONS

“Transgressions” is a masterfully–written collection dripping with delicious irony!

Once again, former Brooklynite John Greco has treated his readers to hard-hitting tales dripping with delicious irony, comeuppance, violence, and twisted morality. His opening salvo, “The Hitchhiker,” a Hitchcockian tale, plays on the “not everyone is what they appear to be” as a screwdriver becomes a gruesome murder weapon. A drive-in theater playing two Roger Croman classics and a smoking addiction brings a fiery death to the main character in “Emily Has Risen.” In another story, a car plunges off a bridge, and an Officer and a girl are found drowned, all with a delicious twist of irony.

One of Greco’s best stories is “Knock Knock Knock,” a fabulous Edgar Allan Poe/Fargo hybrid, in which the wood-chipper in the latter envisioned. One might think of Boris Karloff’s Thriller “A Good Imagination” in “The Anniversary,” where the wife is smothered with a pillow, and an alligator appears. “Dream Lover, partially set in Anton’s Trattoria and involving a meal scam, will have some of us craving gnocchi and broccoli rabe.

Greco’s love for felines shines through in ‘The Orange Tabby,’ a delightful story with a rare happy ending. This heartwarming tale will leave readers with a sense of warmth and connection.

“The Librarian” features Greco’s excellent knowledge and appreciation of film noir and James M. Cain. In “Lenny the Lip,” bullets cut down Joey’s Barber Shop customers. My favorite of the 30 stories is “Family Tradition,” which I consider Greco’s descriptive writing masterpiece in the distinguished batch. Moon Lake is the setting, and the finding of Corrine’s body recalls the Tim Hunter film “River’s Edge.”

Greco is a master of dialogue and end-of-your-seat suspense. This collection could not be more strongly recommended!

Order here!

Halloween Night

HALLOWEEN NIGHT is now available as a fine art print, coffee mug, clothing apparel, stationary, greeting cards, tote bag, jigsaw puzzle and more. Click on the link below.

https://fineartamerica.com/featured/halloween-night-john-greco.html

The Woman in the Red Dress – A Short Story

Check out my latest short story, THE WOMAN IN THE RED DRESS, a free read. Just click here!

Stop the Insanity!

Photo by Douglas R. Clifford (Tampa Bay Times)

Sometimes people care. Recently here in the Sunshine State Gov. Ron DeSantis and his cohorts at the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) are proposing to build golf courses, pickleball courts and hotels in Florida state parks. This would be a violation of public trust, a wasteful use of public funds and most importantly a full-blown attack on the beauty of nature and the animals who call it home.

This was brought to light recently thanks to Tampa Bay Times reporter Max Chesnes. There is much irony to fact that these plans were developed by the FDEP.

Protests have been mounting and hopefully will continue until the folks at the FDEP and the Gov. give up on this insane attack on nature and the people of Florida.  

Publication Day

TRANSGESSIONS, my latest collection of short stories is out now as an eBook and paperback. You can order your copy here. If you like it please consider leaving a review on Amazon and Goodreads.