4 | APRIL 1 - 7, 2022 | WORCESTERMAGAZINE.COM
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Worcester’s Anthony Molinari gets fi rst lead role in ‘The Last Deal’ Richard Duckett Worcester Telegram & Gazette USA TODAY NETWORK
The new independent action crime drama fi lm “The Last Deal” represents a fi rst for Worcester native Anthony Molinari. The former St. Peter-Marian High School football star and preschool and elementary school teacher left Worcester to try his luck as a stuntman in Hollywood just over 20 years ago. He is now the lead actor in a movie for the fi rst time at the age of 47. “This is my fi rst lead role in a feature fi lm. It’s a new experience, one never to forget, but very exciting,” said Molinari, who lives in Los Angeles with his wife and three children. Molinari made an impression with “The Last Deal” writer and director Jonathan Salemi from the start. “He was absolutely amazing. I couldn’t have gotten a better actor,” Salemi said. “He was like my Tom Brady. He delivered my message to the rest of the cast.” In “The Last Deal,” Molinari plays Vince, a long-time marijuana dealer in Los Angeles facing the prospect of recreational marijuana sales becoming legal in L.A. in 2018. Vince tries to pull off one last big underground marijuana deal before getting squeezed out of business. The fi lm also stars Sala Baker, Jeffri Lauren, Mister Fitzgerald and Mike Ferguson, “It has all the action elements. It’s nonstop all the time. He’s (Vince) up against a series of obstacles,” Salemi said. “The Last Deal” will have its premiere at 9 p.m. April 15 at AMC Theatre, 175 Tremont St., Boston, as part of the Boston International Film Festival. Molinari and Salemi, who is originally from Revere and now also lives in the Los Angeles area, both intend to be on
Worcester native Anthony Molinari stars in “The Last Deal.” PROMOTIONAL PHOTO
hand for the screening. That will also give Molinari a chance to come back to Worcester for a visit, something he said he tries to do often. He grew up up on a dead end road just off Burncoat Street. His parents, older sister and younger brother all still live in the Worcester area, he said. Molinari hasn’t forgotten where he’s from, and neither has his accent. “He still has that accent, so that’s the character. It made it nice. Like a a working guy,” Salemi said of Molinari’s Vince.
“Thank God Jonathan took a risk. It was such an amazing leaning experience,” Molinari said. Salemi was looking for an “action actor” to play the role of Vince — someone who can act and do his own stunts. There are a lot of scenes “running, punching and falling. I knew I couldn’t aff ord an actor without stunt experience,” Salemi said. Salemi’s stunt coordinator, Carl Ciarfalio, a veteran in the business, knew Molinari and mentioned his name.
Salemi and Molinari spoke to each other, Molinari auditioned, and “a couple of weeks later I got a call (where they) off ered me the part,” Molinari said. “From there it kind of blossomed into a relationship that was a great one for me, anyway. I had a lot of fun working with him (Salemi).” The fi lm was shot in August 2020, at a time when jobs were scarce because of the pandemic. “He (Salemi) was able to go out and get an elite crew because no one was working,” Molinari said. “Hard as it was going through the pandemic, this was a blessing in the darkness. We all went out and did it together, which was a lot of fun,” Molinari said. At the former St. Peter-Marian Junior-High School (now St. Paul Diocesan Junior-Senior High School), Molinari rushed for a school-record 388 yards in a win as a junior football player, but a knee injury sidelined him for his senior season. He went on to graduate from Bowdoin College in Maine and then taught school for eight years, including in San Francisco and Newport, Rhode Island, and as a special education teacher at the Roosevelt Elementary School in Worcester. “There were only nine of them (students) but it was like having 100 kids,” he recalled with an amused fondness. Still, Molinari felt that he had established a good classroom when one day, Kenny, a student, took exception to having to relate about what he wanted to be when he grew up. “This is stupid,” Kenny told “Mr. M.” Then he asked, “What do I want to be when I grow up?” Molinari said. The truth came out when Molinari mentioned Lee Majors and “The Fall Guy” and being a stuntman. A few days later Kenny gave Mr. M a brochure about See MOLINARI, Page 5
