Ask American Profile 11/23/2008

Q What can you tell me about the actor who plays gangster Ralph Cifaretto on The Sopranos? He’s so good at being bad! I know I’ve seen him before.
—Dee Kinders, Ada, Okla.

Joey Pantoliano, 57, had nose-reduction surgery after seeing himself in his breakthrough role in the 1983 hit movie Risky Business. “I told the doctor I didn’t want to play bad guys the rest of my life,” he says. “I wound up playing bad guys with smaller noses.” His resume includes memorable roles in Running Scared, Midnight Run, The Matrix, La Bamba and the award-winning TV series The Sopranos. Pantoliano is finishing up a documentary, Hope’s Messengers, that he hopes will remove the stigma attached to brain disease. “I’m working to get our brain the same rights as our gall bladder, liver and heart,” he says. The father of four lives in Connecticut with his wife of 14 years, Nancy.

Q After watching the movie Mamma Mia!, I’m wondering if all the actors did their own singing? And was anyone from the group ABBA in the movie?
—Sharlane McDermott, Suisun City, Calif.

Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan and the other stars of Mamma Mia!, the movie musical based on the Broadway hit built around the songs of ABBA, did indeed provide their own vocals on the 22 tunes featured in the film. ABBA founding members Benny Anderson and Björn Ulvaeus make blink-and-you’ll-miss-’em cameo appearances as a piano-playing fisherman during “Dancing Queen” and as a Greek god in the closing number, respectively.

Q What is Debra Messing doing now that Will & Grace is in reruns? Does she have plans to come back to TV?
—Adam Issacs, Centreville, Md.

Messing, who planned to take five years off after Will and Grace before considering another series, changed her mind. She’s back on television in the new USA network series Starter Wife. The project began as a 2007 miniseries—for which Messing, 40, was nominated for an Emmy—and returned for the fall with 10 episodes. “It feels amazing to be on a new show,” she says. Messing was recently on the big screen in The Women, co-starring with Meg Ryan and Annette Bening.

Q Whatever happened to Dick Elliott, who played Mayor Pike on The Andy Griffith Show? He was a good comedic actor. He left the show with no explanation.
—Bob West, Hayesville, N.C.

Elliott played many different parts over the course of 240 movies and dozens of TV shows. But his short, squatty appearance often led to typecasting as blustery, comedic windbags, such as the Mayberry mayor. In the movie It’s a Wonderful Life, he has only one line as the exasperated front-porch neighbor who tells Jimmy Stewart, who’s saying goodnight to Donna Reed, to “go ahead and kiss her!” He died at the age of 75 during production of the second season of The Andy Griffith Show in 1961.

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