‘The Sopranos’ Actor Richard Romanus Passes Away In Greece

He was 80. He died December 23 in a hospital in Volos, Greece, his son, Robert Romanus, reports People magazine.

No cause of death was given. Romanus was known for his tough-guy roles including Michael Longo in 1973’s ‘Mean Streets’. In the Martin Scorsese-directed crime drama, Romanus played a loan shark who gets into a memorable confrontation with Johnny Civello (Robert De Niro).

Scorsese, 81, recalled the iconic bar scene in Andy Dougan's Untouchable: Robert De Niro, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "Something had happened between Bobby and Richard because the animosity between them in that scene is real, and I played on it. They had gotten on each other’s nerves to the point where I think they really wanted to kill each other,” the writer-director recalled in the 2011 biography.

“I kept shooting take after take of Bobby yelling all these insults while the crew was getting very upset,” he added. According to Romanus, De Niro, 80, was upset with him because he saw him laugh. “By laughing I was saving face,” he said. “He thought I should be fuming, but he had no control over my reactions. Sometimes the reaction you get from your acting partner is not the one you want.”

“Then you simply have to react to that. But in this scene I laughed organically. I thought Bobby was very funny when he was doing that stuff. And he looked ridiculous,” he added.

As per People, Romanus also appeared in three episodes of another iconic crime drama, The Sopranos, as the estranged husband of Dr. Jennifer Melfi, Tony Soprano’s psychiatrist, from 1999 to 2002.

He also starred in several made-for-TV movies including ‘Night Drive’, ‘Gold of the Amazon Women’, ‘More Than Murder’ and ‘Ghost of a Chance’. His final role was Ben Ishak in 2003’s ‘The Young Black Stallion’, a prequel to the 1979 Disney classic ‘The Black Stallion’.