In Popular Culture
In the movies The Godfather and The Godfather Part II, the consigliere to Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando), and later Don Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), is Tom Hagen (played by Robert Duvall). (In the novel, Tom's predecessor, Genco Abbandando, is briefly featured, dying in a hospital room on the day of Connie's wedding. This scene was filmed for the first movie, and has been included in some television showings.) Hagen is the adopted son of Don Vito Corleone, and doubles as the family's lawyer. At the end of The Godfather, Don Vito's successor and son, Michael, temporarily demotes Hagen within the organization, saying that things could get rough during the family's move to Las Vegas, and he needs a "wartime consigliere." (In an earlier scene, Sonny Corleone, Michael's older brother and acting Don after Vito Corleone's attempted assassination, similarly criticizes Hagen.) Vito Corleone, Michael's father, replaces Hagen at Michael's side as de facto consigliere until his death. Tom is reinstated after Vito's death.
In the television series The Sopranos, Silvio Dante is the consigliere to Tony Soprano.
In The Simpsons episode "Donnie Fatso" Homer explains to an FBI agent that he was at one time Fat Tony's consigliere (see "The Mook, the Chef, the Wife and Her Homer"), but has trouble pronouncing the word and just says "his Robert Duvall"; a reference to Duvall's character in The Godfather series.
In "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story", White Goodman's employee, Me'Shell, is introduced as his consigliere.
Read more about this topic: Consigliere
Famous quotes containing the words popular culture, popular and/or culture:
“Popular culture is seductive; high culture is imperious.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“O, popular applause! what heart of man
Is proof against thy sweet, seducing charms?”
—William Cowper (1731–1800)
“Both cultures encourage innovation and experimentation, but are likely to reject the innovator if his innovation is not accepted by audiences. High culture experiments that are rejected by audiences in the creator’s lifetime may, however, become classics in another era, whereas popular culture experiments are forgotten if not immediately successful. Even so, in both cultures innovation is rare, although in high culture it is celebrated and in popular culture it is taken for granted.”
—Herbert J. Gans (b. 1927)