Richard Romanus was an American actor who appeared in Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets and provided voices for Ralph Bakshi’s animated films.

Richard Romanus Children

On May 20, 1967, he married Tina Bowman. They had a son named Robert before divorcing in 1980.

Richard Romanus Biography

Richard Romanus was born on February 8, 1943, in Barrem Vermont, and grew up in West Hartford, Connecticut. 

He is renowned for his roles in The Sopranos, Mean Streets, and Heavy Metal, and has died at the age of 80.

Richard Romanus received his bachelor’s in philosophy in 1964 from Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. 

After spending a year in law school, he redirected his career path to become an actor at New York’s Carnegie Hall, where he was trained alongside Lee Strasberg. 

He died at the age of 80. The cause of his death has not been revealed to the public yet.

The tough-guy character actor died at a private hospital in Volos, Greece

, on December 23, as confirmed by his son, Robert Romanus, to the Hollywood Reporter.  The cause of death was not specified. 

Richard Romanus played the character Richard La Penna, Dr Jennifer Melfi’s husband, in four episodes of The Sopranos from 1999 through 2002. 

His other notable roles included Michael Longo in Martin Scorsese‘s Mean Streets in 1973 and the role of cab driver Harry Canyon in Heavy Metal in 1981. 

Romanus’ iconic scene on Mean Streets (1973) with Rober De Niro, who played Johnny Civello, occurred on the next-to-last day of shooting. 

The director Scorsese recalled in Andy Dougan’s 2011 book, Untouchable: Robert De Niro the moment. 

‘Something had happened between Bobby and Richard because the animosity between them in that scene is real, and I played on it,’ he said. 

‘They had gotten on each other’s nerves to the point where I think they really wanted to kill each other. I kept shooting take after take of Bobby yelling all these insults while the crew was getting very upset.’ 

Richard Romanus recalled that De Niro became angry: ‘By laughing I was saving face. 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.’ 

In the television season of 1981-82, he gained a recurring role as Detective Lieutenant Charlie Gunzer on the highly intense ABC crime series ‘Strike Force.’

The show produced by Aaron Spelling also starred Robert Stack but was canceled after just 20 episodes.

Upon relocating to the Greek town of Skiathos with his wife two decades ago, Romanus shifted his focus to writing and published his memoirs, ACT III, in 2011.

The book was short-listed for the International Rubery Book Award a year later.

He also wrote two novels set in the country: Chrysalis in 2011 and Matoula’s Echo in 2014.

The couple produced two Lifetime telefilms, Giving Up the Ghost and If You Believe, earning a nomination for the WGA Award for Original Long Form for the latter. 

He played Richard La Penna, Lorraine Bracco’s ex-husband, later husband again, in four episodes of The Sopranos from 1999–2002.

In 1999 he co-wrote the Christmas film If You Believe along with his wife Anthea Sylbert, which was nominated for a Best Original Screenplay award by the Writers Guild of America.

He had a net worth of $1.3 Million.

His younger brother Robert Romanus is also an actor. They both appeared in the MacGyver episode “The Prodigal” in 1985.

He is the son of dentist Dr. Raymond Romanos and Eileen (née Maloof).

In 1967, he married Tina Bohlmann and welcomed a son before divorcing in 1980. He was later married to Oscar-nominated costume designer Anthea Sylbert in 2004. 

Richard Romanus is survived by his son Robert, his second wife, Oscar-nominated costume designer Anthea Sylbert, and his younger brother Robert Romanus. 

In 2004, Romanus and his wife moved to the Greek island of Skiathos and since then he has focused on writing.

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