The Untouchables (TV Series) The Artichoke King (1959) User Reviews

Gangsters Do Themselves In

[ccthemovieman-1 · 8/10 · 8 August 2007]

Jack Weston plays a slob-like thug nicknamed "The Artichoke King" who is terrorizing the produce industry in New York City. In town for a brief stay, Elliott and the boys decide to see if they can get this sick murderer before he causes more harm.

This was an interesting episode thanks to a number of facts presented about how gangsters operated back in the era, such as how the largest flowers sent to the funeral almost always indicated who killed the fellow mobster. That's what this story winds up being about: rivalry inside the gang in which "Ciro Terranova" (Weston) has a subordinate "Frankie Yale" knocked off after the latter "becomes too big for his britches." Ness pits one gangster after another until they incriminate themselves..

There are other good guest stars in here, such as Mike Mazurki, Al Ruscio, Jerry Paris and others, and the photography is excellent, too. I had no idea these "The Untouchables" TV shows were so well-filmed until this DVD came out. This was solid camera-work done on these shows.

Terranova's gotta make better friends....

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 12 December 2015]

Ciro Terranova (Jack Weston) is the guest nasty in this installment of "The Untouchables". Terranova has made his fortune an odd way...by monopolizing the artichoke (?) business. Actually, despite the title, Terranova also controlled the rest of the produce business. Using muscle and killings, he's able to charge as much as he wants and the ability of mankind to enjoy artichokes in peace is at stake...so Elliot Ness springs into action. However, first Terranova has to deal with one of his employees. Frankie (Al Ruscio) is a killer...and he thinks he deserves a piece of the action...or else. The fact that Frankie would try to muscle in on his boss would indicate that he's soon to assume room temperature. Now when Frankie no longer is a problem for Terranova, you'd assume things would be just peachy. But unfortunately, Terranova's problems go from bad to worse as Ness and his men watch the thugs tear each other to pieces.

This is a very good and tense episode--even though in reality Ness and his men didn't have to do very much! It's a big relief following a horrible episode just before this. Well worth your time.

Barely housebroken

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 8 June 2012]

The omnipresent Untouchables are working on every gangster case in the country according to the television when in actuality they never ventured much beyond their prime location of Chicago. Here they are involved in trying to take down Ciro Terranova the self styled artichoke king.

From gangland lore Terranova was just like the barely housebroken performance we see Jack Weston give with his doormat of a wife Meg Wylie. What's not true is that Frankie Yale as played by Al Ruscio never worked for Terranova, but he did try muscling in on the wholesale produce beat and he got killed and the largest gangster funeral in New York was his. Some say it rivaled those in Chicago.

Two true incidents of the robbery at the Roman Gardens and the death of Frankie Yale are worked into the plot. Neither in real life had anything to do with the other.

Nice to see that The Untouchables were on the job.