The Gentleman Bandit

The Gentleman Bandit (1981)

Based on the real-life ordeal of Baltimore priest Bernard Pagano, who was accused of several armed robberies in the late Seventies.

Date of release
1981-05-06
TMDB
5.7 / 10 (6)
Runtime
1h 36m
Genres
Crime, Drama, TV Movie
Director
Jonathan Kaplan

Casting

Interesting facts

The Gentleman Bandit is a 1981 TV movie directed by Jonathan Kaplan and starring Ralph Waite. It is based on the real story of Reverend Bernard Thomas Pagano.

Production

Until the eve of the first screening, the working title for the film was The Bandit Priest.

The film was based on a true story of the Reverend Bernard Thomas Pagano who was arrested in 1979 for five armed robberies and one attempted robberies. Eventually another man, Ronald W. Clouser, confessed to the crimes.

Writer Milan Stitt spent a week interviewing Pagano, his attorney, friends and parishioners in December 1979. He wrote the script in four days. Pagano, a native of Newark, New Jersey, served five years as a chaplain at the VA hospital in Lyons and East Orange in the 1990s, according to Tom Malek-Jones, the chief chaplain for the facility. Pagano, himself a veteran of the U.S.

Filming took place in New York City and Westchester County. It began on 19 January 1981. Pagano himself acted as technical advisor on the film. Pagano later taught theology at Notre Dame High School in Easton, Pennsylvania in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

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