Interview with Joey Pantoliano (Pants)

Q: What is the ìlabyrinthî?
A: The labyrinth is in the center of the label. There are labyrinths all over Europe and the world; and thereís one at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. Itís made of cloth. Itís huge. And people all over the world, when they come to San Francisco they go to Grace Cathedral and they walk the labyrinth. So I was walking the labyrinth -- actually with the Wachowski's and my wife, and their wives. We were there for a film festival, Bound was showing there. And as I was walking it; and I was talking at breakfast about, you know, we need to design the label. I came up with the idea -- ìthis is amazing, this labyrinth, this long journey.î So I thought, ìItís just like a cigar,î and the journey it takes from the time that the seed is planted right to the time that you smoke the cigar. Itís this enormous journey. And I thought, ìWhat a great symbolic meaning for the cigar -- is in the labyrinth.î And thatís why I came up with it. So thatís the labyrinth. The colors, the turquoise and green, were kind of like an accident. I originally wanted to do it with a dark blue and a powder blue. I showed it to Joe Howe and he said, ìYou know, blue doesnít go good with brown.î He said, ìItís not good. You know, on paper it looks great, but it doesnít compliment. You need earth tones.î So I changed it to turquoise, which was my motherís favorite color, and bronze. So weíve got bronze, gold, and dark green. But, I think they came out great, donít you?
Q: Itís awesome, itís amazing. The labels seem to be the thing that people have the most difficulty with.
A: Yeah. Yeah. And I think more people buy cigars based on the label than they do on the cigar itself.
Q: Yeah. Where are these made?
A: Iíll tell you a story about this cigar, and the blend, and how it. . . . Itís a good question and Iím glad you asked. I was going to the Dominican Republic on many trips for the Grand Havana Room with my partner Stan Shuster. We were trying to find diversity, whereas the Pants is a more medium to low-end cigar, I wanted it to be more accessible. Like the Fuente.
Q: Royal Salute?
A: Yeah. Those are the lower-end.
Q: Five dollars or up?
A: Five dollars . . . five dollars . . . . Well this is going to be a little more. Like this is probably a seven dollar cigar. So in talking to Guillermo Leon, he always would give me some cigars that were the family cigars -- that only the family smoked. And I said, ìThese are terrific. Why canít I have this cigar?î He said, ìNo, itís the family cigar.î So, two occasions I kept saying, ìGuillermo, please. Just on a limited basis make this cigar.î And he said, ìNo.î So my wife and I designed the label. Mostly Nancy but I gotta take some credit. But, Nancy designed the label with a woman named Kim Shepherd.
Q: Is she related to your wife?
A: Uh, no. No, actually.
Q: Your wifeís name is Nancy Shepherd.
A: Yeah. Kim, her name is Shepherd too. Go figure. But I ordered fifty thousand labels; and I went back to the Dominican Republic and I said, ìHereís the labels Guillermo. If you donít make the cigar with that blend, throw them out.î And he said, ìOK, OK, Iíll make the cigar. Iíll make the cigar. Limited basis. Two hundred and fifty thousand cigars a year to start.î
Q: Strategy.
A: And thatís how we got it. And only the four sizes. So we got the Howe, which is the Lonsdale; we got a Double Corona, which is the Franz; we got the Churchill, which is the Mantegna; and we got the Rubusto, which is the Devito.
Q: Do you play much golf?
A: I get invited to all the golf tournaments, and I go to all of them, but, I canít play golf.
Q: You are kidding me, right?
A: I donít even like the game, (laughs), all right, you win, Iím kidding around. Iím playing in a tournament tomorrow at Seven Bridges.
Q: Joe, youíre a busy guy. What are you working on after you finish shooting ìU.S. Marshallsî?
A: Iím doing another movie with the Wachowskiís, who produced and wrote Bound, called Matrix, Keanu Reeves is starring in it. Weíre all going to go to Las Vegas next weekend to see the Tyson-Holyfield fight. Grand Havana Room and Showtime are doing a joint venture where weíre going to sponsor the party and weíre going to show the fights in all three locations: Washington D.C., New York, and Beverly Hills. And then weíre going to Arturo Fuente, Grand Havana Reserve, and Pants cigars. Weíre going to hand out cigars and sponsor the party at MGM Grand.
Q: Is that what youíre calling it now, Pants cigars? OK, I can dig it. Letís talk about ìEasy Streetsî, if you want to talk about ìEasy Streetsî?
A: Sure.
Q: As an experience for you, how was it?
A: I liked working on Easy Streets. You know, when I read the script, I thought it was terrific. I also felt that it was impossible to be able to stay on television. I thought it was too difficult to follow for an audience to watch. But I thought it was really good material and why not work on it. And I just . . . you know, now . . . we just got nominated. The series got nominated by the Association of Critics.
Q: Uh-huh.
A: . . . as best show of the season. You know, up against NYPD Blue, and ER, and Homicide, I mean itís an illustrious cast. And I was nominated for best actor, you know, with Dennis Franz, and David Ducovney, and Anthony Edwards. Yeah, so it was really good that we got recognized in that way, and I think that weíre going to get some Emmy nominations.
Q: And whatís your take on television opposed to films? Do you like working on one better than the other?
A: I like working on film better only because you have a real opportunity to get it right. I mean, if you do a film, you know, like on U.S. Marshals weíre shooting an average of a page and a half a day -- and thatís a big budget studio picture. When I worked with Joe Mantegna just recently on our little movie we shot . . . we were shooting five pages, sometimes six pages a day. When you do television, youíre shooting sometimes eight pages a day. So itís a lot of work. I have a development deal now at CBS to develop a series for me, which l may do -- I donít know. If I can find something that I really like to do.
Q: Is it a definite project yet?
A: No. They have to find projects for me. I think, you know, a half-hour or an hour, whatever I want.
Q: What was your favorite role?
A: That Iíve been in?
Q: Yeah. Mine was ìGuido the Killer Pimpî.
A: I donít really have favorite roles as much as I have, you know, I liked a lot of movies. I liked Midnight Run, I liked Bound, I liked Risky Business, I liked La Bamba. . .
Q: All right, letís move on to cigars. This is the easier stuff to talk about. Back me up to the start of the Grand Havana?
A: I met Stan Shuster through a mutual friend, Joseph Servenigno, and they were opening up an Italian restaurant called, On Cannon. Stanley and I got to like each other and he was a cigar-smoker, and I was a cigar-smoker. And we, you know, we came up with this idea -- wouldnít it be cool to have a place where you could go and smoke a cigar and have a great dinner. So we came up with this idea to do a private club where you had lockers. Members could hold their lockers; but the only way that they could use the club was if they had a locker. And Stan's father, Harry Shuster, was in the restaurant business. So when we told Harry the idea, he liked it. And he said that he wasnít interested in opening up a cigar club, but he wanted to open up twenty of them and turn it into a public company -- and thatís how you made money. I thought, that would be great, you know? I always wanted to be able to have a job; have other income other than my acting so I didnít have to rely on the acting as a source of income. So he put financing up. And now, in just two short years, Grand Havana Room has become a public company -- weíre traded on the stock exchange. Our symbol is Puff.
Q: On what exchange?
A: Nasdaq smallcap. Harry Shuster is the C.E.O., Stanley is Executive Vice President, and Iím Senior Vice President. So Stanley and I basically, you know, run it, and Harry writes the checks. We have the Washington D.C. club thatís doing really good. Good club.
Q: When did that open?
A: Washington opened up in February; New York opened up April 28th -- we had the big opening party.
Q: Nobody invited me, thank you.
A: I forgot. When we open one in Chicago youíll get invited. We just made a big deal with these Chinese guys from Hong Kong where we are now opening the Grand Havana Room in Hong Kong in December; Tokyo in April. Weíre gonna do the whole Pacific Rim. There are going to be nine Grand Havana Rooms in the next twenty-four months: Shanghai, China, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore, Thailand. . . . Itís very exciting whatís happening with the clubs.

Q: Now can anybody join the Grand Havana Room? Do you have to be invited or sponsored in?
A: You have to be sponsored in. Anybody can apply, and then we have a board of directors that goes over the . . . . Like for example, New York . . . weíve got seven hundred lockers. We sold about two hundred fifty lockers, of which forty-five are corporate lockers. We have three and we have about six hundred applications. So, if we wanted to, New York could be sold out if we just took every application that came in. But we donít want to do that, we canít do that. Because itís reciprocal. If youíre a member in New York and youíre in Beverly Hills
-- youíre a member there, you can go in and you can go by Washington. Itís all reciprocal. So a lot of our members in Los Angeles are very concerned that the quality of membership maintains and stays the same. We have a lot of high-profile celebrities. The reason why they go to the Grand Havana Room is the luxury of having anonymity and they can be there, and nobody bothers them. Itís a very difficult process to be these people. This is like an oasis for them to go and have a nice meal and play a little backgammon, or play some cards, or play a little chess, watch television, socialize with their friends, do business. Itís great. Our basic, the single locker is a three thousand dollar one-time fee and two hundred dollars a month maintenance fee. That entitles you to a card and a locker. Then we have shared membership which is I think three thousand dollars one-time fee and a hundred and fifty dollars each a month. Then we have corporate, which is a seventy-five hundred dollar one-time fee and five hundred dollars a month and that gives you four cards. That means you have four members to a corporate, two members to a share, one member to a single.
Q: Iíve gotta tell you, the best steak Iíve ever had in my life was at the Grand Havana in Beverly Hills. That Black Angus with the mustard. Youíre a vegetarian, but it was the best piece of meat Iíve ever had in my life.
A: Well you know, our kitchen in Beverly Hills is all of two hundred square feet. Weíre very limited there. Now in Washington we have a huge kitchen -- eight-thousand square feet is the size of Washington. Beverly Hills is about forty-two hundred square feet and New York City is seventeen thousand square feet. New York City has taken the place of the opulence --- where Grand Havana was the center of Beverly Hills, now New York is. I mean, what weíve done there is just magnificent. Itís the old top of the sixes. Itís 666 Fifth Avenue; weíre on the thirty-ninth floor, overlooking Manhattan, and itís phenomenal.
Q: Now, as a kid from Hoboken, you think youíre ever going to move back to New York?
A: You know, I still have an apartment in Hoboken. So when I go to New York, I stay in Hoboken. But moving back? Iíd like to move back. My wife doesnít want our kids to go to school in the east. My son is in Seattle, just finishing up the tenth grade -- so heís got two years left. My daughter is starting the eighth grade and the baby starts school in the fall; so weíve got sometime before . . . maybe . . . you know, weíre talking about moving . . . if weíre moving back east, maybe weíll move like into Terrytown or Connecticut, or something like that.
Q: Youíve become somewhat of a Hollywood ambassador to the cigar industry. When did you first start going to the Dominican Republic and how did that come about?
A: My father was a cigar smoker going way back, but I remember growing up as a kid hating the smell of cigars. My Uncle Popeye, my fatherís brother . . .
Q: Popeye?
A: Popeye. Everybody in my family, they all had nicknames . . . like my name is . . . they called me Joey Pants, right? My fatherís name was Monk, his sister was Anna Monk, there was Rosy Jit, Frankie Hook . . .
Q: You gotta slow down. Rosy who?
A: Rosy Jit. Anna Monk. My father was Monk. Uncle Popeye. Uh, Frankie Hook was my. . .
Q: Was he missing a hand?
A: No, they called him the hook because he was a shylock, he was a bookie. My uncle Frankie the Mayor -- they called him the Mayor because he always wore a tie. We had Clarkie because he had ears like Clark Gable. We had John Wayne because his father had a push cart, a fruit cart with a horse; and they used to let him ride the horse on Sundays. So they said, ìHey look, itís John Wayne!î
Q: <laughs> What about Anna the Jit?
A: Oh, Rosy Jit. I donít know why they called her Rosy Jit, but she was Rosy Jit.
Q: <laughs> . . . and Joey Pants.
A: And Joey Pants.
Q: Have you had any endorsement offerings from Haggar or Levi?
A: No. Tommy Hilfinger wants to do something with me.
Q: Oh. That would be great. That would be a great line. All right, I gotta talk about the chapeau. What youíve done for cigars, I think youíre doing for the hat industry.
A: Yeah. Well you know, I always wore a hat -- I think thatís probably why I lost my hair so quickly. But I always had an affinity for hats and I collected all different kinds of hats. I bet you I have about three, four hundred different hats at home.
Q: Wow. So I kinda got lost off the question there about going to the Dominican Republic.
A: Oh. Dominican Republic started, uh . . . Dennis Franz gave me my first cigar. It was an Arturo Fuente Rothschild Maduro cedar wrap.
Q: Connecticut wrap you mean.
A: No.
Q: Oh, the cedar wrap.
A: You know-- the cedar that goes around it.
Q: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
A: We . . . Dennis . . . we were all skiing in Park City, Utah. It was Thanksgiving and we had a Thanksgiving dinner, and there were about twenty of us. We took all the furniture out of the big living room and we rented tables, and we had a big kind of George Rockwell type of Thanksgiving. After dinner, Dennis pulled out a couple of cigars; and all of the women and some of the men said, ìNot in the house.î So Dennis and I put on our winter coats, and our little ear-muffs, and gloves -- and we went in the garage with our red wine, and we smoked these cigars. And I said, ìDennis, these cigars are phenomenal.î And he said, ìYeah, I just started smoking Maduros.î Usually he smoked Connecticut wrapper -- he likes Ashton, he likes Fuente, so I started with that. I went to the smoke shop on my return, and I got some Paul Garmirian -P.G.ís, and some Fuente cigars. And then, you know, seven, eight years ago, it was a lot easier to get cigars than it is today.
A: Joe Howe will collaborate this. Brian Haley and I walked into Jack Schwartz after having lunch in Greek Town. We found it . . . we went looking for this place. Joe and I, and Brian, we went to Erwin Wiess. Somebody from Hoboken . . . um, Carlos . . . they have the smoke shop, Carlos Florez. They told me to go find Joe Howe at Jack Schwartz Importers, but I forgot the name of the cigar store. So I said, ìI think itís Erwin Wiess. Letís go there.î So we went there -- that wasnít it, that wasnít it. Finally we find this guy Joe Howe. We just loved the place and the people. So we became friends. In fact, the first cigar dinner I ever went to was a Jack Schwartz dinner that they had, and at that dinner . . . . You were there . . . at that dinner, Joe Mantegna brought a surprise guest, George Hamilton. George had never smoked a cigar . . . you know, he smoked occasionally . . . you know like . . .
Q: Thatís not what he says.
A: Yeah. Well, I was there.
Q: He says when he was a kid he started smoking and went to Cuba.
A: Oh, I bet he did. No, I bet he did. I bet he did. But you know, people were just starting to get back into it. So, George was there, and I was there, and Joe was there; and then I met Wayne Suarez through Joe Howe, and Carlos Fuente through Joe Howe and it became a real hobby for all of us. A real passion. And every time I was on a movie, on a location, I would find all the cigar stores and just go in there and check them out. So, because of Joe, I met all of these guys; and because of Joe I was invited to the Dominican Republic by the Fuente family. And that was my first trip. That was like two years ago. Then I met Guillermo Leon through Wayne Suarez. And I went to the RTDA in Chicago, here what three years ago?
Q: Three years ago.
A: And they were a lot of fun. I met Marvin Shanken in Cuba.
Q: Who?
A: Marvin Shanken.
Q: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
A: The original. The man that made this all happen. Weíre all humble followers; and I believe, I truly mean that.
Q: Well, if it wasnít for him, we wouldnít have our magazine.
A: Thatís right . . . if it wasnít for him. You know, heís opened up all kinds of avenues.
Q: Credit where credit is due. All kidding aside. If it wasnít for him, we wouldnít have our magazine.
A: So, on the Cuban front, I met Tom Hinds, through Michael Neury. Tom did these trips, these really cool trips where you go to Cuba, and itís like seven days. And you go to the fields and you go to the factories. So I got to learn about the Cuban process, which is very similar. In fact, the Dominicans -- what they do in the Dominican Republic is state-of-the-art, nobody can go near them. Iíve grown really fond of Dominican cigars. I smoke less and less Cubans, truly, because most of them are crap thatís coming through right now. So unless theyíre three or four years old, I wonít even go near them. So, that was my first trip to the Dominican Republic. And now, you know, Iíve been to the Dominican Republic three or four times. Stanley and I were there just recently and we have to go back to check on our cigars when I finish the movie.
Q: You played Maggio. Have you met Frank Sinatra before?
A: Iíve been in the same room with him, but Iíve never met him really. I missed that boat. I would have loved to have met him.
Q: As a kid from Hoboken, youíve had a lot in common. What do you like playing better, a good-guy or a bad-guy?
A: I think all roles are interesting. I donít judge them on what they do. I like playing bad-guys because they always get to wear the good clothes. You know good-guys are always in Brooks Brothers suits and bad-guys are always wearing Armani.
Q: <laughs> Did you study acting somewhere?
A: Uh huh. I studied acting in New York City. My first teacher was Herbert Bergoff. And I studied with Mira Rostva and Bobby Lewis. Mira Rostva -- she was Montgomery Cliffís teacher.
Q: Was that at the Actorís Studio?
A: No. It was at H.B. Studios. But the guy I really studied with and coached me for like twelve years is a guy named John Lehne, who was a really good teacher. I learned my craft from that guy.
Q: What about comedy for you -- do you like playing comedies?
A: Yeah, whatever I do I always find the comedy in it. You know, if itís comedy I find the pathos; if itís a drama, I find the comedy in the drama. Even when I did ìEasy Streetsî. I mean this guy was a ruthless killer and I always found the humor in what he did.
Q: Where do you see the cigar industry going, now that you have your own line of cigars and as the ìambassadorî?
A: I think itís, as crazy as it sounds, I think it keeps going up. I think the market, you
know . . . itís a healthier choice than cigarettes -- more women are smoking cigars now, young people . . . more young people are smoking cigars -- you know, thereís a whole market out there now that wasnít there two years ago. Asia and Europe now are catching on. A lot of my friends in the cigar business are going to the Pacific Rim. I think thereís another six, seven years left in it.
Q: Do you have a closing cigar anecdote for me, for the readers? Tell me a cigar story.
A: We were having a party at the Grand Havana Room, and a celebrity, movie star, which has to remain nameless -- because Iíll embarrass him if I tell you his name. We had these Fuentes. When we opened up the Grand Havana Room, Carlos Fuente Jr. made me three-hundred boxes of a Don Carlos filler with a Connecticut wrapper and it was a . . . about a fifty ring gauge and about 6 1/2 inches long, and he wrapped it in cedar. Boxes of ten. We had a party, and this guy . . . I said, ìYou gotta try this.î And Stan, my partner, explained to him. . . you know, thereís two ways of . . . you can light the cigar with the cedar. A lot of people like to use the cedar to light it. So, we walked away, and a few minutes later thereís this flame. The guy had lit the cedar while it was still wrapped around the cigar and the cigar just blew up.
Q: <laughs>
A: And heís going, ìOh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god!î He almost set the joint on fire.
Q: Who was it?
A: I canít tell you.
Q: Tell me.
A: No.
Q: You certainly were not the number-three guy through the door in ìU.S. Marshalsî. You were the number-two guy through the door. And now youíre back in the recurring role. How is ìU.S. Marshallsî going to be different from the original ìFugitiveî, outside of Harrison Ford not being Dr. Richard Kimball?
A: I think itís going to be very similar and what the audience wants is Tommy Lee Jones chasing a fugitive. So now weíve got a brand new fugitive, Wesley Snipes. Q: Does Wesley smoke cigars?
A: Yeah, Wesley smokes cigars.
Q: Tommy Lee Jones?
A: Tommy smokes cigars. Arnold Copleson, the producer, smokes cigars. A lot more cigar smoking on this set than there was on the last one. But itís really exciting. Weíve got a great director Stewart Baird, who did Executive Decision. Itís his second movie, but he was a big action film editor. He did Altered States, and he did Superman I and II, and he did Die Hard I and II.
Everybody . . . all the marshalls are back except L. Scott Calwell, who was in the first one. She got a big Broadway play, so she didnít come back. But Latonia Richardson took her place, thatís Sam Jacksonís wife. So weíve got Robert Downey Jr. in it and itís really good. Itís kind of fun to be back playing these roles again, four years later. Hopefully theyíll be successful and weíll do a couple more. And itís always great to be in Chicago. I mean Iíve had the good fortune to get hired to work in Chicago -- this is like our seventh or eighth movie. And I love it here. I love coming here. I love spending time here. My wife and my kids are coming down now -- weíre gonna spend the summer here. I mean, itís the best. And I got a free lunch from you. Whatís bad about that?