Gravesend

A low budget mafia series based in the 80's. I'm good with that. You do not need expensive props to make a series that based upon the drama of mafia families with a couple of shootings and stabbings every once in a while.

What you do need?

Acting. The ability to make the characters seem believable. Here the actors come across like high school students practicing for a school play about the mafia. Everything is exaggerated to the cliched stereotype of New York Italians. Having some of that is fine, having the majority of the cast acting that way is grating.

Writing. Maybe is not the actors fault, they may be doing the best they can with the material that they are working with. The dialogue does not have a 'natural flow', instead it is a collection of complete sentenced-statements (Jimmy, why don't you go to the refrigerator and get the butter and put it on the table for dinner at 7pm). No one talks that way.

Direction. N/A. You are jumped from scene to scene without correlation, background, or even knowing who the parties are.

Skip.

I was interested in watching this for a few reasons. I'm from Brooklyn, I grew up around guys like this, it was filmed in my neighborhood, and I remember Brooklyn in the 80s. Just two episodes in, and I'm already frustrated.

1. If you are going to do a period piece, make it accurate. Punk was not immensely popular in 1986. Hairbands had taken over and grunge was ready to kick it's ass. Coney Island DID NOT look like that in the 80s, and neither did the bus stops.

2. The acting is TERRIBLE. I feel like I'm watching an AU Sopranos, where James Gandolfini looks like Quagmire, and it's a bad high school production of Goodfellas.

3. It makes Brooklyn Italians look like a bunch of thugs.

The only thing accurate about it is the racism that constantly spews out of the mouths of these "gangsters". Garbage like this makes me ashamed to be Italian.

As an Italian -American from South Brooklyn who is the same age as William DeMeo, I really want to support a local guy and wish him success, but this is not it. I also know how hard it is to conceive, write, direst, raise funds, cast, and get a movie produced -- so I give him a lot of credit. But everything here is really unwatchable: from the opening credits (the low-budget value is cringy) to the acting to the story line. Well directed in my opinion, so I give him credit for that, but really not much else of value here. I wish William luck in his future endeavors, but this is not the one to break his career.

I see the posters for this show all around Staten Island. These guys are a laughing stock - an embarrassment to the Italians. It's people like this that give all Italians a bad name. Ones who believe they are celebrities, but naturally, only in their minds. They are uneducated, narcissistic nincompoops who would rather keep pretending that they are actors rather than taking the time to invest in any sort of creative education.

This show is unwatchable. It should've been canceled after the first season, along with the rest of the cast, from ever acting again.

Willie DeMeo would be better off writing a letter of condolence to his audience, than another screen or teleplay. To call this guy an artist is an insult to real artists who actually know what they're doing. Total poser.

This is what you get when a bunch of guys with little education get in a room and BS an investor into putting any sort of money into awful writing like this. Give it to the poor next time fellas - it'll be put to better use!

Possibly the worst acting ever put onto film since Mariah Carey filmed "Glitter". What an embarassing disservice to Italian Americans in Brooklyn. They were all made to look like knuckle dragging idiots with limited vocabulary and the I. Q. of a doorknob. The acting was high school play calibre at best. My wife and I burst out laughing several times at this unintentional comedy. It garnered more laughs than Seinfeld's recent stand up special. This was a true slap in the face to hard working, educated Italians in this country. Acting was horrible. Props (except for the cars) were horrible. An entire one sided conversation with a Saint Anthony statue ? People that let out an audible "ugh" when they are shot ? "Blood" that looks like it came from a paintball gun ? And the script ... horrendous. I could go on and on, but I might vomit. Jeff Bezos should be ashamed of himself for allowing this monstrosity to air. Is David Chase going to sue william demeo for plagiarism? Who are the idiot sponosrs and investors?