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The arrival of spring is always special at Deep Cut Gardens in Middletown, says staff horticulturist Katie Lepsis. The lush reds of the park’s parterre (rose garden), dense greens of its shrubs and bonsai trees, and striking shades of orchids make it easy to forget the property’s, er, colorful past.
Later this month, an underworld figure from those bygone days is coming to a theater near you.
Robert De Niro, star of legendary Mob movies Godfather II and Goodfellas, plays not one, but two lead roles in the new gangster flick The Alto Knights.
Directed by Oscar winner Barry Levinson (Rain Man; Good Morning, Vietnam), De Niro plays real-life kingpins Frank Costello and Vito Genovese, alongside Will & Grace star Debra Messing and Sopranos alum Katherine Narducci.
Though Genovese’s base was the famous Manhattan Mob hangout Alto Knights, he also built a palatial estate where Deep Cut Gardens is located today. “New York City was where Genovese was making his fortune,” Anthony DeStefano writes in the 2021 biography The Deadly Don. “But maybe because of his roots in Italy, he wanted…a place outside the metropolis.”
Even in the Depression, Genovese spent lavishly on his summer home, landscaping with exotic and native plants, flowers and trees. Visitors can even see a miniature replica of Mount Vesuvius that Genovese built to complement fish ponds, cascading pools and a pergola. (The movie, however, was not filmed at Deep Cut Gardens.)
For all of this sculpted and exotic beauty, park officials say these 54 acres are meant to inspire amateur gardeners, who can find all kinds of resources at Deep Cuts’ horticultural center.
“People can learn about native plants, sustainable gardening practices, container gardens, floral design, wreath making and more,” says Lepsis. Deep Cut also has a pond for darting fish, swooping birds and ribbiting frogs.
Vito Genovese sold his Middletown property in the 1940s, after what authorities called a suspicious fire that damaged the family home.
He had fled the United States in 1937, fearful he’d be arrested for a Brooklyn murder. He returned in 1945, right before a key witness against him was found dead on the side of a Bergen County road.
By the 1970s, the Monmouth County park system had purchased the property and surrounding green spaces to open Deep Cut, now a vast green space in the middle of America’s most densely populated state.
Genovese, whose 1969 funeral mass was held at St. Agnes church in Atlantic Highlands, was part of a Jersey crime clique that included Margate’s Joe Abate, Newark-born Abner Zwillman, and Deal resident Willie Moretti.
At least, until October 1951. That’s when Moretti was shot and killed outside Joe’s Elbow Room in Cliffside Park.
[RELATED: How New Jersey Shaped ‘The Sopranos’]
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