Sopranos' Little Pussy Pleads Guilty in Extortion Racket

"Big Pussy" Vincent Pastore (right) and little pussy Tony Darrow (left). Photo by Rob Rich.

​Who would have guessed that "Larry Boy Barese," one of the minor hoods on The Sopranos, would turn out to be a real-life hood? Actually, he turned out to be a little chickenshit who plotted with hoods to beat up a guy to collect a debt. Darrow, who set up the guy for the beating, pled guilty today in Brooklyn federal court to an extortion conspiracy. He'll get from 33 to 41 months in a federal prison, probably one of the country-club types.

Darrow, whose real name is Anthony Borgese, was a minor nightclub singer before he became a minor actor -- he was the bar owner whom Joe Pesci beat the shit out of in Goodfellas. He was busted in 2009 for the 2004 real-life crime perpetrated by the real-life Gambino family. It sounds like a scene from right out of The Sopranos:

Along with Gambino crime family soldier Joseph "Joey Boy" Orlando and associate Giovanni "Johnny" Monteleone, Darrow was accused of trying to strong-arm cash from a man in Monticello, New York who owed money to a loan shark.

His own bio says "playing a wise guy is as natural [to me] as breathing." Yup. Of course, it also says he "was never a gangster." Nope.

You could say he was no Boy Scout, but you'd be wrong. IMDB notes that October 10, 1997, was designated "Tony Darrow Day" in New York, and that he was honored by the Hudson Valley Council of the Boy Scouts as a "distinguished citizen."

But as the Post notes in recounting the 2004 violence in upstate Monticello:

Several Gambino family enforcers allegedly left the victim with his jaw and ribs broken.

On an FBI recording, one of the Gambino heavies is heard saying:

"So Tony [Borgese] meets them...shows them where the house is. They go to the house...the guy answers the door...they beat the living s--t out of him."

In other words, he was no Big Pussy. Darrow was just the little pussy who had real thugs beat up somebody.

Check out pictures of Tony Darrow posing with "the Sopranos motorcycle." They're on Johnny Sack's website.