Tom Palazzolo

Lisa Gottlieb's Oscar-winning spoof of misogynist film noir.

Chesterton, Indiana's annual WIZARD OF OZ parade (as well as their many Oz-themed festivities) provides the backdrop for I MARRIED A MUNCHKIN, Tom Palazzolo's study of the life and career of Mary Ellen St. Aubin. Self-described as "normal, but little," Mary Ellen details her early start in show business as a performer in an all-dwarf vaudeville act, her brief appearance in 1946's THREE WISE FOOLS, her 1948 marriage to former Munchkin Parnell St. Aubin and their subsequent retirement from entertainment to run a bar (called the Midget Club) in the South Side of Chicago. Two other former Munchkins (Margaret Pellegrini and Clarence Swensen) briefly appear among the day's revelry. Also included is a postscript (shot some time after the initial film) featuring Mary Ellen briefly describing the original size of her role in THREE WISE FOOLS, which originally featured a line and an ill-fated "flying" effect. - Tom Fritsche

Based on a comic Heather McAdams created for the Chicago Reader, the short comedic film was made by Tom Palazzolo's 1990 film production class at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Set in downtown Chicago on S Columbus Dr & E Congress Pkwy, McAdams demonstrates tips on how to ward off unwanted attention from men on the road.

Lillie Santangelo had for most of the 20th century owned and operated a wax museum at New York's Coney Island. She leads us on a final tour, just before her museum is closed and her wax figures and exhibits are auctioned off. Old age and declining attendance have forced her to close and sell everything. This film deals with the loss of her "friends" (the wax figures), she has known for so long. She reminisces about her years as a Coney Island fixture as she visits the ocean boardwalk one last time.

Tom Palazzolo's 1978 film "Sharie's Prom" is a documentary that captures the experiences of Sharie Holeb and her friends during their prom night in Chicago. The film offers an intimate glimpse into the lives of these young individuals as they navigate the excitement and challenges of this significant high school event.

Rita, a young high school student, recounts and reflects on her life in a monologue played over footage of her wandering through various beautiful and often strange Chicago locations.

Chesterton, Indiana's annual WIZARD OF OZ parade (as well as their many Oz-themed festivities) provides the backdrop for I MARRIED A MUNCHKIN, Tom Palazzolo's study of the life and career of Mary Ellen St. Aubin. Self-described as "normal, but little," Mary Ellen details her early start in show business as a performer in an all-dwarf vaudeville act, her brief appearance in 1946's THREE WISE FOOLS, her 1948 marriage to former Munchkin Parnell St. Aubin and their subsequent retirement from entertainment to run a bar (called the Midget Club) in the South Side of Chicago. Two other former Munchkins (Margaret Pellegrini and Clarence Swensen) briefly appear among the day's revelry. Also included is a postscript (shot some time after the initial film) featuring Mary Ellen briefly describing the original size of her role in THREE WISE FOOLS, which originally featured a line and an ill-fated "flying" effect. - Tom Fritsche

Based on a comic Heather McAdams created for the Chicago Reader, the short comedic film was made by Tom Palazzolo's 1990 film production class at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Set in downtown Chicago on S Columbus Dr & E Congress Pkwy, McAdams demonstrates tips on how to ward off unwanted attention from men on the road.

Lillie Santangelo had for most of the 20th century owned and operated a wax museum at New York's Coney Island. She leads us on a final tour, just before her museum is closed and her wax figures and exhibits are auctioned off. Old age and declining attendance have forced her to close and sell everything. This film deals with the loss of her "friends" (the wax figures), she has known for so long. She reminisces about her years as a Coney Island fixture as she visits the ocean boardwalk one last time.

Tom Palazzolo's 1978 film "Sharie's Prom" is a documentary that captures the experiences of Sharie Holeb and her friends during their prom night in Chicago. The film offers an intimate glimpse into the lives of these young individuals as they navigate the excitement and challenges of this significant high school event.

Rita, a young high school student, recounts and reflects on her life in a monologue played over footage of her wandering through various beautiful and often strange Chicago locations.

Rita, a young high school student, recounts and reflects on her life in a monologue played over footage of her wandering through various beautiful and often strange Chicago locations.

Rita, a young high school student, recounts and reflects on her life in a monologue played over footage of her wandering through various beautiful and often strange Chicago locations.

Hot Nasty is a humorous documentary short set entirely inside a Chicago massage parlor called Big Bertha’s. The film features interviews with the women who work there, openly sharing funny stories about how they got into the business, dealing with different patrons, and so on.

A film by Tom Palazzolo and Mark Rance documenting neo-Nazi activity in the Marquette Park neighborhood of Chicago on August 21, 1976. The day marked one of many conflicts between black civil rights marchers and white supremacist neighborhood groups who were mobilizing to prevent black residents from moving into the neighborhood.

A documentary on a Neo-Nazi rally in Marquette Park, Chicago, on July 9, 1978 features footage from inside the Neo-Nazi headquarters in Chicago (led by Frank Collin) and protesters in Marquette Park. In the headquarters they discuss logistics, chit-chat, and organize themselves for the rally. In the park beforehand we see people gathering (both anti-Nazis and Neo-Nazis) and police organizing themselves for the rally. Filmed by Tom Palazzolo and Mark Rance.

A documentary about a man who wins a million dollars in the Illinois lottery. Takes place at Woodfield Mall in Schaumburg, IL.

Filmmakers Tom Palazzolo, Jeff Kreines, and Bernie Caputo attend the annual Chicago Senior Citizens Picnic hosted by the Democratic Party. Shot in the style of direct cinema, they spend the afternoon in a Chicago park following the seniors as they have a musical revue, hula dance, listen to speeches, play organized games and generally seem to have an all around fabulous time.

An experimental silent film by Tom Palazzolo documenting the comings and goings of Chicago's "El" rapid transit system in the 1970s. Exact year unknown.

Footage documenting a toy drive – “Toys for Tots” – held at a leather bar / motorcycle club in Chicago, called the Baton Lounge. The club was originally located at 436 N. Clark St., but moved to 4713 N. Broadway in 2019. The owner is Illinois native Jim Flint, who along with Irv Kupcinet helped to inaugurate the club’s most well-known tradition, “The Top of the Nation Revue,” which popularized the art of female impersonation and lip syncing – some of which can be seen in this film.

Home movie documenting birthday celebrations for Palazzolo's daughter, Amy Louise, who was born in 1974. The footage captured here is most likely of her fifth birthday in 1979. She is shown surrounded by friends, excitedly opening her presents.

An awkward wedding rehearsal at which the in-laws meet

ADDED LESSONS is an absurdist fever dream that follows young Francis (Liam Hayes) as he's bounced between maternal demands, burgeoning sexual desires, the church, and pretensions of the art world. Filled with painted sets, symbolic gestures, and a who's who of Chicago's performance art scene of the late 1980s, ADDED LESSONS is decidedly non-naturalistic, instead referencing 1920s surrealist and expressionist silent films for its cinematic visual language.

On August 13, 1969 thousands of Chicagolandians flocked to downtown Chicago to get a glimpse of the first humans on the Moon (Neil A. Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin, Jr.). Chicago Filmmaker Tom Palazzolo captures the Chicago Apollo 11 Parade with wit and charm, highlighting the hoards of suburbanites who made the journey into the city.

JERRY'S DELI is a testament to a bygone era when shrieking lunatics could run successful (even popular) businesses. Shot on film-stock leftover from television cameramen, Tom Palazzolo's portrait of Jerry Meyer offsets sequences of the tyrannical deli owner (seen berating his employees and physically dragging customers to the counter) with personal interviews in which a soft-spoken Meyer calmly describes his decorated military service in World War II, his early stand on civil rights and this one time when he stabbed an employee in the arm. - Tom Fritsche

"Fears and thrills... Part structure (the centerpoint): part improvisation."

A short documentary on wet t-shirt contests at a Chicago bar.

A 14-minute almanac of Midwestern America and its funky Americana at the end of the Love Generation, Love It / Leave It begins with proudly naked people parading about for all the world to ogle at the annual Naked City beauty pageant in Roselawn, Indiana, before returning to Chicago, where families literally draped in American flags are found wilting under the heat of the sun along a downtown parade route.

Pigeon Lady is an observational documentary centered around the everyday comings and goings of an elderly woman in Chicago, Clara Miller. Palazzolo films her walking, carrying a shopping bag, and stopping to toss bread crumbs to pigeons and other birds. Palazzolo’s distance from her renders the film a portrait of the city as much as it is of the “pigeon lady.” Set to classical music including Ottorino Respighi’s “The Birds,” Gustav Mahler’s “Symphony No. 1 in D Major,” and Richard Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde,” the film is tender and sensitive, yet hints at the humor and penchant for oddball subjects that would come to define Palazzolo’s later films. Roger Ebert called Pigeon Lady a “masterpiece” and “one of the most moving experimental films” he had ever seen.

The once teeming Riverview Park was shut down in 1967. The Tattooed Lady of Riverview is a portrait of its final occupant, Jean Furella, the titular tattooed lady of Riverview's sideshow.

VHS compilation of two Tom Palazzolo documentaries - Marquette Park (1976) and Marquette Park II (1978) - about the American Nazi party and its leader Frank Collin.

Surreal film melding documentary footage of Chicago and its residents, featuring fast paced montage sequences set against a rollicking 1960s musical backdrop. The film aptly deconstructs the absurdities of contemporary American life, particularly the thick fog of patriotism engulfing the country at the time.

An impressionistic view of the 1968 Democratic National Convention featuring appearances by Abbie Hoffman, Alan Ginsburg, Mayor Richard J. Daley, Hubert Humphrey, and others. This version of the film is distinct from other edits. This version also contains several minutes of silent footage shot for the film as well as a short film made on the day of the final game played at Comiskey Park, the home of the Chicago White Sox.

Documentary about the first annual Miss Illinois Bikini Contest, held by the Amateur Athletic Union at a theater on Chicago's south side. The event was staged as a means of drawing more eyes to the Junior Mr. Illinois bodybuilding contest held the same afternoon. The men took the stage first, while the bikini-clad contestants waited for over an hour in a cold back room waiting for their turn on stage. After the 31 contestants strut across the stage while their weights and goals are announced to the crowd, we see the Miss Illinois contestants bond backstage over smokes and classical piano.

This film follows a film crew as they make a TV spot for a Ford new/used car dealer who (even though he is dressed in white) is not the kind of person you'd buy anything from. As the commercial is being filmed, I also turn the camera on a salesman who is trying to unload a used car on an unsuspecting woman - hoping she will buy on time so he can charge her 17% interest.

Silent home movie capturing the marriage of Tom Palazzolo and Marcia Daehn on December 22, 1968.

Sound home movie depicting the Palazzolo family's 1977 Halloween outing.

“Primarily a pet parade for children.”

The two filmmakers use the style of direct cinema to film the Italian/Polish backyard wedding shower of a young couple, Ricky and Rocky. The pair show off their wedding gifts and guests and relatives express their approval of the shower to the filmmakers.

The story of Tom Palazzolo's efforts to get his photographs included in the City 2000 exhibition, a show featuring images of Chicago from throughout that year. Palazzolo shoots events during the year 2000, such as Taste of Chicago, Maxwell Street, an AIDS bicycle ride, and other public festivals. Througout the tape we see his new photographs and some of his older ones.

A music and costume filled portrayal of the 1976 Gay Pride Parade by filmmaker Tom Palazzolo. All is fun and games until a bystander hurls an egg at Palazzolo's camera lens. It resumes quickly though.

A portrait of the spectators and press covering the dedication of Claes Oldenburg's "Batcolumn" sculpture on April 14, 1977, outside of the newly-built Social Security Administration Center at 600 West Madison Street in downtown Chicago.

Set in a bizarro St. Louis and populated with characters from Palazzolo’s boyhood memories, Caligari’s Cure is an irreverent retelling of Palazzolo’s youth that is both absurd and tender.

Palazzolo's cameras are there as Mayor Richard Daley reveals the Picasso gifted to the city from the famed artist. Nicknamed "the Bride" and bad mouthed almost universally upon its unveiling, we get some of that social commentary here, as well as lots of souvenirs.

Chicago was the host for the 1968 Democratic Convention, and the surrounding hype and horror that resulted. Mayor Daley called out the cops on the various protestors and hippies attempting to influence the proceedings, and resulting riot remains a stain on the city's reputation. Palazzolo combines footage of the various youth leaders as well as press comments from candidate Hubert Humphrey and Daley to illustrate the divide between the factions.

Chicago, 1966. Artists assemble at Domenico Di Meo's loft to prepare banners and artwork for an anti-Vietnam War demonstration led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. People pictured include: Vincent Arcilesi, Bernie Beckman, Harry Bouras, Josh Kind (a critic), Vera Klement, Rodney Quiriconi, and Jim Zanzi.