The Lifetime biopic Victoria Gotti: My Father’s Daughter is executive produced by Victoria Gotti, the daughter of notorious mob boss John Gotti (portrayed by Emmy winner Maurice Benard, General Hospital) aka The Teflon Don. The TV movie gives a look into Victoria’s life, “revealing the glamour, glitz and unique hardships of her world.”
Being the daughter of the Gambino crime family boss “was far from easy” says Victoria on camera, “but I fought to stay strong.” The movie starts with Victoria as a teenager falling in love with her future husband Carmine, who John Gotti forbade Victoria to date. In an effort to become her own person and to build a life for herself, Victoria became a blonde, got bangs, married Carmine, and started a family.
Victoria is portrayed by actress Chelsea Frei but in many scenes she resembles Hole lead singer/actress Courtney Love, a celebrity who has also experienced being in the public eye during duress: she was married to Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain who committed suicide in 1994. Victoria Gotti is just two years older than Courtney Love. And both were followed by paparazzi in the mid 1990s. In the 1995 New York Times article, “A Singer Spurns the Role of Victim,” journalist Neil Strauss wrote, Love had “acquired a strange distinction reserved for Presidents, major felons and celebrity widows: every word she said and wrote became newsworthy.”
Victoria Gotti was also known for throwing pearls to the press. After her father was convicted in 1992, she said: “A lion is a lion even in a cage.” Ten years later, after her father died in prison in 2002 at the age of 61 (throat cancer), Victoria Gotti launched her TV career. She also starred in the reality TV show Growing up Gotti with her three sons, competed on Celebrity Apprentice (she was fired by Donald Trump after week 2), and has appeared on episodes of The Real Housewives of New Jersey and Mob Wives, among others.
In 1996, Love pursued her acting career and starred in films including the Andy Kaufman biopic Man on the Moon, The People vs. Larry Flynt, and Basquiat. Love will appear next on the big screen in the 2019 film The Long Home directed by and starring James Franco. Victoria Gotti: My Father’s Daughter premiere on Lifetime on Saturday, February 9 at 8pm. [More Lifetime movies streaming are always available.]
