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City People

A taste of fame

Joe Lala, a son of Ybor City, has platinum records and film credits to his name. At 58, he lives in West Tampa, has his hand in a Mafia film project, coaches actors, does voice-overs and still makes music.

By RICK GERSHMAN
Published September 8, 2006

YBOR CITY

It was one of the funniest events on television all year: The Comedy Central Roast of William Shatner. And it kicked off in style, with the man who portrayed Star Trek's Captain Kirk entering the auditorium on a horse.

The music that appropriately accompanied Shatner's entrance was Blues Image's Ride Captain Ride, which reached No. 4 on the charts in 1970.

And at home, Joe Lala smiled and thought, I need to check the mailbox for a royalty check.

Lala, who was born and raised in Ybor City to Sicilian parents, was a founding member of Blues Image, a critically acclaimed blues-rock band that formed in Tampa in 1966. Lala played drums and other percussion and sang backup.

Among the band's fans was none other than Jimi Hendrix, who told the British magazine Melody Maker that Blues Image was one of the top up-and-coming bands.

But the band broke up not long after the success of Ride Captain Ride, and Lala discovered the need to reinvent himself. It wouldn't be the last time.

In the years that followed, Lala joined rock legend Stephen Stills as a core member of the group Manassas and became one of the top session players in Los Angeles.

When carpal tunnel robbed him of his ability to play percussion regularly in 1988, he turned his attention to acting and eventually became a sought-after voice-over artist.

"It's easier for a musician to slide into being an actor than the other way, because a musician is used to working with a team."

Lala, 58, returned to Tampa almost a decade ago to help take care of his aging mother, Janie Cacciatore Hondal, but has stayed active in the business. He regularly travels to L.A. to do voice-overs for commercials, animated TV shows and movies, and whatever else pays the bills.

More recently, Lala - who lives in West Tampa off N Armenia Avenue - volunteered to help two local filmmakers re-create a time and place close to his heart.

Paul and Peter Guzzo asked Lala to play a small role in The End is Blossoming, the first in a proposed series of films called Ghosts of Ybor, about Ybor City and the Mafia in the middle of the 20th century.

"We needed someone who could play a Cuban guy in our film," Paul Guzzo said. "We couldn't pay him anything, but he said sure, he'd do it, which was nice. He didn't need us at all, but he was just willing to help."

It didn't hurt that the Guzzos can market a film with a guy who has 42 acting credits listed on the Internet Movie Database and a deep knowledge of the film's subject matter.

"I used to run numbers when I was a kid" in Ybor, Lala said. "I didn't know what it was then - here's a bag, take it there. You don't ask questions. But we just called Mafia bosses 'men of respect.' "

For a while, Lala said, his father even worked for one of the biggest bosses, Santo Trafficante Sr.

Lala used his experiences to help the Guzzos refine some of the details of their proposed series of films.

"Joe gave me a call about a month ago and asked how the rest of the scripts were going," Paul Guzzo said. "He offered to come down and meet with us, and he brought two of his relatives with him, and he just let us pick their brains about it.

"He's just excited to see that there are people here who want to make movies, and he'll do anything he can to make that happen."

For Lala, it's all in a day's work. From his West Tampa condominium, he records demos and samples of his voice work, using a variety of accents and personalities to bring to life hundreds of characters.

He runs an actors' workshop at the Italian Club in Ybor. And he recently lent his voice to commercials for Al Fox, a Tampa native who is running for U.S. House District 11.

Lala, with his diamond stud earring and carefully groomed mustache and soul patch, still looks every bit the musician who performed on 28 platinum records and 32 gold records.

Several line the walls of his home, including Saturday Night Fever, which became the biggest selling soundtrack of all time. On how many of Fever's classic singles did Lala perform percussion? "All of them," he said.

A conversation with Lala on his balcony produces all sorts of interesting tidbits, such as how he helped raise Married With Children star Christina Applegate during her preadolescent years, when Lala dated Applegate's mother, Nancy Priddy.

He'll chat about some of his onscreen roles, which included playing Ybor City icon Ferdie Pacheco, the "Fight Doctor," in a TV-movie biography of boxer Muhammad Ali.

These days, he's doing a bit of everything. He'll sit in with some musician buddies here, do some voice-overs for cartoon and video game characters there.

Meanwhile, he gets help paying the bills with the occasional royalty checks, which is why he'd love to see a resurgence of Ride Captain Ride. Said Lala: "I have a feeling some car company is going to jump on that."

Rick Gershman can be reached at rgershman@sptimes.com or 226-3431. His Times blog, The Ill Literate, is at www.sptimes.com/blogs/tampaarts.

Joe Lala

Gigs: Musician, actor, voice-over artist, acting coach

Age: 58

Family: Single, no children.

You've seen him: On TV shows such as Seinfeld, General Hospital, Melrose Place and Miami Vice.

You've heard him: In the animated film Monsters Inc. and animated TV shows Samurai Jack, Hey Arnold and The Batman.

He's played with: The Bee Gees; Whitney Houston; Eric Clapton; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young; Diana Ross; Herbie Hancock; Etta James; Rod Stewart.

He's a critic: "The Punisher was a horrible, despicable movie. But Tampa looked good."

[Last modified September 14, 2006, 11:10:48]