One of my favorite character tropes is a person at the end of their rope. I love a sad, hapless character I can root for. Which is probably why I love Dog Day Afternoon so much.
Dog Day Afternoon is Sidney Lumet at his most chaotic and alive. Al Pacino plays Sonny Wortzik, a first-time bank robber whose plan falls apart before he even gets the money into a bag. John Cazale plays his partner, Sal.
The film is based on a real 1972 Brooklyn bank robbery pulled off by John Wojtowicz, who, in Frank Pierson's original Oscar-winning screenplay, was written as "John" before he became "Sonny" in the film.
Partway through the standoff, Sonny asks Sal to name a country. What Cazale said in reply wasn't in the script.
It's one of the funniest moments in the movie, and if you've seen how the movie ends, it's also one of the saddest. Check out the scene below, then follow along for what we can learn from it.
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The Scene
Sonny is trying to negotiate a plane. He's told the FBI he wants to leave the country with Sal and the hostages, and he needs a destination. So he comes up to Sal, who's unfortunately a little clueless.
"Now, you got to understand something. If we leave the country, there's no coming back here. You know what I mean? There's no coming back. So, that—if there's anybody in there that you want to talk to, you want to say goodbye to, do it now."
Sal thinks for a long beat. "No," he says quietly.
"Is there any special country you want to go to?"
Sal thinks. "Wyoming."
"No... Wyoming. That's not a country," Sonny says. Sal starts to think again, but Sonny interrupts him. "That's all right. I'm going to take care of it."
He moves off again.
This was Cazale off-script. He improvised the "Wyoming" line. Pacino reacted genuinely in the moment.
Lumet wasn't expecting it either. He said later in his DVD commentary (via Cinephilia & Beyond):
"In the screenplay, Cazale's role was written to be a smart-ass street kid. But Al came to me and said, 'Sidney, please, I beg you, read John Cazale for it.' And when John came in, I was so discouraged and thought, 'Al must be out of his mind.' This guy looks 30, 32, and that's the last thing I want in this part. But Al had great taste in actors, and I hadn't yet seen him in The Godfather. And Cazale came in, and then he read, and my heart broke … One of the things that I love about the casting of John Cazale was that he had a tremendous sadness about him. I don't know where it came from; I don't believe in invading the privacy of the actors that I work with, or getting into their heads. But my God—it's there—in every shot of him. And not just in this movie, but in Godfather II also. When Al asked him during a scene, 'Is there any country you want to go to?' Cazale improvised his answer by saying, after long thought, 'Wyoming.' To me, that was the funniest, saddest line in the movie, and my favorite, because in the script he wasn't supposed to say anything. I almost ruined the take because I started to laugh so hard… but it was a brilliant, brilliant ad lib."
A Joke, and a Wound
Lumet is, of course, right that Cazale plays the role as a gentle, clueless man in over his head. If the character had been street-wise and smart, this line would have played as just a joke, but in this context, it's tragic. Cazale plays Sal as a man who has never known a map. Not really stupid, just small-world. The audience might laugh, but the character isn't a punchline.
Then look at what Pacino does. Sonny doesn't mock. He corrects and shields him, protective. "That's not a country. That's all right. I'm going to take care of it."
Sonny has spent the day failing at everything, and here he still shows up for Sal. The line reveals both men.
That's how the film gets you rooting for two people robbing a bank. Every craft layer aims at the same target. Cazale's blank sincerity. Pacino's protective patience. You care deeply about these people and this friendship.
Credit: Warner Bros. Pictures
The Twist That Turns the Joke Over
Late in the film, Sonny and Sal get their plane. The FBI drives them out to JFK Airport with a security escort. In the car on the tarmac, an agent shoots Sal in the head.
Sal never boards.
The Wyoming line was funny because Sal named a nonsense destination. It's tragic because Sal never had a destination to name in the first place. He probably had never even thought that far ahead.
The film is based on real people. The real Sal was 18-year-old Salvatore Naturile, shot by an FBI agent on the tarmac of JFK on August 22, 1972.
And Cazale himself would be dead within three years. He was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1977, completed his role in The Deer Hunter while he was sick, and died on March 13, 1978, at 42. He made five feature films in his career. All five got Best Picture nominations.
What to Learn from the Line
It's hard to manufacture a line like this unless you know the character so well that they surprise you, which was the case for Cazale inhabiting this tragic man. Sal is just clueless and has never had an opportunity to dream. It's not stupidity or a joke for a joke's sake.
It's also a line that builds sympathy because you start to understand Sal better as a character. Wyoming doesn't become a real goal. It's a swerve deeper into character, and those are the moments when audiences fall in love, even with people they shouldn't.
Sonny is also someone we end up rooting for, and that's partially because of Sal. Sonny's "I'm going to take care of it" is tender. If you want the audience on your antihero's side, put them with somebody they love and let them be gentle for a second.
