John Turturro says he ‘pickpocketed a lot of people’ to prepare for role
John Turturro says he ‘pickpocketed a lot of people’ to prepare for role
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Wesley StenzelThu, October 22, 2026 at 12:53 AM UTC
John Turturro in ‘The Only Living Pickpocket in New York’Credit: Jon Pack/Sony Pictures ClassicsKey points -
John Turturro plays a pickpocket in The Only Living Pickpocket in New York.
To prepare for the role, the Severance star says he “pickpocketed a lot of people.”
“Sometimes they would catch me, but a lot of times they didn’t know,” he said.
Watch your wallets and purses around John Turturro.
The Severance star said that he learned how to pick people’s pockets to play a petty larcenist in The Only Living Pickpocket in New York.
Turturro trained with a sleight-of-hand artist to learn the tricks of his on-screen trade. “Apollo Robbins is like a concert pianist,” Turturro told The New York Times. “I’m never going to be that. I mean, he could take my watch off and every single time I don’t feel it.”
The Barton Fink star said Robbins gave him “exercises with coins” to practice and also taught him how to “bump someone” for a swift pickpocket. “I kept practicing, mostly on set,” he explained.
The cast and crew of the film became the actor’s unwitting victims. “I pickpocketed a lot of people,” he said. “Sometimes they would catch me, but a lot of times they didn’t know.”
Turturro in Los Angeles on Oct. 17Credit: Lisa O'CONNOR / AFP via Getty
Turturro also practiced on the subway in New York, and would get his hands as close as possible to wallets and phones of fellow commuters, but stopped short of actually taking anything. “I came really close,” the actor explained. “I just wanted to feel the thrill, the nerves of what that would be.”
The Transformers star said he didn’t think his excuse — training for a movie — would hold up in court. “I would think, ‘Well, I don’t want to get arrested,’” he said. “What was I going to say? That I was doing research?”
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Turturro has never been a victim of pickpocketing himself, but his wife has. “We were together, coming out of the movie, someone distracted her, went in her purse,” he said. “I mean, I had my apartment robbed, but that was different. I put an air-conditioner in the window of a little studio, and the next day, I was robbed.”
The film shot on active trains on location, which Turturro described as “really invigorating because people were so warm and giving” in public. “You have to penetrate these neighborhoods that you don’t normally go into,” he said. “Neighborhoods past Coney Island. I had my dressing room in a hair salon, in an apartment, in a pawn shop.”
The film sees Turturro’s character Harry steal from passersby as he cares for his wife (Karina Arroyave), who is in a coma.
“I read so many scripts and they’re so derivative. But this one, Wow,” Turturro said. “A person who’s never taken care of someone now realizes that’s what life is, to care for someone. His life has changed, the world has changed, his profession has changed and it just resonated with me. At a certain age, you know what loss is, you know what failure is.”
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The Only Living Pickpocket in New York hits theaters on Friday.
on Entertainment Weekly
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
