Life and career

Picerni was born in New York City, New York. He was an Eagle Scout

Eagle Scout (Boy Scouts of America)

Eagle Scout is the highest rank attainable in the Boy Scouting program of the Boy Scouts of America . A Scout who attains this rank is called an Eagle Scout or Eagle. Since its introduction in 1911, the Eagle Scout rank has been earned by more than 2 million young men...

 who joined the United States Army Air Forces

United States Army Air Forces

The United States Army Air Forces was the military aviation arm of the United States of America during and immediately after World War II, and the direct predecessor of the United States Air Force....

 during World War II, where he served as a B-24 Liberator

B-24 Liberator

The Consolidated B-24 Liberator was an American heavy bomber, designed by Consolidated Aircraft of San Diego, California. It was known within the company as the Model 32, and a small number of early models were sold under the name LB-30, for Land Bomber...

 bombardier

Bombardier (air force)

A bombardier , in the United States Army Air Forces and United States Air Force, or a bomb aimer, in the Royal Air Force and other Commonwealth air forces, was the crewman of a bomber responsible for assisting the navigator in guiding the plane to a bombing target and releasing the aircraft's bomb...

 in the China-Burma-India Theater

China Burma India Theater of World War II

China Burma India Theater was the name used by the United States Army for its forces operating in conjunction with British and Chinese Allied air and land forces in China, Burma, and India during World War II...

. He flew 25 combat missions with the 493rd Bomb Squadron of the 7th Bomb Group

7th Operations Group

The 7th Operations Group is the operational flying component of the United States Air Force 7th Bomb Wing, stationed at Dyess Air Force Base, Texas...

 and received the Distinguished Flying Cross

Distinguished Flying Cross (United States)

The Distinguished Flying Cross is a medal awarded to any officer or enlisted member of the United States armed forces who distinguishes himself or herself in support of operations by "heroism or extraordinary achievement while participating in an aerial flight, subsequent to November 11, 1918." The...

. He was part of a mission that attacked and destroyed the real bridge made famous in the film The Bridge on the River Kwai

The Bridge on the River Kwai

The Bridge on the River Kwai is a 1957 British World War II film by David Lean based on The Bridge over the River Kwai by French writer Pierre Boulle. The film is a work of fiction but borrows the construction of the Burma Railway in 1942–43 for its historical setting. It stars William...

(1957). After the Japanese surrendered, Picerni became a Special Services

Special Services (entertainment)

Special Services are the entertainment branch of the American military. The unit was created on 22 July 1940 by the War Department as part of the Army Service Forces. Special Services would not only use their own specially trained and talented troops but would often engage local performers.Special...

 officer in India. Following his discharge, he enrolled at Loyola Marymount University

Loyola Marymount University

Loyola Marymount University is a comprehensive co-educational private Roman Catholic university in the Jesuit and Marymount traditions located in Los Angeles, California, United States...

, at Los Angeles

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

.

As a young actor returning from the war, he appeared in military pictures: in Twelve O'Clock High

Twelve O'Clock High

Twelve O'Clock High is a 1949 American war film about aircrews in the United States Army's Eighth Air Force who flew daylight bombing missions against Nazi Germany and occupied France during the early days of American involvement in World War II. The film was adapted by Sy Bartlett, Henry King ...

(1949) as a bombardier and as Private Edward P. Rojeck in Breakthrough. This led to a Warner Brothers contract for Picerni and a succession of roles at that studio including a starring turn as the hero in the 1953 horror classic House of Wax

House of Wax (1953 film)

House of Wax is a 1953 American horror film starring Vincent Price. It is a remake of Warners' Mystery of the Wax Museum without the comic relief featured in the earlier film, and was directed by André de Toth...

. After his departure from Warners, he appeared with Audie Murphy

Audie Murphy

Audie Leon Murphy was a highly decorated and famous soldier. Through LIFE magazine's July 16, 1945 issue , he became one the most famous soldiers of World War II and widely regarded as the most decorated American soldier of the war...

 in Universal Studio's To Hell and Back

To Hell and Back (film)

To Hell and Back is a CinemaScope war film released in 1955. It was directed by Jesse Hibbs and starred Audie Murphy as himself and Kyle Sanville. It is based on the 1949 autobiography of the same name and is an account of Murphy's World War II experiences as a soldier in the U.S. Army...

.

In 1954, he appeared as Rube Burrows in the syndicated

Television syndication

In broadcasting, syndication is the sale of the right to broadcast radio shows and television shows by multiple radio stations and television stations, without going through a broadcast network, though the process of syndication may conjure up structures like those of a network itself, by its very...

 western

Western (genre)

The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...

 television series Stories of the Century

Stories of the Century

Stories of the Century is a Western television series that ran in syndication through Republic Pictures between January 23, 1954, and March 11, 1955.-Synopsis:...

, hosted and narrated by Jim Davis

Jim Davis (actor)

Jim Davis was an American actor, best known for his role as Jock Ewing in the CBS prime-time soap Dallas, a role which he held up until his death in April 1981.-Biography:...

. That same year, he appeared in the pilot episode for the 1957-1958 NBC

NBC

The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...

 detective series, Meet McGraw

Meet McGraw

Meet McGraw is an American dramatic television series starring Frank Lovejoy in the role of the hard-hitting detective McGraw, a man specifically given no first name in the program. Forty-one half-hour episodes aired on NBC during the 1957-1958 season, sponsored by Procter & Gamble. The series was...

, starring Frank Lovejoy

Frank Lovejoy

Frank Lovejoy was an American actor in radio, film, and television. He was born Frank Lovejoy Jr. in Bronx, New York, but grew up in New Jersey. His father, Frank Lovejoy Sr., was a furniture salesman from Maine...

. Picerni appeared in two episodes, "Gun Hand" and "Badge to Kill" of the 1957-1959 syndicated western series 26 Men

26 Men

26 Men is a syndicated American western television series about the Arizona Rangers, an elite group commissioned in 1901 by the legislature of the Arizona Territory and limited, for financial reasons, to twenty-six active members. Russell Hayden was the producer of the series and the co-composer of...

, true stories of the Arizona Rangers

Arizona Rangers

The Arizona Rangers is an Arizona law enforcement agency modeled on the Texas Rangers. The Arizona Rangers were created by the Arizona Territorial Legislature in 1901, disbanded in 1909, and subsequently reformed in 1957. They were created to deal with the infestations of outlaws in the sparsely...

, starring Tristram Coffin. In 1957, he played a deserter in an episode of the syndicated Boots and Saddles

Boots and Saddles (TV series)

Boots and Saddles is an American Western television series that aired in syndication from 1957 to 1958. The series was created by Robert A. Cinader.-Synopsis:...

. In 1959, he appeared in an episode of NBC's Northwest Passage

Northwest Passage (TV series)

Northwest Passage is a 26-episode half-hour adventure television series produced by Metro Goldwyn Mayer about Major Robert Rogers during the time of the French and Indian War . The show derived its title and the main characters Rogers, Towne, and Marriner from the 1937 novel of the same name by...

adventure

Adventure

An adventure is defined as an exciting or unusual experience; it may also be a bold, usually risky undertaking, with an uncertain outcome. The term is often used to refer to activities with some potential for physical danger, such as skydiving, mountain climbing and or participating in extreme sports...

 series about Major Robert Rogers

Robert Rogers (soldier)

Robert Rogers was an American colonial frontiersman. Rogers served in the British army during both the French and Indian War and the American Revolution...

's exploits during the French and Indian War

French and Indian War

The French and Indian War is the common American name for the war between Great Britain and France in North America from 1754 to 1763. In 1756, the war erupted into the world-wide conflict known as the Seven Years' War and thus came to be regarded as the North American theater of that war...

. That same year, he appeared as a police detective in the episode "The Quemoy Story" of Bruce Gordon

Bruce Gordon (actor)

Bruce Gordon was an American actor best known for playing Frank Nitti in the ABC television series The Untouchables....

's short-lived NBC docudrama

Docudrama

In film, television programming and staged theatre, docudrama is a documentary-style genre that features dramatized re-enactments of actual historical events. As a neologism, the term is often confused with docufiction....

 about the Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

, Behind Closed Doors

Behind Closed Doors (1958 TV series)

Behind Closed Doors is an American drama series set during the Cold War hosted by and occasionally starring Bruce Gordon in the role of Commander Matson. The series, which aired on NBC from October 2, 1958, to April 9, 1959, focuses, among other themes, on how the former Soviet Union stole American...

.

When Italian organizations began to complain about the use of Italian gangsters on TV's, The Untouchables

The Untouchables (1959 TV series)

The Untouchables is an American crime drama that ran from 1959 to 1963 on ABC. Based on the memoir of the same name by Eliot Ness and Oscar Fraley, it fictionalized the experiences of Eliot Ness, a real-life Prohibition agent, as he fought crime in Chicago during the 1930s with the help of a...

, starring Robert Stack

Robert Stack

Robert Stack was an American actor. In addition to acting in more than 40 films, he was the star of the 1959-1963 ABC television series The Untouchables and later served as the host of Unsolved Mysteries.-Early life:...

 as G-man Eliot Ness

Eliot Ness

Eliot Ness was an American Prohibition agent, famous for his efforts to enforce Prohibition in Chicago, Illinois, and the leader of a legendary team of law enforcement agents nicknamed The Untouchables.- Early life :...

, Picerni joined the cast of the show as Ness's number-one aide, Lee Hobson, from 1960-63.

In 1964, he portrayed Pierre Lafitte

Pierre Lafitte

Pierre Lafitte was a pirate in the Gulf of Mexico in the early 19th century. He also ran a blacksmith shop in New Orleans, his legitimate business. Pierre was the historically less-well-known older brother of Jean Lafitte...

 in, The Great Adventure

The Great Adventure (TV series)

The Great Adventure is a historical anthology series that appeared on CBS for the 1963-1964 television season. The series, hosted each week by Van Heflin, and featuring theme music by Richard Rodgers, presented each week a one-hour dramatization of the lives of famous Americans and important...

. For some 30 years, Picerni was the half-time master of ceremonies for the Los Angeles Rams home games. He had since moved to Anaheim

Anaheim, California

Anaheim is a city in Orange County, California. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city population was about 365,463, making it the most populated city in Orange County, the 10th most-populated city in California, and ranked 54th in the United States...

, California.

Picerni married former ballet dancer Marie Mason, in 1947; they had eight children and 10 grandchildren. Many of their children and family are employed as Hollywood stunt people, including son Paul V. Picerni, Jr., grandson Rick Picerni and sister Paula Picerni.

His autobiography

Autobiography

An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...

 "Steps to Stardom: My Story," written with the help of Tom Weaver, was published by BearManor Media in 2007. Picerni died from a heart attack on January 12, 2011 in Palmdale, California

Palmdale, California

Palmdale is a city located in the center of northern Los Angeles County, California, United States.Palmdale was the first community within the Antelope Valley to incorporate as a city on August 24, 1962; 47 years later, voters approved creating a charter city in November, 2009. Palmdale is...

.

External links

• Paul Picerni interview http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=372399322536
• Obituary LA Daily News