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[seagulls chirping]
[background conversations]
[horses trotting]
[heavy breaths]
[wheels rolling]
Woman: Oh dear,
[city sounds build]
Man: Off the sidewalk.
[soft female opera singing]
I beg your pardon?
Can you see that I’m speaking with someone?
I don’t understand you.
Frank: Go to a hospital that takes Italians!
Come on,
Filthy little Dago, let’s go! Out!
[soft opera continues]
Policeman1: Where’s your father? Do you have any other family?
Policeman2: Johnny, don’t waste your time--
those monkeys don’t understand a thing.
Two days and she’s in the Potter’s Field.
[music intensifies] [female opera singing]
[low music continues]
[multiple footsteps running]
[coughing]
[coughing and gasping]
[knocking on door]
[shuddered breaths]
[single violin plays]
[bike noise and farm noises]
[locomotive engine]
[adventurous music]
[dramatic opera music]
[background conversations]
[his words repeated as though heard through water]
[water sounds continue]
[low violin plays]
[words continue repeating]
[low violin playing]
[symphony of strings plays]
New York.
And from now on, my sisters, we speak English.
We will be greeted at the port by a priest named Morelli.
He can no longer manage his orphanage in Five Points,
so we will gain possession of it,
and give the abandoned children the love they so badly need.
If we are to build an empire of hope,
my sisters,
it seems we must first conquer New York.
[ship foghorn]
And so we begin.
[fog horn]
[inspirational music]
[wind and flowing water]
[low violin sound]
[many footsteps and harbor sounds]
We’ve waited long enough.
Excuse me, how much to Five Points?
Don’t go to Five Points at this hour.
Please, sir. We don’t know--
I’m sorry.
[background conversations]
Open your eyes.
See everything.
This is who we’ve come to serve.
[dramatic music]
[slammed door and kids scream]
Hey!
[door squeaks open]
[saloon music and commotion in the background]
[moving dresser]
[banging on the door]
[rooster crows]
[background conversations]
Francesca Cabrini.
[music plays]
[street market conversations]
Welcome to America.
[door closes]
[street market and music]
[adventurous music]
[horse and carriage noises]
Man 1: Filthy dagos,
they just keep coming.
We ought’a ship ’em all back.
Who are you looking at, Guinea Pig?
[man snorts]
Man 2: Come on. Let’s go.
Bishop: If you’re saying that there is an Italian problem,
then yes, there is.
Quite a large one!
Now, I... It’s not safe--
not for you, not for your wards.
Now, I’m terribly sorry
that you sailed the Atlantic to hear it,
but that is my letter in brief.
Cabrini: Then I take it as a great sign,
I did not receive it.
Because I’m staying.
Ah.
Well, uh...
Bishop: I made my decision,
so I’m afraid there’s no choice
but for you to get on a boat and go back home.
Now, my office
would be pleased to assist you
in arranging a steamer, if that might-
Cabrini: I was sent here by the Pope.
I would not want to disappoint him.
Hmm.
Of course, I am delighted that the Pope wishes you well.
But please know that I am empowered by Him
to make decisions for the Archdiocese
entirely as I see fit.
So if you are to remain in New York
it is only because I allow it.
Is this clear?
[door opening]
[rats squeaking]
Well...
[low violin plays]
This should be just fine.
[music grows to full opera]
[hammering]
[music continues]
[coughing]
[music continues]
Concetta: Look, Mother.
This one.
But this is nice too and it does cost less.
We’ll save on other things.
Our children deserve the best.
They will notice.
[praying in Italian]
[music continues]
[animal sounds]
[footsteps]
[labored breathing]
[coughing]
[background conversations]
[coughing and labored breathing]
[sigh]
[water sounds]
[street market conversations]
My lungs are very compromised.
I know.
How do you say it?
Post-tubercular symptoms...
We can speak English, Dr. Murphy.
I need the practice.
You’re fortunate I was here tonight.
I only volunteer on occasion.
Dr. Murphy: I take it you know your prognosis.
I’m afraid it’s not a cheerful one.
The doctors tell me five years.
In my experience... two,
perhaps three.
Five would be a miracle.
In that case,
I should get to work.
That’s if you rest, Mother.
If you have another episode like this...
it could very well spell the end.
[street market conversations]
[low violin plays]
Concetta: She’s here.
Don’t worry about me.
There will be a time...
There will be a time when I am away.
That’s why you have to learn
to face your fears,
to not just carry on
but to lead.
And to demonstrate
you can do all things,
all things in Him who strengthens us.
Whether I am here or not.
This is a beautiful place to live in.
Now we need to fill it with children.
[Italian song starts to play]
[street market conversations]
[footsteps in water]
[single violin plays]
[soft music starts]
[street market conversations]
Enzo, Paolo...
[background conversations of children]
[soft music plays]
[background conversations]
[gunshot]
[children screaming]
Be careful, Mother, or this place will eat you alive.
[soft music plays]
[flames crackle]
[man outside laughing]
[upbeat music]
And you’ve been in America for how long?
A few weeks.
Jenkins: Then, I suppose you can be excused
for not knowing that the City of New York
is not in the business of giving assistance
to people of...
...the Latin persuasion.
Of course, I wish you the best in all your-
Is this
the Mayor’s decision
or is it yours?
Pardon me?
I’d prefer to discuss this with the Mayor,
if you don’t mind.
Bishop: The Archdiocese simply cannot allow you
to solicit funds from City Hall.
Because I’m Italian?
The Archdiocese has worked many years indeed,
to earn the support of the highest echelons of this City.
I will not put that at risk.
I need your help.
I need an orphanage with more room,
where my children can be children,
and I don’t have to worry
that a pimp will smack them in the face.
All right.
This is all I can do.
Once-a-year contribution.
That should help a little.
But allow me to make myself clear,
You
are not to solicit money from any American institution--
or any American individual for that matter.
I will not have you begging your way
through the Upper West Side.
You are to solicit from Italians only.
You ask me to
fund the needs of impoverished Italians...
entirely from impoverished Italians.
I am giving you an order, Mother.
[heavy breaths]
[gasp]
[dramatic music]
[children playing]
[gasping]
[low violin plays]
[crying]
[street market noises]
[Newsie shouting]
[typewriter strokes]
[background conversations]
The problem is, I have to write articles that people read.
Do people know
that in America, the greatest nation on earth,
rats have it better than the children of Five Points?
I sincerely doubt that.
Then you clearly...
haven’t been to Five Points.
Vittoria, if you would be so kind
as to get Mr. Calloway’s hat.
[somber music plays]
“Even Rats Have It Better.” By Theodore Calloway.
Over the last several months,
a group of dark-eyed nuns,
led by a frail woman named Cabrini,
have been taking the risk of entering
certain forbidding places
where not even police dare to enter.
To each child,
Cabrini makes a promise,
“Soon we shall have a bed for you.”
These kids are coming home with us tonight.
They learn in English,
so they can be American citizens,
great ones,
proud of the land where they now live.
...will always be protected by the government.
And they sing in Italian,
so they can be proud of the land they came from.
She imbues these castaways
with a dignity their parents never knew.
For she believes the wounds these children bear
can only be healed through love,
and through an education of the heart.
Take the case
of the little waif
whose body was found upon the street
by one of Cabrini’s orphans.
No one stepped forward as the girl’s family,
so Cabrini and her children claimed her as their own.
Dear Reader,
New York is built upon the dead.
Her mighty rails,
her tunnels...
her shining streets,
all are set upon a bedrock of immigrant bone.
Is this bone not ours as well?
Did we not all arrive as immigrants?
Do we not owe these children-- our children
a life better than a rat’s?
[somber music continues]
Dear Reader,
what kind of New York do we want?
The one imagined by City Hall,
where the Italian is voiceless,
quarantined in slums?
Or do we want the New York that Cabrini imagines--
where the Italian is our equal in dignity,
and their children have a chance to live?
Cabrini: Here.
Concetta: Oh, but didn’t the Archbishop say--
The Archbishop ordered us not to beg here.
Cabrini: So we won’t.
We will live here instead.
[lighthearted music]
[Italian singing]
[city street noise]
[music continues]
So she didn’t need your permission.
That’s not exactly how she operates.
So you let a woman push you around,
an Italian woman.
Is that how you run your Church?
I’ve got the whole Upper West Side
climbing down my throat.
They look out their window,
and what do they see?
A wave of brown-skinned filth
parading up their street,
with a nun
as their pied-piper.
But don’t be mistaken,
this is not about a neighborhood.
This is about New York.
This is about the kind of New York we want.
About our New York.
A beacon of prosperity.
Somewhere, somehow,
a line must be drawn.
Well I am a shepherd, Mr. Mayor.
And, perhaps inconveniently,
the Italians are among my flock.
And the people of Crown Heights
and Corcoran’s Roost,
are they not among your flock?
Wouldn’t it be a shame
if a few permits got between all those good people
and the new churches they deserve?
And all those Irish kids
on their city grants,
my grants
—are we going to let some
puffed-up ‘dago’ nun
get in the way of all that?
A shepherd like you,
a good shepherd...
he knows where his sheep belong.
Bottoms-up, Your Grace.
Oh come now--
you’re a good Irish man, bottoms-up.
[somber music]
Inspector Hennessy, Housing Department.
[horn music plays]
Concetta: Maybe I can show you the classrooms, Inspector...
[background conversations]
Okay...
Congratulations,
you’ve broken 14 city codes
and stuffed 71 children
into a space appropriate for 20.
Italians like to stay close.
It’s unsanitary.
Then surely you’d like to inspect
the cellars where they used to live.
What I’d like you to do is to keep your crime
and your filth out of this neighborhood.
What crime?
You have seven days to make all modifications
and pay all fines or you will be evicted at once.
At which time,
you can move back to Five Points,
pack’em in there like herrings in a barrel.
You’ve acted in direct disobedience, Mother.
I was ordered not to solicit Americans,
and I did not.
America came to me.
Oh, that’s clever.
But you’ve strayed into waters
that are far too deep for you.
Maybe you could run to the papers again,
maybe you could raise enough to pay the fines,
but the Mayor will find a way to get you out
if he has to have his rowdies plant
a dead body in your yard, he will get you out
and your children will be right back in the rubbish dump.
Now, I don’t want to see that any more than you do.
So, I have a proposition.
The Jesuits own a property just north of here,
one they’d be willing to part with at a discount,
but only for the right cause.
There’s fifteen acres,
views of the Hudson, and room to play.
You know I couldn’t possibly afford this.
How much can you afford?
Have you come to make fun of me...?
Let me ask this way
how much do you have right now in your bank account?
Nine hundred sixteen dollars and twelve cents.
Mostly pennies.
Let’s call it a thousand,
I’ll chip in the difference.
And the Jesuits, they will accept, but...
the property does have a certain...
Well, it’s a challenge.
So how about we just discuss
that while we’re there, shall we?
Hmm?
[low violin music]
[horse and buggy moving]
[regal music]
Well...?
I shall be buried here.
May I meet you at the carriage?
Bishop: Yes, those are the wells.
As I said, there is a challenge.
Cabrini: There’s no water? None at all?
The Jesuits spent a lot of money looking.
But they had 300 men.
Far too many to support without a well.
If you keep your numbers low,
maybe you can find a way.
The Jesuits failed.
That does not mean we will.
[children playing]
[background conversations]
Cabrini: The Jesuits dug here,
and on the south side.
So we will start from the north.
They dug every fifteen meters,
we will have to dig every ten meters.
Umilia, establish two shifts,
and work your way south.
The older children can also help
when they’re free from class.
In the meantime, we will make the river work for us.
[inspirational music]
[water splashing]
[shoveling]
Want to join me?
[soft music]
[music continues]
[Explosion and alarm]
[alarm ringing and shouting]
[high pitch ringing]
[pipes humming]
[explosion]
[soft opera singing]
[street market commotion]
[music envelopes the conversations]
Keep that tight.
Mother!
I need someone to go to Mt. Carmel.
Now! Tell them I need morphine and chloroform!
And doctors!
Concetta.
Concetta: I can pay, please.
Nurse: We are not a supply store.
But we need help!
Sorry. We can’t help.
We need doctors! Please!
People are dying!
[dramatic opera music]
[crying]
[Italian song plays]
Dr Murphy: The explosion pushed Morelli over the edge.
As far as I can tell,
the hospital’s bankrupt.
He plans to shut it down, go back to Italy.
But they need that hospital.
Even if it’s just a place to die.
That’s more or less why I’ve come.
I know it’s mad to even think about it...
but if anyone could make a go of it...
it’d be you.
We live bucket-by-bucket, Dr. Murphy.
I couldn’t possibly take on a hospital.
Here’s the cold hard truth.
If that had been Mt. Carmel Hospital,
Enzo would be alive.
As would a good many of those men.
[horn music plays]
My lunch begins in an hour and fifty-three minutes,
not nearly enough time for me to list all the reasons
this bank will never make a loan to anyone who looks,
smells, walks, or talks like you.
If you’re asking my permission,
I won’t stop you.
If you’re asking my advice,
I think that you are barking mad.
Why even consider it?
Because people died that should not have.
How can we sleep knowing that?
I need funding.
From Americans!
No.
[DiSalvo singing Italian opera]
[Audience applause]
May I help you?
I am here to see signore DiSalvo.
I’m sorry but Mr. DiSalvo
does not accept any uninvited guests.
I’m sure he won’t mind!
To Americans, the great Verdi, Puccini,
Michelangelo, DaVinci,
they are one thing.
The men digging tunnels,
dying without a doctor,
these men are quite another.
Poor men,
from Sicily,
like you were.
We have to show America that we are all people of dignity.
As indeed we are.
But I’m afraid
I will not participate in your adventure.
Now, if you’ll excuse me
it’s time for me to go to the Opera.
This is about helping your people...
I have never been late to the theater
and today is not going to be the first.
But you must understand, this is not an issue you can just-
No, no, no.
you must understand.
I will never participate in any scheme
that involves... the church.
Show her out.
[street noise]
[inspirational music]
Evening George.
Cabrini: Dr. Murphy. - Yeah.
May I have a moment?
No one is going to invest in a failed hospital,
in a rat-infested building that was once a brothel.
But we could found a hospital like this one, a great one.
How would we begin?
We would need a real building
with a board of directors comprised of men of influence,
who are also sons of immigrants
Irish, Polish, Jewish.
Can you introduce me to such men?
My father came here from Ireland to work the rails.
Cheap labor,
disposable,...
just like the Italians in that pump station.
I figure anyone who came here on a boat, anyone at all,
I owe them a hand.
As does Mother Cabrini.
When I stepped off the boat,
gentlemen, not so long ago,
I had to learn words that were not in my dictionary.
Dago. Guinea pig.
Words said with such disdain, such hate,
that they cut just like a knife.
When your fathers first came here
did they not also have to learn words
such as Kike, Mick, Polack?
And even now,
in this fine neighborhood--
don’t you still hear
those names whispered behind your back?
I ask you to take those names, and turn them into a hospital.
I propose purchasing this property
and renovating it for 400 beds,
with services fine enough to attract the wealthy.
The fees we earn here,
we use to fund the needs
of the immigrant with nothing.
Who will also be treated by the finest doctors,
so that America will learn
we are more than Kike and Polack and butcher’s meat.
But you don’t even have the funds
to sustain the hospital in Five Points.
Begin the mission and the means will come.
This mission begins tonight,
in this room,
with you, gentlemen--
or it does not begin at all.
[inspirational music]
Gentlemen, have you all met?
Thank you for being here.
As you can see...
[conversation continue in the background]
...pediatrics.
Dr. Murphy: ...and if Abrams makes a pledge
I see no reason why his colleagues
wouldn’t follow suit.
It won’t put a dent in the grand total but...
it’s a start.
Dr. Murphy...
see if you can add another zero to his pledge.
[music and conversations continue]
There are 200 here.
And with the pledges that came in this week,
it’s... 617-
[gasps]
[music rises to triumphant]
[girls voice singing in Italian]
[Children singing in Italian]
[male singing upbeat Italian]
Oh no! Please, do not put me in jail. Please!
No, no jail! They need you to clean their toilets.
[upbeat Italian music]
[DiSalvo singing in Italian]
Man 1: You take money from a kid?!
[yelling and shouting]
Policeman: Time to clear the park!
Get out, Dagos!
Go, go!
You’re under arrest.
[background conversations]
Jenkins: Well,
on behalf of the Mayor,
I promise you that this is the last time New York will ever
see an Italian Festival.
The fines, including those attended upon your arrest,
amount to 3,111 dollars,
which happens to be exactly the amount we collected.
It’s your lucky day.
I need to speak to the Mayor.
Jenkins: Oh do you?
Cabrini: This money belongs to the poor!
I will speak to the Mayor, signore!
Who the hell do you think you are?
I am a woman!
And I am Italian!
And I am done with little men like you!
With hearts the size of a peanut!
Jenkins: Officer Rentschler!
Too blind to understand the truth!
To know that we are all human beings!
We are all the same!
Children of God!
And you dismiss us at your own peril!
Jenkins: Officer,
please escort this guinea
back to Five Points where she belongs.
Cabrini: I can walk myself!
Bishop: I warned you!
But you were blinded by ambition!
Naked ambition!
You chose to disobey me
and now your actions
have become the problem of the Archdiocese,
and the souls under my care!
You have left me no choice
but to inform you that your institutions
are to be disbanded,
and you and your sisters are to return to Italy.
I assure you
that the Archdiocese
will handle your wards appropriately.
You mean my children.
Your mission is over, Mother.
My mission has barely begun.
Mother Cabrini-
You ask me to destroy my houses
and run back to Italy like a criminal.
You were arrested, were you not?
This problem will be with us in a hundred years.
There’s no point working yourself
to death trying to change it.
Some things never change.
Forgive me if I don’t have the strength to think like you.
Well, despite that, the Italians
have survived without you,
and somehow they will continue to do so.
You are to leave New York and never return.
This is an order of obedience.
[low tones]
[church bell tolls]
[low violin plays]
Cabrini: It is an order of obedience, and must be obeyed.
Corrigan gave us 30 days,
I intend to use them.
In my absence, Concetta will manage all New York operations.
Until we hear otherwise,
we will continue the work we’ve begun.
As Mother says, we have plenty of time to rest in Heaven.
So, let’s get back to work.
We are survivors...
are we not?
[music continues]
We are.
Would you take me with you?
[seagulls chirping]
[ship foghorn]
[newsie shouting]
[church bell tolls]
[door opens]
[low tones play]
[watery echoes of voices]
[coughing]
[soft music plays]
[sounds of water]
[music plays]
[coughing]
[footsteps]
[low tones and water]
[triumphant music]
[bell toll and water]
[violin plays]
[coughing]
[music continues]
[coughing]
[Heart beat sound]
[men speaking in Italian]
[low triumphant tones]
We are bold,
or we die.
[soft music]
[ship’s foghorn]
[background conversations]
Bishop: Mother Cabrini!
Cabrini: Your Grace.
What an honor that you came to greet us.
May I?
No, thank you. I can manage.
Sister.
Bishop: When I was a boy,
I would sit in a parlor
with my father and his cronies.
All of them fresh from Ireland, all of them illiterate.
And
when the whiskey hit my father,
he would pin me
with his blue eyes and say,
“Listen to me, Mikey boy,
our generation
is digging the whole bloody tunnel from old Croton Dam.
So you lads can drink cool water from a tap.
And don’t you forget it.”
Well, I never did forget.
Please don’t think I don’t understand.
Or that I don’t on some level
admire what you’re doing.
But please know, Mother,
that you have swatted the hornet’s nest.
And neither I nor the Pope
can protect you from what may come.
Good morning, Mr. Merton.
Francesca Cabrini.
Shall we begin?
[soft music]
Of course half of the workers must be Italian.
Italian? No, no, no. Sorry, sister.
We built Rome, I am sure we can build a hospital.
I’m afraid-
It is not negotiable.
And all workers-- including Italians--
must get the same pay.
We’ll see what Dr. Murphy has to say about that.
You’ll have to do as I say, Mr. Merton.
And from now on, the sisters and I sleep here.
[female opera singing]
No, no Salvitore...
[window crashes]
[footsteps]
[liquid splashing]
[fire crackling]
[low dramatic music]
[gasps]
[dramatic music]
[background conversations]
[determining music]
I have a favor to ask, Mr. Calloway.
Cabrini: I will see the Mayor.
Now, Mr. Jenkins.
You will never see the Mayor.
Mr. Calloway wants a front page story.
And Mother is the only one holding it back.
So I’d do as she says.
Jenkins: Mr. Mayor.
Mother Cabrini.
Cabrini: Your Honor.
[violin music]
Where’s Calloway?
Cabrini: I’d like to speak to the Mayor alone, Mr. Jenkins.
Do you know why I am here, Mr. Mayor?
Mayor: Not in the least.
Are you aware of the fire at my construction site?
Mayor: If I was kept abreast of every fire in this--
It was arson.
The Detective Unit is on the third floor.
Is there anything else I can help you with?
Cabrini: Lives were almost lost...
And I am willing to believe
that whoever did this
thought the place was empty.
Careful, Mother.
I am not here to accuse.
Mr. Calloway, however, has his own ideas.
I believe I am being threatened by a nun.
Cabrini: If Mr. Calloway-
Mr. Calloway is a lying son of a bitch!
Cabrini: Mr. Calloway is a friend.
Who would be delighted to hear that you have put your support
behind my hospital
and the good work of-
Oh, no, no, no!
If you think you’re gonna march in here and tell me-
I want the best hospital!
For your people
and for mine!
Oh, what rot!
Cabrini: You may think we are lazy, dirty animals,
but someday, sooner than you think,
there will be an Italian in this office!
And he will not be cleaning it!
He will be running New York.
Because most of these ‘Dagos’
are already Americans!
You have an election coming up, do you not?
Support my work now,
and you will have their loyalty.
That I promise.
And if I cannot have your support,
I will settle for your protection.
Mr. Calloway will be very happy to hear it,
as will the voters of Five Points.
And I thought you were new at this.
Yes, please.
Now, I need to know that this is the end of all the fires,
of any kind.
And I am willing to take your word for it,
because you are a good man,
and good men don’t lie to nuns.
[glasses clink]
It’s a shame that you’re a woman, Mother.
You would have made an excellent man.
Oh no, Mr. Mayor.
Men could never do what we do.
[swell to triumphant music]
[somber music]
“An Empire of Hope,” by Theodore Calloway.
My dear friend, Frances Xavier Cabrini,
arrived in New York with nothing but a small suitcase
and a few sisters--
and went on to become one of the great entrepreneurs of her time.
Her first hospital--
built amid the smoke of controversy--
was soon considered one of the finest in all New York,
and was a source of pride and healing
and hope for immigrants of all nations.
Cabrini and her sisters went on to found hundreds
of hospitals, orphanages, schools,
and aid centers all around the world...
on every continent...
including institutions deep in China.
It was the largest charitable empire
the world had ever known--
an accomplishment equal to that
of any Rockefeller or Vanderbilt.
And all of her institutions were run by women.
Cabrini continued to defy death
until the age of 67.
She was buried at her grand orphanage
high above the Hudson,
just as she predicted.
She was canonized
at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican.
The great plaza--
across which she had walked alone
so many years before -
was packed to bursting.
Just as Cabrini had wrapped her arms
around the forgotten immigrant,
America now embraced her as one of its own.
A celebration was held in her honor at
Chicago’s Soldier Field,
while hundreds of thousands more
listened on radios all across the country.
Cabrini was the first American saint,
and is the patron saint of all immigrants.
And even now she begs us to ask –
what kind of world do we want?
And what will we do to achieve it?