According to a representative of Ray Liotta, the actor died in his sleep in the Dominican Republic while shooting his latest film Dangerous Waters alongside Saffron Burrows.
Liotta was born in New Jersey and abandoned at an orphanage before being adopted at six months. “At first, I didn’t understand how a parent could give up a child,” he said to People magazine. “So I had that kind of energy of just being like, that’s fucked up. And then when I finally met my birth mom in my forties, by then, I wasn’t as angry about it. It’s just another journey.”
The movie star has been idolized in several hip hop songs due to his true to life portrayals in movies.
Throughout 1990s, rappers such as Jay-Z and other New York rappers—inspired by his film GoodFellas(1990), used and interpolated the movie’s title, phrases and situations in the hip-hop world as the cinematic equivalent.
The line “Fuck You Pay Me” which is now used by many hip hop acts comes from a narration sequence in which Ray’s character, Henry Hill explained how the mafia world works.
The term Goodfella itself has been adopted countless times by hip hop stars as a term endearment and status in their lyrics.
Future makes reference on the No Games remix(2013), “They treat us like the Goodfellas everywhere that we go No games.”
Fabolous on All Good off his Young OG Project(2014) , “It was G.O.O.D Music like Kanye and them It was Goodfellas like Henry and them.”
On All About The Benjamins(1997), Puffy starts off the intro with “Uh, uh-huh, yeah Uh, uh-huh, yeah (it’s all about the Benjamins baby) Uh, uh-huh, yeah (it’s all about the Benjamins baby) (Goodfellas, uh).”
Ray’s was also best known for playing Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams (1989), and Tommy Vercetti in the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002).
