24 years ago, last month, came the release of My Cousin Vinny. It’s a smash hit that no one saw coming in 1992. The movie, made on an $11 million budget, took in about six times that at the box office, and Marisa Tomei won an Academy Award for her supporting role as Mona Lisa Vito, the girlfriend with a loud biological clock to Vinny Gambini, played by Joe Pesci. Like every great fish-out-of-water story, it’s the interactions with the locals that make it so funny, and perhaps Vinny’s most famous conversation with the judge (Fred Gwynne) involves a misunderstanding that was born from a real conversation the actor had with director Jonathan Lynn.
