Humans of the Heights: A Conversation with Nick Braccia

For the seventh installment of my series sharing the stories of the people of the Heights, I spoke to Nick Braccia. An award-winning creative director, author and copywriter who’s been shaping culture for decades. In this interview, he reflects back on his life and extensive career and shares insightful perspectives on the creative industry, life in the city and much more. 

This is his story:

Avraham Frohlich: Let’s start with your background; where are you from? How was your childhood?

Nick Braccia: Well, I was born in the mid-70s, grew up in southern Connecticut, and went to high school in Fairfield. My parents were civil servants, a cop and a nurse. I was a competitive baseball player and swimmer from a young age, but I also liked video games and reading books.

Living and working in Norwalk and Stamford, there was a pronounced Italian and Jewish enclave with deep roots. My family is three quarters Italian-American, one quarter mixed European. It was an interesting time to be Italian-American in Connecticut.

AF: What do you mean?

NB: Coming out of the mid to late ‘70s, when I was born, we had a cultural moment with Pacino, De Niro, Sylvester Stallone and mob movies. I actually wrote a book about the show “The Sopranos.”

AF: Very cool. What speaks to you about that show?

NB: I think it speaks satirically but also with a lot of truth to the complete assimilation and end of the Italian-American immigrant experience. In my own family, you would see little gestures at maintaining tradition, but it was kind of going through the motions.

AF: What did tradition look like for you growing up?

NB: You know, church, Easter. I was confirmed, I grew up Catholic, but I’m not practicing now.

In my parents’ generation, working-class families often all lived on the same block. Like that’s how my parents met; my mother was the babysitter for my dad’s niece and nephew. On this one street when I was growing up, you had my grandmother in a house here, my mother’s mother, my dad’s sister, everyone.

And family stuck together. And then, with my generation, people went to college for the first time and started to move out and get their own lives. In the ‘80s and ‘90s, in a consumerist America, the notions of tradition kind of fell off.

AF: How was your college experience? 

NB: I went to the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. and I was an English major. I took a lot of film classes, and my film professor became a mentor of mine and contributed to my book, as did a lot of my classmates from back then. It was there that I found my niche.

But I was also reading “The Village Voice” and I knew that at that time, late ‘90s, early aughts, the city was where I wanted to be. So I moved here after college.

AF: How was it arriving in New York?

NB: Oh, it was awesome. It was a great time to be in the city. I didn’t have much money, though. I moved to the East Village with a friend of mine and bounced around a bit. 

And I was getting used to having a career as a copywriter and creative director in digital and experiential advertising. It was a really exciting time to be in the city just before 9/11. After 9/11, you know, that was a very rough experience.

AF: What do you remember about that day, 9/11?

NB: I was in the city. I was on my way down to work. I saw the planes hit on the TV, and I couldn’t understand the scope of it. Everyone, at first, thought it was just a small Cessna plane that had gotten lost or something. It didn’t click until I took the subway down and everyone was starting to look at each other, like, “Oh geez.” I got out at Union Square, and a colleague was running towards me saying, “the tower’s going down, the tower’s going down,” and I turned around, you could see it, the smoke, the aftermath. 

And then I went into the office, and there was pandemonium. I thought friends were dead. One of my colleagues came up to my office to use my phone. I remember breaking into tears when I saw him because I thought he was dead.

The subways were all down, and once we knew it was safe, we had to walk. From 18th Street to 95th, 77 blocks.

AF: What was the city like after 9/11?

NB: Somber. I’ll always remember the smell of burnt rubber. You could smell it all the way up on the Upper East Side. For months.

I remember going to a concert shortly after at Village Vanguard. And Bill Frisell, this great jazz guitarist, did his version of the song “What a Wonderful World.” It’s the sort of thing you never forget.

AF: How’d you make your way to the Heights?

NB: After moving back from a couple years in California, I had a boss who recommended checking out Hudson Heights. I thought it was too far, not enough going on. But I really fell in love with it. Been here ever since, for 13 years. Had my daughter here and three different apartments.

AF: How was it working in the city after college?

NB: Well, the dot-com boom was happening at the time, and there weren’t enough young people who were digital natives. So, whereas it’s really hard to get a job out of school as a copywriter today, I was recommended by a friend, wrote a couple of fake eBay ads on a napkin, and got a job. I still remember the ads I wrote like “Get Egyptian artifacts without the booby traps.”

I did some work for M&M, Skittles, things like that and then worked more in entertainment, like books, video games and movies. I got admitted to the Producers Guild and got to vote on the PGA awards each year. Eventually, I connected with someone who became a friend and mentor, Mike Monello, and helped develop the creative strategies for “Westworld” and “Watchmen” among other projects, and developed a podcast that got bought by AMC. During my time there, I won a Clio award, which I got on the Oscar stage in LA, and a Cannes Lion.

AF: What was the process of writing a book like?

NB: “The Sopranos” deal came together at Simon & Schuster quite by happenstance, and I had a fairly limited time to do it. I developed the book as a concept, like a party I’m hosting with the most interesting fans in the world providing their analyses of the show.

Being able to tell this story, to talk about this show which felt kind of close to my roots with people who mean a lot to me, is probably the proudest achievement I have.

AF: Was it hard to get published?

NB: The industry can be hard, but my experience in New York is if you put yourself out there and you’re busy, good things happen. The “Sopranos” book in part happened because I was at HBO for a meeting, and I had a friend that worked up at Simon and Schuster and I wanted to use his charger. I got talking to the editor-in-chief who ran his department, and she was like, “What kind of ideas do you have for books?” and I brought up “The Sopranos” concept and she got really excited about it. A few weeks later I had a contract.

Some of it is right place at the right time. The director Guillermo del Toro says it’s talent, luck and hard work. You can’t really control talent that much, and you can’t control luck at all. But if you keep pushing yourself out there and you’ve got a good sense that you’ve got some talent, you can make things happen. The hardest part is just to keep showing up and keep pushing yourself to go out there.

AF: What are your favorite things about living in the Heights?

NB: I love that it’s so small and neighborhoody. I like that I know supers in multiple buildings and see the same people and artists over the years when I go to coffee and just around. It really is like this little neighborhood filled with characters.

And Fort Washington Park’s amazing. One day, I saw a whale there swimming in the Hudson.

These days, I go downtown a lot to teach film and interactive storytelling classes at Columbia University and AMDA (The American Musical and Dramatic Academy) in Columbus Circle.

AF: Do you have any experience with the Jewish community in the Heights?

NB: My daughter went to the Y and learned swimming at the JCC. We would take my daughter to the Purim festival and to music classes at the synagogue. And I’m someone who’s always had a lot of Jewish friends. Often, my friends joke that I’m honorary.

AF: How is it living in New York and working in the creative arts?

NB: Well, the degree of difficulty of living here is way harder. I’ve been spending a lot of time in West Palm Beach lately for a project; people seem happier and healthier and have more time. It’s hard to do it here.

AF: So why do you do it here? 

NB: Good question. Because I’m stubborn, and I don’t want to mow a lawn. I always want to be dreaming or reading or writing. But the other thing is, you know, Sinatra sang it in “New York, New York” “if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.” And I’ve made it here to a degree. I’m not a wealthy man, but I never wanted to quit or give it up.

AF: How was it to stand on the Oscar stage?

NB: Oh, it was terrifying. It’s a surprisingly small space. And I had never been on a stage with lights like that. So I’m on the stage, and the lights are blinding you, and you’re in front of a microphone, and there are hundreds of people in the room, none of whom you know, and you’ve got to hit your thank yous. In a way, it felt very lonely.

AF: What did it mean to you to win the award?

NB: After the show, my friend Mika and I went out to this Mexican restaurant on Sunset Boulevard. It was there, drinking micheladas and eating chips with him, that I decided the accolades don’t matter. 

Still, the recognition for a project feels really good, especially when it’s with your friends and you feel like you won together. It strengthens those bonds. And people I’ve done projects with, I’ve officiated their weddings, I’m there for their kids. It’s like being in a band.

AF: Last question: What’s your advice for Yeshiva University students?

NB: I would say that Yeshiva is lucky in that it is in proximity to the most neighborly area in Manhattan. So, consider all of it your campus. I’m just one person; there are thousands of stories as unique as mine all over the place. Just meet people because the people around you become your neighbors, neighbors become family and families look out for one another.

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Photo Caption: Nick Braccia 

Photo Credit: Nick Braccia