R.I.P.: Carmine Capobianco, star of Psychos in Love, has passed away

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

The name Carmine Capobianco may not be immediately familiar to a lot of horror fans, and to be honest I wasn't familiar with it myself before I walked into a Q&A with the man at the Cinema Wasteland convention in October of 2016. Of his twenty-plus acting credits, I had seen maybe one of the movies he was in… but by the time that Q&A was over, I was a Carmine Capobianco fan, he was so funny and entertaining during that hour-long panel. I sent him a friend request on Facebook soon after, and enjoyed seeing his good natured, humorous posts. Sadly, Capobianco had also been battling cancer for years, and on January 9th that cancer took him from us at the age of 62.

Born in Waterbury, Connecticut in 1958, Capobianco earned his earliest screen acting credits in the 1980s through a series of collaborations with director Gorman Bechard. Their first feature together was the 1984 horror film Disconnected, and that was quickly followed by the horror-comedy Psychos in Love, the sci-fi comedy Galactic Gigolo, and the vigilante film Cemetery High (which was going to be called Assault of the Killer Bimbos, until executive producer Charles Band decided to use that title for a different movie).

Capobianco didn't appear in any movies during the '90s, but in the last twenty-one years he added a lot more indie film credits to his résumé, including movies in the Bikini Bloodbath seres, I Spill Your Guts, Cool as Hell, The Sins of Dracula, Seven Dorms of Death, and Model Hunger. 

Residents of the Waterbury area may remember Capobianco as the host of the public access show Funstuff with Carmine, and as the owner of Funstuff Video & Games. He wrote editorials for the Waterbury Observer, and also published two books; Tall and Short Tales of My Hometown and The Rude Pen.

Capobianco is survived by three daughters, a son, a grandson, a sister and brother, his longtime partner Carmel Scampolino, and several nieces, nephews, great nieces, and great nephews. 

I was only in Capobianco's presence for one hour, but he made a lasting impression in that time. I've been rooting for him throughout his fight with cancer, and was very sad to hear that it ended this way. I didn't know anything about Carmine Capobianco when I went into that Q&A, but now I'll never forget him.

Our sincere condolences go out to his family, friends, and fans.