Dino Ortolani
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Dino Ortolani, played by Jon Seda, is a fictional character who only appeared in the first episode of the HBO series Oz.
[edit] Character overview
The epitome of a macho Italian gangster, Ortolani is racist, homophobic, and hotheaded. He is also the nephew of Nino Schibetta. He is in prison for murdering a man and nearly killing Ryan O'Reily, and is serving a sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
[edit] Season 1
Ortolani, a short tempered man, runs the kitchen for Italian chief Nino Schibetta. He dislikes the black inmates and bosses them around, unconcerned with the the fact that they constitute the majority of the kitchen staff. He is disliked my most staff and inmates but is somewhat admired by Vernon Schillinger (the feeling is not mutual). When Ortolani learns that Ryan O'Reily is alive and coming to Oz, he schemes to have his old enemy killed.
Ortolani nearly cripples a gay inmate, Billie Keane, who flirted with him in the shower. This enrages Billie's brother, Jefferson, the leader of the homeboys gang, who plots to kill Ortolani in retaliation.
Tim McManus lets Ortolani know that every prisoner and guard in Oz either hates him or is scared of him (or both), something he does not seem to mind. So, as punishment for beating up Billie he sends him to work in the AIDS ward, hoping to teach him a lesson in tolerance. While he serves time in the AIDS ward, Ortolani develops an infatuation for Dr. Gloria Nathan.
Although Ortolani is initially appalled by the AIDS patients, he begins to like one of them, Emilio Sanchez. Sanchez eventually asks Ortolani to help him die and end his suffering. Ortolani doesn't agree immediately, but returns later to do as Sanchez asked him. He disconnects Sanchez from his life support and smothers him.
McManus and Nathan throw him into isolation ward and have him sedated. Keane then gives the order to Johnny Post and O'Reily to kill him. O'Reily uses his connections to allow Post entry to the hole, and Post then pours flammable liquid onto the sedated and restrained Ortolani and sets him on fire, burning him to death.
Ortolani is portrayed as a callous temperamental bigot seething with hatred and anger, but he occasionally reveals some positive characteristics. Throughout the episode, Ortolani is seen to feel some admiration for new inmate Kareem Said, whom he watches during his lectures to the Muslim inmates. And just before he is about to smother Sanchez, Ortolani tells Said, "It's too bad you're of the wrong color," before taking off.
In the sixth and final season, his spirit co-narrated with Augustus Hill in Episode #54: A Day in the Death.
[edit] External links
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