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Phil Manna: A long dance with giglio

By Lauren Johnston | amNY.com

June 1, 2007

Phil Manna will serve as No. 1 Capo, head of the lifters, in Williamsburg's 2007 Feast of the Giglio. (Lauren Johnston / June 1, 2007)

A dozen men huddle in the basement of Williamsburg's Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church, hunched over the paper mache likeness of a Catholic saint with brushes and cans of gold paint, and Phil Manna is standing watch.

For 51 years, he toiled among the parish crew preparing for the church's annual Feast of the Giglio, which honors the sacrifices of their patron saint, Paolino.

But now as No. 1 Capo, it's Manna's job to pick the colors for the 5-ton tower central to the celebration and decide how many times this crew of burly painters will lift and heave it down Havemeyer Street.

And not even a recent kidney transplant could keep him from the job.

"I guess the only thing more important was my marriage and two children," says Manna, 63, who suffers from Type 2 diabetes. "My wife says it's easier to become president than No. 1 Capo."

And that spirit of sacrifice pulsing through the feast means even more to him now it was his wife Joanne who gave him a new kidney.

Doctors told Manna in November that his kidneys were failing fast and he'd need a transplant to survive. Against all odds, Joanne was a viable donor.

"It was amazing, like a miracle that she was a perfect match for me," Manna says. He would otherwise have waited at least two, and likely closer to five years for a kidney.

And poor health would have forced him to forfeit his reign as top capo. For the Mannas, both Williamsburg natives raised on the song and spirit of the feast, that wasn't an option.

"My husband worked so many years on the feast in different ways and this is his year to shine," Joanne says.

They scheduled their surgeries for Jan. 25, leaving Phil six months to recuperate before stepping up as Capo Paranza, the Italian name for No. 1 Capo which translates to "head of the lifters."

Phil is bouncing back, but recovery has been more painful for Joanne, who suffered some spinal complications and may need another surgery.

The Mannas have been married for 32 years. Both grew up on Conselyea Street, just a few blocks from Our Lady of Mount Carmel, where they met when he was 10 and she was about four.

"I know her all my life," says Phil.

They raised their two daughters, 22-year-old Christina and 19-year-old Paula, on nearby DeVoe Street.

They also share the bond of heritage. Both their families immigrated to Williamsburg from Nola, Italy, where the feast began, so celebrating the giglio is as they often say in this parish in their blood.

Joanne is fifth generation and Phil's 14-year-old nephew Joseph Aragona will this year become the fifth generation of his family to lift the giglio in Brooklyn, and he'll do so before an audience of nearly 50 Nolani relatives traveling from Italy to congratulate Phil on making capo.

"My grandfather was president of the San Paolino Society in 1923. My father was a lifter. My uncles were lifters," he says. "I had to work my way up, but I'm proud I could become one of them."