Matthew J. Prigge

Dog’s Day

The wilder-than-fiction true story behind the sensational bank heist immortalized in the 1975 film Dog Day Afternoon

On the hottest day of 1972, John Wojtowicz and a teenage accomplice strode into a Brooklyn bank, guns drawn, and demanded the contents of the vault. The cops showed up before the two could escape. Over the next 14-hours, an unexpected drama played out in real time. Wojtowicz took the lead, making demands of the cops and unashamedly declaring that he was a gay man and wished to see his trans lover. Part of the reason for the heist, he hinted, was to get the cash to pay for her gender-affirming surgery. Wojtowicz captured the attention of the city and the nation. And did not let it go until he was arrested and his accomplice was shot dead by the FBI. 

Al Pacino famously portrayed a fictionalized Wojtowicz in the film Dog Day Afternoon, but Hollywood could only tell part of the story. Dog’s Day is the never-before-told story of the robbery and the tragically intertwined lives that made it happen. From the gritty origins of the gay liberation movement to the Mafia exploiters who controlled New York City’s queer gathering spaces to the bizarre post-prison celebrity of a man who could never admit he’d done anything wrong, Dog’s Day is a story that feels as relevant today as it was fifty years ago: a messy love story in a politically fraught time in which simply being oneself could be seen as an act of rebellion. Nerves fray and desperation looms, guns are drawn and the straight world—for a few hours at least—cannot look away.