This highly dramatized film focuses primarily on Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky. They start as young men victimized by the current mafia. They rise from petty criminals and Rum-running to push aside the old guard of the American Cosa Nostra and eventually establish The Commission (mafia), which set up the New York Mafia into five separate families. Bugsy Siegel (Richard Grieco) and Frank Costello (Costas Mandylor) control the physical elements of the operation, while Lucky Luciano (Christian Slater) and Meyer Lansky (Patrick Dempsey) bring up the business end.