Mr. Cucuzza is the patriarch of the family who moves into the apartment below the Roths’ as part of the Good Neighbors program. Mr. Cucuzza, like Herman Roth, deeply opposes the spread of fascism in America, having seen what Benito Mussolini’s dictatorship did to his home country of Italy. Though the Good Neighbors program has nefarious purposes, Mr. Cucuzza ultimately does prove himself to be a good neighbor—he is protective of the Roths and even lends Herman a pistol so that he can defend his family against the rising threat of anti-Semitic violence.
Get the entire The Plot Against America LitChart as a printable PDF.
Mr. Cucuzza Character Timeline in The Plot Against America
The timeline below shows where the character Mr. Cucuzza appears in The Plot Against America. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 7: The Winchell Riots
...family headed by a stoic but kind night watchman named Tommy, whom the Roths call Mr. Cucuzza . The Cucuzzas have a young son, Joey, who is just a bit older than...
(full context)
The night of Winchell’s assassination, Mr. Cucuzza and Joey knock on the door of the Roths’ apartment and bring in some gifts—a...
(full context)
Chapter 8: Bad Days
...against the chaos happening in the outside world, the Roth household quickly dissolves into violence. Mr. Cucuzza , hearing the noise and fearing the worst, breaks into the living room wielding his...
(full context)
Late that night, after Mr. Cucuzza brings Herman back home from the emergency room, shots, screams, and sirens break out on...
(full context)
Chapter 9: Perpetual Fear
Sandy and Herman’s 1,500-mile trip out west is the “adventure of Sandy’s lifetime.” Herman carries Mr. Cucuzza ’s pistol in the glovebox the whole time, stopping for gas only once and, upon...
(full context)
