Ric directed a memorable series of music videos beginning with the Beastie Boys (You Gotta)Fight For Your Right(To Party).  He reached an artistic peak with LL Cool J’s Going Back to Cali and Slick Rick’s Children’s Story both of which demonstrate his growing confidence and individualistic style.  He continued to write treatments for a wide assortment of music videos even after he stopped directing them. Ric worked in the last years of his life on That Menello Show and Mr. Ric’s Cinema that brought his enthusiastic love of movies into a digestible format viewable to a wide audience.

Special Ric Third Anniversary Memorial Video

In 2015, our cousin Ron Menello found a series of boxes that contained some of the comic books that Ric had collected as a boy. The boxes were stored in old wooden file cabinets in our Grandmother’s garage. Ric had outgrown his comic-book phase a long time ago, and his collection was all but forgotten. In time, they would show that his enthusiasm for all forms of media – from toys to comic books to movies and literature – was developed and fine-tuned long before his adulthood.

On this third anniversary of his passing, we take a small glimpse back on these weathered comics that maintain his wild, inventive spirit within them.

Menello Archives: Volume Four

On Christmas 2012, Ric, at a casual get-together with a group of friends in Brooklyn, was coaxed into singing a few songs. Mel pulled out his cellphone and recorded two of them. They remained on his phone until he was able to recently transfer them.

Ric chose to sing “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” a song sung by Gene Pitney that was based upon the eponymous movie’s plotline but not used in the film. The John Ford film was one of Ric’s favorite movies.

It was the last Christmases Ric would spend with his family and friends before his death in March of the following year.