Some of my crispy zesty headcanons for my dearest Sonny Wortzik who I hate so much!!!
-32 years old during the events of the film.
-He and Angie are very recently separated, not officially divorced but they basically are. He’s stuck living with his parents after the separation, he still pays for Angie’s rent and paid half of Leon’s rent before they lived together.
-Angie was physically abusive towards him on occasion, Sonny has deeply repressed this and has downplayed it in his mind and is repeating the cycle of abuse towards Leon.
-Loves his kids, he tries to see them as much as he can and will do anything for them, but he doesn’t get to be with them much after he moved out.
-Timmy (his son) was an accident and the reason he and Angie had to get married.
-Not particularly close with anyone in his immediate family, has a very strained and warped relationship with his mother and has always had a tremulous relationship with his father. Basically Sonny has mommy AND daddy issues. He has a younger sister named Daniella/Dani who also lives at home, she’s in grad school and she lowkey bullies Sonny (as a younger sister should).
-Has basically no friends, he has a very hard time creating actual meaningful connections with people and has always felt like an outcast.
-Has always known he’s queer/bisexual, isn’t super involved in the community but isn’t dumb about the goings on.
-He’s generally pretty open about his bisexuality, he isn’t “out” per se to his family or coworkers but he’s not ashamed of who he is and isn’t super concerned with keeping himself or his relationship with Leon hidden.
-Lowkey nonbinary but he has a job rn so he doesn’t have time to think about that
-Worked at a bank for three or so years as a bank teller, had multiple jobs later on to try and get the money for Leon’s surgery, but as the stress of it all built up and he unraveled he was fired from his bank job, which is part of what made him spiral so bad by the end. As the pressure worsened he had trouble keeping any job which is one of the reasons he decided to rob a bank instead.
-Was an early Vietnam war veteran and enlisted before the public really knew how bad it was (early to mid 60s), wasn’t drafted but was “highly encouraged” to join by his father because he thought it would give Sonny “structure.” Sonny holds a lot of resentment towards his dad because of that.
-Developed his facial tic (where he twitches his lip when under high stress) after the war.
-Wears both wedding rings at once, his ring from he and Leon’s wedding on his ring finger and his ring from he and Angie’s wedding on his pointer finger.
-Favorite flavor is lollipop is green apple.
-Lost the spelling bee as a kid and never got over it, co-hosts the spelling bee at the local elementary school just so he can relive the glory days and mentally beat a bunch of kindergarteners at spelling.
-First job was when he was 18, he was a Christmas elf at the mall who took pictures of kids with Santa (like in a Christmas Story (1983)) and he was hired because he was short.
-Grew his hair out after coming back from Vietnam, at one point his hair was long enough he could put it in a ponytail, Serpico (1973) style, the 60s was a very Gender era for him.
-Favorite movie is The Graduate (1967).
-Drivers license is hella expired and he's the world’s worst driver.
-Total film bro and is lowkey misogynist about it. His favorite movie is The Graduate but he claims it's The Godfather (1972) after it comes out because he wants cool guy points. He was the Original Film Bro.
-Has definitely lived in his car at some point.
-Is an incredibly fretful sleeper, will wake up at the quietest noise, has a really hard time going to sleep and has night terrors a lot.
-He’s an actual furnace, basically never cold and will sweat in Winter.
-Loves to hum/sing to himself around the house.
-Will stay up all night making Halloween costumes for his kids because he loves them so much.
