[8] Albano was one of the "Triumvirate of Terror", a threesome of nefarious WWF managers which included The Grand Wizard of Wrestling and Freddie Blassie.

A unique showman, with an elongated beard, rubber band facial piercings, and loud outfits, Albano was the forefather of the 1980s Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection.

Lou attended Archbishop Stepinac High School in White Plains, New York, where he competed in track and field, and finally rose to the position of captain of the football team.

He then joined the United States Army, but due to a childhood injury exacerbated by his football days, Albano was honorably discharged after only eight months.

[11] Although Albano's father, retired from medicine, wanted to open an insurance agency with his son, Lou instead began training as a boxer.

A distant cousin and family friend, Lou Duva, introduced Albano to Willie Gilzenberg, a boxing promoter who later became the first titular president of the WWWF.

At this point, Gilzenberg introduced Albano to Vince McMahon Sr., promoter of the new Capitol Wrestling Corporation in Washington, D.C.—the first predecessor to what is today WWE.

[13] Albano made little impact as a solo wrestler, working prelims in various circuits, but he achieved moderate success as a tag team performer with partner Tony Altomare.

[14] Dubbed The Sicilians, Altomare and Albano competed as a stereotypical Italian gangster combo in the mode of the then-popular television series The Untouchables.

[8] The pair won the Midwest tag team championship on the undercard of June 30, 1961 Comiskey Park event starring Pat O'Connor and Buddy Rogers that set the all-time record gate in the United States to that point.

During their run as Midwest tag team champions, personal differences with bookers and other wrestlers resulted in the pair abandoning the territory quickly enough that they did not lose the title before leaving.

[8][14] Albano and Altomare only held the championship for two weeks, a title change which was not even acknowledged on WWWF television outside the Atlantic City market.

But several photographs of the pair with their title belts were taken, which elevated Albano's reputation in the wrestling magazines of the time, and provided good publicity fodder later in his career.

The result was a Madison Square Garden sellout when Verdu faced Sammartino in June 1970, the first for the company in five years and a then-record gate for a wrestling event in that arena.

The mob surrounded the cab and began breaking windows, so the trio ran to a nearby bar, followed by the crowd who were pelting them with mud and objects.

Vince McMahon received a bill for damages totaling $27,000 ($182,378 in 2021 dollars), cementing Albano's unparalleled ability to "draw heat" (arouse anger in the audience).

And the stage was set in front of a sold-out crowd at Madison Square Garden, where he defeated Captain Lou Albano quite convincingly.

For the remainder of the 1970s and into the mid-1980s, Albano's cadre of loyal henchmen were unable to re-secure the heavyweight championship, held by either Sammartino, Pedro Morales, Bob Backlund or Hulk Hogan.

[19] Shortly thereafter, a bloody beatdown by Albano, Freddie Blassie and Ray Stevens, helped transform Snuka into a sympathetic figure, and triggered the most successful period of his career.

In 1984, the opportunity came when Lauper's video for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" needed an actor to play the singer's father, and Albano was suggested.

His brother's brother-in-law had recently died of multiple sclerosis, and the experience led Albano to lend his time to raising awareness and funds to combat the disease, occasionally alongside Lauper.

His increasingly public benevolence clashed with his in-ring persona, which violated the principles of kayfabe—maintaining the appearance of reality within professional wrestling—which were still strictly adhered to at the time.

In the course of the ceremony, Roddy Piper and "Cowboy" Bob Orton came into the ring to sarcastically praise Albano before breaking Lauper's award, a gold record plaque, over his head.

The melee was broken up by Hulk Hogan who draped himself across Albano to protect him from further onslaught, signalling to the audience that the once notorious heel manager was suddenly now a fellow babyface.

His last two (heel) singles protégés, Valentine and Ken Patera, were paired with Jimmy Hart and Bobby Heenan, respectively, after Albano's face turn.

Albano would then make a one-time appearance on a "Piper's Pit" on an episode of Superstars of Wrestling in February 1987 to ask André the Giant to reconsider his recent alignment with Bobby Heenan.

MTV's decision to broadcast the Brawl to End it All tremendously increased the WWF's public profile, especially in the coveted young adult demographic.

If you take Albano's participation out of the equation, there is a good chance the McMahon expansion would have hit an iceberg and died in early 1985 ... the attention garnered by the Rock & Wrestling Connection, stemming from that chance meeting on an airplane between Lauper and Albano less than two years earlier, led NBC to make the decision to air Saturday Night's Main Event several times per year in the Saturday Night Live time slot."

He also had roles in the TV series 227, Hey Dude, and Miami Vice, the 1992 film Stay Tuned, and was a recurring guest on the game show Hollywood Squares.

Albano played a villainous caricature of himself named "Captain Lou Morano" in the 1987 movie Body Slam, starring Dirk Benedict and Roddy Piper.