"It was fun and it was nice, but there are long days, and you're basically doing nothing," Pagani said.
Supplying cars for a movie requires a considerable capacity for managing details. Besides ensuring the old cars are running well, the vehicles often have to be moved to the set for filming and then driven away at the end of the day -- a workday that often lasts 12 hours. Pagani said that directors were sometimes finicky and that the cars they had asked for were not always used.
It's not a job for everyone. Bruno Salerno, 75, an ex-marine from Bloomfield, New Jersey, said he was paid nearly US$12 an hour for the use of one of his old cars. But Salerno quit the business recently, saying: "It started to interfere with my family life."
Immersi said supplying cars to Hollywood can be a good way to make money, but agreed the business was extremely demanding. He said he sometimes got calls from the prop master of a film or the set designer for a TV show looking for a particular car for a certain date -- needs and dates that often changed.
Immersi arranges for cars for movies by contacting private collectors like Pagani; the two have worked together since 1999. Pagani has about 10 drivers for films when he is unavailable.
When that happens, Ken Bratko, the chief mechanic at Ace Auto for the last 15 or so years, may fill in.
After the cars are hired, the prop masters take over. Even if the car is only passing through a scene, they attach period-correct details like license plates, taxi medallions and even inspection stickers to make the car as historically accurate as possible.
Immersi said that when studios occasionally asked to wreck a client's car, the filmmakers were told they would first have to buy the car. He said he would burn or batter cars upon request, after removing the engine and transmission.
Immersi and Pagani would not discuss what they charge the studios, but Pagani said he did not make enough money to allow him to close his repair business. Immersi said his relationship with the studios was "pretty informal."
Drivers perform as background actors, and can qualify for membership in the actors' union by working a minimum of three days for any company that has agreed to employ workers with union cards.
Pagani stashes cars wherever he can; he has a Packard limousine in his own driveway and a 1948 Plymouth at his mother's on Long Island.
"The trick is to remember where I put all of them," Pagani said.
About 20 cars are kept at Ace Auto, including his most recent acquisition, a green 1961 Chrysler Windsor station wagon that he bought at an estate sale in Pennsylvania.
His garage, its cramped loft filled with parts, was the setting for a recent television movie, Intervention, set in 1965. The movie has not yet been broadcast.
"I have a toy box," Pagani said. "I put toys in it."
But when Hollywood beckons, he can take out one or more of those toys for a fanciful spin.
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