Former NYPD detective Sonny Grosso playfully pulled a gun during dinner at Rao’s on Monday.
The 80-something legendary ex-cop hosted mystery author Nelson DeMille and Discovery Communications honcho Henry Schleiff at his regular table at the Harlem eatery — where we’re told Grosso pulled his fabled piece just before dessert in front of his “nervous-looking” guests.
The legendary cop who was played by Roy Scheider in “The French Connection” also played a cop in “The Godfather.”
And he recalled to his rapt table how he lent the same pistol to Al Pacino for a famous scene in the 1972 Francis Ford Coppola film — in which Pacino grabs a gun hidden in a Bronx restaurant’s restroom to blow away a mob rival and crooked police captain in the dining room.
Grosso put the heater away after about two minutes, a spy said, and a relieved DeMille cracked, “That’s why I couldn’t find it in the men’s room.”