There are two kinds of Italian food in America.
First, there is the traditional “spaghetti and meatballs” style of the first immigrants, mostly from the south of Italy. This includes pizza, but also all kinds of pizza including many American variations. This also includes sandwiches with Italian meats and cheeses. Think of the traditional old-school Italian restaurant with bottles of Chianti in baskets and red checkered tablecloths and pasta with tomato sauce. This style has been around for more than a hundred years and it is still the kind of food thought of when most people mention “Italian” food.
Second, there is the modern style which would be a lot more recognizable to Italian people today. Sometimes it’s called “Northern Italian” but that term is quite inaccurate and should be discarded. In any modern Italian restaurant, the traditional modern restaurant menu coexists with regional specialties of all kinds. This includes the division of the meal into courses, as “antipasto, primo piatto, secondo piatto, contorno e dolce.” This is what any Italian person thinks of when they mention “la cucina italiana.”
An Italian restaurant here in America will normally be of one or the other style but practically never both. An Italian person finds the traditional American Italian restaurant to be more of a Napoletano style, from Napoli. An American in an Italian restaurant for the first time will find little or nothing in common with the familiar American-Italian menu.