Playing the role of Tony Soprano made James Gandolfini rich and famous. But is Gandolfini really acting?
A college friend of mine is a location scout for several popular television series, one of them being The Sopranos. He managed to get me into a sneak peak of the first episode from season six, which debuts next Sunday.
This is what I saw:
* * *
New Jersey mob boss Tony Soprano is invited to attend a $500-a-plate benefit for the Cuban Rainforest Conservancy in New York City. The invitation is arranged by one of the many corrupt politicians on Soprano's payroll. As a nod to his well-known love of Cuba, he was selected to name a newly discovered Caribbean flower. Several suggestions were cat-called from the audience — "Tonylip" and "Sopranodill" were among the most creative. Those who are intimate with Soprano, of course, know he cares not a whit for flora and fauna; only fowl and equines.
The real reason he wants to attend is because the benefit raises money for the restoration of the house where Ernest Hemingway wrote The Old Man and the Sea. Soprano, not surprisingly, has never read a word of Hemingway, but he is well aware of his reputation. Considering his oft-expressed admiration for stoic behavior from figures of the past (Gary Cooper, for one), it is not hard to see why he is so passionate about Hemingway. If viewers remember, in a therapy session from one of last season's episodes, Soprano tells Dr. Melfi, "I don't know a lot of writers now who would go to a war just so they could write about it. He was a different breed. I don't know if it was that time or we are just slightly weaker."
An added attraction for Soprano is the presence of local celebrity author Bret Easton Ellis, author of American Psycho, the only book Soprano has read cover to cover in the past five years. Soprano managed to get himself seated at the author's table and proceeded to criticize Ellis's book for the entire evening, much to Ellis's dismay. Among the litany of criticisms is of Ellis's depiction of the hero using an ax to dismember a body. Everyone knows a meat-cleaver and a hack saw are the tools best suited for such a job.
Towards the end of the evening, Soprano flips from the role of book critic to mob boss when he intervenes in a situation between the event organizers and the union staff. Apparently, the event was dragging on past contracted hours and union reps were threatening to force organizers to pay staff for overtime. Upon learning of the dispute, Soprano excuses himself from his table (Ellis is visibly relieved) and makes his way to the kitchen for a sit-down with the staff leader. Not surprisingly, he walks out of the kitchen five minutes later and announces the whole thing a misunderstanding. There will be no extra charge for staff labor. The event continues until well past midnight.
The next day, Soprano is in such a good mood, he hands out several checks in the five-figure range to his capos during an informal meeting at the Bada Bing. "Business is good," he says by way of explanation. "Business is good."
* * *
Okay, so some of you readers may have already caught on . . . I'm making this up. Actually, I'm only making up parts of it. Care to guess which parts? In the interest of time, I'll break it down for you:
1) I do have a friend who is a location scout for The Sopranos. Also for Law and Order.
2) Tony Soprano did attended the NYC benefit, but he did so in the guise of James Gandolfini.
3) The benefit was for the African Rainforest Conservancy, not the Cuban Rainforest Conservancy.
4) Gandolfini was invited to name a newly discovered flower. Some suggestions included "Gandolpansy" and "Gandylion."
5) Bret Easton Ellis was also in attendance, but I have no idea if Gandolfini is a fan or if he even spoke to the author.
6) Gandolfini did go back into the kitchen for a sit-down with staff workers when they threatened to make the event organizers pay overtime. He did get the staff to agree to back down.
7) Gandolfini did hand out several checks in the five-figure range to his coworkers because "business is good." The business in question, however, is not racketeering, but acting. In 2003, after renegotiating his contract with HBO from around $400,000 an episode to over $1 million an episode, Gandolfini gave several of his cast members checks. For the record, he claims his generosity derived from his belief that The Sopranos is a show dependent on its ensemble, a laughably insincere statement considering production of the show was halted for months while Gandolfini sued HBO and threatened to leave the show if the network didn't meet his demands.
8) Gandolfini has never read Hemingway, but he is part of a foundation for restoring the house where The Old Man and the Sea was written and he's being considered for the role of Papa Hemingway in an upcoming movie. Also, he really did say that bit above about Hemingway being a "different breed" and modern men being "weaker." It's just that he said it to an interviewer, not to Dr. Melfi.
As you can see, it wasn't much of a stretch from truth to fiction, and I'm not even certain which version I find more interesting. Gandolfini is notoriously shy of press, so it's difficult to know whether these parallels I'm drawing are purely conjecture or have some basis in reality.
In real life, James Gandolfini has stressed repeatedly he is nothing like his suburban mob boss character. In fact, he often expresses confusion about why people would want to know anything about his personal life. "I just don't think I'm that interesting," he has been quoted as saying. "I don't think what I have to say is that interesting. To hear me go blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I mean, who the hell cares?"
He has something there. For the most part, prior to The Sopranos, his career was unremarkable. He was predominantly a character actor in movies like Get Shorty, True Romance, Terminal Velocity, and Crimson Tide. At that point, no one would have cared about anything Gandolfini had to say. But when he assumed the mantle of Tony Soprano and made the suburban gangster a cultural icon, all of a sudden everybody was very interested.
Gandolfini captures the essence of Tony Soprano so convincingly it's impossible to imagine he has his own personality completely separate from that of his television character. The question is, notwithstanding Gandolfini's insistence to the contrary, how different is the man from the character? I mean, that theory on Hemingway could easily have come from Tony Soprano. He's always griping about how modern men aren't like Cary Grant or Gary Cooper anymore. "What ever happened to the strong, silent types?" is one of Soprano's favorite questions.
And what about his strong-arm negation tactics to double his pay from HBO? Very Tony Soprano. Gandolfini was willing to put the payrolls of hundreds of cast members and crew at jeopardy because he didn't feel like he was getting the respect he deserved. He was upset because other television actors (such as Ray Romano, the cast of Friends, and Kelsey Grammer) were being paid around a million dollars an episode. He felt he should be commanding that kind of money as well. After all, he's the star character in HBO's most celebrated series. Show some respect, dammit!
While Gandolfini would have us believe otherwise, it is clear he is inescapably linked to his character. After all, even though it was Gandolfini eating at the benefit for the African Rainforest Conservancy, it was Tony Soprano that the organizers invited, and it was Tony Soprano who paid $500 for the plate. Gandolfini was making pennies for his acting before he became Tony Soprano; these days he makes millions per role.
Assuming the Heminway movie is ever made, I'll be very curious to see how convincingly Gandolfini pulls it off. When we're watching a big brawny man fishing off of a boat, are we going to believe it's Ernest Hemingway fishing for marlins in the Caribbean Ocean, or are we only going to see Tony Soprano fishing from his yacht, the "Stugotz," off the shore of New Jersey?
