[Captions are auto-generated] When did you first start
thinking about the idea of having
Michael Gandolfini play the teenage
Tony right away?
Yeah, why?
Well, he looks like his father.
He is his
father's son, mostly because he
looked like him and.
Moves a little bit like him.
I thought so for a movie that's
supposed to be the same character,
that would be the best, although I
don't think we started.
With him, I think we read other kids
when it hit, it really hit like,
oh yeah, that's the way to go.
I spoke to him and he said initially
when when his manager told them that
there was interest in this, his
response was, and I quote, Fuck no,
fuck. He wanted no part of
of sort of stepping into this.
Do you remember like, what
conversations did you have with them
over the course between that
and when he did?
None. None.
None. He came in, he read.
We are.
I didn't talk to them, but I
mean, I knew him,
I had met Denise
and I had had lunch with him
when he first came out to
California, which was probably, I
don't know, a year before
that. And actually,
he seemed at that
dinner, at that lunch,
very soft.
And we kind of stayed
very loosely.
I probably saw him twice in
two years.
Friends of his,
he is a friend of Tim Van, patent's
daughter, they're both actors,
you know.
So Tim Van Patten says it's
OK.
He was a little kid, like he
was born after the first season
wrapped and I think was seven or
eight when the show ended.
He remembered, like his dad, bring
him to Silver Cup and he would nap
and Tony and Carmella's bed.
Do you remember him at all being
around there? Yes, I talked to him.
What was he like as a kid?
I mean, he never acted up there.
I mean, he probably was told to
settle down all the time there, but
he had a great little
kind of Tony like face,
and I recall that.
He was with Tony a couple of times
with Jim when
Jim called me Satan
vampire.
Oh, that.
Loving stuff.
When he started
either at the table read or at the
audition or whatever level,
when he started really sort of
capturing the essence of
that character because he really
does.
What did that feel like to you,
having been there for Jim when he
played that role for so long?
Well, it felt miraculous.
Sometimes when things are miraculous
or astounding, you start laughing
because they're so it's so
incredible.
But I remember looking across the
room at at the readthrough at
the table, and he was sitting there
like this and it wasn't his scene.
And he was I mean, I can't do it
with his shoulders.
He was doing this thing and.
Holy shit, that's incredible.
Yeah. You know, he did the
one we were having lunch.
He did the what did you just say
kind of face that Jim would do all
the time. And I kind of had to push
back in my chair.
It's did it for real or as a
show.
No, no. Just basically I was asking
like what sort of mannerisms he
picked up from his dad that he tried
to sprinkle into the performance,
as you just say,
in general. I mean, that's
it's almost like actors
playing historical figures with some
of these characters because the
audience has an impression in their
head of what Tony looks and sounds
like, what Olivia, Pauly,
Silvio, etc.
does. And yet you've got actors who
you want to give performances that
that they're not just doing
impressions.
What what did you want out
of this cast?
The people who were playing
characters from the show?
It's very, very difficult and very
difficult to say.
I mean, I probably would have been
content with impressions,
but I would have known that was
wrong.
I probably would have gotten a kick
out of it if if it was really
working, but
I would have known that that's not
what it should be, whether
I would have had the willpower to
stop.
I don't know, Billy Magnuson
said you actually got Tony Sirico to
record the young Paulie Walnuts
dialog for him to listen to, just
sort of as a reference.
Why did you do that?
I would say Paulie was the hardest
one to get.
Why he's the most unusual.
I mean, this is not disrespect
for.
Most cartoon like the way
he talks, his gestures,
all this stuff,
nobody can touch his hair, his hair
stories.
The way he bugs his eyes when he's
surprised and great
expressions.
Sort of soyabean doing,
yeah,
yeah, it was sort of beyond doing.