A Conversation with Dominic Chianese - The Sopranos' Uncle Junior
Pope Auditorium, Fordham University, Lincoln Center campus
Conference:
The Sopranos: A Wake
May 23, 2008
Chianese: Dominic Chianese
Levinson: Paul Levinson
Lavery: David Lavery
AM: audience members
Levinson: Welcome to Fordham University and our conference on “The Sopranos: A Wake.” For those of you who may not know me, my name is Paul Levinson. I’m Chair of the Department of Communication and Media Studies. In fact, I’m ending my second and final term as Chair and I can’t think of any better way to end it than doing a conference like this and in fact this very panel that you’re soon going to hear, with the two people seated at the table.
Let me introduce you to probably the lesser known person, [
audience laughter] but certainly a very significant person, and actually he is someone who helped put together most of this conference. In fact he was here with me and the other people who put together this conference back in September 2002, when we had a little vest pocket conference on
The Sopranos. His name is David Lavery, and he [
audience applause]…He certainly deserves a round of applause. He has edited two books about
The Sopranos. One of which I am especially fond of because an essay of mine is in there, but the other book is pretty good too. I would say there’s probably no one in the world who knows more about television - not just
The Sopranos, but
Lost,
Buffy,
Heroes - than David Lavery. So I am very happy that David is here with us.
And sitting next to David is someone who was born in the Bronx in 1931. Actually I was born in the Bronx too just a few years after that - not that many years after that. He may look familiar to you because in
The Godfather II, you may recall that tall sinister figure, Johnny Ola [
applause], but of course he’s probably far better known, in addition to that role and other distinguished roles over the years, for the part he played in
The Sopranos as Uncle Junior [
applause], otherwise known as Corrado Soprano.
And when I was speaking to Bob Milang the other day, when he called me and we were discussing Uncle Junior coming to this conference, I said to him I thought that that character in many ways was the heart and soul of the show. It was such a wonderful show, there were so many important characters, but there was something about the Junior character that brought out aspects of the show that no other character did. Now the actor has a name other than Uncle Junior, and his name is Dominic Chianese, so we are going to have an interview with Dominic ... well, really not so much of an interview, more a discussion in which both David and I will ask questions and I encourage Dominic to answer however he pleases, however short or long because far be it from me to ever tell Dominic what to do, but then, you know, we want to this to be a group experience as well, so we will leave a lot of time for all of you to ask questions. By the way, we do have another member of
The Sopranos cast here in the audience, Katalin Pota. You may remember Lilliana [
applause]... She played the housekeeper on
The Sopranos, so we’re glad to have her here as well. All right, let's then go to the discussion. I am going to sit down right at that table, and I’ll ask the first question and we’ll see how it goes.
Why don’t we start at the end if that’s okay. One of the things that struck me with the final season of
The Sopranos was the diminished role that Uncle Junior had on that show, and I was wondering if you could perhaps speak to that. How did you feel about approaching that as an actor? Were you disappointed in that? Did you think the story called for that?
Chianese: You speak specifically about the ending?
Levinson: Yes, we can talk specifically about the very last minutes of the show, and also the whole final season.
Chianese: The final season…well I think the ending is a good indication of, I think of what David [Chase] was trying to write, in my opinion. I noticed that when we read the script, the final script, we were amazed at the quietness of the ending. However, when all the actors read the final script, there was no indication that there would be a blackout for maybe 15 or 20 seconds. We just thought they’d end up having an ice cream soda and onion rings together, and that was it. Finito, complete, you know. Even David said, “Why not?” So we were all surprised when the blackout came. My wife and I thought, of course, we had lost television. But, my daughter pointed something out to me, which I think is very interesting. David – the greater genius that he is – he may put clues sometimes, and we don’t realize it. If you remember, she told me….I haven’t checked on it, but if you go home and check on the jukebox that he was playing at the table, it had a song in it – “Don’t Stop Believing,” or something like that. There was a “B” side to that. Does anybody know what the title of the “B” side was?
Audience member #1: “Any Way You Want It”
Chianese: “Any Way You Want It.” [
audience laughter] I think maybe that’s David’s motive or something, his idea or his motive for putting it in, and that struck me as something David possibly would do. Any way you want it. You make the idea. A lot of teenagers come up to me and got mad at me, and said “why don’t you kill him?” What am I gonna say? [
audience laughter]
Lavery: Paul started at the end. I would like to go back to start at the beginning. Could you reflect or remember anything about the casting, about how you were actually cast in the show?
