Biography
Born and raised in New Jersey, press-shy James Gandolfini forged a film career as a prolific character actor before finally emerging as a bona fide star in the critically-lauded HBO series
The Sopranos. After earning his college degree in 1983, Gandolfini headed to New York to study at the Actors Studio. Supporting himself for almost ten years as a bartender and nightclub manager, Gandolfini's major break came in 1992 with a role in a Broadway version of A Streetcar Named Desire starring
Alec Baldwin and
Jessica Lange, and his film debut in
Sidney Lumet's
A Stranger Among Us. Following small parts in several 1993 films, including the
Quentin Tarantino-scripted
True Romance, Gandolfini played more substantial roles as one of the heavies in
Terminal Velocity (1994),
Geena Davis' neighborhood boyfriend in
Angie (1994), one of the submarine crew in
Crimson Tide (1995), and a stuntman-turned-Mob enforcer in
Get Shorty (1995). Equally gifted at playing characters on either side of the law, Gandolfini appeared as the violent neighbor who assaults
Robin Wright Penn in
She's So Lovely (1997) and a cop in Lumet's legal drama
Night Falls on Manhattan (1997).
Gandolfini played supporting roles in several more films, including
Fallen (1998) and
A Civil Action (1998), before he was cast as the head of a dysfunctional Mafia family in
The Sopranos. Anchored by Gandolfini's superbly-nuanced performance as Prozac-popping, mother-bedeviled capo Tony Soprano,
The Sopranos was hailed as a TV masterpiece for its alternately funny, surreal and deadly-serious look at New Jersey Mob life. Though he was passed over for the Emmy, Gandolfini won the SAG and Golden Globe Awards for Lead Actor in a TV drama for
The Sopranos' 1999 season. During the series break, Gandolfini appeared as a slimy pornographer in
8MM (1999).
Gandolfini finally added the Emmy to his trophies in 2000 for the second season of
The Sopranos. Despite the inevitable criticism about the series' sophomore slump, there was no question as to Gandolfini's continuing excellence as the New Jersey Mob
paterfamilias. Gandolfini followed his Emmy triumph with a supporting role as a gay hit man in
The Mexican (2001), easily stealing the film from co-stars
Julia Roberts and
Brad Pitt. Even as he was earning
The Mexican's few good notices in theaters, Gandolfini was garnering still more plaudits for
The Sopranos' controversial third season, as Tony's increasingly delinquent son elicited anguished soul-searching from Tony about his legacy. Though his third Emmy nomination spoke to his formidable TV presence as Tony, Gandolfini also further burnished his movie credits with a small part in
Joel Coen and
Ethan Coen's Cannes Film Festival award winner
The Man Who Wasn't There (2001), and a major starring role as a corrupt Army colonel who goes head-to-head with
Robert Redford's incarcerated general in
The Last Castle (2001).
Gandolfini continued to impress on
The Sopranos for the next few years, but he struggled to match that success on the big screen. He was a part of the infamous bomb
Surviving Christmas, and had the lead in the never released
John Turturro directed musical Romance & Cigarettes. In 2006 he was a part of the high-powered ensemble for Steve Zaillian's
All the King's Men that included
Sean Penn,
Jude Law,
Anthony Hopkins, and
Kate Winslet. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide