Tony Soprano is back!
More than 13 years after “The Sopranos” ended and seven years after the death of leading man James Gandolifini, the complicated antihero is returning to the screen in the prequal “The Many Saints of Newark” — and, fittingly, a younger Soprano is being played by a younger Gandolfini.
Michael Gandolfini, the actor’s 21-year-old son, is Tony this time around, and a glimpse of him in character shows the resemblance is striking.
Warner Bros. Pictures released a video promoting several of its upcoming films Wednesday, all of which are premiering on the big screen and on HBO Max simultaneously. The montage includes a brief clip from “The Many Saints of Newark” that shows a young Tony in a tense moment.
"Sopranos" creator David Chase cast the young actor for the “Many Saints” role back in 2019, around the time he was getting his acting career off the ground. The younger Gandolfini has appeared in "Ocean's 8" and HBO's "The Deuce."
"It’s a profound honor to continue my dad’s legacy while stepping into the shoes of a young Tony Soprano," Gandolfini said in a statement to Deadline when the casting was first announced. "I’m thrilled that I’m going to have the opportunity to work with David Chase and the incredible company of talent he has assembled for ‘The Many Saints of Newark.’"
Fans of “The Sopranos” will have to wait until Sept. 24 to see the movie. It was originally set to debut last fall, Variety reported.
James Gandolfini was 51 when he died of a heart attack in 2013, while on a trip to Rome with his son. Just one day after the star’s death, GQ writer and “Difficult Men” author Brett Martin told TODAY that he’d once asked Chase what it meant to cast the actor in the lead role on “The Sopranos.”
“He looked at me as though I was crazy,” Martin explained. “He said, ‘It meant everything.’ What he brought to that role, the depth and the humanity and the kind of soulfulness, as well as the ugliness and anger. It changed television forever, really.”