Gandolfini: Jim, Tony, and the Life of a Legend

Film historian Bailey (Fun City Cinema) traces the career of Sopranos actor James Gandolfini, who died in 2013, in this incisive biography. The New Jersey native dabbled in theater during high school, but he had largely left acting behind when his girlfriend died in a car crash his junior year at Rutgers University, motivating him to return to the stage to cope with his grief. Bailey suggests that whether he was appearing in a ragtag traveling production of A Streetcar Named Desire in his mid-20s or the rom-com Enough Said near the end of his life, Gandolfini was thoroughly committed to every role. For instance, he built a backstory for his minor character in 1995’s Get Shorty and hired a dialect coach to perfect the Southern accent he decided the character should have. A detailed account of Gandolfini’s starring turn as mobster Tony Soprano discusses how the show’s dark themes and marathon shoots took a toll on the actor’s mental health and exacerbated his issues with drugs and alcohol. Even as Gandolfini struggled to distance himself from Tony, he remained fundamentally kind, Bailey suggests, noting that Gandolfini wrote $36,000 checks for each of the other 16 Sopranos series regulars after negotiating a more profitable contract for himself. A riveting look inside the mind of a towering talent, this is a must for Sopranos fans. Agent: Daniel Greenberg, Levine Greenberg Rostan. (Apr.)