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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — James Gandolfini
sewfae¡ speshul — 4 years ago(November 23, 2021 12:13 PM)
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Jamie-Lynn Sigler reveals how her 'Sopranos' costar James Gandolfini 'stepped up' to make sure she was 'taken care of' following her MS diagnosis
Jamie-Lynn Sigler revealed that her "Sopranos" costar James Gandolfini "stepped up" to help her following her MS diagnosis, including by sending his acting coach to work with her.
"There was a time in the maybe fourth or fifth season where I was dealing with my divorce privately and and my diagnosis of MS and a lot of other stuff that I wasn't talking to people about, and he really stepped up," Sigler said of Gandolfini in "Woke Up This Morning," the new oral history of "The Sopranos."
The actress split from her first husband, AJ DiScala, in 2005, and was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis around the same time.
But according to Sigler, Gandolfini remained a supportive presence throughout her personal struggles.
"He sent his acting coach, Susan Aston, to work with me, just to make sure I was taken care of," Sigler said in the new book. "Little things like that, that he really just stepped up in amazing ways."
Sigler starred as Meadow Soprano, Tony and Carmela's daughter, on the HBO drama from 1999 to 2007. She later starred on HBO's "Entourage," and tied the knot with professional baseball player Cutter Dykstra last year.
Stories about Gandolfini (who died in 2013) feature heavily in "Woke Up This Morning," written by fellow "Sopranos" stars Michael Imperioli and Steve Schirripa.
Elsewhere in the oral history, "Sopranos" writer Todd Kessler said James Gandolfini took him out for dinner after the staffer was fired from the HBO drama.
"'You hold your head high and know that you did great work,'" Kessler recalled Gandolfini telling him.
https://www.insider.com/james-gandolfini-sopranos-jamie-lynn-sigler-woke-up-this-morning-2021-11 -
sewfae¡ speshul — 4 years ago(November 23, 2021 12:06 PM)
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A 'Sopranos' screenwriter who was fired from the show reveals that James Gandolfini insisted on taking him out to dinner the night he was let go
The "Sopranos" writer Todd Kessler said James Gandolfini took him out for dinner after Kessler was fired from the HBO drama.
Kessler told Michael Imperioli and Steve Schirripa, who starred on "The Sopranos" as Christopher Moltisanti and Bobby "Bacala" Baccalieri, in their new oral history of the show, titled "Woke Up This Morning," that Gandolfini became one of his "dearest friends in life as we worked on the show."
"Jim called me up after he finished work that day," Kessler recalled of the day he was fired. "He knew what had happened, and he said, 'I'm taking you out.'"
Kessler, who created the show "Damages," said that while he and Gandolfini were sitting at a restaurant, two women came up to them, and Gandolfini introduced Kessler as a writer on the show he'd just gotten fired from.
"I shrunk, I was so embarrassed," Kessler said. "But they didn't care. And we talked a little bit, they laughed, and then Jim said to me — and it was really one of those moments that will forever stick with me of Jim — he said: 'You do not shrink. You have nothing to hang your head about.'"
Kessler also recalled Gandolfini telling him, "You hold your head high and know that you did great work."
Kessler told Imperioli and Schirripa that "getting fired was something that was really painful but formative."
Elsewhere in their book, Schirripa and Imperioli said that Gandolfini, who died in 2013, once got an anonymous late-night call that went on to inspire an iconic line on "The Sopranos."
https://www.insider.com/james-gandolfini-took-fired-sopranos-writer-to-dinner-2021-11
