Friends of ours: Soprano Crime Family
After eight years and 86 episodes, the ultimate fate of fictional New Jersey crime boss Tony Soprano might be determined by a pizza shop owner from Penndel.
Paolo Colandrea, owner of Paul's Penndel Pizza, last month filmed a potentially pivotal scene for the final episode of “The Sopranos,” the groundbreaking HBO mob drama that says goodbye at 9 Sunday night.
Colandrea, 47, describes his role as simply “mystery man,” a guy who walks into a diner and locks eyes ominously with Tony, who's sitting at a table with wife, Carmela, and son, A.J. Colandrea sits down at the counter, stares at Tony again, gets up to go the bathroom, and ...
He can't say what happens next. But even if he could, it might not mean a thing.
“Sopranos” creator David Chase reportedly filmed three different endings to ensure secrecy. Colandrea, who spent 18 hours on the set one day and 10 hours two weeks later, doesn't even know if his scene will appear.
“I don't know. Nobody knows,” the charming Italian said while sitting in the restaurant he's owned since emigrating from Naples in 1978. “They keep it so closed, not even the cast knows all that's going to happen. I can assume, but I don't know.”
Colandrea, who doesn't have any lines, filmed his scene at Holsten's Diner in Bloomfield, N.J. Off camera, he said he mingled with series stars James Gandolfini (Tony) and Edie Falco (Carmela) and met Robert Iler (A.J.) and Chase. During his first day of filming, he shared a sushi dinner with Gandolfini, Falco and the crew.
“He's such a nice guy, just an unbelievable person,” Colandrea says of Gandolfini. “And Edie Falco, she's the sweetest woman you ever want to meet.”
Colandrea, who earned more than $3,000 (before taxes) for his role, also saw Jamie-Lynn Sigler (Meadow) on the set but didn't talk to her. “She's so gorgeous,” he said. “She has bodyguards with her, but I don't blame her.”
So how does a pizza shop owner with no previous acting experience land a role on the final episode of the most acclaimed program in cable television history? Right place, right face, really.
Earlier this spring, Eileen DeNobile, owner of the Lawrenceville, N.J.-based Noble Talent Management, was looking for an Italian man, about 6 feet tall, between the ages of 30 and 50, for a part on “The Sopranos.” She stopped into Penndel Pizza for dinner one evening, saw the framed photo of Colandrea pouring a glass of wine and thought she might have found her man.
“That's authentic Italian all the way,” said DeNobile, who already knew Colandrea casually. “He certainly looks the part. Plus, we were looking for a person easy to work with, and he's got a great personality, very bubbly.”
DeNobile sent the photo and a recommendation to HBO, and Colandrea was invited to audition in New York City, along with 29 others. The audition consisted of performing the actual role as it appeared in the script. A few days later, Chase called Colandrea and asked him to come to North Jersey for a costume fitting. The part was his.
“It's unbelievable,” said Colandrea, a fan of the show since its debut in 1999. “For an Italian, it's the experience of a lifetime to be on "The Sopranos.' ”
Colandrea, a single father of two daughters, said he plans to watch Sunday's episode with about 100 friends and family members at a cousin's house in Ewing. (“I have to cook for all of them,” he said, smiling.)
Meanwhile, he said, “half of Italy” is waiting to hear what happens Sunday night. And if his scene ends up on the cutting-room floor?
“Everyone knows there's nothing I can do, that it's out of my power,” Colandrea said. “But I'm thinking, "Why make me go up again after two weeks if they're not going to use me?' I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
Thanks to Andy Vineberg
Monday, June 11, 2007
Warming Up for The Sopranos' Swan Song
With the end coming for Tony Soprano, wanna bet on his last words? I figure one word will do:
Mama.
If he says "Mama," the Oedipal gangster is ending where he began, though I'm not wagering money. Placing bets about the end of "The Sopranos" with offshore Internet gaming companies would be too ironic, even for me.
Or, Tony might offer up a pathetic "I'm sorry," after he's been betrayed by a friend, the universe contracting in that last moment of excruciating clarity, when there's so much to say but no time left to say it. But the only one he could tell is Paulie Walnuts, so why bother?
Then again, Tony might live. And his last words could be, "I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," as he sits in the witness stand, ballooning out of his suit, staring glumly at old colleagues at the defense table.
He'd have something in common with real-life Chicago mobster Nick Calabrese and his old pals, who will show up soon in the federal building in Chicago for the upcoming and historic Outfit trial, to the dismay of those who simpered that the Outfit was dead and that Chinatown tough guys are the stuff of fiction.
Either way, it's been a fine ride, and I've loved it and laughed along with it, and tonight it's over, with "The Sopranos" final episode on HBO after an eight-year run.
I'm old enough to have witnessed other pop-culture spasms of ritual mourning for television shows, and loathed them all, cringing at words like "iconic" and "touchstone" being applied to what escapes the idiot box. I've been nauseated by eulogies of comedy/dramas about sex-crazed Army doctors in Korea or sex-crazed alcoholics in Boston sports bars where everybody knows your name, even the drunken mailman. But here I am, in ritual, reeking of incense, and I can't help it, because "The Sopranos" was great drama and great TV.
What a premise: the dysfunctional suburban gangster family and the boss undergoing therapy, appraising the legs of his psychiatrist week after week, and the whiny children and the wife who made her bargain with blood money and decided to keep it. And the guys, Paulie and Big Pussy and Bacala, and Christopher seduced by Hollywood like others before him, and Silvio, who ran the strip club, yet was appalled that his teen-age daughter could be seen as a sexual object by a soccer coach.
The hook was a natural, and for years we sat safely in our living rooms, enjoying characters offered up as the last unrepentant white males, saying what they wanted, grabbing what they wanted, smoking, drinking. And we remain locked on the other side of the screen, in an increasingly bureaucratic, timid and politically correct modern American landscape.
No wonder Tony Soprano's crew stood out like broken thumbs on the hands of a mannequin in a window.
Corruption was the constant theme, not only the pimping and the muscle stuff and the gambling, but corruption with the stain of legitimate business upon it. It was realistic, too, in its analysis of politics. Organized crime can't survive without the support of politicians and judges and police officials, in those towns where billions of dollars in public works and development deals are skimmed. We viewers understood all this, if not in our bones, then somewhere in the inarticulate ligaments of our wrists, as we signed our names on tax forms. But millions were also turned off by the show when one of the gangsters had his questionable sexuality challenged by a dimwitted stripper, and he beat her to death in the parking lot of the Bada Bing. A woman at work was visibly shaken by the scene of the stripper's murder and could not believe they could be so cruel. But that's what they are, I told her. That's who they are. They're criminals.
They run suburban abortion clinics and rely on our respect for privacy to shield them. They're shot down in the vestibules of fried chicken restaurants at morning meetings, pawing the glass doors as they fall. And if they're lucky enough to die shriveled with age, as did the ruthless Chicago Outfit hit man Marshall Caifano, then their children fill their coffins with crucifixes asking Jesus to save them.
"The Sopranos" creator David Chase told the truth and created characters that are aped by the wise guys
, and the guys who ape wise guys on Rush Street, much as their grandfathers aped the fictional persona of Edward G. Robinson's "Little Caesar," a case of life imitating art.
It was art, as Chase allowed his characters to reveal themselves. "The Godfather" films glamorized the wise guys, and though many Italians know the lines from those films, many -- including my wife who is now hooked on the show -- felt insulted by Tony Soprano, and argued that he glorified crime. But in the end, is Tony glorious? In the episode preceding the finale, he was hiding out in a dump, on a bed without sheets, in his clothes, staring at the ceiling in the dark, cradling a gun, waiting to be betrayed.
I expect he calls on his mother when, and if, he goes. But don't bet on it. Gambling's illegal -- unless it's government-approved.
Thanks to John Kass
Mama.
If he says "Mama," the Oedipal gangster is ending where he began, though I'm not wagering money. Placing bets about the end of "The Sopranos" with offshore Internet gaming companies would be too ironic, even for me.
Or, Tony might offer up a pathetic "I'm sorry," after he's been betrayed by a friend, the universe contracting in that last moment of excruciating clarity, when there's so much to say but no time left to say it. But the only one he could tell is Paulie Walnuts, so why bother?
Then again, Tony might live. And his last words could be, "I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," as he sits in the witness stand, ballooning out of his suit, staring glumly at old colleagues at the defense table.
He'd have something in common with real-life Chicago mobster Nick Calabrese and his old pals, who will show up soon in the federal building in Chicago for the upcoming and historic Outfit trial, to the dismay of those who simpered that the Outfit was dead and that Chinatown tough guys are the stuff of fiction.
Either way, it's been a fine ride, and I've loved it and laughed along with it, and tonight it's over, with "The Sopranos" final episode on HBO after an eight-year run.
I'm old enough to have witnessed other pop-culture spasms of ritual mourning for television shows, and loathed them all, cringing at words like "iconic" and "touchstone" being applied to what escapes the idiot box. I've been nauseated by eulogies of comedy/dramas about sex-crazed Army doctors in Korea or sex-crazed alcoholics in Boston sports bars where everybody knows your name, even the drunken mailman. But here I am, in ritual, reeking of incense, and I can't help it, because "The Sopranos" was great drama and great TV.
What a premise: the dysfunctional suburban gangster family and the boss undergoing therapy, appraising the legs of his psychiatrist week after week, and the whiny children and the wife who made her bargain with blood money and decided to keep it. And the guys, Paulie and Big Pussy and Bacala, and Christopher seduced by Hollywood like others before him, and Silvio, who ran the strip club, yet was appalled that his teen-age daughter could be seen as a sexual object by a soccer coach.
The hook was a natural, and for years we sat safely in our living rooms, enjoying characters offered up as the last unrepentant white males, saying what they wanted, grabbing what they wanted, smoking, drinking. And we remain locked on the other side of the screen, in an increasingly bureaucratic, timid and politically correct modern American landscape.
No wonder Tony Soprano's crew stood out like broken thumbs on the hands of a mannequin in a window.
Corruption was the constant theme, not only the pimping and the muscle stuff and the gambling, but corruption with the stain of legitimate business upon it. It was realistic, too, in its analysis of politics. Organized crime can't survive without the support of politicians and judges and police officials, in those towns where billions of dollars in public works and development deals are skimmed. We viewers understood all this, if not in our bones, then somewhere in the inarticulate ligaments of our wrists, as we signed our names on tax forms. But millions were also turned off by the show when one of the gangsters had his questionable sexuality challenged by a dimwitted stripper, and he beat her to death in the parking lot of the Bada Bing. A woman at work was visibly shaken by the scene of the stripper's murder and could not believe they could be so cruel. But that's what they are, I told her. That's who they are. They're criminals.
They run suburban abortion clinics and rely on our respect for privacy to shield them. They're shot down in the vestibules of fried chicken restaurants at morning meetings, pawing the glass doors as they fall. And if they're lucky enough to die shriveled with age, as did the ruthless Chicago Outfit hit man Marshall Caifano, then their children fill their coffins with crucifixes asking Jesus to save them.
"The Sopranos" creator David Chase told the truth and created characters that are aped by the wise guys
, and the guys who ape wise guys on Rush Street, much as their grandfathers aped the fictional persona of Edward G. Robinson's "Little Caesar," a case of life imitating art.It was art, as Chase allowed his characters to reveal themselves. "The Godfather" films glamorized the wise guys, and though many Italians know the lines from those films, many -- including my wife who is now hooked on the show -- felt insulted by Tony Soprano, and argued that he glorified crime. But in the end, is Tony glorious? In the episode preceding the finale, he was hiding out in a dump, on a bed without sheets, in his clothes, staring at the ceiling in the dark, cradling a gun, waiting to be betrayed.
I expect he calls on his mother when, and if, he goes. But don't bet on it. Gambling's illegal -- unless it's government-approved.
Thanks to John Kass
Sopranos Fall Short of Organized Crime's Impact on Cyber Crime
Friends of ours: Soprano Crime Family
The world of Tony Soprano ended Sunday night with the final episode of "The Sopranos." Over seven years, the award-winning HBO TV series offered insight into the business of the modern Mafia, albeit based on a fictional crime family in New Jersey.
We got glimpses of garbage contracts, construction scams, protection rackets, illegal gambling, truck hijacking and credit card fraud. But missing from the list of criminal enterprises was cybercrime. Tony Soprano was a face-to-face communicator, someone who is wary of wiretapping and other forms of electronic surveillance. He wasn't a laptop user, and he didn't appear to cash in on the myriad ways to get rich from Internet-related scams.
Richard Stiennon, chief marketing officer at security firm Fortinet Inc., says this is where "The Sopranos" fell short in its depiction of modern organized crime.
"Here they are beating people up with baseball bats, and a lot of the criminals have moved online," Stiennon said. "The opportunity has been growing with the growth of the Internet. Cybercriminals are looking to expand. They need an organization to exploit those opportunities. It's like organized crime 2.0."
Stiennon has been an expert on security for a while. For work, at PricewaterhouseCoopers, he was a "white hat" hacker. He would break into corporate networks to tell companies where their vulnerabilities were. He succeeded every time, he said.
Now at Fortinet, which supplies security appliances that protect networks, Stiennon has been going around giving talks on how we have to worry about how much money is flowing through the illegal crime networks online.
Of course, a lot of security tech vendors want us to be scared. They'll make more money if we buy enough armor to protect ourselves. "Some like to take the attitude that this is all vendor hype," Stiennon said. "The problem is, there is so little revelation of actual attacks. Companies like to stay out of the news, even when they're attacked."
But others are raising the same alarms about organized crime. Like the Mafia depicted on the show, the nature of cybercrime has evolved over the past seven years from "script kiddies," or young kids who used automated programs to create "cybergraffiti," to organized efforts aimed at stealing a lot of money.
Michelle Dennedy, chief privacy officer at Sun Microsystems Inc., said that in the past couple of years, the FBI and Secret Service have been warning that they're encountering much more organized crime activity in cyberspace. "Stealing identities is the new bank job," Dennedy said. "They go to chat rooms where they trade credit cards, using code words. I don't know if you need to have mob bosses behind it. But it is organized crime."
Christian Desilets, research attorney for the National White Collar Crime Center, said the "Tony Soprano types" may indeed be missing out on electronic crime. But Desilets added, "We do see them in offshore betting, but not as much in electronic crimes. But the electronic criminals are organized. There are very sophisticated operations linked to the Russian Mafia."
In its annual report on organized crime and the Internet last week, McAfee Inc. said that new criminal organizations are emerging to prey on Internet users and that they're becoming more sophisticated and scoring bigger paydays.
One study that McAfee cited said banks lost $2 billion through illegal access to online bank accounts last year. In 2005, the FBI estimated computer crimes cost U.S. corporations $67 billion.
With such stakes, you can bet most organized criminals are involved. The FBI notes that a number of crime syndicates are based in Russia but that many cross borders.
Stiennon contends that organized criminals online now are split up, like vendors in a flea market. Some sell hacking tools for spying on people or stealing identities. Others use those tools to steal credit cards and data, including programs that harvest identities from unsuspecting Internet users.
The FBI periodically shuts down these sites. The criminals put credit cards up for sale. Still others will buy the cards and use them to buy merchandise in electronics stores.
Since organized criminals have traditionally been linked to credit card fraud, expanding into online credit card theft is an easy expansion. Here and there, evidence of organized criminals using technology is emerging.
In 2005, thieves stole $423 million from the London branch of the Sumitomo Mitsui Bank. They did so by posing as janitors, putting "keystroke loggers" that captured keystrokes on computers, thereby stealing passwords from clerks who handled wire transfers.
Authorities traced the crime to a gang in Israel, and Stiennon noted that one person held for the crime was later killed.
In a series of incidents ranging from mid-2005 through January 2007, more than 45 million credit card numbers were stolen from TJX Cos., the owner of the TJ Maxx, Marshalls and other retail chains. Stiennon said many of those card numbers have been used around the world in various kinds of fraud. One ring of criminals used the card numbers to buy more than $8 million in merchandise in Florida.
Other big cases have involved the purchase and sale of controlled drugs via Internet pharmacies or credit card theft.
Extortion, one of the oldest traditional mafia tactics, has moved online as hackers threaten to shut down Web sites unless they're paid off.
Meanwhile, the federal budget aimed at stopping cybercrime doesn't add up to much, Stiennon said. "The sequel to the Sopranos will be cybercrime, with a lot of young kids using computers," Stiennon said. "Tony, assuming he's still alive, will be typing LOL (laugh out loud)."
The cost of cybercrime
Thanks to Dean Takahashi
The world of Tony Soprano ended Sunday night with the final episode of "The Sopranos." Over seven years, the award-winning HBO TV series offered insight into the business of the modern Mafia, albeit based on a fictional crime family in New Jersey.
We got glimpses of garbage contracts, construction scams, protection rackets, illegal gambling, truck hijacking and credit card fraud. But missing from the list of criminal enterprises was cybercrime. Tony Soprano was a face-to-face communicator, someone who is wary of wiretapping and other forms of electronic surveillance. He wasn't a laptop user, and he didn't appear to cash in on the myriad ways to get rich from Internet-related scams.
Richard Stiennon, chief marketing officer at security firm Fortinet Inc., says this is where "The Sopranos" fell short in its depiction of modern organized crime.
"Here they are beating people up with baseball bats, and a lot of the criminals have moved online," Stiennon said. "The opportunity has been growing with the growth of the Internet. Cybercriminals are looking to expand. They need an organization to exploit those opportunities. It's like organized crime 2.0."
Stiennon has been an expert on security for a while. For work, at PricewaterhouseCoopers, he was a "white hat" hacker. He would break into corporate networks to tell companies where their vulnerabilities were. He succeeded every time, he said.
Now at Fortinet, which supplies security appliances that protect networks, Stiennon has been going around giving talks on how we have to worry about how much money is flowing through the illegal crime networks online.
Of course, a lot of security tech vendors want us to be scared. They'll make more money if we buy enough armor to protect ourselves. "Some like to take the attitude that this is all vendor hype," Stiennon said. "The problem is, there is so little revelation of actual attacks. Companies like to stay out of the news, even when they're attacked."
But others are raising the same alarms about organized crime. Like the Mafia depicted on the show, the nature of cybercrime has evolved over the past seven years from "script kiddies," or young kids who used automated programs to create "cybergraffiti," to organized efforts aimed at stealing a lot of money.
Michelle Dennedy, chief privacy officer at Sun Microsystems Inc., said that in the past couple of years, the FBI and Secret Service have been warning that they're encountering much more organized crime activity in cyberspace. "Stealing identities is the new bank job," Dennedy said. "They go to chat rooms where they trade credit cards, using code words. I don't know if you need to have mob bosses behind it. But it is organized crime."
Christian Desilets, research attorney for the National White Collar Crime Center, said the "Tony Soprano types" may indeed be missing out on electronic crime. But Desilets added, "We do see them in offshore betting, but not as much in electronic crimes. But the electronic criminals are organized. There are very sophisticated operations linked to the Russian Mafia."
In its annual report on organized crime and the Internet last week, McAfee Inc. said that new criminal organizations are emerging to prey on Internet users and that they're becoming more sophisticated and scoring bigger paydays.
One study that McAfee cited said banks lost $2 billion through illegal access to online bank accounts last year. In 2005, the FBI estimated computer crimes cost U.S. corporations $67 billion.
With such stakes, you can bet most organized criminals are involved. The FBI notes that a number of crime syndicates are based in Russia but that many cross borders.
Stiennon contends that organized criminals online now are split up, like vendors in a flea market. Some sell hacking tools for spying on people or stealing identities. Others use those tools to steal credit cards and data, including programs that harvest identities from unsuspecting Internet users.
The FBI periodically shuts down these sites. The criminals put credit cards up for sale. Still others will buy the cards and use them to buy merchandise in electronics stores.
Since organized criminals have traditionally been linked to credit card fraud, expanding into online credit card theft is an easy expansion. Here and there, evidence of organized criminals using technology is emerging.
In 2005, thieves stole $423 million from the London branch of the Sumitomo Mitsui Bank. They did so by posing as janitors, putting "keystroke loggers" that captured keystrokes on computers, thereby stealing passwords from clerks who handled wire transfers.
Authorities traced the crime to a gang in Israel, and Stiennon noted that one person held for the crime was later killed.
In a series of incidents ranging from mid-2005 through January 2007, more than 45 million credit card numbers were stolen from TJX Cos., the owner of the TJ Maxx, Marshalls and other retail chains. Stiennon said many of those card numbers have been used around the world in various kinds of fraud. One ring of criminals used the card numbers to buy more than $8 million in merchandise in Florida.
Other big cases have involved the purchase and sale of controlled drugs via Internet pharmacies or credit card theft.
Extortion, one of the oldest traditional mafia tactics, has moved online as hackers threaten to shut down Web sites unless they're paid off.
Meanwhile, the federal budget aimed at stopping cybercrime doesn't add up to much, Stiennon said. "The sequel to the Sopranos will be cybercrime, with a lot of young kids using computers," Stiennon said. "Tony, assuming he's still alive, will be typing LOL (laugh out loud)."
The cost of cybercrime
2 million: Number of Americans whose online bank accounts were robbed
$2 billion: Total losses for the banking industry from such thefts
$30 million: Credit card company fraud losses from online crime, 30 percent of total fraud losses
15 million: Number of Americans who reported being victims of identity theft in the 12 months ending mid-2006, up 50 percent from 2003
$3,257: Average loss from identity theft in 2006, up 131 percent from 2005
Source: McAfee North American Criminology Report: Organized Crime and the Internet, 2007
Thanks to Dean Takahashi
Fans Bid Farewell to The Sopranos
Friends of ours: Soprano Crime Family
MILLIONS of fans of the mafia series The Sopranos anxiously awaited the hit drama's final episode on Sunday amid a flurry of speculation over the fate of its top mobster, Tony Soprano.
Viewers were left last week with a final scene of Tony climbing into bed at a hiding house, clinging to a massive assault weapon after his New York rivals gunned down his top captain and sent his consiglieri into a bullet-ridden coma.
With the last of 86 episodes of the award-winning series set to air at 9pm (local time), the media was abuzz with predictions about how the psychotherapy-seeking New Jersey mob boss and his dysfunctional family's saga would end.
"I think he lives," former FBI special agent Joe Pistone, whose life as an undercover infiltrator of the mob was chronicled in the hit movie Donny Brasco, told Fox News television.
Another mob expert, Bill Bonanno, son of the notorious real-life New York mafia kingpin Joseph Bonanno, concurred. "I think he lives because (show creator) David Chase would like to bring him back some time," he said.
Chase reportedly filmed three different endings in order to keep secret the finale of the series which began in 1999 and has aired on the cable channel Home Box Office, or HBO.
Chase said he knew "about three years ago" how the story would end, and that "from the beginning, my goal was always to do a little movie every week," according to the Washington Post. "It has all been planned out, we always knew exactly where it was going, but within that framework, we left a lot of room for each episode to have its own character and to invent stories that would fit in with the continuing story," he said.
However, Chase has ruthlessly upset expectations throughout the long-running mafia yarn, killing off popular characters like mob girlfriend Adriana LaCerva (Drea de Matteo) and letting a Russian foe escape a gunbattle in the snowy woods, never to resurface.
Over the last eight years, mob watchers have come to adore quirky characters like Tony's right-hand man Silvio Dante, played by Steven Van Zandt who in real life strummed guitar alongside rock legend Bruce Springsteen.
Tony's therapist Jennifer Melfi, played by Lorraine Bracco who starred as mobster-turned-rat Henry Hill's wife Karen in the movie Goodfellas, and Tony's blond money-grubbing wife Carmela, portrayed by Edie Falco, are also fan favorites.
Tony is played by James Gandolfini, who has admitted that he is ready to let the character go after years of whacking enemies and friends, having sex with mistresses, lounging in his Bada Bing strip club and trudging down his driveway to fetch his newspaper in his open bathrobe. But however bloody, cruel or treacherous Tony has been over the years, his character is cherished by fans and the twists and turns of his storyline have largely won over the American public.
"I think America has witnessed an erosion in kinship with each other and an erosion of honor," said Bonanno. Regardless of what happens with the characters, "people still see a sense of morality there."
The New York Times described the series, which has won 18 Emmy awards, as "widely proclaimed as the greatest drama ever created for television."
For Pistone, the public just adores the mafia lifestyle, and its sheen will never wear off. "I think people really go for the mob and the movies and the Sopranos show, because the average guy is a working stiff. He comes home he has the same hours every day. He sees the Sopranos, he sees guys that don't go to a 9-5 job."
MILLIONS of fans of the mafia series The Sopranos anxiously awaited the hit drama's final episode on Sunday amid a flurry of speculation over the fate of its top mobster, Tony Soprano.
Viewers were left last week with a final scene of Tony climbing into bed at a hiding house, clinging to a massive assault weapon after his New York rivals gunned down his top captain and sent his consiglieri into a bullet-ridden coma.
With the last of 86 episodes of the award-winning series set to air at 9pm (local time), the media was abuzz with predictions about how the psychotherapy-seeking New Jersey mob boss and his dysfunctional family's saga would end.
"I think he lives," former FBI special agent Joe Pistone, whose life as an undercover infiltrator of the mob was chronicled in the hit movie Donny Brasco, told Fox News television.
Another mob expert, Bill Bonanno, son of the notorious real-life New York mafia kingpin Joseph Bonanno, concurred. "I think he lives because (show creator) David Chase would like to bring him back some time," he said.
Chase reportedly filmed three different endings in order to keep secret the finale of the series which began in 1999 and has aired on the cable channel Home Box Office, or HBO.
Chase said he knew "about three years ago" how the story would end, and that "from the beginning, my goal was always to do a little movie every week," according to the Washington Post. "It has all been planned out, we always knew exactly where it was going, but within that framework, we left a lot of room for each episode to have its own character and to invent stories that would fit in with the continuing story," he said.
However, Chase has ruthlessly upset expectations throughout the long-running mafia yarn, killing off popular characters like mob girlfriend Adriana LaCerva (Drea de Matteo) and letting a Russian foe escape a gunbattle in the snowy woods, never to resurface.
Over the last eight years, mob watchers have come to adore quirky characters like Tony's right-hand man Silvio Dante, played by Steven Van Zandt who in real life strummed guitar alongside rock legend Bruce Springsteen.
Tony's therapist Jennifer Melfi, played by Lorraine Bracco who starred as mobster-turned-rat Henry Hill's wife Karen in the movie Goodfellas, and Tony's blond money-grubbing wife Carmela, portrayed by Edie Falco, are also fan favorites.
Tony is played by James Gandolfini, who has admitted that he is ready to let the character go after years of whacking enemies and friends, having sex with mistresses, lounging in his Bada Bing strip club and trudging down his driveway to fetch his newspaper in his open bathrobe. But however bloody, cruel or treacherous Tony has been over the years, his character is cherished by fans and the twists and turns of his storyline have largely won over the American public.
"I think America has witnessed an erosion in kinship with each other and an erosion of honor," said Bonanno. Regardless of what happens with the characters, "people still see a sense of morality there."
The New York Times described the series, which has won 18 Emmy awards, as "widely proclaimed as the greatest drama ever created for television."
For Pistone, the public just adores the mafia lifestyle, and its sheen will never wear off. "I think people really go for the mob and the movies and the Sopranos show, because the average guy is a working stiff. He comes home he has the same hours every day. He sees the Sopranos, he sees guys that don't go to a 9-5 job."
The Ruthless Rise of Mobster Joey "The Clown" Lombardo
To neighbors, Joseph Lombardo was a beloved family man and respected boys baseball coach in his West Side neighborhood -- "more liked than the priest" in the community, according to one friend.
To the feds, Lombardo is the man who had a factory owner slain in front of the man's wife and 4-year-old son.
To investigators, he's the man who knows no loyalty, signing off on the murders of three close friends.
When he appears in federal court these days, for updates on the trial starting June 19 that could put him in prison until his dying days, he's the wisecracking senior citizen. At 78, he's the oldest of a mostly geriatric bunch of mobsters in what likely will be the last great Outfit trial in Chicago history -- the Family Secrets case.
He's "the Clown," known for his quick wit. When the cops stopped him once in the 1980s, after he fled a gambling raid, he had $12,000 in cash on him and a book filled with jokes. But the wisecracks, investigators say, only mask the brutality of one of the last of the old-time Chicago mobsters.
Interviews with people who have known and investigated Lombardo, as well as a review of thousands of pages of court records and law enforcement documents, reveal the story of the ruthless rise of Lombardo in the Chicago Outfit.
"He was vicious and a killer," said retired FBI Agent Jack O'Rourke. "He was their prime enforcer."
Lombardo has denied hurting anyone. Now behind bars at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago, he declined an interview request.
In court in 1983, Lombardo said: "I never ordered a killing, I never OKd a killing, and I never killed a man in my life."
His attorney, Rick Halprin, says his client has never been a mob leader. But investigators say Lombardo was a top mobster for years, thanks to his criminal versatility.
He allegedly went from busting heads and two-bit burglaries to orchestrating a bribe attempt of U.S. Sen. Howard Cannon. He was convicted in that case in the 1980s, as well as another one for skimming millions from Las Vegas casinos for the mob. He allegedly controlled millions of dollars in Teamster pension funds through his friend, insurance magnate Allen Dorfman, and was responsible for getting the skim from Las Vegas casinos to Chicago mob bosses.
As a child, Lombardo never knew such wealth, growing up poor in Depression-era Chicago, one of 11 children, the son of a printer. A graduate of Wells High School, he worked as a paperboy, plucked chickens, shined shoes, loaded boxcars at Union Station for 69 cents an hour and handled room service at the Blackstone Hotel.
He was also quite the athlete, playing on wrestling, basketball, fencing and swimming teams and even taking square-dancing lessons. He found a passion for golf and caddied for top Chicago gangster Jackie Cerone. He was also quite the gin rummy cardshark. But he didn't have to rely on cards for cash. His criminal work was apparently quite profitable, authorities said. In recent years, while Lombardo pleads poverty, his family trust benefitting his ex-wife, son and daughter has sold real estate for millions. Authorities believe the trust was set up to keep the feds from seizing assets.
Lombardo's success was punctuated by violence. He has been a suspect in numerous murders but never convicted. What's more, authorities say, he had control over the most allegedly vicious hit man around, Frank "The German" Schweihs. Schweihs is charged in the Family Secrets case with Lombardo. Schweihs would talk about doing an Outfit killing like he was taking out the garbage, court records show.
Even before Lombardo was a somebody in the Chicago Outfit, he was "the Clown."
It was 1964, and Lombardo was on trial in Chicago with other alleged loan sharks for beating a man who owed the mob money. The case was making headlines, and so was Lombardo. When police took his mug shot, he opened his mouth into a cavernous yawn to stop the cops from getting a good photo of him.
Even then, Lombardo -- then going by a variation of his birth name, Joseph Lombardi -- was referred to in the press as the Clown.
The other notable twist: Lombardo was innocent of the charge. But he was part of a clever plot to scotch the case, authorities said. When police rounded up the loan sharks, they arrested the wrong Joseph Lombardi. At the time, two Chicago gangsters had that name and looked similar. Defense attorneys for the men realized the error but kept silent to spring a trap on prosecutors, authorities said. It worked. When the victim took the stand, he could identify all the defendants as his attackers, all except the Clown.
"Talk about having your jaw drop and your case collapse," said attorney Louis B. Garippo, who prosecuted the case. Lombardo walked out a free man. His fellow mobsters walked too, after a jury acquitted them.
Lombardo's antics would be only his first of many public displays.
After he was arrested in 1980 for leading police on a chase, he left the courthouse one day, past the press corps, hidden behind a newspaper with a peephole cut out for his eyes. He was tripped up, though, as he went through the revolving door.
When Lombardo got out of prison in 1992, the FBI in Chicago began getting strange phone calls from a man identifying himself as Long John Silver. The caller would let agents know when he was going to call through newspaper ads.
The caller provided good info about the Outfit's hierarchy but was anxious to steer agents away from one person -- Lombardo's son, Joseph Jr., whom agents were investigating but never charged. Agents traced the calls as coming from pay phones near Lombardo's home, sources said.
The phone calls never amounted to much, and the agents never proved they were coming from Lombardo. But there was a tantalizing clue. Flip the initials for Long John: you get J and L. Short for Joseph Lombardo? Lombardo could pull that stunt, agents figured.
To get into the Chicago Outfit as a made member -- to have the full rights of membership -- a candidate must murder for the mob. Lombardo's qualifying kill was allegedly the 1965 hit of mob associate and hotel owner Manny Skar, according to court records. Lombardo allegedly shadowed Skar for two days before Skar was killed as he exited his car to enter his apartment on Lake Shore Drive.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s Lombardo was on the move, wearing multiple hats for the Outfit and allegedly signing off on the murders of three close friends.
The first was in 1974 -- the slaying of businessman Daniel Seifert. Seifert ran a fiberglass business in the suburbs and was an unwitting front for Lombardo. Lombardo and Seifert were so close that Lombardo baby-sat Seifert's kids. But when the feds came calling and Seifert decided to cooperate, Lombardo decided his friend had to go, authorities charge. On Sept. 27, 1974, Seifert was gunned down outside his Bensenville factory as his wife and 4-year-old son watched. With Seifert dead, the charges against Lombardo evaporated. Lombardo is charged in connection with Seifert's murder in the Family Secrets case along with racketeering.
The next to go was insurance magnate Allen Dorfman, who went on Hawaii golf vacations with Lombardo. Lombardo was close to Dorfman, a clout-heavy insurance broker. Lombardo and Dorfman allegedly schemed to control the Teamsters' pension funds, which loaned millions to build Vegas casinos. Lombardo would allegedly muscle people for Dorfman.
In one conversation, secretly tape-recorded by the feds, Lombardo spoke to mob lawyer and casino investor Morris Schenker, who wasn't coming up with the money Dorfman believed Schenker owed the Outfit.
"Now, it's getting to the point now where you either s - - - or get off the pot," Lombardo said to Schenker, who was 72 at the time of the 1979 conversation. "If they come back and tell me to give you a message and if you want to defy it, I assure you that you will never reach 73," Lombardo said.
Schenker died of natural causes. Dorfman did not, getting gunned down in 1983 in Lincolnwood after Outfit leaders worried he'd turn stool pigeon.
Three years later, another Lombardo friend, mob killer Anthony Spilotro, was beaten to death along with his brother, Michael Spilotro. Lombardo allegedly oversaw Spilotro, who was the Outfit's man in Las Vegas. The Spilotros and Lombardo were close. Their families came over on the same boat from Italy.
In the end, though, Anthony Spilotro had to die, Outfit leaders decided. He was causing too much heat in Vegas, including taking out a contract on an FBI agent.
The Spilotro brothers were lured to a Bensenville area home on the ruse they were getting promotions. Instead, when they went down to the basement, several mobsters surrounded them and beat them to death. They were buried in an Indiana cornfield.
In recent years, Lombardo has kept a low profile. He has been seen hanging out more at the Italian restaurant La Scarola than with other mobsters.
His defense -- unique but possibly workable -- is that he has moved away from the mob life.
In short, he's retired.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
To the feds, Lombardo is the man who had a factory owner slain in front of the man's wife and 4-year-old son.
To investigators, he's the man who knows no loyalty, signing off on the murders of three close friends.
When he appears in federal court these days, for updates on the trial starting June 19 that could put him in prison until his dying days, he's the wisecracking senior citizen. At 78, he's the oldest of a mostly geriatric bunch of mobsters in what likely will be the last great Outfit trial in Chicago history -- the Family Secrets case.
He's "the Clown," known for his quick wit. When the cops stopped him once in the 1980s, after he fled a gambling raid, he had $12,000 in cash on him and a book filled with jokes. But the wisecracks, investigators say, only mask the brutality of one of the last of the old-time Chicago mobsters.
Interviews with people who have known and investigated Lombardo, as well as a review of thousands of pages of court records and law enforcement documents, reveal the story of the ruthless rise of Lombardo in the Chicago Outfit.
"He was vicious and a killer," said retired FBI Agent Jack O'Rourke. "He was their prime enforcer."
Lombardo has denied hurting anyone. Now behind bars at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago, he declined an interview request.
In court in 1983, Lombardo said: "I never ordered a killing, I never OKd a killing, and I never killed a man in my life."
His attorney, Rick Halprin, says his client has never been a mob leader. But investigators say Lombardo was a top mobster for years, thanks to his criminal versatility.
He allegedly went from busting heads and two-bit burglaries to orchestrating a bribe attempt of U.S. Sen. Howard Cannon. He was convicted in that case in the 1980s, as well as another one for skimming millions from Las Vegas casinos for the mob. He allegedly controlled millions of dollars in Teamster pension funds through his friend, insurance magnate Allen Dorfman, and was responsible for getting the skim from Las Vegas casinos to Chicago mob bosses.
As a child, Lombardo never knew such wealth, growing up poor in Depression-era Chicago, one of 11 children, the son of a printer. A graduate of Wells High School, he worked as a paperboy, plucked chickens, shined shoes, loaded boxcars at Union Station for 69 cents an hour and handled room service at the Blackstone Hotel.
He was also quite the athlete, playing on wrestling, basketball, fencing and swimming teams and even taking square-dancing lessons. He found a passion for golf and caddied for top Chicago gangster Jackie Cerone. He was also quite the gin rummy cardshark. But he didn't have to rely on cards for cash. His criminal work was apparently quite profitable, authorities said. In recent years, while Lombardo pleads poverty, his family trust benefitting his ex-wife, son and daughter has sold real estate for millions. Authorities believe the trust was set up to keep the feds from seizing assets.
Lombardo's success was punctuated by violence. He has been a suspect in numerous murders but never convicted. What's more, authorities say, he had control over the most allegedly vicious hit man around, Frank "The German" Schweihs. Schweihs is charged in the Family Secrets case with Lombardo. Schweihs would talk about doing an Outfit killing like he was taking out the garbage, court records show.
Even before Lombardo was a somebody in the Chicago Outfit, he was "the Clown."
It was 1964, and Lombardo was on trial in Chicago with other alleged loan sharks for beating a man who owed the mob money. The case was making headlines, and so was Lombardo. When police took his mug shot, he opened his mouth into a cavernous yawn to stop the cops from getting a good photo of him.
Even then, Lombardo -- then going by a variation of his birth name, Joseph Lombardi -- was referred to in the press as the Clown.
The other notable twist: Lombardo was innocent of the charge. But he was part of a clever plot to scotch the case, authorities said. When police rounded up the loan sharks, they arrested the wrong Joseph Lombardi. At the time, two Chicago gangsters had that name and looked similar. Defense attorneys for the men realized the error but kept silent to spring a trap on prosecutors, authorities said. It worked. When the victim took the stand, he could identify all the defendants as his attackers, all except the Clown.
"Talk about having your jaw drop and your case collapse," said attorney Louis B. Garippo, who prosecuted the case. Lombardo walked out a free man. His fellow mobsters walked too, after a jury acquitted them.
Lombardo's antics would be only his first of many public displays.
After he was arrested in 1980 for leading police on a chase, he left the courthouse one day, past the press corps, hidden behind a newspaper with a peephole cut out for his eyes. He was tripped up, though, as he went through the revolving door.
When Lombardo got out of prison in 1992, the FBI in Chicago began getting strange phone calls from a man identifying himself as Long John Silver. The caller would let agents know when he was going to call through newspaper ads.
The caller provided good info about the Outfit's hierarchy but was anxious to steer agents away from one person -- Lombardo's son, Joseph Jr., whom agents were investigating but never charged. Agents traced the calls as coming from pay phones near Lombardo's home, sources said.
The phone calls never amounted to much, and the agents never proved they were coming from Lombardo. But there was a tantalizing clue. Flip the initials for Long John: you get J and L. Short for Joseph Lombardo? Lombardo could pull that stunt, agents figured.
To get into the Chicago Outfit as a made member -- to have the full rights of membership -- a candidate must murder for the mob. Lombardo's qualifying kill was allegedly the 1965 hit of mob associate and hotel owner Manny Skar, according to court records. Lombardo allegedly shadowed Skar for two days before Skar was killed as he exited his car to enter his apartment on Lake Shore Drive.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s Lombardo was on the move, wearing multiple hats for the Outfit and allegedly signing off on the murders of three close friends.
The first was in 1974 -- the slaying of businessman Daniel Seifert. Seifert ran a fiberglass business in the suburbs and was an unwitting front for Lombardo. Lombardo and Seifert were so close that Lombardo baby-sat Seifert's kids. But when the feds came calling and Seifert decided to cooperate, Lombardo decided his friend had to go, authorities charge. On Sept. 27, 1974, Seifert was gunned down outside his Bensenville factory as his wife and 4-year-old son watched. With Seifert dead, the charges against Lombardo evaporated. Lombardo is charged in connection with Seifert's murder in the Family Secrets case along with racketeering.
The next to go was insurance magnate Allen Dorfman, who went on Hawaii golf vacations with Lombardo. Lombardo was close to Dorfman, a clout-heavy insurance broker. Lombardo and Dorfman allegedly schemed to control the Teamsters' pension funds, which loaned millions to build Vegas casinos. Lombardo would allegedly muscle people for Dorfman.
In one conversation, secretly tape-recorded by the feds, Lombardo spoke to mob lawyer and casino investor Morris Schenker, who wasn't coming up with the money Dorfman believed Schenker owed the Outfit.
"Now, it's getting to the point now where you either s - - - or get off the pot," Lombardo said to Schenker, who was 72 at the time of the 1979 conversation. "If they come back and tell me to give you a message and if you want to defy it, I assure you that you will never reach 73," Lombardo said.
Schenker died of natural causes. Dorfman did not, getting gunned down in 1983 in Lincolnwood after Outfit leaders worried he'd turn stool pigeon.
Three years later, another Lombardo friend, mob killer Anthony Spilotro, was beaten to death along with his brother, Michael Spilotro. Lombardo allegedly oversaw Spilotro, who was the Outfit's man in Las Vegas. The Spilotros and Lombardo were close. Their families came over on the same boat from Italy.
In the end, though, Anthony Spilotro had to die, Outfit leaders decided. He was causing too much heat in Vegas, including taking out a contract on an FBI agent.
The Spilotro brothers were lured to a Bensenville area home on the ruse they were getting promotions. Instead, when they went down to the basement, several mobsters surrounded them and beat them to death. They were buried in an Indiana cornfield.
In recent years, Lombardo has kept a low profile. He has been seen hanging out more at the Italian restaurant La Scarola than with other mobsters.
His defense -- unique but possibly workable -- is that he has moved away from the mob life.
In short, he's retired.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
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