.png)
2 days ago
10
In the entertainment industry, “secrecy” and “confidentiality” have inevitably become some of the most problematic issues in making a project. The same was the case with The Sopranos, the critically lauded crime drama series, which had to deal with the problem of keeping things strictly under wraps as well. But creator David Chase found the perfect solution to this.
The Sopranos. | Credits: HBO.Even back in the day when the show was still airing, “confidentiality issues” still loomed as a threat. This would have proven especially dangerous to the series because any last-minute leaks would have meddled badly with its crime thriller themes. However, mastermind Chase ensured the news didn’t get out, except that… the one made the guinea pig for this situation was Drea de Matteo.
How David Chase Dealt With Confidentiality Issues With The Sopranos
The Sopranos has unarguably gone down as one of the most interesting crime-drama series of all time, and a major reason behind this was its incredibly suspensive theme. But keeping the plot of the saga strictly under wraps wasn’t an easy task, especially when it came to the death scenes of some of the most prominent characters of the lore. Like Drea de Matteo‘s Adriana La Cerva.
Drea de Matteo in a still from the series. | Credits: HBO.To jog the memory of those who may not remember, in the twelfth episode – Long Term Parking – of season 5 of the series, Adriana is eventually put to rest for being an FBI informant. However, since she was an important character, there was a high risk of news about her death getting leaked out to the public. To stop this from happening, creator David Chase devised the perfect plan.
In the documentary Wise Guy: David Chase and The Sopranos, de Matteo shared how Chase tackled this turn of events, saying (via PEOPLE):
David sat me down on set, and he said, ‘I’m going to shoot this two ways. I’m going to shoot it where you get away, and I’m going to shoot it where they kill you.’ No one is going to know how it ends until it airs, because we have confidentiality issues on the set. Nobody can know what’s really going on.
While this way may not be deemed as perfect as the way George Lucas hid the well-kept secret of Anakin Skywalker being Luke Skywalker’s father until the very last minute, this was still considerably genius enough. This was because, even though de Matteo partially figured out that her character might die, she still had to wait until the episode’s release to get the final confirmation.
A still from the crime drama. | Credits: HBO.On the other hand, at the same time, the doubt of possibly relinquishing her gig with the series with her character’s death was also an issue for de Matteo since she had been playing Adriana for five stunning seasons. But since she couldn’t even confirm it yet and was scared of potentially losing her job, the Emmy winner devised a plan: She took another acting gig as a fallback.
Drea de Matteo Had to Take Another Acting Gig for Fear of Losing Her Job
Of course, having job security was an essential element for Drea de Matteo, and Chase keeping even her in the dark about her character’s ultimate fate was anything but helpful to her. Thus, her scared and struggling self ended up taking another acting job as a backup, just in case she actually ended up losing out on her role as Adriana (which, she did).
A still from the crime drama. | Credits: HBO.As de Matteo continued to share in the documentary:
I took another job, because I didn’t know. I was scared, and [David] was f—— pissed, because now it was going to get out. I had to take that job. I thought I’d never work again. I knew that playing Adriana for 5 seasons and being known for that, that that was going to be my life. I knew I was going to be stereotyped forever. So I was like, I’d better just [take] advantage of this right now.
And so she did, as she not only had another job backing her up but even embraced Adriana’s final fate as she “knew that that was how it needed to be.” But her perfectly serving as the guinea pig to deal with these confidentiality issues also ended up delivering her the fruit of her hard work as de Matteo scored an Emmy in 2004 for her outstanding supporting role in the series.
‘The Sopranos’ and ‘Wise Guy: David Chase and The Sopranos’ can currently be streamed on Max.
Bengali (BD) · 
English (US) ·