James Gandolfini Now Making Films Mostly About Shoes

When you've spent the best part of a decade playing one of the most iconic screen characters in television history, anything you do afterwards is bound to be a disappointment - which might explain James Gandolfini's big new shoe movie.

James Gandolfini has announced his first big role following the end of The Sopranos. And exactly how would James Gandolfini choose to movie on from playing one of the toughest, knottiest, most morally ambiguous characters in modern popular culture? By signing on to play the bloke who got Michael Jordan to put his name on a shoe, that's how. James Gandolfini will play the real-life Sonny Vaccaro in HBO movie ABCD Camp, a film that sounds as if it'll go down a storm with people who like basketball. And shoes. And stuff. Possibly.

The end of The Sopranos was a monumental pop culture moment the likes of which are rarely seen on television. By angering everyone who enjoyed The Sopranos by just cutting to black at the end of the final episode, confusing the people in The Sopranos and allowing Hillary Clinton to engineer the most opportunistic piece of bandwagon-jumping by any politician ever, The Sopranos created an all-time career high for cast and crew alike.

And now comes the inevitable drop. Although The Sopranos is still waiting to win all those Emmys, James Gandolfini - Tony Soprano himself - has started to move on. And in what's possibly quite a shrewd move, Gandolfini has noticed that the exact opposite of a thuggish Mafia boss is a basketball-fixated shoe executive, which is why he's signed up to star as Sonny Vaccaro in new HBO movie ABCD Camp, as E! Online reports:

Gandolfini will star in the real-life tale as Sonny Vaccaro, the man frequently credited with pushing Michael Jordan out of the realm of mere basketball player and into the stratosphere of superstardom, after brokering his multimillion-dollar endorsement deal with Nike. Vaccaro also did the same, much to the NCAA's chagrin, for college-bypassing NBA heavyweights LeBron James and Kobe Bryant, among several of the game's other major players… The movie, however, will not focus much on his banner work partnering pro ballers with major shoe companies. It will instead center on the last youth basketball camp established by Vaccaro.

Thank goodness - we've always wanted to see James Gandolfini try his hand at a heartwarming shoe-based basketball movie along the lines of The Mighty Ducks, and now finally we can. Of course, after such a long time playing Tony Soprano, transferring suddenly to another character will be an unusually large struggle for James Gandolfini, and only time will tell if he'll be able to play a bald, overweight Italian American with strong ties to Las Vegas and a reputation for being driven by money and power.

Read more:

Gandolfini's Next Gig Easy As ABCD - E! Online