James Gandolfini Makes New Stuff For HBO

Now that The Sopranos is coming to an end, several of the cast will have to make plans about their future; they'll either wait for a Mickey Blue Eyes sequel to be made or return to their failed pop careers. Not James Gandolfini, though.

As Tony Soprano, James Gandolfini has become a figurehead for The Sopranos, HBO and that airline he does those adverts for. And HBO seems to want to keep James Gandolfini onboard - it's signed a three-year deal with him to make all kinds of stuff for the network, starting with a drama about a big fat man who doesn't get the acclaim he feels he deserves for making cash-in American Airlines commercials.

Now that it's official that the next batch of Sopranos episodes will be the last, there's going to be a big hole to fill. Sopranos fans will have nowhere to turn to satisfy their need to watch talking fish telling a fat bald gangster about the FBI, Sopranos actors will have no choice but to return to their life of petty crime and Sopranos network HBO will have a bunch of gaps in its schedules that it'll need to fill.

Handily, one Sopranos actor wants to make a load of new stuff for HBO, which instantly solves two problems in one go. James Gandolfini, who plays Tony Soprano, has signed a three-year deal with HBO to produce original programming for the network, as well as getting a first-look deal on any film projects at HBO movie distribution wing Picturehouse.

And what's the first thing James Gandolfini wants to make? Just like any other big fat overtly masculine actor, Gandolfini is eager to have a crack at playing Ernest Hemingway, as Reuters reports:

He has been busy developing "Hemingway," a feature about the tempestuous romance between Ernest Hemingway and war correspondent Martha Gellhorn, and will play the noted novelist. Philip Kaufman ("Quills") will direct. Additionally, Gandolfini and Alex Ryan, his partner in newly launched production company Attaboy Films, are developing "Occupation Iraq," an HBO documentary that chronicles the stories of U.S. soldiers in Iraq.

But that's not all, since the three-year deal specifies that James Gandolfini must also produce a few HBO pilot shows too. And it's probably wrong of us to expect that at least one of these will be a gritty drama about a family of mobsters, maybe called The Fopranos or something.

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Gandolfini, HBO in production deal - Reuters

[story by Stuart Heritage]