The Sopranos - Reviewed by Former Mafia Capo Michael Franzese

it's mob movie monday and today by popular demand we're going to review the sopranos [Music] everybody welcome to another sit down with michael francis hope everybody is doing well today is mob movie monday and we got a good one for you today a lot of requests for this one we're going to get into it right away quickly the books i got them up there because i'm getting a lot of requests christmas time everybody's looking for gifts you buy them on my website store michael francis store.michaelfrancis.com i will autograph them a little bit more expensive there i got to be honest with you you can get them on amazon everywhere else they're not autographed but if you want an autographed copy for me store.michaelfriendsheets.com or you can buy them on facebook instagram i think we have stores on there also so that's that so the sopranos uh gosh i got so many requests uh from all of you about this television show and let me let me say it this way probably if not the greatest uh certainly one of the top two greatest television series of all times it was groundbreaking at the time that it came out a lot of things were cloned after that series were cloned after the success of the sopranos it was an amazing series uh it won every kind of award you can imagine it ran for six seasons i think 80 plus episodes and it was brilliantly done and i have to say that a quick little story that some of you heard but i always have new people tuning in so i have to say this 1995 i'm out on parole and i'm working for working at a friend's studio over at universal studios actually and i get a call through my agent at the time jack gillardy famous agent at icm passed away uh not too long ago love jack who was married to annette funicello remember from uh the mickey mouse club and uh great guy and uh he gives me a call and he says mike a guy by the name of david chase wants to speak to you about a tv series that he's putting together for fox at the time and um he said he'd like to talk to you maybe bring you on as a consultant well i was working for a friend uh at that time just reading some scripts trying to stay out of trouble while i was on parole make a long story short i turned it down didn't want to do it because i was just out on parole i didn't think i should get involved in a mob you know show at that point in time just goes to show you how smart i was and it turned out to be uh fox turned it down for some reason didn't go there which i think was great because they had a lot more leeway leverage on hbo to do it the way they should have done it hbo picked it up and the rest is history but that was my you know little connection to that and i always say that i thought that one of the characters uh the mom tony soprano's mom might have been loosely based upon my mother because there was a bug in my house and a lot of conversation between my mother my dad the kids came out and i have a feeling that david chase got a hold of that i can't verify it i don't know it for a fact i never spoke to him about it but i had a feeling that's one of the reasons why he might have gotten in touch with me who knows anyway great series and let me tell you this you know we talked about uh art imitating life and i think that's what they tried to do with the sopranos and they captured it in a big way you know the mob family was supposed to be based upon loosely based upon the jersey crew the cabal county family and again i don't know how tightly written it was about that family but it was loosely based upon it and i'm going to talk about now we can go on for this for a while it lasted six seasons it was 80 some odd episodes but i want to talk about episode one and two because that's when it was set up and really i think what it was set up to show is the dysfunction of most families who have somebody a dad that's a participant in the mob life that's what i got out of it now i'm going to be honest i didn't watch all six seasons religiously i did watch season one thought it was brilliant got into season two kind of fell off for me after that and sporadically i would watch an episode here and there but i love the characters i love the writing on it even though i wouldn't say was 100 realistic they did capture a lot of the realism of that life and again brilliantly done you can never argue with the success of that show so let's talk about a little bit let's set it up you got tony soprano who was you know kind of the acting boss he was really the boss of the family although he wasn't official at that point in time i'm not going to get into the whole story because you know most of you have seen it but those of you that haven't hbo go wherever you got to go watch it it was a brilliant series you're going to love it so tony is the kind of acting boss on the boss of the family but he's got a problem he's got a uh an anxiety problem and he kind of passes out you know at one point in time he's barbecuing something he passes out goes into the hospital it turns out he's having panic attacks so he goes to see a therapist psychiatrist whatever she plays a brilliant role lorraine bronco was terrific as the psychiatrist and he starts to open up to the psychiatrist now many people have asked me about that role is it real michael what what would happen if he was going to a psychiatrist i will tell you this and i'm going to prove it a little bit later on in the uh in the series if a mob boss was ever seeing a psychiatrist he would be in deep trouble why because what would he be doing there he'd be revealing secrets talking about his innermost thoughts you can't do that with somebody outside of their life now somebody will throw back and say frank costello is doing that he did it for a very limited period of time and when his psychiatrist told him he had to walk away from the life costello got rid of him nothing happened to costello after that you know the story he eventually got out of the life but you cannot be visiting a psychiatrist and be in that position in life you would not lash you'd end up in the trunk of the car maybe with the psychiatrist trust me on that but anyway he's seen a psychiatrist and it's it's great because it shows the dysfunction of his family his wife and him you know she was brilliant also in that role carmella they had a dysfunctional relationship no doubt about it she knew that he was cheating on her and uh it was dysfunctional and she was she did not back down she was not you know uh what could i say a quiet mob wife she let tony know her feelings you know and she did that in a couple of scenes you saw that right away it was established immediately so tony is dealing with this psychological problem like many mob families look my family was totally dysfunctional there's no question about it sister dies an overdose of drugs you know the story with my brother drug addict eventually turned informant uh you know my mother and dad separated for all of those years my mother was kind of neurotic in that regard you know i had my own issues at the time definitely dysfunctional and many families of the mob were like the sopranos and that they were dysfunctional in that family he had um you know a son and a daughter and the daughter in that family jamie sigler who happened to go to school in jericho long island with my kids they knew each other then she was a great kid and um you know she was always uh you know in in conflict with her mom and you know a lot of it was because of the interaction between you know tony soprano and his wife and you know tony's odd ways and odd habits and so on and so forth and you could tell there was tension in that family the son he just was kind of a lazy kid didn't really care about much you know it wasn't uh at least the early on you know things changed a little bit later but at least early on in the opening two episodes that's how he was again brilliantly acting uh tony starts to bring his crew together there uh for those of you that know tony sharico paulie walnuts in there i love tony cerrito he's great i did meet him i was actually in a little documentary with him one time he's a brilliant actor uh he captures the role terrifically and he was one of the loyal soldiers for uh old school guy soldiers for tony and then of course you got vincent pastore who played big loved vincent pastore he was in the original hbo gotti movie with armand assante he was terrific dan he played quack quack and he was brilliant in the sopranos you know you'll see how the story goes if you get into it uh but they're like uh tony's two trusted guys most trusted guys they're old school and tony trusts them uh for their loyalty and uh for their knowledge of their life and he leans on them to do certain things um christopher you know uh michael imperiale character you know that character in the beginning wasn't real to me he was supposedly related to tony but the way he talked to tony he was kind of a hot head a little drug user i was doing heists and so on and so forth uh but the way he spoke to tony his big deal is he wanted to get made he wanted to become a member of that life and tony was just telling him you know be patient but he would talk to tony in a way that you don't talk to made guys i don't care if you're related or not so there was you know that was unrealistic to me i'm going to be honest with you in my whole time in that life i've never seen a guy that wasn't made talk back to a made guy didn't happen in my crew people were always respectful i tried to give them respect too but i never saw that happen you know guys that were around you didn't talk back i don't care if you were related or not he kind of reminded me of my brother a little bit kind of a hot head you know wanted to get made but always kind of in trouble doing these small heists and things like that and doing the drugs and kind of reminding me of a way in a way of my brother and as the series develops he's in and out of a lot of trouble causes tony a lot of aggravation then you've got uh uh uncle junior who uh i think dominic gianni's his name is something like that uh played a brilliant role he was terrific um he was kind of uh um always upset that he wasn't the real boss of the family he was tony's father's brother and he was kind of always you know second rate you know even tony soprano had more uh stature in the family that he did than he did and junior always felt that you know it should have been his position so there's kind of a rocky relationship between tony soprano and his uncle junior uh and i've seen that you know many times in my life you know and as i'm i'm describing this i'm telling you this is this is kind of the realistic part of the sopranos tony's mother played a brilliant role you know she's like almost any italian grandmother you know they're ready to die any minute they're very very dramatic uh they want to be weighted on hand and foot uh even though they don't ask for it they want you to do it on their own uh and she was always a a she was always kind of a burden to tony tony's trying to get her to go into a uh uh not a nursing home into a senior living home uh because she really can't be alone you know she sets her house on fire one thing she drives into a a neighbor of hers or a friend of hers she shouldn't be alone but she's resisting it she's not going into a nursing home she misses her husband who was a saint she's always given tony a hard time you know she doesn't like carmela because carmela didn't cater to her you know all that stuff and believe me i witnessed all if you're italian you've probably witnessed this if you've been around a while especially the old school italians so in that regard you know this was great we do sue we see uh um chris do a hit you know he does kill somebody in the first episode i believe and um you know trying to make his bones trying to do something to become a made guy uh i don't think he did it with permission he got in trouble for it if i remember um and they do have a scene about that you know um but again episode one and two i thought were pretty realistic and really did set up the show and honestly there is a scene there i gotta mention that i thought was terrific and it's between tony and his wife carmela they're out eating and tony had not tell told carmela that he was seeing a psychiatrist she obviously knew he was having these panic attacks which he he was embarrassed to say panic attacks i'm a made guy i'm a boss how do i get that but uh he sits down with her and he says i have to tell you something and i'm going to be perfectly honest with you and she's like okay what is this about no you're going to tell me you're cheating on me something like that and he says to her if i remember i'm taking prozac and i'm seeing a psychiatrist and she thought that was the greatest thing in the world oh that's terrific tony it was funny how she reacted instead of you know really what's wrong how are you you know what's going on you know tell me it's your health she's the happiest person in the world that he's on prozac and he's getting some psychiatric help it was a it was a really scene like to say she's a strong woman in this you know a lot of people have this uh this image of mob wives just sitting there never mentioning anything to their husbands just you know closing their eyes to everything not so i mean my mother certainly wasn't like that she stood up to my dad in every which way possible carmella does the same with tony soprano she stands up to him you know in every which way and i think that was accurately depicted you know in this first episode and episode one and two actually so um again this whole thing this whole episode one and two set up the the uh dysfunction of a mob family and what a mob guy has to go through and boy i related a lot of that to myself because trying to hold my family together trying to hold my mob business together trying to keep my sanity trying to keep law enforcement off my back which again tony has to do there you know being you know tony was kind of a hot head you know i'm not going to say that you know i was a hot head but i had my moments you know when uh you know when things got to me and i think you keep it inside of you and then all of a sudden boom you erupt because all this stuff is there's a lot of tension in that life and it's there all the time and all the guys have to go through it there's no question about it so in these first two episodes i think it sets up the series the right way very intriguing pulls you in and brilliant acting brilliant writing and yes art imitating life very much in the first two seasons so that's it for today i'm going to continue but again love this series if you haven't seen it go on hbo go whatever it will draw you in you know every time i try to get out they pull me back it will draw you in you're going to love it and we will continue with the sopranos you have any questions comments about it things you want me to you know questions you want me to answer about the series whatever send them in and we'll uh we'll deal with them as we go along so that's it for today michaelfrances.com the community is growing you know we have i think well over 8 000 almost at nine thousand members and you people are getting so much out of it youtube keep subscribing we give you the alerts we got a lot of interviews set up hopefully for early next year when covet allows us to right now it's a problem by the way um one of uh mike tyson we were supposed to get together shortly but one of his close team members uh got sick and so that's put off just a little bit you know hopefully he's gonna be okay but that is uh on the schedule it's coming up soon so we got a lot of things planned so that's it for today again holiday season make the best of it you know do do what you got to do get into the spirit you know it comes only once every year and we move forward so how do i leave you always the same way be safe be healthy god bless you all and i'll see you next [Music] time [Music] you

Channel: Michael Franzese

Views: 1,830,493

Keywords: michael, franzese, michael franzese, mafia, mob, mobster, mob boss, mafia boss, capo, caporegime, colombo, colombo family, colombo mafia, gambino, bonanno, lucchese, genovese, al capone, john gotti, gotti, american mafia, italian mafia, prison, federal prison, prison gangs, fat tony, sonny franzese, mob monday, mob movie mondays, mob movie reviews, the sopranos, hbo series sopranos, tony soprano, movies, reviews, tony sirico, mafia movie scenes, mafia movie reviews, mob movie reactions

Id: fhPYspXowx4

Length: 16min 26sec (986 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 14 2020