Word: chasing
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...Sopranos' debut date also launches the show into the publicity wake of the bout of national scab-ripping that is the Sept. 11 anniversary. Ironically, Chase has told the story of how, when he shopped around The Sopranos to the networks in the '90s, executives would ask if Tony could do an occasional good deed--like, one suggested, help the FBI catch a terrorist. And after Sept. 11, the question arose whether the terrorists might have done in Tony Soprano--whether Americans were now less willing to accept dark dramas about morally suspect characters...
...worrier by nature," Chase says, "so I did begin to think that. But then I began to read articles about 'the death of irony' and how [the new climate] is going to require more family films, people are going to want less complexity, people are going to want more simpleminded, escapist fare. Like that's any different than before Sept. 11!" Says Gandolfini: "9/11, I hope it's changed us. If we haven't learned something from it, that's the real f______ tragedy. But I can only do my job. If [the show] is not relevant...
...fact, it's more relevant than ever. The new episodes have a few World Trade Center references, and Chase cut the Twin Towers from the credits, where they used to be visible in the rearview mirror of Tony's car. But the disaster really echoes in more oblique ways, as when Carmela badgers Tony to start estate planning in case anything should "happen" to him. "Watch the f______ news," she says. "Everything comes...
...episodes are not perfect--a storyline about a Native American protest over Columbus Day is uncharacteristically heavy-handed in airing Italian-American and other ethnic grievances. But they are close enough. Chase says he already knows how he plans to end the series, and the looming fed investigation and conflicts with the New York Mafia point toward a climactic showdown. But even as the cordon tightens around Tony, the show's emotional range expands. For all its flashy violence, it has become a work of aching sadness and irony about people who can't say what they feel...
...Still, Chase and his stars are adamant about ending the show after next year's season 5 (though they leave open the possibility of Sopranos movies). There will be loose ends to tie up, and a producer who is willing to kill his baby won't hesitate to kill characters. "There are actors who don't know it," says Chase, grinning, "but because of the needs of the story, the Angel of Death hovered right over their heads and then moved on." Nobody is safe, because The Sopranos, bless its criminal heart, is not safe TV. --With reporting...