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Kingfish, despot of the Delta

BARCLAY McBAIN

Huey Long had a great fall. All the self-styled Kingfish’s henchmen, fixers and doctors couldn’t put Huey together again. He was propelled into oblivion on September 10, 1935, two days after being mortally wounded by a crazed assassin in Baton Rouge, capital of the state, Louisiana, he ran as his personal fiefdom. A version of the American dream, albeit soiled by the corrupt way Long practised politics, died with the Kingfish that fateful day.
He was 42 and poised from his Louisiana power base (he was first governor then senator) to challenge President Franklin Delano Roosevelt for the Democratic nomination in the 1936 American presidential election. So confident was Long of becoming president in 1940 that he had a ghostwriter start work on a book entitled My First Days in the White House. Huey’s hubris was punctured by a .32 slug into the would-be contender’s stomach. “God, don’t let me die. I have so much to do,” were reputed to be his dying words.
Robert Penn Warren, the American writer and critic who was born 100 years ago this weekend, based his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel All the King’s Men (1946) on Long’s career. It is one of the finest political novels in modern literature and was made into a film, starring Broderick Crawford, which won the Academy Award for best motion picture in 1949.
More than 50 years on, Hollywood has returned to All the King’s Men for a remake of Warren’s classic. An all-star cast has been assembled under Steven Zaillian, who is directing his own screenplay. The new movie, which is due for general release early next year, is apparently more faithful to Warren’s novel than the first version in the sense that Jack Burden, the narrator, is the central character, as he is in the book. Jude Law plays Burden, a cynical newspaper reporter who cannot find meaning in his life so opts for refuge in the world of Willie Stark, Warren’s Huey Long. Sean Penn takes on the role of Stark, an idealistic politician whose lust for power corrupts him and those in the pull of his orbit. Kate Winslet plays Anne Stanton, the love of Burden’s life. Anthony Hopkins is Judge Irwin, an establishment power-broker whose past Burden is ordered by Stark to delve into, with tragic consequences. James Gandolfini has the role of Tiny Duffy, the most oleaginous of the many hangers-on in Stark’s debt.
Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 26th, 2005 | No comments »

‘Sopranos’ beau tells his side

By JOANNA MOLLOY

In the seven days days since the Daily News told the story of Lisa Regina’s harrowing breakup with “Sopranos” star Vincent Pastore, the actor has been biding his time.
Today, the 58-year-old star and his closest friends are determined to give their account of a relationship gone sour.
“If she picked up the phone and said, ‘Can we stop this?’ I would run down and put my arms around her and say, ‘I’ll marry you tomorrow,’” Pastore told The News exclusively.

“I still love her,” he said. “I didn’t throw her pictures away or anything.”

But his version of the events that led to his arrest on assault charges earlier this month following a confrontation on the streets of Little Italy are totally at odds with those from his former lover.

And his description of their relationship paints a completely different picture. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 24th, 2005 | No comments »

‘SOPRANOS’ BAD BOY IN NEW MESS

By PHILIP MESSING and ERIN CALABRESE

April 23, 2005 — Three years to the day after “Sopranos” bad boy Robert Iler copped a plea in a mugging case, the actor finds himself in a new imbroglio involving an assault on an Upper East Side woman, police sources said yesterday.
Iler is named in an NYPD report filed by a woman claming the 20-year-old and a pal beat her up Wednesday night at a party in a building at West 46th Street and Eighth Avenue, police sources said.

Bonnie Knaus, 41, allegedly flied the complaint early Thursday and claimed the assault left her with bruises and scrapes on her arms and legs.

Police sources said the woman admitted she could not remember the details of what happened.

Iler, who plays Tony Soprano’s son A.J., has not been charged with any crime.

The case got stranger last night when Knaus told The Post Iler did not beat her up.

Iler’s manager, Jeff Mitchell, said he had not heard of the complaint and could not comment.

The allegations against Iler come just two weeks after fellow “Sopranos” actor Vincent Pastore was accused of making like an onscreen leg-breaker and beating up his fiancée.

Pastore, who played mafioso “Big Pussy” on the show until his character got whacked at the end of the second season, allegedly beat up gal pal Lisa Regina in his car as they drove down a Little Italy street.

Posted by: uno on April 24th, 2005 | No comments »

Wiseguy flips sides

One of the worst things that can happen to an actor is to become enwrapped in the dreaded “t” word - “typecasting.” And one of the best things is to get that call from Dick Wolf uttering these blessed words, “Would you like to join the cast of ‘Law & Order?’”

Which is where we pick up the story of one Michael Imperioli, who joined New York television’s most celebrated show Wednesday for four episodes while cast regular Jesse L. Martin is on leave to film Revolution Studios’ big-screen adaptation of “Rent.”

What’s in a name?

In a career that effectively began in 1990, with his portrayal of Spider in “GoodFellas” - one of many Joe Pesci victims in the flick - Imperioli has since played characters named Johnny, Benny, Bobby, Giorgio, Fabrizio, Matty, Stuey and Vinny. Suffice it to say, a few were wiseguys, but it is the name Christopher (or “Christopha” as many of his “Sopranos” colleagues pronounce it) that will forever be stamped on this well-wrought resume. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 24th, 2005 | No comments »

The Sopranos with superpowers

By Aileen Torres

Comic strip writer Fred Van Lente is not interested in churning out the same old superhero schlock. Not that he doesn’t respect his elders-he admires Jack Kirby, the creator of such characters as The X-Men, the Incredible Hulk and Captain America-but Van Lente just doesn’t see the battle between good and evil as strictly Manichean.

In the fourth installment of “The Silencers,” a series he co-created with cartoonist Steve Ellis-”It’s sort of ‘Sopranos’ with superpowers,” said Van Lente. The main character, or, more precisely, antihero, the Cardinal, goes off on a tirade against the Tights, a group intended to represent traditional superheroes. The Cardinal, a long-time hired gun of the Provenzano Mafia of New York City who wishes to retire from the “business,” rails against the notion of evil existing as a monolithic force outside the individual. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 24th, 2005 | No comments »

Tracing a friendship

By Evan Henerson
Staff Writer

Nearly eight years ago, future “West Wing” star Allison Janney left a mark on Broadway’s 1997-98 season … and on her scene partner’s face.
During a performance of Arthur Miller’s “A View From the Bridge” at the Roundabout Theatre Company, Janney - in the role of Beatrice, the neglected wife of a longshoreman - got a little too intense with Anthony LaPaglia’s Eddie Carbone.

“On one particular night when we clashed on stage, my teeth went into his nose, and he just started bleeding,” Janney recalls. “I was looking at him, trying to do the text and also tell him he’s bleeding to death on stage. To this day, he still has a scar from my upper teeth. We’re really powerful together.”

LaPaglia and Janney - the former an Australian, the latter a Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts-trained Ohioan - and both with much experience treading the boards in New York - ended up with day jobs on the same Warner Bros. lot where “Without a Trace’s” stoic FBI bloodhound Jack Malone tracks down missing persons, and C.J. Cregg, “The West Wing’s” press-secretary-turned-chief-of-staff, has the president’s ear. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 24th, 2005 | No comments »

Guesswork, again, about ‘Sopranos’

Sunday, April 17, 2005

He’s part of the inner sanctum, but Michael Imperioli says he’s as clueless as you and I when it comes to that big, burning question: Will this definitely be the last season for “The Sopranos?”

“I don’t know. I’m hearing yes, I’m hearing no, I’m hearing yes again,” he says. “I have no idea, to be honest with you.”

Imperioli won’t believe anything until he gets the official word, straight from the mouth of “Sopranos” creator David Chase - who had, in fact, said that the sixth season would be the end. But then, Chase also said that about the fifth season, Imperioli notes.

The actor also has no idea - “not a one” - about the story lines for next season (which he’s heard will kick off in January or March of 2006). But he guesses that his Christopher Moltisanti character will be dealing with the repercussions of his fiancée’s getting whacked after she revealed to Christopher her reluctant role as an FBI informant. Before she took that fateful ride with Silvio, Adriana, played by Drea de Matteo, was brutally beaten and nearly strangled to death by Christopher - a wrenching sequence for character and actor. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 24th, 2005 | No comments »

‘The Sopranos’ set to resume production on April 29

Friday, April 15, 2005
By DANIEL FIENBERG
ZAP2IT.COM

Ask any true “Sopranos” fan and they’ll be able to tell you that the last episode of their favorite mob drama aired back on June 6, 2004. It’s a drought that hasn’t gotten any easier to bear as it approaches the one-year point.

Fortunately, relief is on the way. In a call with reporters this week, “Sopranos” co-star Michael Imperioli revealed that production on the show’s sixth season is set to begin April 29.

Before he returns to his Emmy-winning role as Christopher Moltisanti on the HBO drama, Imperioli is squeezing in a four-episode arc on NBC’s “Law & Order,” filling in for Jesse L. Martin as Nick Falco, a young detective partnered with Dennis Farina’s Joe Fontana. Imperioli’s first “L&O” appearance is scheduled for two days before lensing starts on “The Sopranos.”

Unfortunately for rabid “Sopranos” aficionados, Imperioli only knows what day he’ll be reporting for duty. He hasn’t seen a single script and he doesn’t know when new episodes will premiere, though he hazards a guess of either January or March of next year. All information about the fate of Johnny Sack or blowback from Adriana’s death remains locked in creator David Chase’s head, at least for the time being.

Imperioli says that while he’s looking forward to rejoining the cast, he’s never gotten antsy during the show’s extra-long hiatus.

“For me, the idea that we’re going back is enough security,” he notes. “It’s a luxury to have a sure thing in this business and have so much time in between to do other things. I knew it was coming back, so I knew I had time to do other stuff, like ‘Law & Order.”‘ Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 20th, 2005 | No comments »

A Quick Chat With A ‘Sopranos’ Star

So, the other day I was on a conference call with Michael Imperioli to talk about his upcoming four-episode stint on Law & Order as a by-the-book detective.

But since we all know Michael stars on The Sopranos as the hot-headed mobster Christopher, there were as many questions about HBO’s gritty mob drama as there were about Imperioli’s latest gig on TV’s wildly popular cop franchise.

You’ll be able to read about Michael’s thoughts on playing a guy on the right side of the law in the April 24 TV Post. For now, however, I thought I’d fill ya in on the latest on The Sopranos.

Like the rest of us, Mike says he doesn’t know much. Shooting is scheduled to begin April 29. But don’t look for Tony & Co. until early next year, probably March. But Mike has no idea if the sixth season will be the show’s last.

“The last time I saw (creator) David (Chase), he was on the fence,” Mike said. “Until I hear it out of his mouth as an official statement, I don’t know. I’m sure when we go back to work we’ll have an answer by then.” Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: uno on April 19th, 2005 | No comments »

Sopranos hope of ‘05 season whacked

Fri, April 15, 2005
By Bill Brioux, Toronto Sun

More news ‘n’ notes from the wacky world of television. YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT: People wanna know — will we ever get new episodes of The Sopranos? The last one aired on June 6, 2004. The HBO drama doesn’t even resume production on the sixth and final season (10 to 13 new episodes) until the end of this month. Now comes word those episodes may not debut until April, 2006 — a year from now.

Posted by: uno on April 19th, 2005 | No comments »

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