A lot of new information about The Sopranos has come to light this year thanks to James Andrew Miller’s new book, Tinderbox: HBO’s Ruthless Pursuit of New Frontiers. Published in November, the book traces HBO’s transformation of cable television, revealing plenty of juicy, behind-the-scenes details from some of the network’s most groundbreaking shows — like the Tony Soprano gas station masturbation scene James Gandolfini did not want us to see.
Apparently Gandolfini wasn’t the only one who took issue with the show’s raunchier moments, with a new detail from the book revealing the entire cast was once kicked out of a “conservative Italian funeral home” where they were filming a scene for season one, all because of a line about blow jobs.
Producer Ilene Landress recounted the story to Miller, revealing the cast was unceremoniously dismissed from the Manhattan funeral home thanks to some off-color dialogue in which Uncle Junior pays his respects to the deceased by waxing nostalgic about his first blow job.
“We were shooting a funeral scene and the scene was a little lady in the coffin and Uncle Junior turns to somebody in the receiving line, glances into the coffin and says, ‘She gave me my first blowjob,’” Landress recalls in the book.
According to Landress, she knew trouble was afoot as soon as she arrived on set. “I walk across Sixth Avenue, and I see our trucks in front of this little old conservative Italian funeral home where we were shooting,” she told Miller. “Then people start walking out, and the location manager running toward me.”
Long story short, “We got kicked out of the place,” Landress revealed in the book.
While the proprietors of the funeral home may not have been amused, Landress maintained a sense of humor.”You could totally panic or you could see the humor in the whole thing,” she said. “I called HBO and told them, ‘I guess we’re done for the day.’”
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