Throughout his tenure on “The Sopranos,” Gandolfini won 3 Emmy Awards and 1 Golden Globe as mob boss Tony Soprano.

Sopranos showrunner addresses reports about James Gandolfini ‘going missing’ from set: ‘He never refused to do anything’

Throughout his tenure on "The Sopranos," Gandolfini won 3 Emmy Awards and 1 Golden Globe as mob boss Tony Soprano.

By Marina Watts

Marina Watts

Marina Watts is a news writer for with seven years experience covering entertainment, pop culture and celebrity news. Her previous work appears in PEOPLE, Bustle and Newsweek.

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March 30, 2026 11:17 a.m. ET

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James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano. Credit:

Anthony Neste/Getty

- *Sopranos *showrunner David Chase addressed rumors surrounding James Gandolfini's occasional absence from the set.

- While he acknowledged he would sometimes go MIA, he clarified that Gandolfini "never refused to do anything."

- Chase went on to compare The Sopranos set to *Northern Exposure*.

Despite having his own process, James Gandolfini was a team player on the set of *The Sopranos*.

In an interview with *The Guardian** *published on March 27, *Sopranos *creator David Chase spoke about working with the late actor, who died in 2013 at 51. When asked about recent reports that Gandolfini would go missing for days from set while portraying the complex Tony Soprano, Chase shared his perspective.

“Well, fortunately, I wasn’t the one who dealt with him going missing,” he said. “That was Ilene Landress, our line manager. She was the one who found out where he was and did everything that needed to be done.”**

“I mean, he asked to meet me a couple of times, once on the banks of the Hudson River when he didn’t want to go to work, and he was so unhappy," Chase, who was so close to Gandolfini that he delivered the actor's euology, continued. "This happened three or four times, and we talked and talked and talked, but I was never the one who had to find out where he was.”

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Chase then put to rest any rumors that though Gandolfini would need space from his onscreen persona, his absence was never because of a lack of enthusiasm: “He never refused to do anything. He never said, ‘I’m gonna go wait in my trailer, and when you’re ready to shoot it the way I want it, come get me.’ That never happened.”**

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Chase compared his experience with Gandolfini to working on the 1990s era drama *Northern Exposure*, recalling two trailers in the set's parking lot that needed to be exactly the same distance from set.

"The first assistant director was out there with a long tape measure, measuring the distance from one trailer to the front door and then the other trailer to the front door, because neither one of the two stars wanted to have a longer walk than the other. Now that wasn’t a happy set.”

Throughout his tenure on *The Sopranos*, Gandolfini won 3 Emmy Awards and 1 Golden Globe. *The Sopranos* meanwhile took home 21 Emmy Awards and 5 Golden Globes. The series is widely considered one of the best shows on television.

Chase has been open about his working relationship with Gandolfini. In the 2025 book *Gandolfini: Jim, Tony, and the Life of a Legend*, Chase recalled the casting process and his initial reservations about casting Gandolfini.**

James Gandolfini and David Chase.

"Here’s the deal,” Chase told Nancy Sanders, Gandolfini's manager, according to the book. “I think he’s brilliant. I have one concern, and that is, is he threatening enough?"

"If you said to me, ‘He’s a little chubby,’ or ‘He’s losing his hair,’ I could understand," she told Chase. "But he’s threatening enough. This is your guy.” And Sanders was right.

*The Sopranos *is available to stream on HBO MAX.

Original Article on Source

Source: “EW TV”