Michael Gandolfini is taking on his father’s iconic role of Tony Soprano in an upcoming prequel.
The 22-year-old actor will play a younger version of the HBO crime boss in “The Many Saints of Newark,” a feature film that is going to be distributed on the cable network’s HBO Max streaming service in October.
The highly anticipated movie comes roughly 14 years after “The Sopranos” series finale, which featured six-time Emmy winner James Gandolfini in the leading role, according to Page Six.
‘SOPRANOS’ PREQUEL ‘MANY SAINTS OF NEWARK’ DROPS FIRST TRAILER
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To prepare for the audition, he watched the first season of “The Sopranos” and recorded four hours of his father’s monologues.
“It was really hard to watch my dad,” he told the magazine.
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After three months, Michael was offered the role. Tony Soprano’s origin story is being directed by Alan Taylor, who has worked on “Game of Thrones” and “Thor: The Dark World.”