Alessandro Nivola’s Breakthrough in The Many Saints of Newark

How was Tony Soprano “made?” That’s the through line for the long-awaited prequel to HBO’s Sopranos series, The Many Saints of Newark. At a stellar premiere this week at the Beacon Theater, Robert DeNiro, who knows a thing or two about mobsters, along with Tribeca Film Festival partner Jane Rosenthal—greeted a packed, masked house of the show’s creators, veteran actors, as well as devotees dressed to kill. As creator David Chase introduced the superb cast, much hooting and shouting, I love you, rang out--well, this was a celebration. With no room for this feature to tank—instead, it radiated excellence intertwining the Soprano’s trademark violence with values of the family kind.

Tony (a wonderful Michael Gandolfini trying on his late, great father’s shoes) is just a kid here, troubled but smart, a born leader, taking notes from a variety of paternal figures, especially his uncle Dickie Moltisanti played with psychotic charm and menace by Alessandro Nivola. You have never seen this actor this good, turning from lover to murderer on a proverbial dime. At the Tavern on the Green afterparty, Vera Farmiga, Tony’s mother Livia in the film, could not stop talking about Sandro, how she could not take her eyes off his every gesture. She, in turn, transformed to play the Soprano matriarch, brings the mob wives’ domineering submissiveness to new levels of humor and delight. John Magaro as Silvio Dante gets a big laugh as we see him walk that walk. Billy Magnusson as Paulie Walnuts frets over the blood stains on a new jacket as he tortures, making a mess using a drill. They almost got Corey Stoll as Uncle Junior to sing. With its sly humor and nod to the popular, game changing series, the movie creates its own universe—this is not Philip Roth’s Newark.

A first-rate origins myth, the film turns on a powerful father-son theme, connecting Dickie to his violent father dubbed “Hollywood” Dick (Ray Liotta). Let’s just say, the Freudian paradigm plays out, especially with Moltisanti’s new Italian bride (a beautiful Michela de Rossi). Trying to see himself as a good guy, Dickie seeks out his uncle, Ray Liotta again, in prison for murdering a “made” man. Creating a soulful bond with this jazz lover, Dickie gifts him some vinyl, Miles Davis’ “Birth of the Cool,” while Harold (Leslie Odom, Jr.), who once worked for him starts his own rival racketeering gang. While Newark burns in the background, a ring is passed to Tony, ready for the sequel to the prequel. Bada bing!