'Tis the season for celebrity tell-all books. “The Sopranos” actors, Michael Imperioli and Steve Schirripa, have jumped into the fray with their oral history, Woke Up This Morning.
Katie Couric, Kal Penn, Will Smith, and Dave Grohl all have new revelation-filled books out, but unlike those career-spanning memoirs, Woke Up This Morning is solely focused on the beloved HBO crime family classic, though it offers its own litany of surprises.
In one, Imperioli and Schirripa -- Christopher Moltisanti and Bobby "Baccala" Baccalieri, respectively, on the show -- tell a creepy tale involving James Gandolfini that inspired an iconic line from the series.
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Apparently, as Insider reports, the late Gandolfini, who of course played the lead, Tony Soprano, got an unsettling late night phone call.
"The story goes like this,” Imperioli remembers, “Gandolfini got a call in the middle of the night on his cell phone, it was an unknown number. He answers the phone, 'Hello,' and the guy on the other line says, 'Hello,' and then nobody's talking."
Imperioli goes on, "The guy doesn't identify himself. Guy finally says, 'Listen, you're a great actor, we like what you're doing, but you got to know one thing: 'A don never wears shorts.' And click, the guy hung up."
"I think Jim was disturbed by it. Who knows who made the call -- but the invasion of privacy is definitely disturbing," Imperioli said.
Though Gandolfini was shaken by the call, the line made its way into the script, with a fellow mob boss admonishing his character for wearing casual clothes at a backyard barbecue.
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No word if Motley Crue’s Nikki Sixx’ upcoming children’s book will offer any such celebrity revelations.
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