It’s safe to say that if The Sopranos wasn’t made in 1999, the television landscape would look very different today. With its dark themes, cinematic visuals, and morally gray antiheroes, The Sopranos singlehandedly kicked off the Golden Age of Television. Without The Sopranos, we wouldn’t have gotten The Wire or The Shield or Mad Men or Breaking Bad. It’s just as unfathomable to picture the TV landscape without The Sopranos as it is to imagine the music world without the Beatles.

But if The Sopranos didn’t get made in 1999, and David Chase didn’t create the series until 2026, who would be cast? Could anyone other than James Gandolfini do justice to the role of Tony Soprano?

Jon Bernthal As Tony Soprano

When David Chase made the Sopranos prequel movie, The Many Saints of Newark, he cast James Gandolfini’s own son, Michael Gandolfini, to play young Tony, and he did a terrific job. The younger Gandolfini is a wonderful actor in his own right, and a chip of the old block. He has his dad’s unmistakable, inimitable charm. But he’s still a little young to play Tony as a disillusioned family man. Instead, I’d cast Jon Bernthal.

Much in the way that Jason Statham is the Charles Bronson of our time, Bernthal is the Robert De Niro of our time. Like De Niro, he plays these tough roles with an icy exterior, and explores the fragile, vulnerable human being underneath that badass facade. Whether he’s playing Mikey Berzatto or Frank Castle, Bernthal always brings a deep humanity to these violent, rough-and-tumble guys. Bernthal played Tony’s dad in The Many Saints of Newark, but he’s also one of the few actors who could do justice to the role of Tony himself.

Lady Gaga As Carmela

Between A Star is Born and House of Gucci and even the controversial Joker sequel, Lady Gaga has proven herself to be a pretty incredible dramatic actor. She’s got a ton of range — she can be funny, she can be earnest, she can be angry — and that range makes her the perfect choice to play Tony’s wife Carmela.

Edie Falco brought a real fragility to Carm, but also a fierce inner strength, and I think Gaga could recapture that. She’d nail the subtlety of Carmela’s suspicions about Tony’s infidelity and her temptations from other men, but she’d also nail the righteous fury and the screaming matches.

Jeremy Allen White As Christopher Moltisanti

Image via Hulu

As long as we’re casting Jon Bernthal as Tony, we might as well facilitate a Berzatto family reunion and bring in Jeremy Allen White as Christopher. Bernthal and White only shared a few flashback scenes in The Bear, but it was enough to see that there’s real chemistry between them. Their scenes as Mikey and Carmy captured the same authentic familial bond that Tony and Chris share.

It’s not just about the reunion; White is one of the best actors of his generation in his own right. Much like Michael Imperioli, White is a very subtle actor, who can convey a lot of depth and pain and vulnerability while doing very little.

Skyler Gisondo As A.J.

Image via Max

Skyler Gisondo might have aged out of playing a teenager at this point, after playing hilarious teen roles in Booksmart and Vacation. But he has a very youthful look, so he might be able to get away with playing high schoolers for another decade or so (in between his appearances as Jimmy Olsen in the DCU).

A.J. needs to come off as a bit of a dork, and a normal kid. It helps to sell the juxtaposition of Tony’s violent line of work with his mundane, relatable family life. Gisondo would capture that perfectly opposite Bernthal’s Tony.

Ariana Grande As Meadow

Ariana Grande is much too big a star to play a recurring role; her agent probably wouldn’t even pick up the phone from HBO unless they were offering a lead role. But the writing of The Sopranos is so good that no actor could turn it down, and Grande would be perfect for Meadow.

We saw in the Wicked movies that Grande is capable of capturing a lot of depth and nuance and personality in a character. Meadow needs to be cool and pretty, but she also needs a fierce independence and more complicated feelings toward her dad than her brother has.

Stanley Tucci As Paulie Walnuts

It’s highly unlikely that an HBO crime drama in 2026 could afford to hire Stanley Tucci to play the comic relief. But having said that, I would love to see what he’d do with the role of Paulie Walnuts.

No one could replicate exactly what Tony Sirico did with the role; he brought so much of his own life and personality to that character. But it would be interesting to see Tucci’s own unique spin on the funniest member of Tony’s crew.

Bobby Cannavale As Silvio Dante

There’s not much to the role of Silvio Dante. In the original show, he wasn’t even played by an actor — he was played by a musician (Bruce Springsteen’s guitarist, Steven Van Zandt) — so it’s hardly a challenging role. Most of Tony’s colleagues have some inner humanity, but Sil seems to just be a cold-blooded badass.

Pretty much all Sil does is scowl, in an almost cartoonish manner. Bobby Cannavale is above taking a role this small, but we’ve seen him nail that grimace in other roles (like when he played a clown in Modern Family).

Joe Lo Truglio As Artie Bucco

Artie Bucco is a hilarious contrast with most of the other men in the cast. Artie is Tony’s childhood friend, so he gets a lot more slack and respect and benefit of the doubt than he ordinarily would from these hard-as-nails gangsters. But even then, Artie is constantly pushing his luck and getting himself into trouble.

Joe Lo Truglio would be hilarious in this role. He’s best known as Charles Boyle now, but he played that Artie archetype perfectly in Superbad. He’d be a terrific comic foil as the outsider who wants to be considered one of the guys.

Marisa Tomei As Dr. Melfi

Lorraine Bracco brought something really special to the role of Dr. Melfi. Her on-screen chemistry with Gandolfini was unparalleled, and she did a great job of showing all the emotions that Dr. Melfi was struggling to hide in her sessions with Tony. Dr. Melfi has to represent Tony’s entire relationship to women; not only does she have to reflect his wife and his mother and every other woman in his life, but she needs to have an undeniable, electrifying charm that enraptures Tony from the second he walks into her office.

Who better to play that part than Marisa Tomei? Tomei is one of the most charming actors in the world; she has that magnetic Italian charisma that would drive Tony wild, but she also has the chops to earn an Oscar for a really broad comedy.

Larry David As Uncle Junior

In a classic episode of The Sopranos, Uncle Junior stumbles across an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm and mistakenly thinks that Larry David and Jeff Garlin are him and Bobby on TV. The resemblance between Junior and Larry David is uncanny, and they have a similar curmudgeonly personality, too.

David might give a more overtly comedic turn as Junior than Dominic Chianese, but Junior was always one of the funniest characters in The Sopranos. It would be hilarious to see David in the role of that cranky, confused mobster.

The Sopranos

10/10

Release Date

1999 – 2007

Network

HBO

Showrunner

David Chase

Directors

Tim Van Patten, John Patterson, Alan Taylor, Jack Bender, Steve Buscemi, Daniel Attias, David Chase, Andy Wolk, Danny Leiner, David Nutter, James Hayman, Lee Tamahori, Lorraine Senna, Matthew Penn, Mike Figgis, Nick Gomez, Peter Bogdanovich, Phil Abraham, Rodrigo García

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  James Gandolfini

  Tony Soprano

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