James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano in The Sopranos

James J. Gandolfini, Jr. (born September 18, 1961) is an Italian-American actor. He is best known for his role as Tony Soprano in the HBO TV series The Sopranos, about a troubled crime boss struggling to balance his family life and his career in the Mafia. Gandolfini's other roles include the woman-beating mob henchman Virgil in True Romance, enforcer/stuntman Bear in Get Shorty, Lt. General Miller in In the Loop, and the impulsive Wild Thing Carol in Where the Wild Things Are. In 2007, Gandolfini produced the HBO documentary "Alive Day Memories: Home from Iraq" in which he interviewed 10 injured veterans from the Iraq War.

He performed in a 1992 Broadway production of On the Waterfront for six months. One of his better known film roles is that of Virgil, a brutal woman-beating mob enforcer, in the 1993 romantic thriller True Romance. Gandolfini states in an "Inside the Actors Studio" interview that one of his major inspirations for the role of Virgil in True Romance was an old friend of his, who was a hitman.