A young Robert Iler had Tony Sirico looking after him while co-starring in the hit Noughties drama The Sopranos.
Sirico, who played mobster Paulie “Walnuts” in the HBO series, died aged 79 last week at an assisted living facility in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
In a recent episode of The Sopranos podcast Pod Yourself a Gun, hosted by comedians Matt Lieb and Vince Mancini, Iler, who played AJ Soprano, spoke about the way Sirico protected him as a young actor in Hollywood.
Iler, who was around 14 years old when he started playing the son of Tony (James Gandolfini) and Carmela (Edie Falco), told the podcast hosts: “When all the molesting stuff gets talked about… people always say to me, ‘Did anything happen like that on your set?’
“And I’m like, you think Tony Sirico was standing around, if there were people eyeing me the wrong way, like ‘Oh, Rob looks really cute today,’ Tony Sirico is just gonna stand there and not do anything?”
Iler continued to say that early on in shooting, Sirico pulled him to one side and told him: “Hey, uh, if anyone ever… bothers you, or anybody says anything, you tell Uncle Tony, okay?”
The actor said that this sense of protection extended to school, where he thought: “Oh, this kid thinks he’s gonna mouth off to me? I’ll have Tony Sirico come down.’”
He added: “No matter how old you are, you see somebody that has like black hair here, and silver hair on the sides – and just the way he always had a handkerchief in his pocket – you go like, this dude will f*** you up.”
Following Sirico’s death, tributes poured in for the beloved actor.
Christopher Moltisanti actor Michael Imperioli wrote on social media: “I will miss him forever.”
A day before Sirico’s funeral, an incredible floral arrangement was on display at Sirico’s wake. The message, “The Sopranos. Whaddya Hear, whaddya say?” was written in red and white flowers.
