David Chase on His 'Sopranos' Sequel: 'I Wouldn't Have Taken the Job If I Knew It Was Going to Be a Day-and-Date Release'
'Sopranos' creator, whose 'The Many Saints of Newark' Debuts next month on HBO Max and in theaters, becomes the latest top-level creative to push back on WarnerMedia's pandemic-led distribution strategy
Deadline's just published Q&A with David Chase, coming ahead of the HBO Max day-and-date Oct. 1 release of his highly anticipated Sopranos prequel The Many Saints of Newark, is like a night out at the ol' Bada-Bing, with an 8-ball, a bottle of good Scotch, a couple of Cubans and a straight flush to boot for we fanboys of the venerable HBO drama.
So we'll just link to it and send you there ... but we will aggregate the portion in which Chase joins Christopher Nolan and other WarnerMedia creative partners in pushing back on the media company's decision to release its 2021 slate day-and-date on HBO Max and in theaters.
As the late James Gandolfini, playing his most iconic role, mob boss Tony Soprano, might tell WarnerMedia, "David's got some news you're not gonna like..."
"I don’t think, frankly that I would’ve taken the job if I knew it was going to be a day-and-date release. I think it’s awful," Chase told Deadline.
And yeah, the 76-year-old New Jersey native with the crazy mom is, well, pissed. How angry?
"Extremely angry, and I still am," Chase added. "I mean, I don’t know how much you go into this, you know, like…okay. If I was…one of those guys, if one of those executives was sitting here, and I was to start pissing and moaning about it, they’d say, you know, there’s 17 other movies that have the same problem. What could we do? COVID! Well, I know, but those 16 other movies didn’t start out as a television show. They don’t have to shed that television image before you get people to the theater. But we do. And that’s where we’re at. People should go see it in a theater. It was designed to be a movie. It was…it’s beautiful as a movie. I never thought that it would be back on HBO. Never."
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Daniel Frankel is the managing editor of Next TV, an internet publishing vertical focused on the business of video streaming. A Los Angeles-based writer and editor who has covered the media and technology industries for more than two decades, Daniel has worked on staff for publications including E! Online, Electronic Media, Mediaweek, Variety, paidContent and GigaOm. You can start living a healthier life with greater wealth and prosperity by following Daniel on Twitter today!