Dominic & Junior podcast review: Family business
Dominic & Junior takes Sopranos’ fans back to the mean streets of New Jersey for a walk down memory lane. But there’s more than mob-adjacent nostalgia at play in this warm and reflective podcast, says Paul Dale
So, you rewatched The Sopranos twice during lockdown? You’ve studied and dissected its 2021 movie prequel The Many Saints Of Newark and HBO’s excellent two-part David Chase documentary. You’ve even had a go at every recipe in The Sopranos Family Cookbook. And still there’s a cultural void in your life that can only be filled by affiliated Italian-American chit-chat. Thank the lord of ageing men then for the Dominic & Junior podcast. That’s 95-year-old Dominic Chianese (or Corrado ‘Junior’ Soprano aka Uncle Junior) and his ‘in real life’ 62-year-old son Dominic Junior (who appeared in three episodes of The Sopranos’ sixth and final season as the somewhat uninspired character name of Dominic).
The format here is simple: father and son shoot the breeze about Chianese Sr’s career as a musician (he’s an accomplished singer and acoustic guitarist) and actor (lest we forget he was also Johnny Ola in The Godfather Part II), as well as their collective life, work and mutual admiration. Then they are joined by an old friend from the neighbourhood. Distinguished guests in the first series include E Street Band icon Steven Van Zandt (Silvio Dante), John Ventimiglia and Katherine Narducci (Artie and Charmaine Bucco), and Federico Castelluccio (Carmela’s fantasy lover Furio).
They even step outside The Sopranos’ alma mater bubble to speak with legendary actor, writer, director and producer Chazz Palminteri (The Usual Suspects, Bullets Over Broadway, Modern Family) to talk about being offered the role of Tony Soprano (he turned it down for artistic and health reasons) and his relief and lack of regret about that decision. The themes of James Gandolfini’s genius and the seminal imperative of his casting as Tony are a constant (but also sometimes a given) here.
It’s not all machismo and wilting nostalgia, however, with one episode featuring Aida Turturro aka television’s greatest sibling narcissist Janice Soprano. This rare treat has Chianese and Turturro waxing lyrical about the complexities of playing divisive, landmark characters that come around for an actor once in a lifetime. Contradictions, humour and fragility were the mix that made both their characters work and here they attempt to deconstruct and honour this through the lens of time.
These wiseguys (and gals) are clearly having a ball and that carries weight in any podcast. Too old to care but too young to forget, they respectfully dig down into their memories of working with Chase and Gandolfini, father and son cultural legacies and, of course, the genre specifics of the iconic series that touched all their lives. Chianese is also old and astute enough to recall Hollywood in its heyday and make those cinematic and musical connections from west to east coast and into the heart of that beloved HBO series. The result is something autumnal-warm, mature and reflective. In a field dominated by youthful inquiry, this is an attempt to celebrate the dying of the light.
Episodes of Dominic & Junior are available wherever you get your fictional mob-based listening; The Sopranos can be streamed on HBO Max.