'Sopranos' Creator: Finale Not Setup For Movie
Chase Says He's Not Preparing For Movie
NEWARK, N.J. -- "Sopranos" creator David Chase said he doesn't plan on following up the now-concluded HBO series with a movie, but "never say never."
Chase, 61, told The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., that he thinks he has "kind of said it and done it" with Sunday's finale. Chase left for France last weekend so that he could avoid "all the Monday morning quarterbacking" about the show's finale.
Chase said he'll leave it to fans to interpret the show's last scene for themselves. It featured members of the Soprano family munching onion rings in a diner as Journey's "Don't Stop Believin"' plays. As the music and tension build, the screen suddenly cuts to black.
Chase said he doesn't intend to explain, defend, or add to what's there. And he said he wasn't messing with anyone.
"No one was trying to be audacious, honest to God," he adds. "We did what we thought we had to do. No one was trying to blow people's minds, or thinking, 'Wow, this'll (tick) them off.' People get the impression that you're trying to (mess) with them and it's not true. You're trying to entertain them."
"Anybody who wants to watch it, it's all there," said Chase.
As for talk of a movie, Chase said that was not his intention.
"I don't think about (a movie) much," he said. "I never say never. An idea could pop into my head where I would go, 'Wow, that would make a great movie,' but I doubt it.
"I'm not being coy," he added during his interview with The Star-Ledger. "If something appeared that really made a good 'Sopranos' movie and you could invest in it and everybody else wanted to do it, I would do it. But I think we've kind of said it and done it."
He also said it would be difficult to do a movie because he has killed so many key characters.
He also said that he is considering making other movies, rather than working in television.
"It's been the greatest career experience of my life," he said. "There's nothing more in TV that I could say or would want to say."
Fans Steamed
"Sopranos" fans are still steamed over the finale and some are threatening to cancel their HBO service in protest.
Message boards and chat rooms are jammed with fans who feel like they were duped when the series abruptly ended in the middle of the final scene with the screen going black and the sound cutting off.
Here are some of their comments:
"This finale was pathetic"
"It was the cruelest thing I've seen in my life."
It was a "cowardly cop-out"
"This might have been the worst ending to a show I've ever seen"
"I feel used!"
While in the minority, there were some who liked the ending. One fan wrote "It was awesome. So thought-provoking. Beautifully done."
'The Sopranos' Ratings
The ending of "The Sopranos" wasn't conclusive and neither are the ratings yet.
Nielsen Media Research didn't immediately have ratings information. But, early estimates show viewership at the four biggest broadcast networks was down in double-digit percentages compared to last year.
CBS said only 6.25 million people were watching its Tony Awards telecast Sunday night. That's down 17 percent from last year. That drop could have a lot to do with "The Sopranos."
HBO, by the way, said its Web site crashed shortly after "The Sopranos" finale from the huge number of people checking in and posting messages.
There were 364,000 page views a second at its peak. HBO said that's "just astronomical." It took a half-hour to get the Web site up again, and an hour for the bulletin boards to be back online.
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