Chase has worked in television for over 30 years; he’s produced and written for such shows as “The Rockford Files”, “I’ll Fly Away”, and “Northern Exposure”. He’s created two original show; the first, “Almost Grown”, aired for 10 episodes in 1988 and 1989. Chase is famous for his second first show, the incredibly powerful and critically acclaimed HBO drama “The Sopranos”, which aired for six seasons between 1999 and 2007. A leading figure in American television, Chase has won seven Emmy Awards.
After The Rockford Files run stopped the exact same year, Chase worked in numerous television occupations until he wound up in charge of Northern Exposure in 1993. Chase worked in relative anonymity before The Sopranos debuted. In a recently available interview Chase said he experienced discouragement to get an extended span with being not able to break from the TV genre and into movie over now. In 2000, David Chase was the receiver of the Austin Film Festival’s Excellent Television Writer Award. In 2005, Chase received a Specific Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for his whole body of work. He participated as arranger of On the Record musical. His first initial created show was Almost Grown in 1988, with Eve Gordon and Timothy Daly. Although the one-hour show was well received by critics, just 10 episodes aired from November 1988 to February 1989. Thirty episodes of The Sopranos are expressly credited to Chase. Yet, as the show’s originator, show runner and head writer he’d a leading part in all the scripts, including creating and touching up each script’s final draft. He also directed the pilot episode as well as the series finale (both of which he also composed). Of the contentious closing scene of the series finale, Chase said, “I’ve no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting, or adding from what is there.”
Screenwriter, Television producer, Television Director, Drummer, Actor, Writer
Education
Stanford University, New York University, Wake Forest University
Nationality
United States of America
Spouse
Denise Kelly
Children
Michele DeCesare
Nicknames
David DeCesare , David Henry DeCesare , Master Cylinder
Awards
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series
Nominations
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series, Writers Guild of America Award for Television: Episodic Drama, Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album, Edgar Award for Best Television Episode Teleplay, TCA Award for Individual Achievement in Drama
Movies
Not Fade Away, The Rockford Files: Punishment and Crime, Off The Minnesota Strip
[on the final scene of The Sopranos (1999)] He [Tony Soprano] can never be sure that any enemy is completely gone. He always has to have eyes behind his head. He stood more of a chance of getting shot by a rival gang . . . than you or I do because he put himself in that situation. All I know is the end is coming for all of us. That's what I wanted people to believe. That life ends and death comes, but don't stop believing.
2
Network television at that time was nothing but a world of certainties. The Sopranos (1999) was ambiguous to the point where, to this day, I'm not really sure whether it was a drama or a comedy. It can be both, but people like to reduce it to one or the other. I know there are the two masks, Comedy and Drama, hanging together, but that's not the way American audiences seem to break things down.
3
[on James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano] His eyes are very expressive. There's something about him that's very caring, which you see in him no matter what he's doing. There's a sadness there. As cynical, bullying, vulgar and overbearing as he could be, there's still a little boy in there. He did a lot of mean things, and he enjoyed vengeance, but he didn't seem mean. Somewhere he believed that people are good. There were some roads he was not going to go down, because there was no coming back.
4
[on having to eliminate certain characters during The Sopranos (1999) run] I'd call them into my office and tell them how grateful I was for all the work they'd done, and that this was very painful for the show but that the story had to be served. and this is where the story has taken us--rightly or wrongly--for myself and the other writers. And that the writers had thought about it a lot. We didn't do this easily or cheaply. We never fired anyone for dereliction of duty or for being difficult. It was a hard thing to do, but at the same time, I thought to myself, "Well, I'm writing about a guy who's the boss of a Mafia family, and he has to do these things, too".
5
I was picturing Anne Bancroft as Livia, Tony's mother. We must have read 200 women or more. Then somebody suggested Nancy Marchand. She came up the stairs; she was very out of breath. She sat down and did it, and she was channeling--that character is based on my mother, her mannerisms--she was channeling it. She just got it. The other people were playing this Italian mama who was crazy. She was playing some person who's only hearing what's going on in her head--that was the key.
6
[on the conception of The Sopranos (1999)] When I got over there, they asked, "Would you be interested in doing The Godfather (1972) for TV?" I said, "No, it's already been done". But then I started thinking about this idea that I'd had for a feature film, about a mobster in therapy. I told them about it, they sparked to it, and Fox bought it. When I wrote the pilot script for Fox, I had a feeling that this whole thing wasn't going to happen. I knew what network television is like, and this didn't have that feeling. Sure enough, they passed.
7
It's a cold universe, and I don't mean that metaphorically. If you go out into space, it's cold. It's really cold and we don't know what's up there. We happen to be in this little pocket where there's a sun. What have we got except love and each other to guard against all that isolation and loneliness?
8
I wrote many, many, many a script and they never got made. I could not get arrested, as they say. Nothing started to click movie-wise for me. All the scripts were either too dark or too this or that. Their appetite for me didn't get whetted until The Sopranos (1999), and once they see you are someone who can make a billion dollars, they let you do anything. That's all it comes down to.
9
I guess Tony Soprano has his roots in film noir, but the American gangster picture goes back a lot further than that. But in those films there was a moral accounting. In The Sopranos (1999) there is not. I guess what's essential about it is you are still portraying a hero. In American film, the hero is always the smartest guy in the room, he's always got the answer or the plan. We don't make movies about stumble-bums and slackers or lost souls.
10
[on a perceived change in the traditional view of men as heroes] There are people that will tell you the white American male is clinging to, and nostalgic for, his place at the top of the food chain. Maybe it isn't true anymore and that's what we're seeing.
11
Network dramas have not been personal. I don't know very many writers who have been cops, doctors, judges, presidents, or any of that--and, yet, that's what everybody writes about: institutions. The courthouse, the schoolhouse, the precinct house, the White House. Even though it's a Mob show, The Sopranos (1999) is based on members of my family. It's about as personal as you can get.
12
It wasn't something I was really dying to hear, because my response in my head was: I don't give a fuck - I hate television. But I wasn't used to being talked to that way. - on his reaction to Brad Grey's desire to sign him to a television deal.
13
I felt I was out of step with everything. I remember seeing Pretty Woman (1990) on an airplane. Everybody was laughing their heads off. "Ho-ho-ho!" It wasn't funny to me, it wasn't dramatic--it wasn't anything. I thought, "Why don't I just open the door and jump out?"
14
Network television is all talk. I think there should be visuals on a show, some sense of mystery to it, connections that don't add up. I think there should be dreams and music and dead air and stuff that goes nowhere. There should be, God forgive me, a little bit of poetry.
#
Fact
1
Livia Soprano's frequently used line "Oh poor You" was something Chase's mother used to say.
2
Based Tony Soprano's experience in psychotherapy for depression and anxiety on his own.
3
Chase named the 'College" episode of _ "The Sopranos (1999)_ as his favorite because of its "self-contained nature". Co-stars James Gandolfini and Jamie-Lynn Sigler agreed it was perhaps their favorite episode as well.
4
Has suffered from severe depression and panic attacks since his teens. His depression was so severe in his first year of college that he often slept for 18 hours a day.
5
He originally wanted to be a professional musician.
6
The character of Livia Soprano is based on his own mother, Norma.
7
Attended Wake Forest University in the mid-'60s. A few of The Sopranos (1999) episodes included references to both Wake Forest's basketball team as well as its location, Winston-Salem, NC.
$80 Million
