James Gandolfini Dead at 51

Thursday, 20 June 2013 | by Pat's Picks

Actor James Gandolfini suffered a heart attack while in Italy yesterday and died at the age of 51. The Newark Star-Ledger says the news hit fans “as abruptly — as shockingly, as this-can’t-be-happening — as those famous, final few minutes of ‘The Sopranos.’” Gandolfini is described as a “homegrown Jersey guy” but not a wiseguy—he was actually a “shy man with a gentle voice.” who developed Tony Soprano’s fuhgeddaboutit voice with help from a dialect coach.

The New York Post’s Lou Lumenick says one of Gandolfini’s talents was that he could express “exasperation, amusement, puzzlement or murderous rage, or sometimes all three — with a single glance.”