In the summer of 2010, LeBron James was perhaps the most wanted free agent in NBA history. His contract with the Cleveland Cavaliers had expired and virtually every NBA team wanted a piece of him.
The teams tried everything to get him to sign, but no plan was as unusual as the one the New York Knicks tried.
According to Shattered: Hope, Heartbreak and the New York Knicks, a recent podcast from The Athletic, the franchise hired James Gandolfini to reprise his role as Tony Soprano in a special video to try and lure James to New York.
The unreleased movie also featured Edie Falco, who reprized the role of Carmela Soprano for the video, and was shot in Gandolfini’s apartment in New York.
“We got those requests all the time back then and [James] Gandolfini, he didn’t do anything,” Falco said on the podcast. “And somehow, he accepted this, that he shocked me. I thought it was a joke when someone said he would do it.”