Adriana’s death scene unfolds after Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) calls her to tell her that his right-hand man Silvio will pick her up and take her to the hospital to see her boyfriend, Christopher Moltisanti. A fake-out happens when the episode cuts to Adriana driving alone towards Baltimore, implying she’s running away because she knows what her fate will be if she’s discovered to be an FBI informant. That’s all in Adriana’s head, as the scene reveals she’s already in the car with Silvio and being taken to the woods to be murdered.
The entire sequence is filled with tension over whether or not Adriana will be murdered, but de Matteo revealed there was a scene shot for the episode that more directly told the viewer that her character was being handled. The actress didn’t want her inevitable death to be so blatantly telegraphed, so she fought to remove the scene. “There was a scene shot for that episode where Christopher is hysterically crying and tells Tony everything and Tony says, ‘I’ll handle it,’” de Matteo said. “I went to the writers and said that you can’t air it because then everyone will know that Adriana is walking into her own death. We needed her to go out with a bang, and we owe her that much. Stevie backed me, but I’m not sure about Michael [Imperioli]. And they took out the scene because they realized it was a better way to keep people on the edge of their seats and used the scene as a flashback in the next season.” Adriana’s death went down as one of the most iconic “Sopranos” moments. All episodes of the show are now streaming on HBO Max. Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here.
