How Much Was The Actor Worth When He Died?

According to Celebrity Net Worth, James Gandolfini was worth a whopping $70 million at the time of his death in 2013. And it's safe to say most of his money came from his salary on "The Sopranos." It's wild to think about when you consider the star's early life. "I grew up 20 minutes away from where my character on The Sopranos' lives," he told Wild About Movies.

Although his salary in the show's early days remains unknown, what is known is that by Season 4, he was pulling in $400,000 per episode, or $5 million per season, according to CNN. By the time the show's sixth and final season came around, Gandolfini was pulling in $1 million per episode, which came after a long battle with HBO. And that wasn't the first time HBO paid big. Michael Imperioli (who played Christopher Moltisanti on the show) claimed to the "Talking Sopranos" podcast that HBO supposedly paid Gandolfini $3 million not to take Steve Carrell's spot on "The Office" when he left in 2011. 

Before "The Sopranos," Gandolfini was a working actor but not a very well-known one. And it's safe to say he wasn't expecting the role of a lifetime to come his way. "I thought that they would hire some good-looking guy, not George Clooney, but some Italian George Clooney, and that would be that," he joked to Vanity Fair. Of course, fate had a different plan.

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