Like the Deadwood movie, the Sopranos prequel seems like one of those crazy ideas that will never happen, even as little bits of progress are made on it. However, also like the Deadwood movie, it seems like it’s really going to happen at some point, with Variety reporting that New Line and series creator David Chase are in negotiations with Alessandro Nivola to star in the movie as Dickie Moltisanti, the father of Michael Imperioli’s Christopher Moltisanti, who is dead at the time of the original series. The older Moltisanti was occasionally mentioned on the show but never seen, and he had regular dealings with the central families of the Sopranos saga while he was alive, so he’s really the perfect character to base a prequel around.