by Marc DiPaolo

"There's nothing extraordinary about American gangsters," protested [James] Bond. "They're not Americans. Mostly a lot of Italian bums with monogrammed shirts who spend the day eating spaghetti and meat-balls and squirting scent over themselves.... greaseballs who filled themselves up with pizza pie and beer all week and on Saturdays knocked off a garage or drug store so as to pay their way at the races." - Ian Fleming, Diamonds are Forever (1956)

As David Chase's landmark HBO television series The Sopranos came to an end, select television critics proclaimed it "the greatest TV show of all time," columnist Peggy Noonan called it "a masterpiece," and – despite some dissatisfaction with the open-ended finale – there was great public mourning over the passing of the gritty crime soap opera. However, a solid contingent of Italian-Americans were just as glad to see yet one more mass-media portrayal of their people as degenerate Mafia killers fade into memory.

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Source: http://sequart.org/