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The Sopranos may be over, but not for Michael Imperioli and Steve Schirripa.
In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE partnering with Sanpellegrino, the Sopranos stars speak about their latest collaboration — and how it sometimes reflects real-life experiences.
“Well, the chance for Steve and I to work together is always an opportunity we like to take. We’ve done a lot of things together, besides The Sopranos. We’ve done some movies together, we did the podcast,” Imperioli, 59, explains.
“We like the idea of us being these ambassadors from this lovely product from Italy that we can share with our Italian-American and not Italian-American friends here in the U.S.”
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In the clip for CIAO!, the beverage brand’s new line of flavored sparkling water inspired by Italy’s zest for life, Imperioli and Schirripa, 67, stumble upon cases of the bubbly drink with instructions to share it with friends.
Unfortunately, the actors are unable to shake their association with the fictitious Sopranos mob family.
In the clip, they attempt to knock on doors, stop by local businesses — do anything to share the CIAO! drinks, but everyone they interact with still associates them with Christopher Moltisanti and Bobby Baccalieri.
“We love the script, we thought it was really fun and, you know, just a fun take on how fans perceive us and, we also like Sanpellegrino,” Imperioli says. “It’s something that I’ve been a fan of for a long time and the new product, we think is just great.”
Schirripa agrees. “We’re very close friends, but we kind of have this friendship that comes out on the clips, you know, it’s kind of a little play on our podcast world that we did.”
The Blue Bloods actor also speaks to the reality of the constant mob connection he and Imperoli will get. “It does happen,” he admits.
“People, when we were out in a restaurant or something, people will come over and they do think we’re not Steve and Michael, they kind of treat us like other people, you know, like our TV personas, shall we say.”
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Schirripa also gushes about Sanpellegrino’s CIAO! line. “Sanpellegrino, I’ve been drinking it since I’m young, honestly, and now it’s flavored, and these flavors are great and it’s so much better than these other flavored bubbled water.”
“This is just a whole class by itself, you know. I don’t know how many peach — I like the peach — I don’t know how many of them I drank while we were doing this thing.”
CIAO! is available in Lime, Cherry, Blood Orange and Peach — Schirripa’s personal favorite.
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