Sopranos Star James Gandolfini Almost Starred In A Beloved Stephen King Drama

In his all-too-brief run as an actor, James Gandolfini made a name for himself by playing brutal men hiding a complex emotionality beneath their cold exterior. When he passed away suddenly in 2013, he left us with a filmography packed with standout character roles and empathetic leads in everything from blockbusters like "Crimson Tide" to comedies like "Enough Said."

But even with these stellar parts, we still wish we could have seen more from Gandolfini, leaving fans to look at the roles he almost played and imagine what we could have had. One of these parts would have been his most chilling and horrific villains, which is really saying something considering the dastardly work he put into "The Sopranos," despite the fact that he didn't even want to audition.

Because before he was the kingpin of the Italian mafia, Gandolfini almost starred in Frank Darabont's adaptation of "The Shawshank Redemption," but he had to suddenly leave the production at the last moment because of another role.

When Tim Robbins' Andy Dufresne arrives at Shawshank State Penitentiary, he quickly makes a friend in Morgan Freeman's Ellis "Red" Redding. Their bond forms the heart of the film, but its warmth stands in stark contrast to the terror inflicted on him by Bogs Diamond, leader of "the Sisters" gang. The part is played perfectly by "Aliens" actor Mark Rolston, but in an interview with USA Today, writer and director Frank Darabont revealed that they had originally cast James Gandolfini in the part. 

At the time, he was still an "unknown dude" working on off-Broadway productions but his audition floored Darabond and his team and they offered him the job immediately. But before they could shoot the role, Gandolfini pulled out of "Shawshank Redemption" because he had been cast in Tony Scott's 1993 classic "True Romance" (seen at the top). Darabont says they held "no hard feelings" towards Gandolfini for dropping out, because they knew that role was "going to serve his career better."

After Gandolfini exited the role, Darabont held a new round of auditions, which is when Mark Rolston walked through the doors, and Darabont couldn't have been more pleased. "I'm the  biggest 'Aliens' fan there is. He had me at 'hello,'" Darabont says. "I loved working with this guy. He brought something indelible."

In the end, Darabont was right, with Gandolfini's role in "True Romance" paving the way for him to take on Tony Soprano, one of the defining roles of TV history. We'll just have to imagine how menacing he would have been within the cold prison cells of Shawshank State Penitentiary.