Jennifer Esposito Left Nothing To The Imagination, Try Not To Gasp
Jennifer Esposito, known for her boldness on and off-screen, recently turned heads at a glamorous event with a daring ensemble that left little to the imagination. The actress’s fearless fashion statement sparked a whirlwind of reactions, showcasing her penchant for pushing boundaries and captivating audiences. Esposito’s latest move proves once again that she knows how to command attention and keep us all on the edge of our seats.
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The filming of “Gilligan’s Island,” a beloved 1960s sitcom about castaways on a deserted island, was nearly derailed by a serious on-set accident. During the second season, Bob Denver, who played the titular Gilligan, was injured when a vine he was swinging from snapped, causing him to fall. Despite fears of severe injury, Denver sustained broken ribs and a sprained ankle. Production was briefly halted, but quick adjustments to the script allowed Denver to continue, and the show successfully completed its run. This incident highlighted the risks involved in TV production and showcased the resilience and camaraderie of the show’s cast and crew.
Jennifer Esposito remembers being asked to audition for “The Sopranos” more than once. She declined each time.
“I chose to not go up for it when they would call me in because it was like, ‘I can’t relive this,’” Esposito recalls. “The only thing that used to make me crazy about the show when I did watch it was the character of Meadow because she was very nice. The girls I grew up around wanted to kill me, wanted to kill me every day. So it was PTSD.”
Esposito grew up among organized crime on Staten Island. “Staten Island is the same Staten Island from when I left when I was 18 years old,” says the 50-year-old actor, whose credits span from television’s “Spin City” and “Blue Bloods” to the Oscar-winning “Crash.” “It’s still the same place. You need to understand that nothing leaves this island. It’s a very strange time warp of a place.
But now art imitates life for Esposito. She makes her writing and directorial debut with “Fresh Kills,” an indie drama set in the late 1980s and early 1990s about two sisters (Odessa A’zion and Emily Bader) whose mother (Esposito) tries to hold the family together when the girls’ mafia boss father (Domenick Lombardozzi) goes to prison. It’s a script that had been “percolating and marinating” since Esposito was 16, she says.
“And then I just got so frustrated with where my career had gone and where it was supposed to go — the way I feel it should have — and I thought, ‘Instead of complaining about the stuff that you’re not getting and not seeing, I can’t complain anymore,’” she says. “It was like you’re either quitting or you’re going to do something about it. I would say, without being dramatic, ‘I don’t think I’d be able to die unless I do this.’ It was something that needed to be done.”
“Fresh Kills” premieres during Tribeca Film Festival on June 16.
Working on the movie has been therapeutic. Esposito says she lived with unexplained rage for much of her life. “I had partners who would always tell me, ‘You’re so angry,’” she says. “I’d be like, ‘I’m not angry.’ But I was. There was anger and rage.”
She points to the violence and fear that haunted her childhood, emotions that play out in one particular scene in the movie when the sisters get into a horrific brawl with a couple of other girls from the neighborhood because they insulted their dad. The fighting is savage and ends with faces bloodied from being hit with broken bottles and slammed against brick walls and concrete streets.
“I don’t think people understand unless you lived it. That’s what I saw. And they were in their Catholic school uniforms, and they’d pull a girl on a table in a diner and beat the hell out of her till her face is off,” Esposito says. “It’s that kind of stuff. I wanted to capture that. It’s unleashing a rage that they can’t acknowledge where it’s coming from, because as soon as you touch that button of the father, it’s a match — don’t touch it.”
She understands now that “The Sopranos” was only depicting a slice of Italian-American life. “They wanted me to come in a few times for certain things, and I was like, ‘No. The way you’re portraying Italian culture? Oh, get over yourself. Really?’” Esposito says. “It was an amazing show. But you’re a kid. You don’t see that. Of course I look back, and it’s like, ‘That was stupid.’”
