Tony Soprano put a quarter in the jukebox to play “Don’t Stop Believin'” and ordered onion rings for the table. His wife and son join him as his daughter struggles to parallel park outside. The bell rings every time a customer arrives, deepening Tony’s anxiety: Will the next person who walks through the door kill him?
What happens next has kept fans guessing ever since the last scene of “The Sopranos” suddenly went black in 2007. It also kept some of them strong enough to bid tens of thousands of dollars to own the diner booth where the dismemberment sequence was filmed.
to Holsten in Bloomfield, NJ, preparing for a renovation, put the burgundy booth and yellow Formica tabletop up for auction on eBay on Feb. 28. Chris Carley, a co-owner of an ice cream parlor, set the opening bid at $3,000, hoping to get $10,000 for it to help cover part of the estimated $60,000 cost for a new floor and new booths.
Within 24 hours, the price jumped to $52,000. By Monday afternoon, there had been more than 230 bids, pushing the price above $82,000. When the auction ended after 7 pm, the the booth sold for $82,600.
The winning bidder will get the booth, the table, the divider and the family plaque that allocates seats for the Soprano family. (Not included: the jukebox, which was added by the film crew.) Buyer is responsible for pickup.
Holsten opened in 1939 as Strubbe’s Ice Cream Parlor and later expanded to include dining fare. The booth has been in the Holsten dining room for more than 50 years, Mr. Carley said, and after decades of wear and tear — in recent years from hordes of “Sopranos” fans — it was time for – reboot.
“It’s time to do it,” said Mr. Carley in an interview before the auction ended. “This is not something we take lightly.”
Although Holsten’s is known for its homemade ice cream, it also has embraced its celebrity status over the years, promoting Soprano’s popular onion rings and matching merchandise. David Chase, the creator and executive producer of “The Sopranos,” ordered onion rings when he had lunch there a month before filming, or so the story goes.
But at its core, Holsten’s is a “good, old-fashioned” restaurant where “we know people by their first names,” Mr. Carley, who has worked there off and on since he was 14. He was always drawn back to the store, he said, and became a co-owner in 1980.
“This place has been in my life for 40-some-odd years,” Mr. Carley said. “I’m proud that it continues to grow.”
“The Sopranos” was filmed at Holsten’s over three days in March 2007 with James Gandolfini, Edie Falco and Robert Iler in the booth, and then two more days for reshoots with extras, Mr. Carley said. . He still remembers watching Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who played Tony’s daughter, Meadow, try to park for eight hours.
“I was thinking, How many times can you do this?” Laughing said Mr. Carly. “It was a good experience for us.”
The attention the booth — and Holsten — received last week was close to what it was when the final episode aired, Mr. Carley said. Fans regularly come in to eat at the booth or take pictures. They will also take the restaurant’s laminated menus, one of which fetched $4,150 on eBay, Ron Stark, a co-owner, told The New York Times in 2007.
After Mr. Gandolfini died suddenly in 2013 from an apparent heart attack, the booth became a memorial. The restaurant immediately closed the booth and put up a “reserved” sign “out of respect,” said Mr. Carly. For two weeks, fans left cards and flowers at the booth, which Mr. Carley later gave to Mr. Gandolfini’s son.
Mr. Gandolfini “was a very good man when he was not in character,” Mr. Carley, who recalled how the actor went behind the restaurant’s grill and asked, “What do you need to eat?”
Like many fans of the show, Mr. Carley had her television broken when the finale suddenly cut to a black screen. Even though the scene was shot in his shop, he had no idea what to expect. However, Mr. Carley has money in Tony’s life to see another day.
Holsten put in a new floor about three months ago, took out all the old booths and then put them back. This week the booths were replaced; the Formica tops crack and the cushions, like the ones Tony and his family sit on, sag. The new ones are from J&H Dinettes and Upholstery in Freehold, NJ
Fans of Holsten and “Sopranos” need not panic. The color scheme will be the same, “just a little brighter,” Mr. Carley said.
“We want to give back exactly what we took,” he said. “When people walk into the store, they’re going to have a hard time telling the difference.”
