Romance & Cigarettes Full Production Notes

Starring: James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, Kate Winslet, Steve Buscemi, Christopher Walken, Mandy Moore, Aida Turturro, Amy Sedaris Director: John Turturro Writer: John Turturro Studio: Sony Pictures Classics Rating: R for sexual content including some strong dialogue, and language. Release Date: 2006 Brief Storyline Romance and Cigarettes is a down-and-dirty musical love story set in the world of the working class. Nick (Gandolfini) is an ironworker who builds and repairs bridges. He’s married to Kitty (Sarandon), a dressmaker, a strong and gentle woman with whom he has three daughters. He is carrying on a torrid affair with a redheaded woman named Tula (Winslet). Nick is basically a good, hardworking man driven forward by will and blinded by his urges. Like Oedipus at Colonus, he is sent into exile and searches to find his way back through the damage he has done. In an imaginative, humorous, and touching way, Romance and Cigarettes explores the cost and value of a relationship through life and death. When the characters can no longer express themselves with language, they break into song, lip-synching the tunes lodged in their subconscious. It is their way to escape the harsh reality of their world.