Vincent Pastore, a character actor who specialized in playing Italian American tough guys, most notably the foot soldier turned F.B.I. informant Salvatore Bonpensiero, known to his friends as Big Pussy, on the classic HBO series “The Sopranos,” has died at his home in the Bronx. He was 80.
His manager, Robert Attermann, said that Mr. Pastore’s body was discovered by friends on Saturday.
Tall and sturdily built, Mr. Pastore had a substantial career in TV and movies playing mob enforcers, capos and the like before being cast in a major role on “The Sopranos,” which premiered in 1999.
His character was known as Big Pussy — not for any obscene reason, but because he had started his career in crime as a cat burglar. His friends added “Big” to distinguish him from another character, Gennaro Malanga, known as Little Pussy.
Big Pussy, an outwardly loyal and largely sympathetic character in the expansive, star-crossed world of “The Sopranos,” was also a longtime informant for the F.B.I. The tension between his loyalty to his boss, Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini), and his ties to law enforcement provided one of the central story arcs of the hit show’s first two seasons.
His inevitable but still shocking execution at the hands of Tony, Paulie Gualtieri (Tony Sirico) and Silvio Dante (Steven Van Zandt) — on a boat at the end of season two — remains one of the most memorable scenes in the show’s six seasons.
A complete obituary will be published soon.
Derrick Bryson Taylor contributed reporting.