"Tony was right, he set me straight . . . No more distractions. Focus. Eye on the prize."
Tony refers to him as "nephew" and loves him like a son, but Christopher Moltisanti is actually Carmela's first cousin, once removed. His father was Carmela's cousin, Dickie Moltisanti, who was something of a mentor to the youthful Tony. So when the senior Moltisanti was shot to death, Tony, in turn, took Christopher under his wing. As Christopher remembers very little of his father - he was still in diapers when Dickie was killed - Tony's the closest thing he's ever had to a paternal figure.
Under Tony's tutelage Christopher became a cugine and eventually a made man - but his ascent wasn't a smooth one. For one thing, Christopher is impulsive, and his impulses are often violent: he once "handled" a negotiation with a rival garbage concern by turning their representative into refuse and hauling him to Staten Island - without permission from management. For another, Christopher wasn't always one hundred percent certain that this thing of ours was the thing for him. He once explored the possibility of a film career, going so far as to befriend some Hollywood types and write a screenplay titled, "You Bark, I Bite." But when Tony got wind of it, he barked an ultimatum: if you're with the Soprano crew it's "every fucking second of every fucking day." Christopher's been dedicated to the family business ever since.
So it seems that Christopher may finally be on the path to success: he runs Paulie's sports betting operation and is engaged to the love of his life, Adriana La Cerva. And there's no question that he's tough: he once took six bullets in an ambush, and even managed to mortally wound one of his assailants. But the impulsiveness remains, causing Christopher to make rash decisions and - even worse - to openly challenge Tony's. Compounding that is his "recreational" drug use, something that Tony doesn't know about, and that wouldn't make him happy if he did. And father figure or not, Christopher can't afford to have Tony Soprano mad at him.
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