History
What does your local pizzeria have in common with a hit HBO mob drama?
Coincidentally, our name. When Benito Marcantuono opened Soprano’s Pizzeria in the Warrington Shopping center on Easton and Bristol roads, customers couldn’t help but let their curiosity get the best of them.
“They’d ask if I was related,” Marcantuono said. “I’d just laugh.” -Benito Marcantuono
Soprano’s Pizzeria opened in March 1999, three months after “The Sopranos” first aired on television. Marcantuono said he didn’t name his business after the show. Documents prove that he registered the name during the winter of 1998, about a month or two before the show premiered. I didn’t even know anything about the show, Marcantuono said. I only picked the name Soprano’s because I like music. It just happened to work out in my favor.”
It has been more than a year since our pizzeria’s grand opening, and it’s draw has yet to dwindle. Customers still visit our restaurant out of sheer curiosity.
“I didn’t really think there was any connection,” Karen Kugler of Warrington said. “But I thought why not come in and check it out.” Laurie Clancy of Doylestown was just passing through the shopping center one day when she noticed the restaurant. “I knew a pizza place was there but I never actually knew the name of it until I just happened to glance up at the sign one day,” Clancy said. “My husband loves the show so I thought it would be neat to take him there.”
Marcantuono feeds off the publicity. “The Sopranos” posters hang on our store’s walls. A TV Guide cover featuring “The Sopranos” sits on the counter enclosed in a glass case. Marcantuono has even tried to contact the show’s cast through e-mail but he hasn’t received a response. “I thought it would be great for business if I could get someone to come down,” he said. “But I don’t know if it will ever happen.” Marcantuono opened another pizzeria by the same name in Warminster this past March. It, too, attracts the interest of passers-by, he said.