Dickie Moltisanti with possibly a little Christopher
Richard "Dickie" Moltisanti was a soldier in the Soprano Crew. Died in the mid-1970s, Married to Joanne Moltisanti (née Blundetto), father of Christopher and cousin to Carmella. Dickie was in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War and later served time in prison, making it unlikely that he spent much time with his family when he was alive.
Dickie was killed during Christopher's infancy, right outside the house while bringing TV trays home. In 2002, Tony Soprano told Christopher that Dickie's killer was Detective Lt. Barry Haydu, who had just retired from the force. Tony delivered Haydu to Christopher Moltisanti as a part of his process of bonding Chris to him and slowly easing him up the family hierarchy. However, when confronted by Christopher, Haydu denied ever having heard of Richard Moltisanti and claimed that someone was "obviously" setting him up. Later Haydu inadvertently admitted knowing Dickie Moltisanti by stating "Look, whoever told you I had anything to do with his death is lying!" before Christopher mentioned his father's death.
Tony Soprano remembers Dickie as a "stand up guy" and describes a lot of his positive qualities to Christopher. Dickie once took on a whole crew from New England and brought the war home to their turf. Tony also remembers that Dickie was killed because of a beef with Jilly Ruffalo, a man he was in prison with. Jilly murdered Dickie's cell mate and Dickie gouged out his eye in revenge.
According to Christopher, Dickie also struggled with problems of alcoholism and drug addiction.
Trivia
- Dickie is set to appear as the protagonist of upcoming film The Many Saints of Newark, which is a prequel to the events of The Sopranos. He will be portrayed by actor Alessandro Nivola.
- When Christopher confronts Detective Barry Haydu in "For All Debts Public and Private", the pleading, “I’m sorry," can be heard coming from the episode of Magnum, P.I. playing on the television in the background. Some viewers have mistakenly attributed the sentence to Barry, thinking he is saying it to Chris before being shot, and interpreting it as confirmation of his role in Dickie's death, which remains unconfirmed.