Jamie-Lynn Sigler expressed her gratitude to her late “Sopranos” co-star James Gandolfini at his 2013 funeral.
In the actress’ “And So It Is” memoir, out Tuesday, she recalled kneeling beside the casket and saying, “Thank you. Thank you for loving me, thank you for seeing me, for caring for me, and for making me feel safe.”
Sigler, who played Gandolfini’s character Tony Soprano’s onscreen daughter, Meadow Soprano, on the hit HBO show, noted that she was “not ready to face the reality” of his passing at the June 2013 service.
Sigler’s “Sopranos” co-stars Edie Falco, Steve Schirripa, Steve Buscemi and Aida Turturro were also in present, with series creator David Chase delivering the eulogy.
She told readers the network chartered a private plane from Los Angeles to New York City to get West Coast cast members to Gandolfini’s funeral at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in the Big Apple.
“HBO had it locked down,” Sigler wrote. “Nobody takes care of their people better than they do.”
Friends and family gathered at an Italian restaurant after the funeral, which “only heightened the surreal nature of it all” for Sigler.
“With the buffet and the drinks flowing and the cigars lit, it felt like a scene we had done many times at Artie Bucco’s [Vesuvio restaurant],” the “Mob Town” star explained.
Sigler, who was pregnant at the time, mentioned her love for Michael Gandolfini, James’ son with ex Marcy Wudarski, in the book.
Calling the 26-year-old “such a talented actor and a beautiful person,” — as well as James’ “greatest work” — Sigler wrote that Michael “made [her] think of [her] own unborn boy” that day.
“This was the true ending of ‘The Sopranos,’” Sigler added. “Jim had been the sun that we all revolved around; he had been the center. With him, the entire experience was now laid to rest.”
Sigler and James played Meadow and Tony, respectively, in the Emmy-winning crime drama for all six seasons from 1999 to 2007.
The latter died from a heart attack in 2013 at the age of 51.
James came up elsewhere in Sigler’s memoir as she recounted him uncharacteristically skipping her July 2003 wedding to ex-husband AJ Discala.
“Part of me wonders if maybe he didn’t want it for me,” she wrote of the “dark” union, which ended in 2005.
Sigler recalled returning to the “Sopranos” set post-nuptials to find “the room … completely silent.”
She mused, “It was clear: none of them were happy about this for me. It would take me two long years to understand why.”
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