Reading an early draft of the pilot.

For anyone interested, these are the major differences. It's weird to think how different this show could have been in some alternate reality.

1. Tony's name was Tommy apparently.
2. Hesh was called Herman
3. Uncle Jr. had a crush on Livia and wanted to marry her.
4. Paulie's famed fan-name "Walnuts" is in the script. But it never shows up in dialogue, only descriptive lines and his name title. Probably an idea he was playing with. Can't recall if this shows up canonically later on.
5. Meadow was credited as 15, Father Intintola was in his 30s, Melfi was 35, Tony 40. Livia was described as a very old looking 69. Chris 25. Emil 24. If you consider a screenplay "canon," some of these ages are a little tough to swallow.
6. Chris actually talks to the dead animal during the Emil whacking, instead of the comical shrug like in the show. He asks it if he's seen his soul yet. Don't know if this was shot or edited out of the final product. Either way, glad it's not there cause that would have made Chris look a little too crazy. Maybe it was trying to foreshadow his heavy drug habit.
7. Chris described Carmela as "eminently fuckable.' This didn't actually happen in the script, one of the action lines said that Chris once said this before the script started. Hard to believe Chris would utter a word like "eminently."
8. Tony has a weird conversation about Gotti and mayor Guliani with Melfi. Tony gets mad at Guliani and says his depression started when Gotti went away.
9. Tony has a weird rapey scene with Mefli right after. During session he gets up to stroke her neck and hair. Mefli's response is to say that he's not going to kick him out so he should stop trying. This scene was so odd it was almost surreal. Glad this didn't make it in the show.
10. Speaking of weird scenes, there's one where Meadow is writing a story and fantasizing about her being burned at the stakes in a medieval village. And she's getting sexual gratification from it. I guess Chase was desperate to give Meadow some character, but this scene was way out of tone and glad it was cut out.
11. Tony tells Livia that she's the reason Janice ran away from New Jersey. In the show it seems they ADR'd this line but cut it out.
12. Chris was "good looking -- almost pretty," even though later in the show it's established that Adriana is out of his league.
13. Tony calls his mother a cafone. Which is Italo-American slang for a gruff or low life. This seems a little bit out of character for Tony to dig into his mother like that. You usually reserve that for a friend, enemy, business partner, someone on your level. A wise guy like Tony calling his mother that felt odd.
14. Little dialogue and scene switch ups here and there.