Michael Imperioli Recalls Disastrous First Day Crash on The Sopranos Set with James Gandolfini

Michael Imperioli made quite the first impression on the set of The Sopranos.

In an exclusive preview of the new episode of Who's Talking to Chris Wallace?, the 56-year-old actor recalls lying about having a driver license and getting into a car crash with the series lead James Gandolfini.

"The first day of work, I had to drive him. I didn't have a driver's license, you know, but I didn't tell anybody that because I wanted the job. Because Christopher's job was to drive Tony," he tells host Chris Wallace. "But Michael didn't know how to drive. But I'm like, well, how hard could it be?"

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However, the scene didn't go exactly to plan for Imperioli, who played Christopher Moltisanti, Tony's protégé and member of the DiMeo crime family, on the hit HBO show.

"I had to drive backwards down the sidewalk with trees on both sides and extras running out of the way. Delivering dialogue to Tony Soprano. Looking forward. I mean, that's hard to do," he admits. "Even if you know how to drive which I do now. I did it like four times the fifth time. Boom, right into the tree. The airbags go off, Jim's head snaps back."

"It's my first day I met the guy. There's smoke, people are running," he adds. "And I'm like, 'They're gonna fire me, man, this is really bad.'"

Meanwhile, Gandolfini — who died of a heart attack in June 2013 at age 51 — had an unexpected reaction to the incident. "I look over and he's laughing hysterically," the Blue Bloods star recalls.

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In the clip, Imperioli — who is starring in the new season of The White Lotus — also opens up about the heavily debated ending of The Sopranos in 2007.

As fans know, the final scene saw an anxious Tony Soprano alone in a booth at Holsten's awaiting his family. With Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" in the background, Tony hears the bell dinging every time the door opens. Finally, the bell rings one last time as Steve Perry sings "Don't stop!" and the screen cut to black.

"I've gone back and forth. And then I thought maybe it's just what you see is what you get," Imperioli explains. "That's the end of the story. There's no dying, there's no what if, there's no what happened to Tony, it's just ends right there. I don't know."

He added, "It's mysterious. People ask me that all the time."

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Imperioli previously opened up about the cast's reaction to the show's final scene.

"We were all just, like, speechless," he said during a conversation with the Director's Guild of America in 2015. "First of all, you hear the music and you know that not only is this the end of the show, but it's the end of all of us being together for all these years. So that's hitting you emotionally and personally."

"Some of the guys were not so happy with it," he added. "They were a little bit surprised. They were expecting a more [definitive ending]. I always thought it was brilliant."

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The latest episode of Who's Talking to Chris Wallace? premieres Friday on HBO Max and will also air on Sunday at 7 p.m. ET on CNN.