(Continued from page 27)

in Rome, Gandolfini can be celebrated for performances on TV, on stage and in films that reached beyond the obvious triumph of "The Sopranos" and the unsought celebrity it brought him. Before, during and after "The Sopranos," he remained defiantly a character actor, by all indications spared a leading man's ego as he tackled roles that piqued his interest, not roles meant to guarantee the spotlight.
• "I'm much more comfortable doing smaller things," he declared not long ago. And in the past year, his film appearances included supporting (or smaller) roles in Kathryn Bigelow's Osama bin Laden manhunt docudrama "Zero Dark Thirty," ''Sopranos" creator David Chase's '60s period drama "Not Fade Away," and Andrew Dominick's crime flick "Killing Them Softly."
• ___

• WASHINGTON (AP) -- White House-backed immigration legislation is gaining momentum in the Senate, where key lawmakers say they are closing in on a bipartisan compromise to spend tens of billions of dollars stiffening the bill's border security requirements without delaying legalization for millions living in the country unlawfully.
• "This is a key moment in the effort to pass this bill. This is sort of the defining 24 to 36 hours," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Wednesday night after a day of private talks.
• Under the emerging compromise, the government would grant legal status to immigrants living in the United States unlawfully at the same time the additional security was being put into place. Green cards, which signify permanent residency status, would be withheld until the security steps were complete.
• Officials described a so-called border surge that envisions doubling the size of the Border Patrol with 20,000 new agents, constructing hundreds of miles of additional fencing along the border with Mexico and purchasing new surveillance drones to track would-be illegal border crossers. The cost of the additional agents alone was put at $30 billion over a decade.
• Other details were not immediately available, although it was expected that modifications to the bill would range far beyond border security provisions. The changes under consideration were the result of negotiations involving the bipartisan Gang of Eight who drafted the bill and Republicans seeking alterations before they would commit to voting for it.

(Continued on page 29)