In The Sopranos, the Bada Bing strip club served as one of the base of operations for Tony's work throughout the course of the show. The location was shown to have some illegal activity during its fictional history, and now the actual strip club its based on was found to have some illegal happenings of its own. That's right, the real-life strip club used in the series as the Bada Bing, Satin Dolls, has been closed following a six-year investigation of criminal activity.
Satin Dolls, whose fictional club name in The Sopranos is based on a line uttered by Sonny Corleone in The Godfather, was shut down after authorities allege the club was engaging in a solicitation for prostitution and lewd activity. Authorities also allege that the owners of the club, the Cardinalle family, have failed to account for large sums of money moving in and out of the business. For this reason, EW states New Jersey's Satin Dolls and the Cardinalle family's other strip club A.J.'s has been shut down.
This isn't the first time Satin Dolls has found itself in trouble. In fact, the strip club's legal troubles even predate The Sopranos. Club owner Anthony Cardinalle plead guilty to federal tax evasion in 1995 after failing to report cash payments from his club. In 2013, Cardinalle pled guilty to racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to commit extortion, which was the same year actor James Gandolfini would pass away. In 2014, it was reported that Cardinalle was cooperating with authorities and would become a mob-informant on the others he was involved with in an effort to reduce his sentence.
The club and parking lot scenes of the Bada Bing seen in The Sopranos were actually shot at Satin Dolls. As for the back room segments where Tony Soprano conducted a lot of his business on the show, those were filmed at a separate location. In 2007, Satin Dolls put many of the items in the club up for auction in an effort to profit off of The Sopranos, following the show's conclusion in June of that year. This included selling the actual poles the dancers used, which the club stated had been featured in nearly every episode.
The Sopranos is available to stream on HBO Now and HBO Go. Those looking for other shows to stream before the year is up should head on over to our fall premiere guide and see what's left to watch in 2017. For a look at what's coming in the new year and when all the best shows of this year will make their return, head on over to our midseason premiere guide. For a look at some shows that didn't quite make the mark and were sent to "sleep with the fishes," be sure to visit our cancellation guide.
