Tony Soprano has enough agita, what with the feds constantly on his tail. Now his daughter's videotaped confessions are popping up online. The North Jersey capo doesn't know about it, but one of Meadow's profs at Columbia University requires the class to record video diaries. And the tapes have been leaked to the website of Jeffrey Wernick, a Mob aficionado and author of such books as ''Are You a Jamook or a Fanook?'' and ''He's My F**king Brother! Kinship Patterns in Mafia Life.''
That's the setup for HBO's latest ''Sopranos'' website, which debuts with the series' third season March 4. And it's the most creative crossover since fans became privy to email from an undercover cop on the prison drama ''Oz'' last July. The site includes original video clips of Uncle Junior talking about his father; Christopher Moltisanti taking a meeting with a Hollywood agent; and an Essex County, N.J., public access TV commercial for Artie Bucco's Nuovo Vesuvio restaurant. ''The show is the filet mignon,'' says ''The Sopranos''' coexecutive producer Ilene Landress. ''The website is the sambuca afterwards.'' But it's not yet the whole cannoli.
Watching Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) flip on a camcorder and dig deep into her relationship with Poppa, who's off the deep end over her African American / Jewish boyfriend, is the biggest treat. ''Instead of a hundred dirty looks,'' says Sigler, ''you really understand how she feels about her father.'' The principessa's also a logical choice to star on the Web, since the only thing a stugots like Soprano soldier Paulie Walnuts knows about computers is how to fence them.
Later in the season, Wernick.com turns up a video of Junior talking about his childhood. The biography is clandestinely caught on tape by Junior's toadying bodyguard, a premise that works only because the absurdity of hiding the camera in a leafy plant is played for humor. These two to five minute sketches are solid Jersey pastorals, most of them written by Allen Rucker, author of ''The Sopranos: A Family History,'' and directed by Jerry Adler, who plays the Jewish consigliere Hesh Rabkin.
Smart as the Jeffrey Wernick website is, it lacks the bada bing of the best DVD bonus tracks. You'll learn something new with each week's update; just don't expect to gain much insight into the show's genius. But that's not what the website's about -- it's to establish a ''better, deeper relationship'' with viewers, says HBO's VP of interactive ventures, Sarah Cotsen. While no one has found a way to make a buck off that bond yet, says former TV exec turned IFILM CEO Kevin Wendle, ''once you understand your customer better you can sell them more products.''
Not the warmest, fuzziest concept -- but remember, ''The Sopranos'' is a family business.
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