James Gandolfini wears a Rolex Day-Date

Tony Soprano sits low in an armchair, a dark jacket over a dark shirt, hands folded over a crossed knee, while the light picks out a curve of gold at his wrist. The Sopranos ran on HBO from 1999 to 2007, with James Gandolfini as the North Jersey crime boss at its center, a man who ran a crew and spent the series talking through his panic attacks in a therapist's chair.

Collectors identify the watch as a Rolex Day-Date in 18k yellow gold, reference 18238: a 36mm case with a fluted bezel, a champagne dial, and the three-piece President bracelet that gave the model its nickname. Rolex launched the Day-Date in 1956 as the first wristwatch to spell the day of the week out in full beside the date, and has only ever built it in gold or platinum, never in steel. The President name came from the leaders who wore one, Lyndon Johnson among them, and the watch became shorthand for people who run things. Tony runs things.

By one accounting the gold Day-Date appears in nearly every episode, while the other Rolex Tony owns, a steel Submariner Date rated to 300 meters, comes out mainly for backyards and weekends. The watch built to survive the ocean is the one he treats as casual, and the gold dress watch is the one he keeps on for the business of running a crew.