James Gandolfini wears a Rolex Day-Date

Tony Soprano sits in a wood-paneled office next to Carmela, hands folded over a crossed knee, and the gold on his wrist catches the light. The watch he keeps on through nearly every one of the show's 86 episodes is a Rolex Day-Date, and it says boss without a line of dialogue.

It is yellow gold, 36mm, with a champagne dial that spells the day of the week in full at twelve and carries the date at three, set on the heavy half-round links Rolex calls the President. Rolex has never made the Day-Date in steel; it comes in gold or platinum and nothing cheaper, which is the whole point of putting one on a man whose money has no paperwork. The Day-Date is the watch known as the President, after the heads of state who wore it, and here it rides the wrist of a New Jersey boss no one elected.

David Chase ran The Sopranos on HBO from 1999 to 2007, six seasons of a mob captain who climbs to boss while having panic attacks and lying to his psychiatrist. The gold Day-Date is the one fact about Tony that never moves. Everything else about him is a story he is telling someone, usually himself.