More About The Sopranos

Thru seasons three and four, and into five now. I struggle not to hate myself for thinking about these characters as though they were real people, as though I know them personally. Not to cast aspersions on anyone else's blog--god knows my own efforts do not constitute a how-to lesson for effective blogging--but I always cringe to read others' discussions about their favorite television shows as though the show or the characters or the stories amount to anything. But here I am doing the same thing, acting as though The Sopranos or the show's characters or the storylines matter for shit.

Except I'm not really sure that's it. My previous post tried to make the point, buried in there somewhere, that there is something extraordinary about David Chase's soap opera; and now I've watched much of the series, and I find myself moved by the plights of these people. I don't watch anything of the show for my week off at home, and then I watch an entire season in a couple nights while I sit the sort in KY. And that immersion has me spending more time, for a short stretch, anyway, with these characters than I spend with real people. So I spend my time in the dark cockpit thinking about what has transpired on a television show. I guess that's kind of pathetic. So it's not that the story or the characters are important; but if they're well-drawn, they raise larger questions for us, they connect us with some larger thing.

I think part of it is that, either by the skill of the writing or the sheer screen time, the characters are well-fleshed-out. Having the main character in therapy and, more than that, showing the probing nature of those sessions (which would normally not be seen by any other person, so it's a bit like reading someone's private love letters), and having the therapist herself in therapy so that we might learn HER deeper thoughts; these things give us an insight into these characters which we never get on TV, which a movie does not give us enough time or immersion to accomplish, and which we probably don't get even with most people in our real lives. I think that's part of it. Another part is the drama inherent not simply in a criminal life, but in a criminal life which tries to integrate itself into mainstream society. Tony calls himself a "businessman," and the family is very much in the normal world. This is complicated by the Sopranos' attempts to raise normal children with money gained by criminal enterprises. Several really interesting story details arise from the kids' burgeoning awareness of what their father does for a living, and by his attempts to shield them from it. Tony and Carmella aspire for their kids to live in reality the life that the parents strive to APPEAR to be living. And Carmella struggles to be a normal, ethical person and a good mother, without having to capitalize on her husband's power and money, both of which come from things she cannot reconcile with her ethics. This tug of war rather defines her character much of the time.

Lastly, there's the just the circus sideshow aspects of the story, the expected spectacle of mob murders and titty bars and innocents squashed and drug deals gone bad. There's just a certain amount of that stuff that pays off according to schedule. I wonder if men and women watch and / or like the show differently. I don't honestly think there's much I desire to emulate in Tony Soprano's world (though always having several thousand dollars in loose bills in his pocket at any moment seems decadent), but I don't think I feel the same revulsion at many of the plot twists that Susan does. I have no desire for an extramarital affair, but there's a certain wonder / admiration / jealousy as I watch Tony cavort with Annabella Sciorra (who seems just impossibly sexy) which I'd venture many women would not feel. But I also imagine--and the story clearly posits--that Tony's power brings a definite sex appeal, something that's lost on me (and on my wife as well, or so she claims...)

Again I come back to the power thing. It's really what defines Tony's character. There's an amusing scene where the bigoted Tony insults his daughter's new boyfriend for having some African blood, something which gets an angry and indignant reaction from the young man. But later when the boyfriend exclaims "he's lucky I didn't beat the shit out of him right there!" we laugh at his naivety. When Tony's therapist is brutally raped and the rapist is released on a technicality, she is hugely tempted to enlist Tony's help to restore her sense of justice and a feeling of personal safety. She doesn't mention it to him, but she tells her own therapist that she fantasizes about simply giving the word and knowing that the worm who raped her would scream and beg for his life before being ripped limb from limb. And this version of manhood is juxtaposed with that of her husband, another squishy liberal therapist who is, by inference, half a man. The scene of Tony asking the battered woman how she is and of her bursting into tears is extraordinary. It shows Tony at his closest approximation of humanity, and Dr. Melfi as almost superhumanly strong. It plays with stuff rather deep in our psychology to be faced with the choice between justice and revenge on the one hand, and our sense of decency and societal propriety on the other. (An interesting aside, David Chase has said that the "resolution" of Dr. Melfi's rape is one of the most requested storylines. He scoffs at the pat predictability of this [I'll paraphrase]: "That's not the story. She was faced with a very difficult choice, and she chose to keep herself intact. That's the story.")

I realize as I watch that I don't really care about every one of the 15 storylines the show is carrying. Maybe we're not supposed to. Any of the characters I don't like, for example, contribute to my enjoyment only insofar as they push the rest of the story along. Tony's sister Janice is one of the supremely toxic creations of the screen. But she only raises my blood pressure. And I'm not even particularly interested in the criminal activities, which is odd since I generally like crime fiction. There's such an antisocial and un-glamorous facet about Tony Soprano's "business" that I just feel like I ought to shower after watching. But he seems one of fiction's great characters, and he's compelling to watch: if he's on the screen, you have to pay attention (a hypothesis which I confirm with Susan: if I ask her if she wants to watch an episode she'll usually say no; but if I turn one on on my own, she'll inevitably quickly get sucked in).

I find that I'm much more strongly drawn to the female characters than the men, in general. Carmella in particular seems the real human center of the whole enterprise, flaws and blemishes notwithstanding. She is not written to represent some kind of relationship perfection, or some moral apotheosis in the series. But she has the high ground in her relationship with Tony, and she is often the one who speaks the painful truth, and who wears her emotions with the least coverage. Tony strategizes and postures--it's interesting that David Chase characterizes Tony and his friends as almost never telling the truth when they talk, to each other or to anyone else--and Carmella seems much more simply to be in the world, to react and live. This is an inversion of our stereotypes, where men are simple and direct and women are emotionally complicated and between-the-lines communicators.

And this leads me to wonder about a lot of stuff. In some general way, Tony Soprano seems a sociopath. But I think it's a degree thing: he only has more of some quality that many people have (or wish they had), and he brushes up against normal humanity enough that we want to give him the benefit of the doubt. We seem to pull for him, and for him and Carmella. But all the men on the show seem emotionally handicapped, and they relate to their women partners in a way that I can't imagine any self-actualized woman accepting. And this includes Tony, even though by being in therapy he seems at first blush to be nearer to enlightenment than the rest of them. But how near is that? After what he thinks is an acceptable period, he attempts to date his therapist, and he deals with her rejection badly (I felt the writing of this scene was especially effective, more powerful for all that it left unsaid). One can't help feeling a vaporous sense of foreboding at this.

And maybe that's just where the rubber meets the road in this whole enterprise. What does it mean to be sociopathic? Is a mob boss redeemable as a functioning human being? Susan learned from a friend of some shocking development in the sixth season that, she says, will make me loathe Tony Soprano. And I can only imagine that he kills his therapist, probably from her rejection of him. So does one really wish for Tony and Carmella to reconcile? Is it really in her best interest?

Alas, these are yes and no questions for subject matter where such answers are inadequate.
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And one more addendum (at least until the next one).

Extrapolating from my own experience, I wonder if my reactions are what were intended from us all. I suppose that's a lot like trying to define what makes any art great: it's an impossible task in any comprehensive way. But there are several scenes that I come back to again and again, staring off into space in a daydream, my mind not on my work. And this makes me wonder what hole in me is so in need of filling. They're mostly scenes of pain, and I think my reaction to them is what it would be for me to see any friend or acquaintance of mine in this kind of emotional trauma.

As Exhibit A, there's a scene where Tony's nephew Christopher beats up his girlfriend, Adrianna. Christopher has shown plenty of violent tendencies, and his relationship with Adrianna (and with everyone else) is far from serene. They are both quite uneducated, and in their issues and methods they are always up against the stone wall of their ignorance. But one senses that there is genuine affection between them. In this scene he hits her, due in part to a misunderstanding--his anger is a lashing-out at someone who is not responsible at all for his current woes. After he slaps her around, we see her out at Tony and Carmella's, bruised and tearful. Carmella is mortified, of course, and Tony reacts very strongly at the wrongness of it and says he will have a talk with Christopher and "straighten him out." This is said with an ominous tone, and we know that Tony has the resources to make Christopher feel serious consequences for his actions. Adrianna, who knows (more or less) what the "family" does for a living, is very aware of this. She tearfully chokes out "Don't hurt him!" in a little moment of love and pain that caused my eyes to brim instantly. She is trapped between her need to go somewhere for help and her genuine love for Christopher and the desire that no harm should come to him.

Then there is Carmella kicking Tony out of the house as they separate. Her character is strong and independent, but so is he, and he is the indisputable Alpha of the household (and of his whole world). They are two reasonably normal people with their character traits inflated to extreme proportions. But she reaches her wits' end via a behavioral trajectory that very nearly breaks even her strong will, and it's excruciating to see her in this state. She doesn't break, but she is brought to the blubbering brink, and it's a dark cloud that hangs over the franchise when she is.

My last couple of scenes that are haunting me are from episodes I haven't even seen yet. I know that Tony gets shot early in the final season, and that he recovers. But there is a scene on YouTube where Carmella reacts to the shooting as though someone were performing waking heart surgery on her. She tried to leave Tony and didn't, or couldn't, manage it; now, when she is faced with his involuntary removal from her life she looses an animal wail of absolute pain and despair. I don't know her--there is no "her" to know; she's an invention--but the pain of this scene stays with me. Like hearing a baby cry, there is something deeply in me that wants to intervene and do something to ease this uncarryable load.

It's a scene that carries the baggage of all that has come before--all these scenes do; we could not care so much for people we do not know to at least some degree. We feel for her, and for the pact with the devil she's made. An intelligent person from a working-class background, she latched as a young girl onto dreams and promises that, with more exposure, she might have seen through; and now she's trying to do the best she can with the investment in time and emotion she's already made. But she has a tiger by the tail. Having previously faced the decision of whether to let go and start over again in her 40s with nothing--no money, and no career or marketable skills--or to make peace with these irreconcilable things, she has opted to return to the fold, to the man she loves, only to have some external force threaten to undo her decision.

I have to wonder what it takes out of an actress to play a scene like this one. It's just not something you could record, say, 20 takes of to see which one you like best. You get one or two shots, I'd imagine, and that might be about it for Edie Falco for the day.

Lastly, I saw a clip of Tony and Carmella's surly and taciturn son, A.J., attempting suicide. In what I suppose is a classic cry for help, he makes an attempt to kill himself that leaves just enough wiggle room that he can--just barely--call it off. And when Tony happens to find him, A.J.'s life is saved at the last moment. Tony goes thru quite the range of emotions, from blithe oblivion to angry disbelief to an awareness that his son, his flesh and blood, is at rock bottom and is extraordinarily lucky to even be alive. A.J.'s despair quickly becomes Tony's despair, as the two lay on the deck beside the pool, Tony trying to comfort an absolutely despondent young man whose very soul is leaking out of him in a blubbering animal wail. And for the father who has been in therapy trying to figure out how his own parents have figured into his inability to function normally in the world, the weight of the world comes to him, the possibility that the bottomless pit of his son's agony is also the father's doing. It's almost shakespearean.

Again, is it just that my own life exists on a much more serene emotional plane (and thank the gods for it)? It breaks me up to see the love these people have for each other, and the pain caused by that love. Why is that? My own life is not wanting for affection and understanding; so why is this compelling and not repellant? Is this some large part of the series' pull for us, that we first get inside the lives of these people and then accompany them in some measure on a journey of greater emotional vigor than what we see in life generally?

Maybe it will come to me. It hasn't so far.