🧵 The Sopranos and Therapy
1/
The Sopranos is one of the thematically richest texts of the late American empire. "Tony I" would make a great Shakespeare play (but that's a different thread)
And one of its best themes is its merciless critique of Late American Therapy Culture
2/
The Sopranos has an amazing concept.
A Mob Boss, someone who's actions and motives are kept secret from even his wife and friends, goes to a therapist, who's job is to interrogate motives.
This is basically the Shakespearean monologue updated for TV.
3/
Except there are two Characters in this "monologue"...
Two people who's actions and motives need to be dissected... and Dr. Melfi certainly doesn't escape innocent and unscathed.
4/
Tony attends therapy because he's begun collapsing from panic attacks
Its a genuinely dangerous condition... throughout the show he injures himself falling and passes out whilst driving
He could get seriously hurt, and it betrays a painful levels of stress he's living with
5/
Dr. Melfi offers two treatments Prozac + other psychiatric medication... and talk therapy, which graces almost every episode.
Tony and Melfi discuss everything, his marriage, his cheating, his dying friend, his parents, his extend family trying to have him killed...
6/
they even pretty openly acknowledge the sexual tension between the two of them
7/
But there's one thing that they never talk about.
They never talk about what's actually causing Tony's stress!
8/
Dr. Melfi, like most Psychiatrists, adheres to a code of non-judgement...
She actively laments having once judged Tony to her own therapist, she's so professionally ashamed of it.
9/
She refuses to judge his extortions, his murders (which she is vaguely aware of), or his unfaithfulness (which he's explicit about)
At one point Tony accuses her of judging his sex life... and she vehemently denies it
10/
But Tony needs judgement!
That's the only thing he needs. Its the thing he doesn't get from his wife, his friends and associates, his kids... even the religious figures in the show flee from offering any moral guidance
11/
Melfi never asks Tony the one question that matters... the one that could actually solve his problems... The one any moral person in his life should be pleading with him to answer:
Why doesn't he stop?
12/
Tony's life isn't a mess because His mother's awful or he was raised in a messed up home, or he has bad genes...
His sister Barbara is doing fine with her own kids...Indeed She doesn't have any story lines specifically because she's fine and knows not to get involved
13/
Tony isn't alienating himself from his family, or having panic attacks, or depressed because his childhood was bad or guilt from his mother...
All these things are happening because the specter of violence is haunting him and poisons every aspect of his life.
14/
His children's relationship with teachers, friends, and dates are poisoned by the implicit threat behind everything he does...
His daughter realizes season 1 she can never be close to him, when he disappears during her college trip (to commit a murder) then lies to her.
15/
He can't talk to his wife about really anything bothering him...and her own relationships with friends and neighbors are made toxic.
His son spirals between trying to imitate Tony as a role model, and horrible depression when that infuriates Tony...
16/
So why doesn't Tony stop?
There isn't an obvious answer...
Tony has all the money he needs and far from aspiring to advance higher, he actively conspires to avoid being crowned head of his crime family, and thus avoid the heat that would bring...
17/
Setting aside even the morality, Tony as a wealthy and accomplished professional should be thinking early retirement and spending more time with the family... even if his life and liberty wasn't on the line.
And yet Melfi can't bring herself to ask this question.
18/
No one asks this question of Tony... not his wife, his kids, his friends, or any of his wider family, biological or metaphorical
Part of this is his tyrannical attitude, but people challenge him all the time on all kinds of things, he gets questioned about everything else
19/
And they don't ask him for the reason Melfi doesn't ask him.
The vicarious thrill Melfi's own doctor diagnoses in her. The rush of violence and meaning they get. They don't want Tony to stop...that's why they don't ask, they just complain about symptoms that affect them
20/
The Freudian psychiatrist's non-judgement isn't a professional distance... Its voyeurism.
There's a word for when you help someone alleviate the symptoms of their bad behaviour but do nothing to make them improve said behaviour...
Its enablement.
21/
The Sopranos is a deeply spiritual show... Multiple Characters are visited by ghosts in dreams or have visions of hell...
Religion and morality are major themes, as they are in Shakespeare
22/
But far from acting as the catholic confessor psychiatrists replaced and the church was inadequate to supply... Melfi and psychiatry cannot offer moral guidance...
They even dodge the question by pretending not to fill that role, and hiding behind "professional distance"
23/
The Sopranos uses psychiatry the way Shakespeare uses religious struggle and the personal moral monologue in his plays
And in doing so the Sopranos shows psychiatry's failure
It pretends to treat mental health, but can't treat spiritual sickness
If you enjoyed this thread checkout my deep dive into the American prison system and hellish institutions in:
Cocytarchy: Rule of the Damned
anarchonomicon.substack.com/p/cocytarchy
Share this Scrolly Tale with your friends.
A Scrolly Tale is a new way to read Twitter threads with a more visually immersive experience.
Discover more beautiful Scrolly Tales like this.