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The Psychology of the Sopranos
With Glen O. Gabbard
Author
Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2002; 3 p.m. ET
Now at the beginning of its fourth season, there is no doubt that "The Sopranos" is a cultural phenomenon. So it is no surprise that America's leading mob family becomes a lens through which we can examine our culture. In "The Psychology of The Sopranos: Love, Death, Desire and Betrayal in America's Favorite Gangster Family," author Glen. O. Gabbard explores the characters, motivations and morality behind one of America's most popular shows.
Gabbard will be online Wednesday, Sept. 18 at 3 p.m. ET, to discuss his new book and "The Sopranos."
Submit your questions and comments before or during today's discussion.
Gabbard is a professor of psychiatry at Baylor College of Medicine. He is the author of 16 books, including "Psychiatry and the Cinema" and "Boundaries and Boundary Violations." He has received numerous awards and honors, including the Sigourney Award for outstanding contributions to psychoanalysis. He lives in Houston, Tex.
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over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
Alexandria, Va.:
How about the obvious? How can we love Tony so much and root for him at every turn when he routinely cheats on his wife and has people "whacked!" In real life, we'd think he was the scum of the earth.
Glen O. Gabbard: The reason that we can find some sympathy for him is that he's not a two-dimensional character. In psychiatry, he represents a "vertical split." In other words, he has a side of him that is a loving father and a loyal friend. THis co-exists with a racist murderous thug. The two halves of him are not integrated, so he is a highly complex person. When he's in his sensitive and loving mode, such as when talking with Meadow, its possible that we start to forget the murderous side of him. We begin to root for him in the same way Dr. Melfi does. We see a glimmer of the possibility of a good family man who might be able to leave his evil ways behind.
In addition, we should keep in mind that the writers have juxtaposed Tony with people who are much worse than he is -- his mother and his sister Janis -- both of whom are candidates for the psychopath hall of fame. Tony is not. A psychopath is incapable of loyalty, loving attachments and cannot feel remorse. Tony is intensely loyal, loves his children and has pangs of conscience when he has to whack to Big Pussy.
Alexandria, Va.:
Please discuss the role of food in the
show. Many many pivotal scenes depict
meals and snacking. Tony collapses on
two occasions in the kitchen at the frig
gobbling food. Food is always pressed
upon anyone who displays anger, anxiety,
or depression. Carmella uses food as
bribe, gift, tool and club. Paulie and Silvio
and the late Big Pussy (stone killers to be
sure) all seem obsessed with food
matters at times. The use of food as
symbol and/or surrogate is ubiquitous
and intriguing!
Glen O. Gabbard: THe question contains enough psychological insight that the writer should be awarded a diploma in psychoanalysis at the earliest possible opportunity.
Food is a symbol of the voraciousness of the mobsters in a psychological sense. Their appetites are enormous for fame, power and money. Also, as in the Martin Scorcese film "Good Fellas," the interest in food also humanizes the mobsters in such a way that we can relate to them more easily.
Laurel, Md.:
Do you think Dr. Melfi is doing a credible job of treatment for Tony?
How unusual is it for a patient to be so disturbing that the psychiatrist has to seek therapy?
Glen O. Gabbard: First of all, all psychoanalysts have their own analysis as part of training. Many of us go back for further treatment later in our careers because we all wish to avoid laying our own conflicts on to patients that we treat. Doctor Melfi's treatment of Tony is heroic to the point of being foolhardy. Nevertheless, she does a pretty good job of maintaining professional boundaries despite her fascination with her bad boy celebrity patient. In almost every feature film in which a female therapist treats a male patient the female therapist is swept off her feet by her handsome male patient and ends up in bed with him, proving herself unethical and incompetent. This trend begins with Bergman in Hitchcock's classic "Spellbound" in 1945 and continues through the 1990s with Barbra Streisand in "Prince of Tides." This was completely untouched by feminism.
Melfi defies our expectations by telling Tony they need to talk rather than act on feelings. She makes mistakes, such as bringing Carmella into a joint session after a longstanding one-to-one relationship between Melfi and Tony, but manages to work on her mistakes with Elliot in her own therapy and get back on track.
Despite a number of detours, she manages to return on a reasonable road to therapeutic success, however, in real life it would be a longshot to expect Tony to be cured of his complicated personality disorder.
There are small bits of evidence suggesting that the treatment may be helping. Tony decides not to order a hit on the soccer coach who molests Meadow's girlfriend -- based on Melfi's therapy session. Tony also has a blinding flash of insight worthy of Oedipus Rex when he discovers -- in the midst of a fight with Gloria -- that he is recreating the relationship with his mother in the guise of a Mercedes salesperson. Whether the insight will lead to change in his anti-social lifestyle, however, is highly doubtful.
Glen O. Gabbard: I have always been interested in representations of psychiatrists and psychoanalysts in television and movies. I wrote "Psychiatry and the CInema" where I studied 400 films and found that the accurate representations of psychotherapy could be counted on one hand. So I began watching "The Sopranos" with the assumption that one more woman psychiatrist would bite the dust. To my amazement, Melfi was portrayed as ethical and competent. The scenes are so well written, that I have used the videos to treat residents at the Baylor College of Medicine. Five of the six writers, and David CHase, have been in therapy themselves, so they have captured the authenticity from an inside perspective.
The book became a way of educating the public about psychotherapy and how we apply psychoanalytic understanding to characters in fiction.
Mt. Lebanon, Pa.:
Is there any moral underpinning to the actions and purposes of the characters in this drama? Are the characters motivated by anything other than naked self-interest? And what is the difference between individual self-preservation and personal morality? Frankly, I watch it for the underlying black humor. I find myself laughing at the oddest moments -- uncanny, skillful dialogue even embellished by expletives. Thanks much.
Glen O. Gabbard: One of the main aspects of the Sopranos that hooks 13 million viewers each week is the deliberate moral ambiguity of David Chase's world. There is no question that mobsters have a moral code. Tony Soprano makes it clear that loyalty is rewarded, betrayal is punished. They do not engage in random killings that a serial killer would engage in. Most of the people who are killed have somehow violated the code of honor by which the mob operates. However, the mob has some individuals who might be called psychopathic in a complete lack of morality. For example, Richie April and Ralphie. These characters are clearly in it for themselves without much capacity for loyalty.
I also want to stress that the writers are clever enough to confront the audience with our own capacity for moral footage. When Dr. Melfi's rapist gets off because the police mishandle the evidence, every viewer in TV land is dying for Dr. Melfi to tell Tony the identity of the rapist so he can have him whacked. Lorraine Bracco said for weeks after that episode, people would come up to her on the street and ask her "why didn't you tell Tony?"
The point is that we secretly admire the mobster who can operate outside the constraints of a legal beurocracy and mete out justice according to a moral code. Vigilante justice appeals to all of us in one way or another. Last year after 9/11 a picture of the Sopranos was circulated on the Internet. The caption read "Just tell us where bin Laden is and fuggedabout it." The message was clear -- these mobsters could operate outside the policies of the CIA and military. They could find bin Laden and rub him out and we were all rooting for him.
Alexandria, Va.:
One of my favorite scenes from the show is when Carmela goes to see her own shrink and the guy tells her in no uncertain terms that she should leave her husband and that she is behaving in an immoral way, as opposed to the priests in her life that seem to focus on having her make little improvements.
What do you think of this disparity and would it be likely for a psychiatrist to be so blunt?
Glen O. Gabbard: Carmela's psychiatrist was highly unorthodox. He clearly did not want to keep her as a patient because he did not want to take "blood money." Despite the fact that his technique was outrageous, I had some admiration for him because he was so honest and direct in his confrontation of Carmela's collusion with Tony as an enabler of his mob lifestyle.
Fairfax, Va.:
So, apart from Tony (too obvious), which character would you like most to get on your couch so you could dissect their innermost thoughts? And what would surprise you most about that character?
Glen O. Gabbard: Without a doubt, it would be Dr. Melfi. I think that Dr. Melfi knows she has what we call "counter transference excitement" about Tony to the point that she told Elliot "I can't take my eyes off the trainwreck." But she really doesn't have a grasp about why she's so fascinated by him.
I think analyzing Dr. Melfi would reveal that she herself is a closet thrill seeker who vicariously enjoys her celebrity patient's shenanigans.
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