The Essential Sopranos Reader

405 Pages·2011·3.047 MB·English

by  David Lavery, Douglas L. Howard, Paul Levinson

The Essential Sopranos Reader
http://avaxhome.ws/blogs/ChrisRedfield
Essential Readers in
Contemporary Media and Culture
This series is designed to collect and publish the best scholarly writing
on various aspects of television, fi lm, the Internet, and other media of
today. Along with providing original insights and explorations of criti-
cal themes, the series is intended to provide readers with the best avail-
able resources for an in-depth understanding of the fundamental issues
in contemporary media and cultural studies. Topics in the series may
include, but are not limited to, critical-cultural examinations of creators,
content, institutions, and audiences associated with the media industry.
Written in a clear and accessible style, books in the series include both
single-author works and edited collections.
Series Editor
Gary R. Edgerton, Old Dominion University
THE ESSENTIAL
SOPRANOS
READER
Edited by
David Lavery,
Douglas L. Howard,
and Paul Levinson
Foreword by
David Bianculli
T U P K
HE NIVERSITY RESS OF ENTUCKY
Copyright © 2011 by David Lavery
The University Press of Kentucky
Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth,
serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky,
Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson Historical Society, Georgetown
College, Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University, Morehead
State University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University,
Transylvania University, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville,
and Western Kentucky University.
All rights reserved.
Editorial and Sales Offi ces: The University Press of Kentucky
663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008
www.kentuckypress.com
15 14 13 12 11 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The essential Sopranos reader / edited by David Lavery, Douglas L. Howard,
and Paul Levinson ; foreword by David Bianculli.
p. cm. — (Essential readers in contemporary media and culture)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8131-3012-5 (hardcover : alk. paper) |
ISBN 978-0-8131-3014-9 (ebook)
1. Sopranos (Television program) I. Lavery, David, 1949- II. Howard,
Douglas L., 1966- III. Levinson, Paul.
PN1992.77.S66E88 2011
791.45’72—dc23 2011019762
This book is printed on acid-free paper meeting the requirements of the American
National Standard for Permanence in Paper for Printed Library Materials.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
Member of the Association of
American University Presses
Contents
Foreword by David Bianculli ix
Introduction 1
David Lavery
Part 1. The Sopranos, David Chase, HBO, and Television
The Sopranos as Tipping Point in the Second Coming of HBO 7
Gary R. Edgerton
From Made Men to Mad Men: What Matthew Weiner Learned from
David Chase 17
David Lavery
The Sopranos: If Nothing Is Real, You Have Overpaid for Your Carpet 23
Martha P. Nochimson
Author(iz)ing Chase 41
Robin Nelson
Part 2. Characters
“Half a Wiseguy”: Paulie Walnuts, Meet Tom Stoppard 57
Paul Wright
Christopher, Osama, and A.J.: Contemporary Narcissism and
Terrorism in The Sopranos 65
Jason Jacobs
“When It Comes to Daughters, All Bets Are Off”: The Seductive
Father-Daughter Relationship of Tony and Meadow Soprano 81
Marisa Carroll
Part 3. Gendering The Sopranos
“Blabbermouth Cunts”; or, Speaking in Tongues: Narrative Crises for
Women in The Sopranos and Feminist Dilemmas 93
Kim Akass and Janet McCabe
Honoring the Social Compact: The Last Temptation of Melfi 105
Nancy McGuire Roche
A “Finook” in the Crew: Vito Spatafore, The Sopranos, and the
Queering of the Mafi a Genre 114
George De Stefano
Part 4. Cinematic Concerns
The Producers: The Dangers of Filmmaking in The Sopranos 127
Cameron Golden
Comfortably Numb? The Sopranos, New Brutalism, and the Last
Temptation of Chris 137
Glen Creeber
Part 5. Dreams and Therapy
Fishes and Football Coaches: The Narrative Necessity of Dreams in
The Sopranos 149
Cynthia Burkhead
From Here to InFinnerty: Tony Soprano and the American Way 157
Terri Carney
“Whatever Happened to Stop and Smell the Roses?”: The Sopranos as
Anti-therapeutic Narrative 166
David Pattie
Part 6. Ethnic and Social Concerns
Mangia Mafi a! Food, Punishment, and Cultural Identity in The
Sopranos 183
Michael M. Grynbaum
The Guinea as Tragic Hero: The Complex Representation of Italian
Americans in The Sopranos 196
Frank P. Tomasulo
“All Caucasians Look Alike”: Dreams of Whiteness at the End of The
Sopranos 208
Christopher Kocela
Part 7. Images of Justice and The Sopranos
Representations of Law and Justice in The Sopranos: An
Introduction 221
Barbara Villez
Lawyer-Client Relations as Seen in The Sopranos 229
James M. Keneally
“This Isn’t a Negotiation”: “Getting to Yes” with Tony Soprano 232
Sharon Sutherland and Sarah Swan
The Price of Stereotype: The Representation of the Mafi a in Italy and
the United States in The Sopranos 243
Antonio Ingroia
The Image of Justice in The Sopranos 246
Fabio Licata
Part 8. Narrative and Intertextuality
“Funny about God, and Fate, and Shit Like That”: The Imminent
Unexpected in The Sopranos 257
Robert Piluso
The Sopranos and History 266
Albert Auster
Silence in The Sopranos 277
Steven Peacock
Part 9. Cut to Black: The Finale and the Sopranos Legacy
“What’s Different between You and Me”: Carmela, the Audience,
and the End 289
Joseph S. Walker
Unpredictable but Inevitable: That Last Scene 297
Maurice Yacowar
No Justice for All: The FBI, Cut to Black, and David Chase’s
Final Hit 303
Douglas L. Howard
The Sopranos and the Closure Junkies 313
Paul Levinson
Acknowledgments 317
Appendix A: Characters 319
Appendix B: Episode Guide 323
Appendix C: Intertextual References and Allusions in Season Six 327
Appendix D: A Conversation with Dominic Chianese, The Sopranos’
Uncle Junior 339
Bibliography 363
List of Contributors 377
Index 383
Additional Essays Available Online at
http://davidlavery.net/sopranos
Tony’s Menagerie: Animals in The Sopranos (Paul Lumsden)
“Even Brendan Filone’s Got an Identity and He’s Dead”: Christopher
Moltisanti and the Refl exive Subjectivity of the Constructed Self
(Carl Wilson)
Carmela Soprano as Emma Bovary: European Culture, Taste, and
Class in The Sopranos (Elizabeth Mauldin)
The Sopranos as Art Cinema (William Siska)
Tony and Dora: Mastering the Art of Countertransference
(Bruce Plourde)
The Sopranos: Asleep (Sven Weber)
Hospital Scenes, Nursing, and Health Care in The Sopranos
(Dianna Lipp Rivers)
The New Serial Television Narrative: The Sopranos and Relay Race
Structure (Ilaria Bisteghi)
Foreword
Sopranos Snapshot #1: June 2007. It’s the night of the telecast of the
much-anticipated fi nal episode of David Chase’s The Sopranos, and at
its Manhattan headquarters, HBO has invited a small select group of TV
critics to view the fi nal episode an hour or so early in a private screening;
they are then ushered to separate cubbyhole offi ces to write breaking-
news reviews for their respective newspapers. I was then TV critic for
the New York Daily News, and the review was, literally, front-page news,
trumpeted with the big, bold headline “ONE WHACKY ENDING.”
When the screening ended, with the now infamous cut to black dur-
ing the diner scene, at least we knew, in the comfy isolation of our HBO
screening room, that the cable hadn’t gone out. But we also knew, just
as defi nitely, that Chase had thrown us all a wicked curve ball—one that
we had to process, describe, and evaluate instantly, on deadline. None of
us said anything as the lights came up and we went our separate ways. I
remember, however, a chuckle and a groan or two, and, most of all, the
sound of silence.
“Whether you laughed later,” I wrote then, “depended on your sense
of humor, and sense of betrayal.” I spent much of the review tracing the
ending’s foreshadowing in Chase’s various musical selections. To Bob
Dylan’s “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” the week before, with the
line I thought echoed Chase’s feeling at the time: “I got nothin’, Ma,
to live up to.” To the use of Vanilla Fudge’s version of “You Keep Me
Hangin’ On” in the fi nale opener—a nod and a wink, perhaps, to what
Chase had in store with his now iconic use of Journey’s “Don’t Stop
Believin’” as the series cut to black. I even quoted from the penultimate
episode’s use of “When the Music’s Over” by the Doors, with the Bada
Bing girls dancing topless as Jim Morrison sings, “When the music’s
over / turn out the lights.” “Last night, to put a fi nal punctuation to The
Sopranos,” I wrote, “that’s exactly how Chase ended things.”
Sopranos Snapshot #2: May 2008. At The Sopranos: A Wake, an
international symposium held at New York’s Fordham University and