Reaction Shots: A Sopranotember Postmortem
Plus, my first impressions of The Many Saints of Newark
The Many People Writing About The Many Fans of The Sopranos
So I experienced what some in the media landscape would call a moment where a person has an exciting pitch, worked on it for a time, and someone else just tweeted out. Around the time I hit the publish button on The Sopranos’s diverse fanbase, the New York Times had a long essay about its younger cohort. It covered similar ground with what I wrote and you can find certain overlaps. I observed how the theme of decline is universal, and that it resonated with the conservative viewership as well, because that’s how they instinctively think. Willy Staley, the author of the New York Times piece, pointed out how that message resonated strongly with the socialist contingent, corresponding to many world events. I did as well.
But this one caught my eye and it baffled me:
It is this quality of Tony’s — this combination of privilege and self-loathing — that I suspect resonates with a younger generation, whether we want to admit it or not. He’s not so different from us, after all. He has an anxiety disorder. He goes to therapy and takes S.S.R.I.s, but never really improves — not for long, anyway. He has a mild case of impostor syndrome, having skipped some key steps to becoming boss, and he knows that people who hold it against him are sort of right. He’s still proud of his accomplishments in high school. He does psychedelics in the desert, and they change his perspective on things. He often repeats stuff he half-remembers someone smarter than him saying. He’s arguably in an open marriage with Carmela, if a rather lopsided one. He liked listening to “Don’t Stop Believin’” in 2007. He’s impulsive and selfish and does not go to church, though he does seem open to vaguer notions of spirituality. He wishes his career provided him with meaning, but once he had the career, he discovered that someone had pulled the rug out at some point, and an institution that had been a lodestar to him for his whole life was revealed to be a means of making money and nothing more. Does this sound at all familiar to you?
To answer that question, yes, but I personally have not experienced any of this as someone from that ‘younger generation’. I have not even thought that Tony handing errands to his mistresses counts as an open marriage. But that’s just more
There’s more:
Like many young people, Tony is a world-historically spoiled man who is nevertheless cursed, thanks to timing, to live out the end of an enterprise he knows on some level to be immoral. It gives him panic attacks, but he’s powerless to find a way out. Thus trapped — and depressed — it’s not so hard for him to allow himself a few passes, to refuse to become better because the world is so rotten anyway. Tony’s predicament was once his to suffer alone, but history has unfolded in such a way as to render his condition nearly universal. And if people still see a monster in Tony, then the monster is themselves: a twisted reflection of a generation whose awakening to the structures that control them came in tandem with a growing aversion to personal accountability in the face of these systems.
Ultimately, these are the points evoked by David Chase and his champions many times, so it’s not unique to interpret that in that aspect, or in any other show. The big difference between how the NYT and I cover the topic is that the young fans and their experiences are considered to be fashionable by an older cohort of writers, dissecting them like they are part of a National Geographic profile. The New York Times, among many outlets, is undergoing (or have undergone) an institutional revamp to cater to those interested in social justice and progress. So it doesn’t surprise me, that the tone is smug, the prose often meanders and the revelations are already basic.
Sopranotember covered the underappreciated aspects of the show that still remains popular to this day, even after it last aired 14 years ago. Part of why I wanted to write what I have written, is that I am usually not a fan of writing about the audience and investigating why exactly a certain demographic is enjoying a cultural artifact that is either outside their realm or does not align with how the artist or the critic authoritatively read it. That genre of criticism exists out of moralizing and elitism. When Matt Zoller Seitz pointed out to David Chase how much LGBT+ writers love the show, he was happy about it. But in effect, it only emboldens their beliefs, rather than adding anything substantial to the conversation. But other fans of the show, who would rather lean to the status quo, like the show for the exact same reasons. Yet they’re considered to be the bad fans. So think of it as a quasi-response to that kind of writing.
It’s also not unusual for younger viewers to watch older films or TV, primarily because of the absolute convenience of streaming. It’s also not unusual for them to identify with them if it ever channeled their anxiety. Sitcoms like The Office, Friends, and Gilmore Girls are looped repeatedly because they’re easy to watch and depict cozy yet conflict-prone environments that only they can identify. The lines are also quotable, the characters are memorable and most importantly, it has heart. The Sopranos have a similar appeal while being profane and larger in scope. And yet it is pretty challenging TV that you’re urged to rewatch it again.
So maybe a new rule for this newsletter. I should probably not fixate on why certain people enjoy the show. Still, I think you should read my piece because it was something that I really liked writing about. And if you missed out on any of my analysis, here are some links:
Review: The Many Saints of Newark
The Many Saints of Newark is almost a great movie. It’s almost up there with some of the greatest Sopranos episodes like College and Kennedy and Heidi. If you are expecting moments where your favorite character from the show delivers some playful banter, you’re not gonna get one, because most of Newark is a misdirect. Given his reputation for subverting expectations, David Chase knows this. He’s not going to tell you what happens after the final shot of The Sopranos. He’s not going to give you a straight-up Tony Soprano origin story, which would be a creative excuse to set up reboots of other successful franchises. It also won’t expand with other myths, whether it’s Jackie Aprile pulling off this awesome card robbery, as told by Ralphie, or the killings of Bobby Bacala Sr. This is mainly focused on Dickie Moltisanti, Christopher’s father and Tony’s mentor, who is well-liked among his crew and carries the same level of charisma you find in his successor. Christopher (played by a mellow Michael Imperioli) narrates the movie in interludes and through an uncharacteristically weary manner.
But what it shares with The Sopranos is the existential dread of being a mobster. Moltisanti, like Tony, wants to be a good person, and there’s an expectation that he should be since his surname means ‘many saints’. A key to this is Sally Moltisanti (played by Ray Liotta), who is the film’s Dr. Melfi, except he’s far more judgemental towards Dickie and reflective during his time in prison. Ray Liotta is back in good form here and is by far the best actor, playing two characters of dual opposites: Sally, who I mentioned earlier, and Hollywood Dick, Dickie’s father, who’s far more profane and abusive to his wive.
The cast rounds out with impressions of Sopranos characters, rather than adding a dimension. Corey Stoll brings life to a younger Junior Soprano respectively, and the best one thus far is Billy Magnussen as Paulie, who nails the Tony Sirico role to a tee. These can teeter into caricature if they add little dimensions. If you want to see a human side of Livia Soprano, you would be better off watching the final ten minutes of In Camelot, than seeing Vera Farmiga butcher it. The most egregious performance is John Magaro as Silvio, whose croaky voice resembles less of the pompadoured character and more of a gypsy. There are some callbacks to some of the show’s famous moments, but Chase indulges in them less to something far more underseen.
Some of the callouts made for Sopranos fans are hollowed out into something far low-key. Some of Junior’s lines like “never had the making of a varsity athlete” appears as part of his character, rather than a throwaway punchline in the show.
Tony Soprano remains in good hands, however, with Michael Gandolfini being the literal heir to the character. It’s difficult for someone to channel his father’s most iconic performance, but there’s an embedded sensitivity that you find in Michael, that it stays true and authentic to the character.
There’s an inevitable criticism that The Many Saints of Newark should have been a miniseries, rather than a movie. But its hazy artistic choices show that the film can hold up very well. In contrast to the series’s closeups and mid-shots, Newark has a wide range of compositions that makes it less sentimental and allowing its environment’s atmosphere to blossom. Familiar locations like Satriales and Pussy Bonpensiero’s body shop are stripped of much of their personality. Holsten’s, however, adds a symbolic layer of coming to age and anyone who has seen Made In America would realize that the events that occurred over there are far more clarifying
Where it stretches its limits is the Newark backdrop, when the 1967 riots occurred. There’s an interest Chase has over the issue of race in the series, and the movie is no stranger to that too. The main conflict is between Dickie and his former enforcer, Harold McBrayer, who decides to move on from the mafia and make his own criminal group. The most generous interpretation of this crux is that it attempts to clarify the animus between Italian American criminals and their African American counterparts by trying to show why exactly that some of the events in The Sopranos happen to involve them: Tony almost being whacked by two African Americans. Tony blaming two African Americans for a robbery that resulted in Tony Blundetto’s conviction. And a conversation between two bureaucrats - one who happens to be African American - who reminisce about the racial divide that looked worse in the past. However, it feels jerry-rigged and underdeveloped, as soon as Harold diverges. The last time both men see eye to eye, it feels less threatening.
The Many Saints of Newark is seen by a dead character, who has seen the eyes of both men who wanted to be good, but tragically, they weren’t capable of succeeding. I’ll probably come back and write about it again if I can find the best time because I think it could be rewarding on multiple watches. But for what it is, it’s a hit.
Introducing Officetober
This month, I’m going to cover The Office, both the UK and the US versions. In part, because the UK equivalent created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant has turned 20. But also because, I have spent much of the duration during a Delta-induced lockdown in Australia watching through the entirety of the US version, which has since been a class of its own making, with more heart and sophistry compared to its original predecessor.
Like Sopranotember, this will look at what’s underappreciated about a show that’s already been appreciated by pretty much everyone. So no, I won’t be looking at why young people are watching Jim and Pam get married on the loop. In the spirit of the last themed month, it will be a counter-response to how the Internet writes about The Office. Whether it’s Dwight being a symbol of American wrongness or David Brent representing British wrongness and why that looked bad. As I mentioned earlier, The Office, adapted by Greg Daniels is still popular on loop with younger audiences. But as I mentioned earlier, I have no interest in writing about that.
Unlike Sopranotember, there won’t be as many pieces, and it will be released in the usual Lack of Taste rotation: every week or delayed. Well, that’s what she said.