James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano (left) and Michael Imperioli as Christopher Moltisanti (right) in The Sopranos
This contains ***spoilers*** for all six seasons of HBO’s The Sopranos.
The Sopranos to this day remains the most important television show ever made. From the excellent casting and pitch perfect performances to the sheer quality of the writing and direction, there is absolutely no doubt that without this show, many of today’s most popular shows would not be around. Over the course of six seasons and eighty-six episodes, the show simply redefined modern television. One of the main plot-lines that intrigued throughout the series run was the fragile and ultimately unstable relationship between main character Tony Soprano (the late, great James Gandolfini) and his troublesome nephew Christopher Moltisanti (Michael Imperioli).
Christopher has always been a thorn in Tony’s side. In the ninth episode of the the sixth season titled ‘The Ride’, we witness one of the most bitter-sweet scenes of the series run. The quality of the writing in The Sopranos was uniformly exquisite and in a scene like this one, which is seemingly a throwaway set-piece scene is no exception. It is a scene rife with laughs but overall in the grand scheme of the show acts as the ultimate catalyst for the end of the relationship between the Tony and Christopher a few episodes later. From the joy and exhilaration of the robbery to the reflective dinner and Tony’s general bewilderment at Christopher’s inability to have a glass of wine without relapse (his general lack of understanding about alcoholism and addiction on par with the ignorant masses). It is with Tony’s persistence that ultimately tips Christopher over-the-edge yet again and practically seals in Tony’s mind what needs to be done (which he does in the episode ‘Kennedy and Heidi’).
James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano in The Sopranos.
The biker gang ‘The Vipers’are in the middle of a liquor store robbery, so Tony and Christopher take it upon themselves to take some of the 1986 Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande wine the bikers are stealing. What follows is an intensely amusing stick up scored to ‘All Right Now’ by British rock band Free. The subsequent gunplay is also great, with Christopher’s delight at hitting one of the gang members, “I fuckin’ shot him!” he exclaims in delight at one point. The robbery is the show at its playful best, the humour intermixed with the violence and threat are all staples of The Sopranos, the clever writing and well staged action scene that sets up the dinner Christopher and Tony have afterwards.
The more meditative dinner scene displays the lack of bond between them despite the antics of previous. Anything resembling a close relationship is long gone, and you can’t help but notice it in some of Tony’s gestures (one of the joys of Gandolfini’s performance and his career in general, his ability to say more with a forlorn look, or forced grin than a thousand words). Imperioli and Gandolfini were rightly lauded for their turns in the show and here they share a wonderful scene. Despite all their ups and downs, you get the sense that they are incompatible together and ultimately Tony sees Christopher as a threat to not only him, but his family and himself. Christopher having a glass of wine too signifies the beginning of the end and by the end of the episode is back doing hard drugs. The scene is one of closure for Tony, him coming to terms that he had done his best and failed.
James Gandolfini portraying Tony Soprano in HBO’s The Sopranos.
Introduction: This was an essay written during my time attending the University of Limerick. It was for a class called Sociology of Gender and Popular Culture and was submitted on the 30th April 2012. We were given the freedom to write about any pop culture artefact we wanted. I was in the middle of the rerun of the show so decided to focus on it. Writing about shows you adore in a critical way can be a frustrating experience, but does give one the opportunity to look at things from a different perspective. The essay remains unedited, so it may contain some errors and dubious ramblings of a student trying to fill a specific word count.
The Crisis of Masculinity in ‘The Sopranos’: Tony Soprano’s struggle to be the “strong, silent-type” and the challenges he faces.
David Chase’s The Sopranos was a critically acclaimed drama series that aired from 1999 to 2006 on American television channel HBO. The series followed Soprano family patriarch Tony Soprano in his dealings in both his turbulent personal life and in his violent and conflict-filled role in the DiMeo (later known as the Soprano crew) crime family. This essay will evaluate the representation of masculinity in the show through two characters that interact in different ways with Tony’s masculine performance; his interactions with his sister Janice Soprano and his working relationship with closeted homosexual crime family member Vito Spatafore. There will be a contrast between and evaluation of the masculine stereotypes and how each character tries to challenge/or becomes a victim of these stereotypes. Tony’s patriarchal masculinity is in constant conflict with his work (through Vito’s accidental coming out) and family life as Janice challenges the stereotypical role of the women purely as feminine and performs a dual role containing both feminine and masculine qualities. Vito, while being married and having two children, is a closeted homosexual and the revealing of this information (in a slightly comic way) sees his reputation as a valuable asset to the crime family deteriorate into tragedy, ridicule and the questioning of Tony’s leadership and even his own masculinity for not noticing Vito’s sexuality earlier. The essay will evaluate Tony’s patriarchal role and how his response to these characters actions help him break the stereotypical masculine performance (often much to his disappointment), but creates a more modern, conflicted masculinity at odds with his desire to be the “ideal male” (Larke-Walsh 2010, p. 163), which he defines in the pilot episode of the series in his first meeting with his psychiatrist: “What happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type. That was an American. He wasn’t in touch with his feelings. He just did what he had to do” (The Sopranos 1999). While the overbearing focus of gender studies tends to focus on feminism, it has led to “masculinity and male heterosexuality […] to be understood as fixed, stable, unalterable and therefore beyond enquiry” (Feasey 2008, p. 2), but recent television shows like The Sopranos, The Shield, Brotherhood and The Wire have presented a new approach to the representation of tough-guy male lead characters. While the focus of this essay will be on The Sopranos and Tony, each of the aforementioned shows presents us with a new modern trend of presenting lead male characters struggling with their masculinity and having their ideals challenged and their supposed masculine integrity questioned and damaged/destroyed often through their own inability to adapt to modern ways.
What happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type. That was an American. He wasn’t in touch with his feelings. He just did what he had to do”
– Tony Soprano
The main character of The Sopranos is Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) who very much embodies the anti-hero role. Despite his often horrible actions, we witness his viewpoint, his motivations for what he does and his involvement with other characters often deals with contemporary issues such as patriarchy, sexual orientation, misogyny, the war on terror (in the wake of 9/11), racism, feminism, the use of violence and ethnic identity, albeit in a more exaggerated form for the purpose of entertainment. His relationship with his sister Janice (Aida Turturro) is a troubled one, as she does not fit into Tony’s idea of a traditional family relationship and challenges his (as well as the traditional family value system) value system through her ‘masculine’ actions, her open sexually promiscuous behaviour (she has relationships/affairs with various characters throughout the series) and her feminist influence over Tony’s daughter Meadow which all creates conflict in their relationship and her general antagonistic and manipulative behaviour towards certain people that draws Tony’s anger. Tony and in particular the members of Tony’s crew “offer a thoroughly conflicted masculinity” (Malin 2005, p. 174) and becomes a thing of humour in the series run, with many colourful explicit terms being applied to those not of heterosexual orientation and other ethnic representations that do not fit in with the norms in Italian American Mafioso subculture.
Aida Turturro portraying Janice Soprano in HBO’s The Sopranos.
What makes Tony such a sympathetic and perhaps likeable lead character despite his often despicable and violent ways is that he is shown “often through comparison to other less palatable presentations of Italian-American masculinity” (Larke-Walsh 2010, p. 170) and this is represented with his conflict with the troublesome Ralph Cifaretto (Joe Pantoliano). “Ralph embodies many negative masculine and ethnic stereotypes” (Larke-Walsh 2010, p. 170) and regularly displays misogynistic, violent and overly masculine attitudes that bring him into conflict with Tony. He represents the crisis in male masculinity that goes to extreme lengths to prove their superiority over potential male competition or with violence towards women; which is brought to a sinister head with his relationship with Tracy, a stripper. This relationship exposes both Tony and Ralph’s differentiating definitions of masculinity and exposes further that despite Tony’s aggressive and criminal behaviour, he often has the best intentions in mind. His almost father/daughter-like relationship with Tracy (which Ralph misconstrues) is innocent in nature and Tracy’s misreading of Tony’s kind gesture (advice with regards to her son’s health) leads to her demise at the hands of Ralph, whose feeling of being inferior to Tony (as he is his subordinate in the crime family and his masculinity is constantly undermined by Tony’s open dislike and reprimanding of him) leads to acts of violence to challenge Tony’s rule. “Tony’s violence towards him [Ralph] is not only justified within the narrative, but can also be seen as an attempt to annihilate the possibility of that aspect in Tony’s own identity” (Larke-Walsh 2010, p. 170), as when we see Tony commit acts of violence, there is usually sufficient need in the context of the show to warrant action (the concept of Tony being the lesser evil and even noble in his intentions), even with Tony’s brutal murder of Ralph would have even the most casual of viewers rooting for Tony over the evil sociopath Ralph who shows no redeeming qualities (he was also responsible for the killing of a racehorse Tony was attached to and led to their big fight in which Ralph died). Not only is Tony’s killing of Ralph (in a literal fight to the death) is a showing of his masculine superiority, he feels that it is a murder that needed to be done for the sake of the family and therefore he murdered him in an act of patriarchy protection (or to protect his own best interests and eliminate a rival to his throne).
James Gandolfini portraying Tony Soprano in HBO’s The Sopranos.
Tony has a more troublesome and complex relationship with his sister Janice. “Janice recognizes that she is compelled to perform traditional femininity, but her performances are frequently not “carried out to expectation” and even ignored in favour of the appropriation of her male counterparts’ performances of masculinity” (Palmer-Mehta 2006, p. 58), she is a character who drifts between gender roles, often showing qualities represented as masculine performance like standing up against the violent Richie Aprile, a man who is the personification of the ‘old Mob ways’, who Janice eventually murders after he hits her. She then embraces traits and weaknesses perceived as being part of the feminine performance; she asks Tony for money and to basically clean up her mistakes and to dispose of Richie’s body. Her ability to switch between these gender roles is part of Janice’s successful mixing of gender and her “performances challenge the notion that masculinity naturally inheres to male bodies and that womanliness is natural, normal, or even achievable” (Palmer-Mehta 2006, p. 58). She superficially subscribes to a very much feminist set-up, at one time in the series also showing adherence to a hippie lifestyle (much to the disdain of Tony) as well as being a born-again Christian. Despite often reverting to feminine performances to coax a sympathetic reaction from Tony, as the series progresses she “remains a masculinised presence; now married to the overweight Bobby […], she again serves to upend her culture’s traditional gender roles” (Grynbaum 2011) as she actively takes advantage of Bobby’s grief over the loss of his first wife. She assumes the traditional masculine role of pursuing the grieving Bobby, and once they eventually marry, she begins riling Bobby to challenge Tony’s authority when it comes to work matters. While Bobby suffers for Janice’s actions (Tony is aware of Janice’s actions), her actions are not meant to hurt Bobby, but to undermine and question Tony’s authority and status as patriarch of the Soprano family, something she would seem to be jealous of given her attempts at gender masculine actions. Her ability to transcend the lines between masculine and feminine performance provide a crisis to Tony, as he can do nothing to hurt Janice out of his own code of what defines masculinity and renders her invulnerable.
A character however who does not transcend these performances is Soprano crew member Vito Spatafore (Joseph R. Gannascoli). Tony’s sexuality and masculinity come in conflict with the revealing of Vito’s homosexuality, as he was already struggling to perform the role he sees as being the ‘ideal man’. “Tony’s nostalgia for a masculine identity based on Gary Cooper as the ideal male” (Larke-Walsh 2010, p. 163) is mourning for his own loss of masculinity that builds throughout the series. His masculine identity is challenged in a variety of ways throughout the show’s run, by a variety of sources, from his wife Carmella, daughter Meadow, his sister and the a variety of women he has extramarital affairs with. The revealing of Vito’s sexuality presents a new crisis to Tony, as he failed to not only discover Vito’s secret, but that Vito operated just like any of the other heterosexual characters in Tony’s crew. Vito is a relatively minor character in the early seasons of the show, but comes to prominence from the third season onwards. His undetected homosexuality brings about subconscious fears in the crew. In season five, we see him going to a gay bar and he is eventually found out by the Mafioso in the sixth season and this sends him into exile. “The narrative focuses less on Vito’s sexual identity and much more on the crew’s homophobia” (Larke-Walsh 2010, p. 175) and the colourful list of derogatory terms used by members of the crew to describe him is expansive for a character they once worked with daily and was seen as a top member of the crew (as an “earner”, who made the crew significant money). It becomes apparent that members of the crew feel that if they show support for Vito they may become figures of ridicule and likely suffer a similar fate to him. Vito’s eventual murder by rival crime family member Phil Leotardo is brutal and horrendous despite Phil being his cousin-in-law. Phil shows the most contempt and hatred for Vito once he finds out his true sexual orientation, as Phil represents an older system of values (in Mafia terms and symbolic of older generations reactions to homosexuality), like with Tony’s nostalgic longing to be like Gary Cooper, a role in which he could never fully perform.
Joseph R. Gannascoli portraying Vito Spatafore in HBO’s The Sopranos.
Phil’s anxiety around Vito’s coming out is not a matter of Phil considering Vito’s sexual orientation; rather it is Phil thinking of how other people will lose respect for him and use Vito’s sexuality to undermine his authority. Vito’s eventual gruesome death escalates the tension between Phil and Tony even further and eventually is a catalyst in starting a mob war. Vito’s existence in Tony’s universe undermined a lot of the ideals in the ultra-manly and masculine-centric ideals: “Tony and his crew idealize the manly virtues: loyalty, stoicism, and problem solving through brute force. Their favourite hang-outs—the pork store and the strip club—are shrines to the sacred, macho sins of gluttony and lust” (Selsberg 2007), but Vito’s accidental revealing of his homosexuality brought about another side of Tony and his crew members, fear. They were intimidated by Vito’s sexuality and their reaction are slurs and degrading remarks, purely to reinforce that they are heterosexual males, as perhaps showing sympathy for Vito would have led them to being ridiculed in the vein of Vito. “The reaction to Vito’s homosexuality is truly phobic—irrational terror sprouting as hate” (Selsberg 2007). To maintain his masculine authority figure persona (in the crew’s eyes specifically), he orders a hit (the murder) on Vito, but Phil beats them to it. Despite remaining quiet on the subject (he maintains Vito is a good earner), he is pressured into ordering the murder. Either way, Tony’s authority was going to be undermined by either protecting a homosexual or taking orders from lower ranked family members. He ultimately chooses the one that personally causes him the least personal damage.
The biggest masculine crisis that Tony finds is in his own character as he sees “himself as a castrated ghost of some mythic masculinity past” (Malin 2005 p. 179), his inability to maintain his ideological views in midst of his fractured relationships with those around him. He offers the ultimate view of conflicted lead character: “a toughened killer who cries in his psychiatrist’s office, Tony embodies the vision of masculinity that has him so upset in the first place” (Malin 2005, p. 179) and despite his attempts to implement his masculine authority over those around him (often in fits of rage he comes to regret), his overreactions only serve to undermine his masculine identity and the Gary Cooper persona he wants to adopt. The Sopranos has conflicting messages about the presentation and reception of masculinity in its characters. Tony represents the classic anti-hero convention with modern masculine anxieties; a man so keen to be seen as the all-powerful patriarch that by even expressing these anxieties conflicts with the persona he desires. Janice represents the greatest shift in the symbolic notions of the gender role, with her mixing of both masculine and feminine gender roles to suit whoever she needs to manipulate. Her relationship with Tony is very much a love/hate one, she knows how to both manipulate and anger him to an equal extent, but always falls back on the brother/sister relationship that Tony feels it is his duty to protect and provide for her. Vito’s relationship with Tony is ended by the revealing of his sexuality. This is not because of Tony’s homophobia, but rather an attempt to keep his own heterosexuality out of question and to reinforce his position as the leader and patriarch of the Soprano crew. Tony’s only preoccupation with his masculinity is how others perceive it and it plays a significant part in how he communicates with his sister and Vito. Janice is afforded the compassion that Vito is not because Janice ideally falls into Tony’s idea of patriarch. Tony’s conflicted masculinity and when his attempts at old fashioned patriarchy come into effect, they are only when it suits his own agenda and only to reinforce his own sense of masculinity, rather than genuine concerns about those around him.
Bibliography
– Connell, R.W. (1995) Masculinities, 2nd ed., Los Angeles: University of California Press.
– Feasey, R. (2008) Masculinity and Popular Television, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press Ltd.
– Grynbaum, M.M. (2011) ‘Part 6. Ethnic and Social Concerns: Mangia Mafia! Food Punishment, and Cultural Identity in The Sopranos’ in Howard, D.L., Lavery, D. and P. Levinson, The Essential Sopranos Reader, Lexington: University Press of Kentucky.
– Larke-Walsh, G.S. (2010) Screening the mafia: masculinity, ethnicity and mobsters from The Godfather to the Sopranos, Jefferson: McFarland & Company, Inc.
– Malin, B.J. (2005) American Masculinity Under Clinton: Popular Media and the Nineties “Crisis of Masculinity”, New York: Peter Lang Publishing Inc.
– Palmer-Mehta, V. (2006) ‘Disciplining the Masculine: The Disruptive Power of Janice Soprano’ in Lavery, D., Reading the Sopranos: hit TV from HBO, London: I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd., 56-69.
Bobby Baccalieri Sr. (Burt Young) made one appearance in The Sopranos. And it was a memorable one at that. Dying from lung cancer, the fragile elder Baccalieri undertakes a hit on orders from Tony (James Gandolfini) to kill Mustang Sally (Brian Tarantina), his godson. It must be noted that this storyline is not of any significant relevance to the seasons main story arc (other than building Bobby’s relationship with his father and his feelings about Tony). However, what this scene does is contain all the hallmarks of what makes The Sopranos probably the greatest television show ever made. It is a scene that is brutally violent, yet darkly humourous as Bobby Sr. takes out these two goons in a brutally improvised fashion. It’s a terrifically tense scene, where the ailing Bobby Sr. fights two younger, stronger, but far less clever men. It culminates in the seemingly pleasant old man taunting an injured Carlos before killing him. Old habits die hard for Bobby Sr. who then celebrates with a cigarette. Of course, as only The Sopranos would do, to suffer a heart attack afterwards while driving home is the show at its dark hearted best. Moments of dark humour and violence have never been mixed so well, especially on television. While it’s of no great significance to the overall plot-line, it is what made The Sopranos such a joy to watch (see the episode Pine Barrens for further reference), the ability of the show to go on tangents and to bring in smaller characters and make them fully realised and enjoyable while never sacrificing the main ensemble’s draw. This self-contained segment mixed with wicked humour and gratuitous violence makes it a memorable moment (one of many) in The Sopranos legacy.
John Markham 