Last week The Sopranos turned a quarter century old. It can’t be overstated what a game-changer it was. Apart from gifting viewers with six all-timer seasons — and one of the most divisive, maddening endings in the medium’s history — it also inspired others to think bigger. Without The Sopranos, you don’t get The Wire, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, The Americans, yada yada yada. But 25 years on, is TV still kicking butt? Its creator doesn’t seem to think so.
In a new chat with The Times (as caught by The Guardian), David Chase sounded downright grumpy.
“We’re going back to where I was,” Chase said, referring to the time before The Sopranos came along and changed everything. “They’re going to have commercials,” he added, referring to how streamers, once ad-free, are starting to go back to the ways of linear television.
Chase also lamented how the powers-that-be have been telling him to “dumb down” his prospective shows, to steer away from television that “requires an audience to focus.”
For instance, he’s been working on a show about a sex worker with the filmmaker Hannah Fidell. Recently they were on their third draft and fifth meeting, during which they were told the “unfortunate truth” that their show was way too complex.
“Who is this all really for?” Chase fumed. “I guess the stockholders?”
The last quarter century has been seen as a second “Golden Age,” producing shows as strong and bold as in the early days, from 1947 through 1960. Chase thinks that’s over, calling a “25-year blip.”
“And to be clear, I’m not talking only about The Sopranos, but a lot of other hugely talented people out there who I feel increasingly bad for,” Chase said. “This is the 25th anniversary, so of course it’s a celebration. But perhaps we shouldn’t look at it like that. Maybe we should look at it like a funeral.”
The Sopranos ended in 2007. Since then Chase has returned to the world he created with the underrated prequel The Many Saints of Newark. He also made the even more underrated 1960s saga Not Fade Away, from 2012.
(Via The Times and The Guardian)
