TV Time + "In Treatment"

I'm obsessed... again. This time the object of my affection is HBO's 30-minute drama, In Treatment. The show centers around Gabriel Byrne as psychotherapist Dr. Paul Weston and the sessions he has with his patients and his own therapist.

Funny thing, I'd never heard of the show before Howard Stern mentioned it on his show. And I only checked it out based on a recommendation from a friend who took up Howard on his recommendation. I probably wouldn't have caught up with the show otherwise. More often than not I think my opinions and taste are aligned with Howard's but for some reason I just had a bad feeling about In Treatment. Boy was I wrong. It actually frightens me to think of how close I came to missing out on the show entirely.

So what's to love? Well if you're like me you love a good chat. You love good conversation and well written dialogue in film and television that give the feel of that experience. That's one of the greatest strengths of the show. It's perfectly produced. It feels real. It is real. Real in the sense that... well I have this idea in my mind whenever a great performance transcends the norm: I think of shamans. Shamans are conduits of the divine. They are men. But when they perform within the context of a ritual they don't act as the divine, they are the divine. When an artist is truly in a role, truly in character, they become the character. There's a breakthrough that happens with truly great storytelling. It becomes and is. I've the impression that these people are real, that they've lived and I'm witness to something genuine and true. There's a rawness and reality about the show that doesn't exist in most. It's very special.

Maybe I've gone ahead of myself so let me step back. The show's an easy pick up because of the way it's structured. As I've said, it's a show about a doctor and his patients. But that dynamic doesn't play out in the usual way you see those stories unfold. It's very simple and direct. Each show averages around 23 minutes, which is something I love and hate. I loved it at the outset because it meant it required very little commitment on my part to engage in it. But once engaged, I was utterly consumed and 23 minutes never felt like enough. I wanted more and more. But in reality, those 23 minutes are more than enough because the content is so intense. Those few minutes really pack a punch and leave a lasting impression.

Each show corresponds with one session, with one patient on one day of the week. It's a very simple formula and I love it. There are five sessions throughout the week. One for each weekday, for each patient. That's it. There are never any new characters. There are no new settings. It's just these wonderfully flawed people locked up in a room digging and diving for 23 minutes straight. It's very direct. It's also perfect. Perfect because I get the impression that the show would be ruined if it cut in between different sessions with different patients. The sessions build in intensity throughout the the course of those 23 minutes. But you need every second of those 23 minutes to get to that point. Trying to juggle more than one person's story in that time would be a mess. I love the compartmentalization of the structure. It gives the audience a break. It's a good thing that there's more than one patient to follow. I couldn't imagine having the mental and emotional fortitude to stick with one person's story show after show. Breaking the shows up as weekdays was genius.

Gee, I didn't realize I'd gone on so long... I didn't mean to. I just really want to get across my love for the show because I think it's something a lot of people could love too if they gave it a chance. I think the thing I love most is how it engages the audience in introspection. The characters of the show are beautiful people. They're diverse and familiar. Flawed. It's near impossible not to empathize with them. There have been more than a few episodes where I found it hard to follow because I was lost in my own thoughts. Thinking I can see parts of myself in the stories that are unfolding on screen. If nothing else, the show is thought-provoking. It's deep that way. A lot of it, the superficial, is simple... but the core of the show is so complex. And I love complexity.

Anyway, check out the show!!! Please, at least watch the first five episodes. The first five cover the first week and introduce each patient of the week. Those five shows are more than enough to hook you or turn you off. You can get the first 15 episodes free at the iTunes Store, though you should be warned that they're censored. Then again, the show's not exactly filthy so you won't be missing out on much, just a curse word here and there. But I love to experience things in their most pure form, so you might want to torrent the show to get the full experience. ;)


DS333, in love.



p.s. The Friday shows (episode 5, 10, 15...) are the episodes I live and die for!!! :D