“The Test Dream” Review
Grade: A+
“In dreams I walk with you”
The Sopranos is the de facto “greatest TV show of all time” because of its ability to be appreciated by all audiences. Traditional crime drama violence is effortlessly combined with thought-provoking intellectual artistry, and each individual episode is simultaneously straightforward and ambiguous, a perfect mixture of the high and the low, the primal and the poignant. No matter who you are or where you come from, The Sopranos resonates with everyone and anyone.
To borrow a concept from Stanley Kubrick, The Sopranos can be compared to a Beatles record in that it can be admired by both the Alabama truck driver and the Cambridge academic. This is accomplished by appealing directly to our subconscious mind, where ideas are formed based on our own emotions rather than being plainly stated. Due to the compelling visual storytelling, we discover the deeper meanings for ourselves.
It’s a careful combination of gritty realism and metaphysical surrealism that makes The Sopranos such an unqualified success. And when it comes to metaphysical surrealism, the season five episode “The Test Dream” is the absolute zenith of the series’ cerebral qualities.
“The Test Dream” is best remembered for its 20-minute dream sequence, which takes influence from David Lynch, Luis Buñuel and Federico Fellini to plumb the depths of Tony Soprano’s inner psyche. It’s a breathtaking trip, even if the meaning is initially hard to grasp.
Of course, this shift toward experimental cinema doesn’t necessarily come out of the blue. The Sopranos has already featured several memorable dream sequences throughout its run, including the waking fantasy of “Isabella,” the feverish visions of “Funhouse” and the twin nightmares of “Calling All Cars” (not to mention all the other episodes that carry a supernatural aesthetic). But “The Test Dream” is the episode that pushes the envelope the furthest.
In fact, the episode is already dreamlike before the dream itself even begins. Director Allen Coulter uses dissolve transitions and tracking shots to establish an atmospheric unease, and the first scene of the hour features the unreal image of Tony’s mistress Valentina suffering severe burns as her hair catches on fire. Shortly afterward, an homage to Goodfellas can only be described as uncanny — Phil Leotardo (played by Frank Vincent) brutally murders Angelo Garepe in the trunk of a car, the same exact way that Vincent was killed in Martin Scorsese’s 1990 film.
To get away from it all, Tony checks into the luxurious Plaza Hotel in Manhattan. Aside from The Shining parallels, it’s a very non-Sopranos setting. In the background, Claude Debussy’s “Claire de Lune” plays on a harp, and in the distance, Dr. Jennifer Melfi drifts by with a group of friends. Already, “The Test Dream” is eerie in a manner that the series has never explored.
The dream occurs midway through the episode, after Tony has slept with a prostitute and received news that Angelo has been killed. With fears that his cousin Tony Blundetto — who was Angelo’s cellmate throughout their years in prison — might go rogue, he drifts off to uneasy sleep.
The titular “test dream” takes off, and series creator David Chase employs all manner of surrealist techniques: false awakenings, trick transitions, callbacks, flashbacks, non-sequiturs, absurdist dialogue, canted angles, movie references and peculiar ambiguities where the fourth wall may or may not be broken.
However, nothing about the filmmaking is a gimmick. The dream sequence’s greatness lies in its believability — The Sopranos keeps the same visual aesthetic that it always does, and the characters don’t act any differently than they did in the waking world. Chase’s brand of surrealism is grounded in reality, which is wholly unique compared to how every other film and TV show approached the subject.
The dream isn’t just cinematic showmanship; it’s a natural narrative progression. In a way, it’s more real than anything The Sopranos had ever depicted — every viewer can relate to Tony’s adventures through the looking glass because we share the same type of experience every single night.
Then again, the stuff Tony’s dreams are made of aren’t comparable to yours or mine. He meets several accomplices living and dead, and it’s only natural that a mob boss would be haunted by his personal demons everywhere he goes. A strong fear of death pervades each encounter, as Carmine Lupertazzi Sr. bemoans his loneliness on the other side, while Gloria Trillo laments her abusive relationships and untimely suicide.
My favorite aspects — other than seeing familiar faces that we never thought we’d see again — are the in-dream transitions, in which Tony and another character will watch what happens in the next scene on a nearby television set. It’s such a credibly novel way of showing how dreams break the very fabric of spacetime, jumping from one P.O.V. to the next like the ending of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Ultimately, the dream boils down to Tony’s internal realization that he must kill his own cousin for the good of the family. And even though every detail can be mined for infinite interpretations, the best way to watch “The Test Dream” is to let the stream of consciousness wash over you. It’s rare for a commercially successful work of art to approach avant-garde territory, but just like The Beatles did with Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and The White Album, The Sopranos makes such radical innovations seem simple.
“The Test Dream” culminates with the appearance of Tony’s high school football coach, Coach Molinaro, who berates Tony for the life he’s chosen. It’s here that the full scope of the dream is revealed, and everything seems to make momentary sense: Tony wouldn’t be going through such mental hardships (e.g., the divorce he caused, the deaths he’s responsible for and the agonizing decision to murder a family member) if he had just picked up a whistle instead of a gun as a teenager.
Sure, he could’ve been a lonely salesman somewhere in California, but his life would’ve been changed for the better. Like all vivid nightmares, the answer seems so simple at first — an inner moment of clarity where you shout to the sky, “I get it!” — but the solution forever remains just out of reach. The past dictates the future.
Tony wakes with a start — for real, this time — and receives word from Christopher Moltisanti that Tony B has struck back at Phil Leotardo and his brother. He resigns himself to his fate, finally prepared for his task, and looks out at the darkness over Central Park. The episode ends with Tony calling Carmela at 5:24 a.m. and engaging in a soft, gentle conversation about the day to come. It’s a beautiful way to close the episode — a peaceful postlude that is well deserved.
Both the final scene and the episode as a whole are cathartic in an unexplainable way. But that’s the beauty of dream logic — it’s mysterious and strange and complex, but it somehow makes sense. Like a great film or piece of music, the episode speaks in a universal language, one that doesn’t require any analytical background to understand.
By existing as one of the most realistic and all-encompassing hallucinations in cinematic history, “The Test Dream” easily stands as one of The Sopranos’ all-time masterpieces. And thanks to the series’ status as the most popular show on TV, the episode subsequently made surrealism fashionable on the small screen, inspiring showrunners to bring their dreams to life, from Louie to The Leftovers.
For the crime drama enthusiasts, it’s an amazing detour that comes as a breath of fresh air. But for the fans who watch The Sopranos for its thought-provoking artistry, “The Test Dream” has been a long time coming. The opening scene of the series showed a man anxiously waiting in a psychiatrist’s office. It was only a matter of time before we saw inside his head, and the wait was well worth it.
STRAY ROUNDS
- When Chris visits the hotel room to break the news that Tony B has avenged Angelo’s death, he becomes momentarily transfixed at a half-eaten chocolate bar on Tony’s desk. He asks Tony if he can have the rest, which is an absolutely hilarious thing to say given the circumstances. Real life is often more absurd than dreams.
- There are so many references and callbacks in the dream sequence that to discuss every little detail here would be an exercise in futility. It would at least deserve its own scene-by-scene analysis, so I’ll instead point out a few of my observations:
- Early in the dream, Tony answers the phone and David Chase himself is on the other end (you’d only know it if you recognized his voice). In a sense, The Sopranos crosses over to our dimension in this instant, which is a concept that David Lynch’s Twin Peaks explores in great detail.
- I understand the appearances of Scrooge and High Noon on TV sets during the dream, but I’m confused about the scene from Chinatown. Tony comments that “it’s so much more interesting than life.” In the film, Jack Nicholson plays a private detective who tries to help people but only ends up making things worse for everyone involved. So maybe that’s the explanation?
- The eerie scenes of low-quality TV sets remind me of Lost Highway.
- Vin Makazian (as Finn De Trolio’s father) singing “Three Times a Lady” should be hilarious, but it’s quite unnerving. Especially with the presence of Annette Bening as herself for no apparent reason.
- It’s hard to notice, but Paulie Gualtieri is among the lynch mob that chases Tony down the alley à la Frankenstein. Does this lend credence to the theory that Paulie betrayed Tony in the series finale?
- I’m glad Tony gets to reunite with Pie-O-My in his dream. And, I must say, some nice acting by the horse as he rides her through the living room.
- The final line of the dream is Coach Molinaro taunting Tony, “You’ll never shut me up!” It reminds me of a scene from the end of Ingmar Bergman’s Fanny and Alexander, in which the ghost of the draconian bishop appears and tells young Alexander, “You’ll never be free of me.”
- At the end of the episode, when Tony looks out the window, does there seem to be a small mysterious light on the other side of the city? If so, it’s somewhat similar to what he sees in “Join the Club,” “Mayham” and “Kennedy and Heidi.”
- Without “The Test Dream,” there is no “International Assassin” (from The Leftovers season two). Another incredible surrealist TV episode that features hotels, ghosts and cameos from real-life figures.
- I bet co-writer Matthew Weiner used “The Test Dream” as the basis for Mad Men’s “Far Away Places,” which features Roger Sterling on an LSD trip.
- “The Test Dream” was written by series creator David Chase and Matthew Weiner and directed by Allen Coulter.
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
- “The object is to learn what you saw in me, not what I saw in you.”
- “I don’t have any children. I died too young.”
- “She likes it when you rub her muzzle.”
- “You’re not prepared!”
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