Cold Cuts (The Sopranos)

"**Cold Cuts**"
"Cold Cuts"
The Sopranos episode
Episode no.	Season 5; Episode 10
Directed by	Mike Figgis
Written by	Robin Green; Mitchell Burgess
Cinematography by	Alik Sakharov
Production code	510
Original air date	May 9, 2004
Running time	53 minutes
Episode chronology
← Previous; "Unidentified Black Males"	Next →; "The Test Dream"
	The Sopranos season 5
	List of episodes

"Cold Cuts" is the 62nd episode of the HBO original series The Sopranos and the 10th of the show's fifth season. Written by Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess, and directed by Mike Figgis, it originally aired on May 9, 2004.

Starring

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano
Dr. Jennifer Melfi
Edie Falco as Carmela Soprano
Michael Imperioli as Christopher Moltisanti
Dominic Chianese as Corrado Soprano, Jr. *
Steven Van Zandt as Silvio Dante
Tony Sirico as Paulie Gualtieri
Anthony Soprano, Jr.
*
Jamie-Lynn DiScala as Meadow Soprano
*

Johnny Sack

and

Tony Blundetto

* = credit only

Guest starring

Miryam Coppersmith as

Sophia Baccalieri

Angelo Massagli as

Bobby Baccalieri III

Chandra Wilson as Evelyn Greenwood
Ron Castellano as
Terry Doria
Judy DelGiudice as
Louise Blundetto
Remy Auberjonois as Dr. Phillip Seepman
Angelo Di Mascio Jr. as Security Guard
Gino Cafarelli as
Vinny Pitts
Christian Corp as Janet Petit
Dawn Evans as Cheryl Kolpeki
Adam Grupper as Bela Kakuk
Jennifer Rainville as Gillian Glessner
Andrew Siff as News Anchor

Synopsis

Phil

took the scooters. A shipment of expensive Italian cheeses is coming in; fearing more financial losses, Tony loses his temper in front of his crew.

Tony asks Tony B and

Uncle Pat Blundetto's farm in Kinderhook, New York, which is about to have new owners. Chris complains to Adriana about the two Tonys' past treatment of him. Adriana suggests they leave New Jersey and start over elsewhere, but Chris replies that he is a soldier

for life. Despite early tensions, Chris and Tony B bond as they gradually dispose of the bodies. However, when Tony comes to oversee the completion of the job, the two older men fall back into their routine of picking on Chris, with Tony making fun of his sobriety. Chris passes up an opportunity to go hunting with them and leaves the farm early the next morning, driving home in tears.

Tony returns to the

Paulie

a wad of bills and insists that he make sure Georgie receives the best care. Paulie then tells Tony that Georgie is quitting his job at the Bing and doesn't want to see him again.

Rosalie

that she has no such intention.

soccer game. Tony is infuriated over the publicity brought to his family and storms into Janice's house late at night, demanding she plead guilty to the charges and that Bobby "take control" of his wife. Citing her recent bellicose behavior, Bobby gives Janice an ultimatum to either see an anger management specialist or end their marriage. Janice starts attending anger management classes and tells Tony that they have helped her make tremendous progress; Tony says he is happy for her. The "Soprano temper" becomes the focus of Tony's next session with Dr. Melfi, who observes that both depression

and anger are traits in Tony's family.

Tony joins Janice and Bobby for dinner but becomes irritated when he sees his newly placid sister deal calmly with a series of minor annoyances. He breaks the calm by provoking her with sarcastic and increasingly hurtful comments about her estranged son, Harpo. Janice soon gets enraged and chases Tony round the room with a fork in her fist. Smiling to himself, he leaves.

First appearances

Uncle Pat Blundetto
: Tony S and Tony B's uncle who was given early retirement from the DiMeo crime family because of health issues. He settled on a large farm in Kinderhook, New York, where he was often visited by his nephews Christopher, Tony S, and Tony B during their childhoods.

Title reference

Tony tells Dr. Melfi that "revenge is like serving
cold cuts
" (inadvertently mangling the adage "Revenge is a dish best served cold"). In the episode, Johnny Sack continues to interfere with Soprano business in retribution for the murder of "Joey Peeps."
In a scene at Uncle Pat's farm, Christopher, Pat, and Tony B eat cold-cut sandwiches for lunch.
The title may also refer to the dead bodies Tony B and Christopher are looking for in this episode.

Connections to previous episodes

Christopher and Tony Blundetto dig up and dispose of Emil Kolar's skeleton, moving his body for the second time. Christopher shot and killed Emil in the
Pussy Bonpensiero unsuccessfully tried to put Emil's body into a dumpster. Later, they buried the body under a bridge somewhere. But, the burial was giving Christopher nightmares. So, Christopher and Georgie later dug up the body and relocated it in "The Legend of Tennessee Moltisanti
."

When Tony confronts Janice over the assault, she tells him that the woman is lucky she didn't kill her. Tony responds, "Well, we know that." This refers to the killing of
Richie Aprile by Janice in "The Knight in White Satin Armor
."

The woman Tony sleeps with was previously encountered in "Irregular Around the Margins" as an employee of the dermatologist's office where his cancerous mole was removed.
Tony previously assaulted Georgie in Season 1, Episode 2 "46 Long." Exasperated by Georgie's clumsy way of handling a phone call, Tony took the phone and bashed him on the head with it.

Other cultural references

Of Johnny Sack's belief that Tony Blundetto killed "Joey Peeps," Silvio comments that Sack should be "out looking for the real killers, instead of spending all his time on the golf course." This line is a not-so-subtle jab at O. J. Simpson, who in the years after his acquittal on murder charges claimed to be seeking "the real killers" while he was often criticized for spending much of his free time playing golf.
Dr. Melfi quotes W. B. Yeats' "The Second Coming" during a session with Tony in this episode. This poem will later be used prominently in Season 6 (including an episode titled "The Second Coming").
Tony mentions to Dr. Melfi that John Gotti had a bad temper when he tells her about Janice going to anger management.
On the drive to Kinderhook, Tony B confides to Christopher: "that Legend of Sleepy Hollow cartoon used to scare the piss out of me" and adds that "very sorry people" used to call Tony B Ichabod Crane. According to a notation by Washington Irving, the character of Ichabod Crane was based on a schoolteacher whom Irving befriended in Kinderhook, New York, in 1809.^[1]
Tony B jokes that Tony S's blood is 65% zeppola (an Italian pastry) and that "When he heard the term "pie in the sky," he volunteered for the 82nd Airborne."
In the audio commentary, the episode's director, Mike Figgis, points out how the scene where Christopher and Tony Blundetto dig up the skeletal remains of a man Christopher knew (and killed) symbolically referenced the famous Yorick scene in Hamlet.
Christopher, as in episodes before, once again mistakenly calls Emil Kolar a
Czechoslovakian when, in fact, he was a Czech-American. Paulie Walnuts once confused Chechens with Czechoslovakians in "Pine Barrens
."

When Uncle Pat remembers where the missing bodies are buried, Christopher likens him to Johnny Mnemonic. He remembers the site due to a Swiss Colony wine bottle being on the fence.
When Tony is flipping channels, the Cartoon Network show Whatever Happened to... Robot Jones? is seen on the TV.
At a diner, Tony B mentions to Tony that Christopher has the same car (Hummer H2) as Schwarzenegger. Tony then, in a malapropism (the way Schwarzenegger did), calls it "the Humvee."
Tony B calls Chris a "friend of Bill," a euphemism for a member of Alcoholics Anonymous.
The voice on the TV program about terrorist threats to ports is Jim Lehrer of the PBS NewsHour.
Tony misquotes the Phoebe Snow song "Harpo's Blues" (from her eponymous 1974 album) as "Harpo's Song" when he is deliberately attempting to provoke Janice during this episode's final scene.
At dinner, when Bobby Jr. makes reference to “a G5. It has 64-bit architecture” he is referring to a Power Mac G5.

Music

The piano song played at the wedding shop visited by Christopher and Adriana is "Music Box Dancer," written by Frank Mills.
The song played at the Bada Bing! before Tony beats Georgie up is "Stop" by
Madonna has performed as "Don't Tell Me
".

The song played over the end credits is a live version of "I'm Not Like Everybody Else" by The Kinks, which is featured in their 1994 album To the Bone.

References

^ "In Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Monument in Memory of Soldiers of the Revolution". The New York Times. New York. 1894-10-14. p. 17. Retrieved 2009-02-20.

External links

"Cold Cuts" Archived 2016-08-18 at the Wayback Machine at HBO
"Cold Cuts" at
IMDb

[1] "In Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Monument in Memory of Soldiers of the Revolution". The New York Times. New York. 1894-10-14. p. 17. Retrieved 2009-02-20.

[1]