In Treatment 3x21

Yet another intense session with Sunil. When Paul opens the door, he finds Julia, and she has something to say: she is terminating Sunil’s therapy, it has not helped at all, the situation at home has only gotten worse. You can see on her face she is angry, she has a bandage on her arm and informs Paul that there was an incident with Sunil. They had an argument in front of the children, he pushed her and she fell onto a nail in the book case. Then she leaves and Sunil comes in. His side of the story is very different: he was singing a Bengali song to his grandchildren, Julia demanded that he stop, started yelling at him, the children started crying, and when he tried leaving the room, he pushed passed Julia, who scratched herself against the nail. Now Paul really has reason to worry that Sunil might harm someone. If that isn’t enough, Sunil asks him if he may keep an old cricket bat in safe keeping. Tension is rife, but Paul cannot determine whether Sunil is capable of violence. He keeps trying to find out, whether he could hurt Julia, whether there was more to Sunil’s violent dream, whether he ever harmed Manili, but Sunil keeps evading his questions. Paul and Sunil agree there will be one more session, since Julia offered a check for another hour, as Sunil refuses to become a charity case. How is that one extra session going to resolve anything? Will there be some shocking revelation that Paul has been on the wrong track all along? Stay tuned.

In Treatment 3x17

Sunil remains resistant to Paul’s suggestions – and my question remains whether this is because Paul is on the wrong track approaching Sunil despite his best intentions. The cultural divide has hardly narrowed over the course of the past four sessions. To make matters worse, Sunil’s mind is mostly elsewhere, as India is hit by a flood and his native village has been wiped away. He is still convinced that his daughter-in-law is having an affair and Paul will not be able to persuade him that her innocent flirtations do not prove she is betraying Sunil’s son Arun. For Sunil she is disgracing his family. He also had another disturbing dream in which he mutilated Arun’s unconscious body in order to save his grandchildren from an ominous female figure who seems to embody his revulsion and attraction to Julia, as well as his love and shame for Malini. He starts shouting angrily in Bengali at the implication he ever would have had harmed Manili, while Paul is more concerned that Sunil would ever harm Julia. Will Paul eventually be able to overcome this impasse of Sunil’s resistance to therapy?

In Treatment 3x13

Paul Westen’s Bengali patient Sunil is convinced his daughter-in-law Julia is having an affair, the thought of which repulses him as much as it enthralls him. He finds her open flirtatiousness at once shamefully immoral and irresistibly enchanting. His absolute proof that Julia is sleeping with one of the authors her firm represents is that he found birth-control pills in her study, when he felt compelled to look for the manuscript of this genius author, who he ridicules. His son Arun would very much like to have another child with Julia, so why would she be taking contraceptives? Sunil speaks about a disturbing dream and about watching Arun and Julia in their sleep, and then returns to the girl, Malini, he loved when he was in college. It is clear he’s buried the pain of losing her deep down his heart, and it’s similar to the animal he tried burying in his dream. And just as the animal fell off a high cliff, Sunil tells Paul that Malini, the love of his life, jumped off a bridge after breaking up with him. It’s a deeply emotional moment – even Paul is pained by the tragic story. The universal theme of love and heartache also bridges the cultural divide that has prevented Paul from making much progress with Sunil. However, Sunil remains unwilling to accept that he recognizes in his son’s marriage the love and passion he felt for Malini, or that the anger he feels towards Julia is not so much because her affair might jeopardize her marriage with Arun, but that he wishes to save his son from the same undying hardship. In short, this was yet another wonderful and highly gratifying episode.

In Treatment 3x09

Sunil begins his session preparing tea, and ridiculing the reality show Survivors, before he tells Paul he has been trying to make an attempt at expressing his frustrations. He says it’s like learning how to throw a curveball in cricket with your other hand. Then he speaks with the same excited repulsion about his daughter-in-law’s exercise regimen. Paul is trying to get Sunil to admit that he is drawn to her. He deflects the question a few times by talking about his son’s attraction to Julia instead. Sunil continues talking about honor and shame, about family and dignity. His Brahmin upbringing couldn’t be more different than Western instant-gratification consumerism. When Paul again explains he gets the feeling Sunil is fascinated and intrigued by Julia, Sunil laughs hysterically, hands him the check and leaves. What a treat these two together in one room! They are both aware of their cultural differences, but can’t break through each other’s barriers. Intellectually Paul can sympathize with Sunil’s devotion to dignity, but won’t be able to convince him of Western analytical notions about conflicting emotions, being repelled yet attracted by the same thing or person. Sunil for his part understands that Western culture is driven by desires for fulfillment, but finds this pursuit of happiness a sign of weakness, as immoral has having an affair. I wonder if they will ever find common ground, entrenched as they are in each their own worldview.

In Treatment 3x05

Sunil returns for his second session. He dislikes being referred to as a patient; some kids spoiled soda over his vest; his son and daughter-in-law forced him to take a shower; and recently he’s been having this ache. Sunil is grumpy, but he has a sweet sense of humor. When Paul asks him about the ache, he jokes it must be the same ache his son hopes Paul can release him of. Soon enough Sunil is questioning the method of therapy in which only one side engages in the conversation. He feels he cannot be expected to share intimate details of his life, if the other party of the conversation barely says a word. Paul criticizes Sunil for putting his own complaints and grievances into other people’s mouth, for projecting his own frustrations onto others. Sunil jokes that now he regrets asking Paul to speak more, and he voices his frustration over the poor quality of tea in New York. They continue their cat and mouse game, Paul keeps asking probing questions and Sunil keeps dodging them. When their time is up, Sunil seems insulted as if Paul is throwing him out. From our Western perspective it is clear that Sunil has been bottling up resentments for years, but he is resigned there is nothing that can be changed about his life. It poses a great challenge for Paul to break through such barriers. For both parties this must not have felt as a productive session. Still, Sunil somewhere somehow seems to appreciate his sessions. So there’s hope that he can learn to become more assertive.

In Treatment 3x01

Off the bat, things are going to be different this season on In Treatment. For one, Dianne Wiest won’t be returning as Paul’s therapist Gina – which is a shame, because their sessions were frequently the highpoint of the week. Additionally, this season is not based on the Israeli original BeTipol, so this will be a test case to see if Rodrigo García and his team can pull off another successful season on their own. From this first episode alone, I would say there’s no reason to worry. Paul Weston’s new patient, Sunil, is a highly intelligent and poetic, compassionate and funny, though somewhat cynical, Bengali who arrived only recently in New York. His son and daughter-in-law are worried that he is not coping well with the loss of his wife of thirty years. Daughter-in-law Julia is a gorgeous woman, a literary agent, afraid for his well-being, afraid of his effect on her children, afraid of him – but in his words, Julia is really afraid of herself, of the emptiness inside her. Sunil is a proud man, with a full life behind him, who finds her frivolous and superficial – a bad influence on his son. His son Arun is an optometrician, yet he prescribed his father medication to deal with his grief. When Paul asks Sunil if the medication has any effect on him, he replies that he is “one hundred percent absolutely scientifically positive” they have no effect, because he is actually planting them – in the lily that Julia put in his room. I didn’t know how much I missed the show until I saw the season premiere. What an incredible performance of all involved. I am already intrigued by these new characters. As a side note, the Cricket won’t be posting back-to-back chirps as the episodes air on HBO. Instead you may expect them once a week.