In the Sopranos, what does "...once they got Gary Cooper in touch with his feelings..." refer to?
In the Sopranos episode Strong, Silent Type (Wikipedia, IMDB) the character Tony Soprano says:
Let me tell you something. Nowadays everybody’s got to go to shrinks, and counselors, and go on Sally Jessy Raphael and talk about their problems.
Whatever happened to Gary Cooper?
The strong, silent type; that was an American. He wasn’t in touch with his feelings, he just did what he had to do.
So what they didn’t know, once they got Gary Cooper in touch with his feelings, that they wouldn’t be able to shut him up! And then it’s ‘dysfunction this, dusfunction that, dysfunction vaffanculo!’
Question: Does Soprano refer to an actual situation involving the real life actor Gary Cooper? Or to characters that the actor played later in life? Or does "...once they got Gary Cooper in touch with his feelings..." refer to something more existential?
Quote transcribed from the first thirty seconds of this or this:
Best Answer
It doesn't refer to a specific incident involving Gary Cooper; he's using "Gary Cooper" as an archetype, "the strong, silent type".
What he's saying is basically: "once they got people to get in touch with their feelings, it opened up the floodgates and it never stopped". In his mind, Americans stopped being Gary Cooper and instead became self-obsessed whiners.
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What ever happened to Gary Cooper quote?
It doesn't refer to a specific incident involving Gary Cooper; he's using "Gary Cooper" as an archetype, "the strong, silent type". What he's saying is basically: "once they got people to get in touch with their feelings, it opened up the floodgates and it never stopped".Tony Soprano talking about Gary Cooper strong silent type, the meaning
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Answer 2
It's worth mentioning that Tony probably build his image of masculinity and Gary Copper after watching some of his silent films of western genre during his early acting days. Cooper played cowboys roles (since he was a naturally good rider), that are considered as a masculinity archetype.
That's why Tony probably thinks of Cooper to be the "strong and silent type".
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