Jennifer Melfi
Tony Soprano's psychiatrist, played by Lorraine Bracco.
Dr. Jennifer Melfi is a fictional character in the HBO series The Sopranos, the psychiatrist of mob boss Tony Soprano, played by Lorraine Bracco. An Italian-American graduate of Bard College and Tufts University School of Medicine, she lives in a condominium in Essex Fells, New Jersey.
Tony is referred to her after a panic attack; he claims to be a waste management consultant, but she knows who he is.
Quick Facts
- Series
- The Sopranos
- First
- "The Sopranos" (1999)
- Last
- "The Blue Comet" (2007)
- Creator
- David Chase
- Portrayed by
- Lorraine Bracco
- Nickname
- Jen
- Occupation
- Psychiatrist
- Gender
- Female
Facts from the source article.
Background
In season 1, Uncle Junior's crew learns that Tony is in therapy and fears she could be used as a witness against the DiMeo family. After the failed attempt on Tony's life in "Isabella", he warns her to go into hiding, and she works out of a roadside motel in Wayne, New Jersey, telling her patients her office is being remodelled, until Tony tells her it is over. In the season 3 episode "Employee of the Month" she is raped in her building's parking garage; the attacker goes free when the police lose the chain of custody, and though she knows a word to Tony would bring revenge, she chooses not to tell him.
She sees her own psychiatrist, Elliot Kupferberg, who later reveals at a dinner party that Tony is her patient. Convinced by a study suggesting talk therapy can help sociopaths become more sociopathic, she ends Tony's treatment after seven years. David Chase based the character on his own psychiatrist, and Bracco, first asked to play Carmela, chose Melfi as the greater challenge.
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Elsewhere in The Sopranos
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