In Treatment s01e22 Episode Script

Alex - Week Five

Previously on In Treatment.
I slept with her, OK? But I'm sure you got a full play-by-play from her already.
After we had sex, she straddles my leg, she starts rubbing up against me.
It's so obvious she's completely hung up on someone else.
Ever heard of vertigo? You go into vertigo, you look only at your aircraft's instruments.
But keeping my eyes on my instruments is what got me here.
Because I kept my eyes on my instruments, I dropped that bomb so accurately, I killed innocent people.
What's the first step on the way to my new life? What would you like to do? I think I'll go fuck her again.
Yeah.
Flight 810.
Estimated time of arrival, 9:55am.
Flight 323.
Estimated time of arrival, 11:05am.
Flight 111.
Estimated time of arrival, 12:21 pm.
Hey.
- Am I early again? - No, no, no, no.
- Come on in.
- Finish what you're doing.
- I'll make some coffee.
- No, it's OK.
You're, er You're fine.
"The rain in Spain "falls mainly on the plain.
" That's bullshit, you know.
I've been to Spain, the rain in the Pyrenees is a bitch.
So, I'll open with the punch line, Doc.
I broke up with Laura.
I was actually a pretty great fuck the second time.
I drank about a half bottle of Stoli, just to relax.
I also took a pill that Daniel gave me, you know, one of those.
I had a hard-on for a day and a half, Paul.
You should try it some time.
It's a little strange, though.
It's like a woody that actually feels like wood cos it's just sitting there minding its own business like it's got nothing to do with you.
Works like a charm, though.
Anyway, I made up for the last time.
We were fucking.
All night long, in the morning too.
In the end I realised that she was just using me.
She really wasn't with me, she was just, uh using me for an excuse, you know? Hmm.
Yeah, at any rate, it's over.
It's not gonna go anywhere from here.
Excuse me, when you say "from here," forgive me, - but do you mean from this office? - What? Are you saying your relationship with Laura has something to do with what goes on in this office? Have you completely lost your mind? What are you grasping at now, a word? No, it's just you're always making this bizarre connection between you, me and Laura.
Is it me? Cos you're the one always making a big deal out of it.
Tell me something didn't happen between you and her.
What? You're asking me to tell you what didn't happen? Yeah.
Did something happen between you two or not? You mean apart from therapy? Jesus, look at you dance.
It's a simple question.
Your million-dollar technique, answering a question with a question.
It ain't gonna fly this time.
I'll tell you why I'm asking.
Every time we were together, half the time she talked about you.
She kept asking what I knew about you and your family.
She was obsessive about it.
Then I remembered how jumpy you get every time I mention her name.
So, I thought maybe something went on between you.
Maybe you, a married man How should I put it? You fooled around with her.
What are you suggesting? Can you just say that nothing happened? - Is that so difficult? - We've talked about this.
I will only discuss your relationship with Laura, nothing else.
So you discuss mine, but not yours.
The point I'm trying to make is that my other patients have nothing to do with your therapy.
You having sex with somebody I'm dating sounds very relevant to my therapy.
Did she say she had sex with me? - Didn't have to.
- You're convinced.
- I'm just asking.
- The relevant thing is how you feel about the possibility of Laura having sex with somebody other than you.
Don't start your asinine bullshit.
You're copping out.
Stop trying to force me into this relationship you've concocted.
- Why would I do that? - Maybe you want to compete with me.
Maybe it's like the coffee, the cheque I'm paying to talk.
It's what I want to talk about - you and Laura - and I'd like a straight answer for a change.
Have you noticed when an emotional issue comes up, you focus on money? I have a different theory, cos every time we touch on something that has to do with you, you get scared shitless.
Why would I be scared of talking about myself? Because you want your patients to think you're superhuman, a Buddha.
You don't eat, you don't shit, piss.
You don't argue with your wife.
You don't fantasise about your patients.
No, you're above all of these earthly things, because you live only for your patients.
Your private life doesn't matter, only this inner sanctum.
Why are you giving me that look? What look? It's the way I look.
No, no, no, that look like you know everything.
Like you can see right through me.
Maybe like the old man in Baghdad? Oh, fuck.
Now you'll say you want to talk about my father, right? OK, would you like to talk about your father? You people love this shit.
This is right in your wheelhouse.
You wanna talk about my father? Go ahead, fire away.
Ask me whatever you want.
But he is an amazing man, my dad.
He really is.
- But that's not what you told me last week.
- He's a good man, OK? There's nothing you or 200 shrinks can change.
Let's put aside for the moment whether he's a good man or a bad man, OK? What interests me is how you feel about him and what your relationship with him is like.
When I say he's an amazing man, I'm talking about facts, not feelings.
Would you say that to a girl who was raped by her father in third grade? Would you tell her you're not interested in "good or bad," only in how she feels about the relationship? When did good or bad go out of style? That reference to the girl being raped by her father, where does that come from? Can we go back to last week? If I remember correctly, you described your father as being an unfaithful man.
You said that he was ungrateful, he treated your mother really terribly.
But that at the same time you had a great admiration for him.
That's correct, yes? It seems to me that your feelings about your father, Alex, are pretty conflicted.
- You don't understand what I said at all.
- Well, maybe you could - explain it to me a little more.
- Ah, fuck that, it's no use.
You're gonna hear what you wanna hear.
Mm.
- Do you and your dad talk a lot? - Yeah, we talk, - as much as is necessary.
- What does that mean? - I don't understand the question.
- Who calls who? We talk as much as possible.
He's not a chatterbox.
He's precise, you know? He's to the point, boom.
He cuts straight to the heart of things.
He's like iron, my dad.
Cast iron.
Iron, in everything he does.
His movement, everything The way he works, the way he thinks, his wisdom.
I don't think there's a book he hasn't read.
I'm talking real literature, Doc.
History, political science everything.
The man is 70 years old and he works like he did 30 years ago.
He's as healthy as a horse He can still beat me in arm wrestling, he's he's iron.
You know, when I think of iron, I tend to think of something that's really indestructible, that's incredibly powerful, strong.
And yet at the same time, something that's kind of cold.
How do you feel about what I did? Killing people, dropping the bomb on a madrasah? Why are you going back to that? Simple question, Doc.
It's about your main thing, feelings.
How do you feel about what I did when I dropped a bomb on 16 kids? I'm not here to judge you, Alex.
I'm not asking for a judgment.
I wanna know, how do you feel? How do I feel? Well, I think it must be very difficult for you to live with what you with what happened.
What? You have made an art and a science and a career out of taking the easy position.
Do you really think not judging you is easy, Alex? Let me tell you, it's not.
Why can't you just say you think I'm a murderer? Because I know that's what you think.
I know that's what you talk about when you're out with your friends at a fancy restaurant.
You sit around the table and you say, "It's terrible.
It's awful.
"It's a massacre.
What it does to them, it's just atrocious.
"What it does to us " Let me tell you something.
I come here and I put my trust in you.
Why can't you be honest enough to just tell me how you feel? Hmm.
You know what my father said when I told him about the mission? What? That's what he said.
That was the smartest reaction I got from anybody, including you and all the other bleeding hearts.
There's really nothing to say.
What can you say? Some things can't be explained away.
Sometimes you can't peel away something and find It's just as plain as can be.
That's it.
My father had it right.
The old man You gotta be like that.
You gotta be like iron, baby.
It must be very difficult to have lived in the shadow of somebody who thinks like that, - that you've got to be like iron all the time.
- Wait, wait.
Do you see how you twist things around? Am I ever gonna get out of this alive? If I said he was a pussy, you'd have a comment about that.
If I said he was a hero, you'd have a comment about that.
You love to sit here, listen to people's problems, so you can sit on your porch at the end of the day and tell yourself, - "Wow, my life is so great.
" - Alex Can we stay focused on what the issue is we're trying to deal with here? The difficulty that you must have had living in the shadow of your father, in a world where you're not allowed to express who you are, your tender side, maybe your feminine side, for example.
So what do you do? The only thing you can do is defy him.
You have to fight with everything you have.
But you know something, Alex? You haven't done that.
You haven't dared to do that.
Your father is such a powerful, imposing character, you're terrified he'll crush you.
So you come through this door with all your rage, your resentment, your jealousy, your buried anger toward him.
You bring it here and let it loose on me.
That's what you do, but that's OK.
That's fine.
That's why I'm here.
I think that's the most patronising thing I've ever heard.
Your wife? It's OK, go ahead.
No, no.
No, it's fine, really.
I I apologise.
Jesus, look.
Look at you.
Look at how stressed you get just thinking that I might learn the slightest detail about your life.
So what? You got a wife at home.
Big deal.
That's the real problem with all your theories, Paul.
They completely ignore your side of the equation, that you are also human.
Yeah, you have this nice theory that I see you as my father and that's why I want to What did you say? Defy you.
But what about you? Why do you keep making it seem as if you have no personal stake in this, as if you're only here for me? It's a deception, Paul.
OK, let's take Laura, for example.
You play such a big role in her life, it's unbelievable.
She knows nothing about you.
She's sure you're one of the most perfect people ever and she hasn't the faintest idea of who you are, what your beliefs are, how long you've been married.
Doesn't it just seem a little insane to you? Who are you? Really? Huh? I know the whole truth about you.
You're not made of iron, that's for damn sure.
Not even close.
Paul did you have something going on with her or not? Oh, you really are perverted, you know that? She's young enough to be your daughter, man.
During all our sessions, I bet you sit here and you imagine how I screwed her, right? You trying to make me angry? Is that it? Don't turn this into my psychosis.
I'm onto your shit.
- You're the one in therapy.
- You're the one not telling the truth.
You're the one bullshitting me.
You're the hypocrite.
I come in here every week and I tell you everything.
You can't look me in the eye and admit that you have fallen in love with a patient 20 years younger than you.
I mean, come on.
You can't hang with her.
Come on, look at you.
You'll look like a fool.
Trust me.
You can't keep up with her pace.
I can tell you that.
Let me ask you, why did you have to sleep with her? I don't know.
I got tired of jerking off.
A thousand women could have fulfilled that function.
Why Laura? She's sexy as hell.
Have you noticed? I think that you are trying to get back at me - Oh.
- .
.
because she was my patient.
The whole world revolves around your ass? I understand your theory.
You've hinted at it for the last three sessions.
That ain't flying either.
You really think what happened between me and her was meant to hurt you? You did it to provoke me.
Maybe you were looking for some kind of reaction, anything more than a pat on the thigh.
Something emotional, even if it's anger.
Wow, that's interesting.
That's another brilliant theory there, Doc.
But how about you, Paul? The fact that your wife is screwing her lover in some pathetic hotel overlooking the Piazza di Trevi in Rome.
Is that getting a reaction out of you? Yeah, you'd be real surprised the kind of information you find out from a few phone calls.
Yeah, I found out a bunch of things, Paul, about a whole bunch of subjects.
In fact, I've been taking a little interest in psychology lately.
I've been meaning to check out what you got here.
I even read a book Laura gave me about the whole concept of reciprocity in therapy.
About how everything that goes on in here should be reciprocal.
So it made me think.
You sit here, you listen to me.
And you pretend to solve all my problems.
But you don't have a fucking clue about yourself.
So, I figured Hey, I got a choice.
Either I accept your superiority as if you're some kind of god, or I use my intelligence and do a little investigating, just to make sure that this god is not some kind of Dr Ruth who, uh, tells everybody how to fuck while she's still a virgin.
So I made a few calls, Paul.
Nothing too complicated, the same people I consulted before coming here.
What's amazing is how many people are dying to help you find what you're looking for.
I found a hell of a god in my investigations.
A god whose life is falling apart.
Whose wife is sleeping around behind his back.
Whose daughter is fucking junkies.
Whose father Yeah, whose father is rotting away in some geriatric hospital somewhere in Virginia, and why? Is the son too stingy to pay for a slightly more liveable place? Huh.
What a god.
And then Laura comes along, your sexiest patient yet, and her only wish in life is to get you into bed because she thinks that's gonna solve all of her sexual hang-ups.
And you, you fall in love with that crazy slut.
Don't you fucking talk about my patients, you fuck! How fucking dare you? You prick.
Richard, it's Paul.
Uh, look, I'm really sorry.
I have to cancel our session today, I, um I'm sorry it's such short notice.
Uh Something has, uh, come up and, uh I'll get back to you.
Call me if there's a problem, bye.
What's happened? Nothing, it was Why are you cancelling your appointments, Paul? When did you get in? Uh, it was about ten minutes ago.
Was that you knocking at the door? I'm so sorry.
Honestly, I thought you were alone.
It's OK.
It's OK.
What did you do to your hand? Accident.
Dropped a Let me see.
You'll survive, you know.
How are the kids? Max kept asking when you were coming home.
I didn't quite know what to say to him.
Paul, we moved into separate rooms on the first day.
It's completely over, if that matters at all.
Thanks.
I've got to, uh Hello, Julian.
Come in.
English SDH
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