Eloise (The Sopranos) - Plot Summary

Plot Summary

As Junior Soprano's trial concludes, Eugene Pontecorvo and Dogsy find juror Danny Scalercio while he is out shopping with his son and intimidate him.

While playing golf, Little Carmine and Johnny Sack try to convince Carmine, Sr. to reduce his demands in his dispute with Tony over the HUD scheme. Carmine Sr., who even refuses to consider the Jersey gangsters a "family," becomes angry, smashes his golf club and refuses to back down. Sack meets with Tony and Silvio at Carmine's new restaurant and offers a minor compromise; Tony, angry in part because Carmine will not deal with him face-to-face, rejects it and later orders that the restaurant be vandalised.

Carmine uses his union influence to shut down work at the disputed project, the Esplanade. Tony decides to wait the dispute out, expecting the financial losses on both sides will quickly force Carmine into a compromise. Johnny Sack meets with Tony and raises the possibility of killing Carmine, surprising Tony.

In the Soprano household, Carmela and A.J. discuss a paper he is writing on Herman Melville's Billy Budd. Tony's callous behavior toward Carmela angers Furio, who has difficulty restraining himself when Tony calls his wife a "moody bitch." Tony remains unconscious of the romantic tension between Carmela and Furio. Carmela later visits Furio's house to discuss decorating, but a possible escalation of sexual tension is interrupted by one of her father's contractors.

Tony, Furio, and other members of the crew visit an Indian casino. While most of the others carouse, Furio stands aloof. Later, as the drunken crew prepares to board the casino's helicopter for the flight home, Furio grabs Tony by the shirt front and appears barely able to restrain himself from shoving Tony into the spinning tail rotor. Furio tells the baffled Tony he was standing too close to the blades. The next day, Furio does not appear to pick up Tony when expected, and Carmela an Tony learn he has abruptly returned to Italy. Carmela and Rosalie Aprile have dinner at Nuovo Vesuvio. When Rosalie suggests Tony might have taken action against Furio, she becomes distraught and is later seen spending time crying alone.

Paulie Gualtieri's mother Nucci gets into a minor car crash - she is a backseat passanger when her friend Minn Matrone runs into a car in a parking lot. Paulie chides Minn at the ER where the women were brough; a doctor also aks her about her eyesight. Later, Paulie has lunch with Nucci, Minn, and another friend of hers, Cookie, and overhears Minn keeps a large cache of money in her home under her mattress. After a rough-edged conversation with Silvio about his loyalty to the family reveals Tony's unhappiness with his declining financial contributions, Paulie approaches Carmine Sr., only to learn that Johnny Sack has never informed the New York boss about his previous suggestions of a shift in loyalties. Deeply shocked, Paulie decides to steal Minn Matrone's cash to make up his shortfall to Tony. When she arrives home unexpectedly during his burglary, recognizing him, threatening to call the police and then starting to scream, Paulie kills her by suffocating her with a pillow. He then makes a large payment to Tony.

A family dinner to meet Meadow's new boyfriend, Finn DeTrolio, further dispirits Carmela - she gets involved in an argument about Billy Budd with Meadow and her flatmates when she fiercely defends it as not having homosexual themes, as some literary critics interpret. Their annual mother-daughter birthday outing under the Eloise painting at the Plaza Hotel the next day turns quickly into a hostile bickering. Carmela complains to Tony about her disagreements with Meadow. Meadow learns from A.J. about their mother's visits to Furio's and her depression since he left. Tony later approaches his daughter getting ready for a skiing trip to Montréal for a candid talk about Carmela and reveals to a surprised Meadow he and Carmela both had couples counseling (at Dr. Melfi's) where he learned Carmela may be feeling "unfulfilled" and suggests Meadow that she treat her mother with more restraint. Meadow inquires if that is all Tony suspects, but, when he says yes, she does not reveal anything about Furio. Going to bed, Tony again converses with Carmela about Meadow, trying to make peace between them; when he asks his wife if seeing Meadow turning into a "beautiful woman" is not all she ever wanted, Carmela stares into a wall, seemingly deeply lost in though, and then answers in an emotionless tone of voice, "yes."