I'm excited about In Treatment, the forthcoming HBO show starring Gabriel Byrne as a psychotherapist who is in therapy himself — but it's going to take over my life. See, HBO recently released its schedule for the show, and it's ... intense.
The show will air half-hour episodes five times a week for nine weeks. That's a total of 45 episodes — double the number a regular series airs in nine months.
Each night of the week will focus on a different patient for the duration of the series. One patient's story will always air on Mondays, another on Tuesdays, and so on; on Fridays, Byrne's character takes the couch with his own therapist (Dianne Wiest). The other stars, by the way, include Melissa George, Blair Underwood, Mia Wasikowska, Josh Charles, and Embeth Davidtz. Since that adds up to six patients total, I assume one of them is a couples session. (In a pretty cool twist, HBO Select will be airing the sessions at their "actual" times — so if a patient's session is always Mondays at 9 a.m., that's when you'll see the episode.)
This series could be awesome — it has a cool concept, and it's written by a Big Love and Six Feet Under writer and produced by Mark Wahlberg. I really want to like it. But 45 episodes over nine weeks? That's more intense than a college course! What do you think? Would you be willing to watch something like In Treatment — or are you intimidated before it's even begun?
I will definately check it out at least once to see how good it is!