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254 GRAAT On-Line issue #6 December 2009 “So many traps to set”: subversion and subversiveness in Profit1 Jean Du Verger Université René Descartes - Paris V. Profit, created by David Greenwalt and John McNamara, produced by Stephen J. Cannell and starring Adrian Pasdar as Jim Profit, was first aired on Fox Broadcasting Company in April 1996 and axed after just four episodes2 (out of the eight originally filmed and scheduled). Probably one of the most controversial and category-defying television serials ever, it portrays Jim Profit, a ruthless and ambitious junior executive, whose hidden agenda is progressively unveiled as he climbs the corporate ladder of the multinational conglomerate Gracen & Gracen (G&G). While throwing into sharp relief the shadowy recesses of corporate America, the series also distorts the dominant ideological and aesthetic patterns of traditional television series, as it develops a subversive discourse on American society. Profit mirrors the complex cultural currents and counter currents that run through American society, provocatively depicting such aspects as the workplace, family values and sexuality. Profit is probably one of the most tantalizing and riveting dramas in television‘s recent history, not only on account of the themes it discusses, but because of its reversal of traditional televisual codes, which contributes to the viewer‘s entrapment in a complex and elaborate narrative structure. This paper will, therefore, discuss the narratological implications of the show‘s Chinese box narrative pattern, highlighting the way in which it subverts the traditional textual structures of television series. I will then examine the camera‘s discourse which, in conveying an impression of fragmentation, imparts a puzzle-like 255 dimension to the narrative overall. Finally, I shall study how characterization reveals and subverts mainstream ideological and sociological stereotypes. I. The Chinese box narrative pattern The show‘s narrative arcs are subtly intricate and intertwined; they function like a Rube Goldberg mousetrap,3 as John McNamara remarks: These [arcs] were all carefully plotted out, and then when you changed one little thing in episode 1 [...] it affected five things in episode 3, 6 and 7.4 Consequently, the narrative‘s complex modus operandi resembles that of the domino effect which greatly contributes to hooking the reader-viewers5 by concentrating their attention not so much on what happens, but on how it happens. One of the major features of this extremely complex narrative pattern is the Chinese-box structure, i.e. stories within stories, providing the reader-viewer with a multilayered text, creating textual heterarchy, disrupting the reader-viewer‘s linear reading, and establishing a multiple diegesis pattern. The different settings of the show—Profit‘s flat and the G&G headquarters—seem to reduplicate the Chinese-box structure. The Chinese-box-like construction of Jim Profit‘s posh apartment conveys the impression that the rooms have the ability to replicate themselves in ever-diminishing versions, in which each receptacle contains a smaller one: the flat contains the sitting room which contains the secret room which, in turn, contains the cardboard box in which the reader-viewers are astonished to see a naked Jim Profit curled up in a foetal position at night. In fact, Profit‘s secret lair is the luxurious version of the Gracen & Gracen cardboard box he grew up in (as an abused child), while looking at television through the hole cut out of the side of the box.6 256 This opening onto the world may well be symbolized by the aquarium which also functions as a kind of a window through which we can see Jim Profit‘s living room and which awakens the curiosity of the muckraker reporter Ms Kelly Hunt, in the penultimate episode of the series, ―Security‖. This is clearly illustrated in the segment in which Jim and Kelly kiss in his living room. The camera films the scene from the secret lair and through the aquarium. Then, as the camera moves back slowly, it progressively uncovers the G&G box Jim sleeps in at night, thus emphasizing the Chinese-box structure of the apartment. This mise en abyme effect induced by the setting is also emphasized by the scenes in which Jim Profit is seen sitting in the nude, in the hidden lair, behind his computer. During these scenes, the reader-viewers find themselves immersed in a virtual reconstruction of the fictional world of the show, on Jim‘s computer screen. As the camera moves into the virtual world of Gracen & Gracen‘s virtual premises, 257 the double glass doors swing open and the camera moves towards a virtual office. As the door opens, one is greeted by the avatar of the character whose office the reader- viewer and Profit have entered. The camera then moves on towards the virtual desk located in the office and, as Jim clicks on the desk, a virtual set of drawers appears. Profit then clicks on the drawer containing the information he wishes to retrieve. As the narrative unwinds we clearly notice how the main framework, provided by the headquarters of G&G, is also structured like a Chinese box. Economist and statistician David Lane quotes Herbert Simon‘s definition of hierarchy in the corporate world. Simon‘s definition insists on the complexity of such structures, using the Chinese-box metaphor to describe them: In application to the architecture of complex systems, ―hierarchy‖ simply means a set of Chinese boxes of a particular kind. A set of Chinese boxes usually consists of a box enclosing a second box, which, in turn, encloses a third [...]. The Chinese boxes called ―hierarchies‖ are a variant of that pattern. Opening any given box in a hierarchy discloses not just one new box within, but a whole small set of boxes; and opening any one of these component boxes discloses a new set in turn.7 In the pilot, at the end of the first board meeting, a wall panel in the board room slides open onto another office, in which Japanese executives are waiting for a meeting with Chaz Gracen. In the episode ―Healing‖, the offices of the executive staff clearly mirror this Chinese-box structure: the reader-viewer can see all the offices separated by glass walls, doors opening and closing, and characters entering or leaving this space, in a perfect illustration of Linda Aronson‘s argument that the setting must allow for ―new stories to ‗walk in the door‘‖.8 The Chinese-box structure is also made obvious in the pilot. The open-space office where the lower-ranked personnel work contains cubicle after cubicle which all communicate and can be reached through a labyrinthine corridor. 258 The Chinese-box pattern also informs the main narrative framework, which contains a number of stories, linking the characters‘ pasts with the present. When, for instance, a character decides to probe into another character‘s past, his or her own past and private space will open up in turn. Let us examine the way in which two of the main characters, Jim Profit and Joanne Meltzer, interact during the series. When Joanne Meltzer and Jack Walters delve into Jim‘s mysterious past in the pilot and in the episode ―Hero‖, they discover the existence of his incestuous and promiscuous (step) mother, Bobby Stokowski. This, in turn, leads them to find out that Jim had his father committed to a hospital under a false identity, the reasons for which emerge as they uncover the secret of Jim‘s abused childhood. While they are investigating Jim‘s origins, Jim is busy setting up a master plan which will eventually send Jack behind bars and allow him to invade Jack‘s privacy and befriend his wife. Jim also makes it clear to Joanne that he is aware that she, too, has a repressed and hidden past: Jim: Why, I remind you of someone? Your sister? You know I hear she‘s doing really well at the [mental] institution. They‘re gonna let her out soon. You must have mixed feelings after what she did to you. Joanne, one thing we have to remember is to forgive. You can‘t run from your past. And you can‘t run from yourself. Their confrontation reaches a climax during the fourth episode, ―Healing‖, when Jim blackmails Joanne‘s psychiatrist Dr Grant, having found out that the latter sleeps 259 with his female patients. Using Dr Grant, Jim enters Joanne‘s mind while she is under hypnosis: Dr Grant: You‘re seven years old, Joanne. It‘s June 23rd. You‘re playing in the backyard, remember! During this scene, the reader-viewer learns that Joanne discovered her father hanging in the basement of their house at the age of seven. After a while; Dr Grant, who fears Joanne may suffer a total collapse, reluctantly lets Jim Profit take control and continue questioning her: Jim: So you take her [Joanne‘s doll] downstairs into the basement where the soda pop is kept. Because it‘s cool and dark. Isn‘t it nice down there? [...] Joanne: I hear a noise. Jim: What kind of noise? Joanne: Like hiha, hiha, like a rocking chair. Jim: So you move towards this noise. And what do you see? Joanne: My daddy, he‘s ... Jim: Look at your daddy, Joanne, what‘s he doing? [Joanne looks puzzled] Joanne: He‘s hanging from a rope, that‘s wrapped around a pipe, that‘s making that noise. His head‘s all... bent. Ohhhhh, ohhh. Ohh daddy. [She starts crying, looks horrified, and takes Jim‘s hand.] The psychoanalytical dimension of this segment is enhanced by the way in which Joanne proceeds through her repressed thoughts, moving from the backyard down into the dark basement of her house where she sees her father hanging.

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