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The acclaimed creator is set for a return to television. The iconic mob drama visionary is scripting MKUltra, a mini-series centered around the CIA's secret Cold War period psychological manipulation project for HBO.

Exploring the Project

The project, first reported by entertainment insiders, will be David Chase's initial TV project following the groundbreaking HBO mob drama. The dramatic thriller, based on John Lisle's book Project Mind Control, zeroes in on Sidney Gottlieb, referred to as the “black sorcerer” who oversaw Project MKUltra, the CIA's covert hallucinogen experiments that administered psychedelic substances, hypnosis, and torture on willing and unwilling subjects from 1953 until it was terminated in 1973.

Research Activities

The scientist oversaw such experiments in the name of national security, to combat the alleged danger of Soviet and Chinese mind control methods. He's also known as the inadvertent father of the LSD counterculture, as he introduced the drug to the CIA in the 1950s, in an attempt to explore the potential of manipulating human consciousness. Some test subjects were volunteers from the CIA, military officers and university attendees who had knowledge of the purpose of the experiments. Additional subjects, however, were psychiatric inmates, prisoners, drug addicts, and prostitutes forced or misled into substance administration that in some cases resulted in permanent damage.

Creator's Background

Chase earned five Emmys for the Sopranos, a complex drama about a New Jersey-based mafia family widely credited with ushering in the golden age of high-quality TV. After the series, starring the late James Gandolfini, concluded in 2007, the creator has mostly focused on movie projects. He wrote, directed and produced the 2012 movie Not Fade Away. Additionally, he collaborated on "The Many Saints of Newark", a prequel to The Sopranos starring Gandolfini’s son, that debuted in 2021.

TV Comeback

This comeback to TV comes after he stated the era of ambitious television series in some ways shaped by the Sopranos to be a “blip” that is now finished. In an interview with a major publication for the series' quarter-century milestone, the 78-year-old asserted that he had been instructed to "simplify" his scripts in discussions with executives and advised against producing television that was too complex.

Chase linked that perspective in part to his experience attempting to develop a series with the screenwriter Hannah Fidell about a luxury escort who finds herself in witness protection. In numerous meetings with producers, he noted, they were informed “the unfortunate truth” that it was too complex. "What audience is this targeting?" he said. "Presumably, the investors?"

"It appears we are disoriented, and viewers struggle to concentrate, hence we cannot create content that is overly logical, engaging, and demands focus from the audience," he added. “And as for streaming executives? It is getting worse. We’re going back to where we were.”