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David Chase is set for a return to television. The iconic mob drama visionary is scripting Project MKUltra, a limited series centered around the CIA's secret cold war-era mind control program for the premium network.

Exploring the Series

This new venture, first reported by industry sources, marks Chase's initial TV project since the groundbreaking HBO crime series. This intense narrative, inspired by the author's book Project Mind Control, focuses on Sidney Gottlieb, known as the "dark magician" who oversaw the MKUltra initiative, the agency's clandestine hallucinogen experiments that administered hallucinogenic drugs, hypnosis, and physical coercion on volunteers and non-consenting individuals from the early 1950s until it was halted in the early 1970s.

The Experiments

Gottlieb directed these tests in the interest of state safety, to counter the alleged danger of Russian and Chinese mind control methods. He's also known as the accidental pioneer of the psychedelic movement, as he brought the drug to the CIA in the mid-20th century, in an effort to explore the possibilities of controlling the human mind. Certain participants were volunteers from the CIA, armed forces personnel and university attendees who had knowledge of the nature of the studies. Others, however, were mental patients, prisoners, drug addicts, and prostitutes coerced or deceived into substance administration that in certain instances left permanent damage.

Chase's Legacy

David Chase won five Emmys for his hit series, a complex drama about a New Jersey-based crime syndicate broadly acknowledged with ushering in the golden age of “prestige” television. Since the show, starring the late James Gandolfini, concluded in 2007, the creator has mostly focused on feature films. He authored, helmed, and produced the 2012 movie Not Fade Away. He also co-wrote and produced The Many Saints of Newark, a prequel to The Sopranos starring Gandolfini’s son, that debuted in 2021.

Return to Television

This comeback to TV comes after he stated the era of sophisticated TV dramas in some ways defined by his show to be a "temporary phase" that is now over. Speaking to a major publication for the show’s 25th anniversary, the septuagenarian asserted that he had been instructed to "simplify" his screenplays in meetings with studio heads and advised against making TV content that was overly intricate.

He attributed that view in partly to his experience trying to make a show with the writer Hannah Fidell about a high-end sex worker who finds herself in federal protection. In multiple discussions with executives, he said, they were told "the harsh reality" that it was not straightforward enough. "What audience is this targeting?" he remarked. "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 continued. "Regarding streaming leaders? The situation is deteriorating. We are reverting to previous conditions."