Screen: HBO
While that other prestigious drama that airs Sunday nights at 9 (Eastern) is wrapping up by wrangling with questions about whether it's ever acceptable to do the wrong thing for the right reasons, and how much responsibility attaches itself to the person who merely helps the primary villain, Boardwalk Empire counters with a subplot, in the latest episode, featuring a character not just explicitly reaffirming his commitment to all manner of criminal activity, but expressing disappointment that he doesn't have more to do, and offense that a recent injury has caused him to be sidelined. Never did any gangster have a more courtly, dignified henchman than Eddie Kessler.
In the show's early going, Kessler (Anthony Laciura) often appeared to provide comic relief, whether finding himself in his boss Nucky's (Steve Buscemi) bedroom while Nucky was in the midst of an adult situation or committing malapropisms due to his imperfect grasp of English. That Kessler never faltered in performing his duties as Nucky's most trusted employee with unshakeable composure gave those comic moments all the more heft: as Krusty the Clown told us long ago, "The pie gag's only funny if the sap's got dignity."
But last season, Kessler went from lovable stooge to potentially tragic figure when he and Nucky found themselves in a gunfight, and Kessler got shot. As Kessler was getting treated, poorly, in a hideout and not, let's say, a hospital, Nucky was asked whether Kessler had any family who should be notified, and Nucky had to admit that he didn't know. While Kessler knows Nucky as intimately as it is possible for two people to know each other who aren't actually sleeping together, Nucky regards Kessler as maybe three degrees more sentient than a beloved piece of furniture. It's not really possible for Nucky to be chastened by anything, but the experience of almost losing Kessler brought him about as close as anything we've seen so far.
Kessler survives his wounds and returns to work for Nucky, slightly battered but labouring mightily to keep Nucky in the style to which he's become accustomed; Nucky is being slightly tolerant, because after your valet has taken an actual bullet for you, you can't really fire him for spilling your coffee sometimes, and slightly annoyed, because spilled coffee is annoying. But when Nucky makes the cardinal error of attempting to ease Kessler's burden by reaching for the cup, Kessler pulls it back with a heartbreaking look of wounded pride.
That look makes it clear how much of his identity Kessler derives from serving Nucky, and serving him well -- and we get all that with a facial expression, even before Kessler gets the episode-best speech in defense of Nucky's position in the community:
Mr. Thompson is part of everything. He's in the sky and sea. He is in the dreams of children at night. He is all that there is, forever.
The big move Kessler makes in the episode is to answer Nucky's attempts to help Kessler with a letter of resignation, which Nucky correctly interprets as a bid for an expansion of his duties; by the end of the episode, Nucky has realized Kessler is too valuable to lose, and rewards him (?) with the opportunity to open a safety deposit in Kessler's own name in which to squirrel away some of Nucky's ill-gotten cash (and maybe as a secret 401K program that Kessler would be too proud to take). Ultimately, what this relationship proves is that you don't have to be the world's best boss to inspire the loyalty of the world's best employee.