Category: Directed by James Burrows
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Death and the Dog does a couple things I think are new to “Frasier” and immediately seem like series standards. The first is using the radio show as an episode-long bookend device. The episode opens with Kelsey Grammer and Peri Gilpin bored on a sunny Seattle day and getting a single caller—Patty Duke (not playing…
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It’s a Seabees episode, but only sort of and only at the beginning (the Seabees are the annual radio awards on “Frasier” and there’s always an episode). Always with conditions, however, as the episode opens in the apartment at Kelsey Grammer’s Seabees after party, where the regular cast is doing their best to get the…
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It’s a pretty good episode, even if most of the laughs are cheap and mean. The cheap starts right away, with Peri Gilpin getting her one scene in the episode opposite David Hyde Pierce. She’s celebrating and the punchline’s gross funny. And Hyde Pierce’s reactions to it are great. But then the episode’s done with…
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Look Before You Leap is one of those exemplar “Frasier” episodes. It’s just the regular cast, it’s just the regular sets, and it’s perfect situation comedy. The episode starts with Kelsey Grammer taking Eddie the dog for a walk, which should’ve forecasted everything being off since Grammer abhorring the dog is one of the show…
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Shelley Long is a very good guest star for “Frasier.” She irritates John Mahoney in a particular way he’s never been irritated before and it leads to some great expressions from him and some great one-liners too. Long’s also really good with David Hyde Pierce; they’re both snobs but he wants to be more of…
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Dark Victory has three writers—Christopher Lloyd, Linda Morris, Vic Rauseo—except Morris and Rauseo are a team and Lloyd is a solo guy usually so the disjointed flow makes sense. It’s the season finale, it’s got to get to some kind of season finale moment, except it’s a sitcom and it doesn’t have a cliffhanger. I…
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The Innkeepers is a great sitcom episode without necessarily being a great “Frasier” episode. It’s a really good “Frasier,” with the entire cast doing a great job—they just aren’t asked to do very much. John Mahoney spends a bunch of the episode doing his irate thing even after it isn’t making things funny anymore. He…
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I figured I’d have remembered Don Seigel’s name from last season, if only for it confusing spell check, but I didn’t. I should have. His episode last season was great. This one’s pretty great too; it’s another SeaBea Awards episode, with Kelsey Grammer and Peri Gilpin sure they’ve got a chance this year if only…
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I was kind of dreading this episode—the first season of “Frasier” immediately established the show’s differences from “Cheers” and made the need for a stunt cameo from a “Cheers” cast member superfluous. So waiting to the back nine of the second season to bring in Ted Danson, who was trying to recover from the blackface…
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It’s writers Chuck Ranberg and Anne Flett-Giordano’s second episode this season. They sort of established the show in the first season, so it’s nice to see them back. Even if this episode doesn’t age well. Some of the jokes are great and the performances are fantastic, but the situations associated with said jokes and performances…
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Steven Levitan wrote this episode. Levitan’s one of the few sitcom people whose names I recognize. I didn’t realize he’d done “Frasier.” Turns out this is his first of four episodes. Recognizing the writer (though not remembering he hadn’t contributed a script to credit level before Seat), I paid the writing a lot of attention.…
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I wonder how this episode would play in one sitting. Even just marathoning it (as opposed to cutting out the recap at the beginning of this second part, which Kelsey Grammer performs quite well). Because writers Ken Levine and David Isaacs still have an odd structure. They had an odd structure last episode, as they…
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Remember when we didn’t see TV show episodes all the time? What were they called—electronic programming guides (thanks, Google). So watching Adventures in Paradise: Part 1 in fall 1994, you weren’t wondering why it was called part one. The episode’s got a somewhat strange pacing as writers Ken Levine and David Isaacs have to introduce…
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I missed the writing credit on this episode and I’m glad I did. Seeing it’s Chuck Ranberg and Anne Flett-Giordano is icing. Candidate’s the team’s first script this season (they did a bunch last season) and it’s great. It’s also a bit risqué for a network sitcom as far as politics goes, especially since—I’m not…
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Linda Morris and Vic Rauseo write this one, making it the first episode of the season to have season writers back (credited anyway), and they go in for the laughs from the start. We get Peri Gilpin on a chocolate hunt—leading to a fantastic rant about Raisinets—before David Hyde Pierce shows up to the studio…
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I missed the Christopher Lloyd credit during the opening titles—James Burrows directing is no surprise—so I got to watch the episode without any writerly expectations. It feels somewhat like a first season episode, back when the show was establishing its take on structure. Here, we get a big setup to the episode from Peri Gilpin…
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“Frasier” went out on a high point and returns for its new season strong and assured—with a new writer to the series, Martin Weiss, and James Burrows’s ably directing as always. After a quick phone call to the show from James Spader, we get to the main plot. Or we get introduced to the main…
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My Coffee with Niles is a concept episode victory lap for the first season, scripted by two of the three creators (David Angell and Peter Casey), with James Burrows directing, set entirely in the coffee shop where Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) and Niles (David Hyde Pierce) regularly meet to have coffee together. The difference—besides the entire…
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The episode’s another superlative one—Chuck Ranberg and Anne Flett-Giordano’s script is exceptional, with a bunch of great detail (everyone in the cast has something going on this episode, all of it somewhat related to Kelsey Grammer coming down with a man cold)—but it’s also got the distinction of having the weirdest set of celebrity callers.…
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It’s another great episode. As in, great example of what a multicam sitcom can do. What’s particularly interesting is Author, Author is the first episode credited to writers Don Seigel (not to be confused with Don Siegel, insert Dirty Harry reference here) and Jerry Perzigian. James Burrows directs, which is great, as the episode requires…
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This episode is Linda Morris and Vic Rauseo’s first as the credited writers. Most of the show’s teams as men and women couples; I wonder if it’s intentional or coincidental. But I didn’t catch the writer credits again this time and was curious because Travels With Martin is a quintessential “Frasier”. As in, one to…
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I missed the writing credits at the beginning of the episode, so every time there was a particularly mean joke—usually at Maris’s expense—I got curious who wrote it. Anne Flett-Giordano and Chuck Ranberg, who’ve been the season’s sturdiest writers; outside the cheap mean jokes, they’re also saddled with a very “sitcom” sitcom episode, meaning it’s…
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“Frasier,” the show, has made a few references to the popularity of “The Frasier Crane Show,” the in-show radio program Kelsey Grammer hosts. At one point it seemed to be on the ropes, with Grammer and producer Peri Gilpin worrying they’d get cancelled, then it was getting better ratings than the sports show… but its…
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Bebe Neuwirth’s visit to the new show, coming in the back nine of the first season, is everything it could and should be. Writers Ken Levine and Davis Isaacs craft this perfect plot, which showcases Neuwirth and gives her a relationship—active or not—with all the regulars, then still manages to keep it an episode for…
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It’s a packed, but never frantic episode–Chuck Ranberg and Anne Flett-Giordano are the “Frasier” all-star writers right now and they’ve got a lot of inventive work here, both the plotting and character arcs. Every development is combination delight and surprise. The episode starts with Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) and Roz (Peri Gilpin) dreading having to return…
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It’s a Christmas episode and a good one. Just the right amount of humor and heartwarming, with Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) ending up alone on Christmas and in need of some good fellowship as it turns out. Everything seems to be going swimmingly for Grammer’s first Christmas with Mahoney in Seattle, with his son coming in…
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It’s another strong episode. “Frasier”’s combination for success is the scripts—in this case, from writers Denise Moss and Sy Dukane—the supporting cast, and then the bigger name guest stars. Because whether you know his name or not, John Glover is a name guest star. He’s in this episode as Kelsey Grammer’s boss. The episode starts…
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It’s a Kelsey Grammar-centric episode—it’s about Frasier’s first girlfriend since the divorce, though they’re never too specific about it (just Frasier still thinks women don’t have to pay on dates). Only he manages to screw it all up, even when he finds out the girlfriend (Amanda Donohue with such a good American accent I didn’t…
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This episode brings Peri Gilpin to Kelsey Grammer’s apartment for the first time. It’s not because of what happens with Gilpin there but what doesn’t. During the course of the episode, she meets Grammer’s dad, John Mahoney, but not onscreen. She comes up in conversation later when Mahoney suggests to Grammer he should ask her…
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This episode features Niles (David Hyde Pierce) meeting Daphne (Jane Leeves) for the first time and it’s amazing. Also amazing is how Kelsey Grammer is on it from the start, initially bewildered at Hyde Pierce’s behavior. Grammer really gets across how predictable Frasier finds his brother. It’s so good. Also, I think this episode has…
The Stop Button 