Frasier (1993) s05e07 – My Fair Frasier

Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) finally gets to end an episode without driving away his latest love interest—this time it’s Lindsay Frost, guest starring as a high powered attorney who’s in town to try a sensational case and she and Grammer have a meet cute where she helps him get a purse returned. See, Peri Gilpin’s pregnant and very moody, so she doesn’t like the purse Grammer got her. Except she also just doesn’t like the purse Grammer got her.

So when Grammer goes to return it, they won’t take it back until Frost intercedes and basically Karens the clerk until they relent. Only Grammer and Frost head out from their meet cute before he can actually get his money back, which is a fine enough gaff because it means there won’t be anymore vaguely transphobic jokes about Grammer possibly being a crossdresser. They’re not specific, just credited writer Jay Kogen thinks it’s really funny to have a set full of women laugh at the idea of Grammer being a crossdresser. Wokka wokka.

The majority of the episode is the supporting cast conferring with Grammer about him not being the alpha in the relationship with Frost, who breaks their dates, uses Grammer for quickies, and doesn’t appreciate the time he puts into cooking. There’s a decent enough resolution to it all—especially after Grammer meets all the other trophy wives—but it’s a bit of an easy episode. No one else gets a subplot, with Gilpin disappearing after the opening scene until the end credits when it’s a repeat of the moody pregnant lady gag (albeit extremely well-acted), with David Hyde Pierce being shaken to his core by a boat show snack bar the closest the episode ever gets.

Those asterisks aside, everyone’s really good supporting Grammer in his contemplations over the relationship.

Frost’s a fine guest star. She’s barely in the episode (actually it all reminds way too much of the Sela Ward guest starrer, which opened the season—they may even go to the same restaurant) and even when she is around, she’s an accessory to Grammer (while in the plot he’s her accessory). It’s a solid showcase for Grammer, who’s very good at being whiney about everything. It’s Kogen’s first episode (of many) as writer so hopefully he’ll improve but he could’ve done a lot worse; although, I was expecting more from a Jeff Melman directed outing.

Frasier (1993) s05e04 – The Kid

This episode picks up the morning after last episode, with Kelsey Grammer having to apologize to Peri Gilpin—who’s already decided she’s keeping the baby—for telling a party full of strangers about it. Grammer’s supportive, but thinks Gilpin needs to tell the dad.

Skip ahead to the apartment and David Hyde Pierce is also apologizing—him for being blotto at the party and making absurd accusations—before Gilpin comes over for dinner. There’s a short running gag about the Crane boys making Jane Leeves answer the door even though she’s cooking them dinner and a little about John Mahoney freaking out over Gilpin being unmarried, but pretty soon the supporting cast is out of the episode and it’s all Gilpin and Grammer.

Specifically it’s Gilpin, who’s got to tell the completely unawares dad-to-be (guest star Todd Babcock), with Grammer around for support. Babcock doesn’t react particularly well, which leads to some dramatics before the episode gets to a solid resolution. It’s easily the most Gilpin-focused episode of the series so far (fifth season and she had to get pregnant, but at least it’s not a disappointing Gilpin-emphasis episode like before).

The episode handles the friendship between Gilpin and Babcock exceedingly well, enough to make up for Grammer’s sort of baby steps into the dramatics of being a supportive friend. Grammer handles the parenting-to-be conversations fine (including a solid Lilith joke), though getting there isn’t easy. There’s an awkward eavesdropping on Gilpin and Babcock at the cafe sequence involving Mahoney; it’s actually a repeated gag from earlier (where it’s done a lot better).

The other big highlight is Gilpin getting to prank Dan Butler, which starts iffy but ends up glorious.

It’s an excellent episode for Gilpin, dramatically speaking, it’d just be nice to see her get a more comedically minded showcase as well.

The script credit is to Jeffrey Richman and Suzanne Martin (who got solo credit on the first episode in the pair); Jeff Melman directs. Not flashy direction from Melman but good and thoughtful, sort of like the script. The episode handles the seriousness of the situations well, even if they’ve rife with comedic potential (like what makes Babcock a peculiarity in Gilpin’s dating life), and emphasizes the character work first.

It’s a very successful episode. Even if it makes Mahoney seem way too old fashioned with the “getting herself a husband” stuff.

Frasier (1993) s04e23 – Odd Man Out

It’s not a great season finale. Not a good season finale. I’m low fine on it? So adequate. Not inadequate. Odd Man Out is a not inadequate season finale.

But this season has been great. It’s been the best season of “Frasier” so far; long stretches of consistence excellence. It didn’t even start falling apart until the last few. And the season finale really could’ve saved it; hence the low fine.

The problem is there isn’t an arc to the season. The episode—script credit to Suzanne Martin, who’s had better script credits on the show—is about Kelsey Grammer realizing he’s “single,” not “recently divorced,” which hasn’t really been an issue for him before this episode. The show often goes on about Grammer being miserably lonely and not having had dates in ages but he’s had dates every second or third episode this season. It’s worse now because David Hyde Pierce is back with unseen Maris, which sort of coincides when the season started having its big stumbles, and Hyde Pierce can’t be Grammer’s backup for Grammer’s surprise birthday dinner for Peri Gilpin who has plans because it was a surprise and can’t go. Jane Leeves can’t go because she has a date with some other unseen love interest, ditto John Mahoney because he’s got Marsha Mason (though she’s not in the episode). So it’s Grammer alone at dinner.

Where a little kid (Miles Marsico) befriends him because Grammer looks so lonely. Especially once everyone around him starts showing off their couples-based happiness.

It’s mildly amusing but… it’s pretty thin stuff.

The episode’s eventually going to hinge on a mystery caller leaving messages on the answering machine—she thinks it’s someone else, someone who needs to pick her up from the airport. Will Grammer eventually go to the airport and will it be kismet? I don’t think they say spontaneity ever in the episode; Grammer’s had “I need to be spontaneous” arcs twice this season. Here he’s got a moping arc. Looks like “Frasier” might actually be on an inverted Star Trek schedule with the season finales; first excellent, second blah, third good, fourth blah.

The episode being so unimpressive is immaterial and annoying, with a lot of the annoying coming from it being unimpressive immaterial to the show over all.

The ending doesn’t age well either; after the show’s prostrated itself to portray Grammer as a tragic, earnest, almost romantic figure, he does something shitty and predatory because it was the nineties and lying to women to get them into bed was the hero move. There’s even more to unpack with it, further contributing to the annoying.

Good enough performance from the surprise guest star but it didn’t need to be a guest star.

Not to mention the entire supporting cast is around to support Grammer on this lukewarm character arc. There’s a really well-acted apartment scene with full apartment cast (so minus Gilpin) but it’s purely functional to ease Grammer along.

For the trite emotional resolution, there are much better things they could’ve done. It’s not so much they thought it was gold but it was bronze… they didn’t even try for bronze. If it weren’t “Frasier,” it’d be troubling.

Frasier (1993) s04e22 – Ask Me No Questions

Dan Cohen and F.J. Pratt wrote another episode (a really good one) but I didn’t recognize their names when the writing credit came up here. I don’t think if I’d remembered it would’ve led to a more generous viewing. This episode’s first swing and miss is in the first thirty seconds and it’s a big swing and a bigger miss. The sadder part is director Jeff Melman can’t even get traction and he’s done some really good work this season. Now he gets to do this very desperate miss of a concept episode.

It begins, as “Frasier” often does, with a title card. This one is “The Question.” The question (in question, wokka wokka) is David Hyde Pierce—now reconciling (off screen obviously) with estranged wife Maris—asking Kelsey Grammer if he, Grammer, thinks they’re meant to be together. Portentous fade to black, fade in at apartment, where Jane Leeves and John Mahoney kick off their okay but it’s a bickering time filler subplot about Leeves making Mahoney a sweater as a present and Mahoney not wanting to take it with out paying. It’s an occasionally funny subplot with a much better performance from Leeves than Mahoney, who’s getting the “old man yells at cloud” motivations a little too often lately. Putting the breaks on character development is a bad move, even if the character development isn’t going the way you want.

Anyway.

So while Hyde Pierce occasionally checks in to let Grammer know how couples counseling is going (off screen), Grammer obsesses over how to answer the posed question. It’s going to lead to a couple very low points, though I suppose only one of them would be worth Alan Smithee’ing the director credit. They do a bait and switch with a reveal on Maris, which is the most desperate move I can think of the show making to this point. Then they do a Grammer walking the streets haunted by voiceovers; Meet John Doe it ain’t. If it weren’t for the former, the latter wouldn’t be so bad. But if it were just the former, it’d still be bad. Especially since it gets a reference later too, like they’re proud of the desperation. Even worse, it’s not like Grammer’s particularly good. It’s a thin plot, poorly realized and executed, and there’s nothing for Grammer to work with.

Hyde Pierce does pretty well with very little—actually, everyone who has to deal with Grammer while he frets kind of does a better job (so Hyde Pierce, Mahoney, and Peri Gilpin). They don’t have to make believe the consternation is real, they just have to make believe Grammer’s being annoying about it.

There’s also an iffy scene where Grammer complains to a date (Cindy Katz) about it, which leads to a standard misunderstanding joke; Katz gets through it okay, albeit ingloriously.

Irene Olga López’s back as Hyde Pierce’s maid; she’s at least hilarious, even if problematically included.

Given the plot—even without the reveal gimmick, but just on the existential fretting—this episode was going to soar or fizzle.

Soar, it does not.

Frasier (1993) s04e19 – Three Dates and a Breakup

I don’t know if Rob Greenberg is actually on my list of “Frasier” writers to worry about or if I just think he’s on my list of “Frasier” writers to worry about and I’m mistaking the standard nineties misogyny with it being a repeating problem for Greenberg. Either way, there’s a lot to unpack, as the misogyny interacts with classism, ageism, and just plain old toxic masculinity.

The forty-eight minute episode—a two-parter, which originally aired the same night then went on to get split for syndication I assume—gets off on the wrong foot, with Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce mocking Peri Gilpin for being sweaty while jogging. She’s going to get a subplot about how her self-esteem is entirely based on what her hometown acquaintances think of her appearance. At no point do professionally trained psychiatrists Grammer or Hyde Pierce do anything but encourage her in this pursuit, albeit with an eye roll because, you know, women are silly.

It’s a profoundly thin subplot, ending with Marsha Mason age-shaming Gilpin? Hopefully Gilpin got to keep the elegant gown she eventually casually strolls around in, but it’s a heck of a subplot in a two-parter about Grammer getting dates with three women on three consecutive days. He’s so happy about it he calls and brags to a (sadly offscreen) Norm Peterson (from “Cheers”). On each of these dates, however, Mason shows up to spoil things. She and John Mahoney are in a fight and Mason’s presence in the apartment messes up the evening for Grammer. But more for his dates, as Mason tends to reveal the things Grammer’s been lying to them about in order to get them in bed.

Ah, the nineties.

Hyde Pierce’s subplot is being jealous of Grammer and also trying to make sure Mason and Mahoney’s fight ends in a breakup, even after it becomes clear the tension is having really negative effects on Mahoney. Initially only Jane Leeves—whose subplot about trying out an American accent isn’t funny, but is the only one where you don’t cringe at some point—notices something wrong with Mahoney, but soon Grammer’s picked it up and out of concern and empathy, changes his tune on Mason (he and Hyde Pierce hate her for being brassy). There’s some great material for Grammer in the finish with Mahoney, but there’s never any great material for Mahoney or Mason, even though the episode’s actually about them.

None of Grammer’s three dates make much impression–two are caricatures, one isn’t even in it enough to be a caricature. Greenberg writes the caricatures as hysterical tropes, while the last is apparently even shallower than Hyde Pierce (or Grammer just thinks so little of her, but, you know, in a good way because society girl?).

There’s some really nice direction from Jeff Melman, but given where the episode goes for Mahoney and Mason, they really ought to have gotten more. It’s also not surprising at all they didn’t; if Greenberg isn’t on my writer problem list, I’m definitely going to remember him for next time.

Though, wait, the C plot about the security guard being able to see in the elevators ends up pretty funny. Could be funnier, but it’s an actual solid laugh and not one where you’re laughing with the bully or lying serial dater.

Frasier (1993) s04e15 – Roz’s Krantz & Gouldenstein Are Dead

It’s producer William Lucas Walker’s first writing credit on the show. I wish it weren’t so obvious—it even sounds like the laugh track is louder and more persistent in the first half of the episode (which ends up being significant entirely for its guest stars)—but every line gets a laugh and they’re not very good lines. Jeff Melman’s direction keeps it in check and the actors manage to find the timing but it is a rough first act.

The episode opens with Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce out driving and seeing Peri Gilpin working on a road crew. They whisk her away after some mediocre but also some good banter; Gilpin’s got community service and it’s road crew or visiting the old folks. Grammer talks her into doing the old folks instead of the road and her first day, the resident dies on her. Second day, resident dies on her. The subplot for the episode is Hyde Pierce needing a date for an outdoor wedding, which turns into he and Grammer making fun of each other’s wives. It’s really easy jokes from Walker, who stays sex oriented for a recurring erectile dysfunction joke.

Thank goodness it all goes away once Grammer accompanies Gilpin to the old folks home for her final attempt to fill her hours (and not kill anyone).

While Gilpin goes in and starts bonding with fun old dame Lois Smith, Grammer finds himself meeting a super-fan played by… James Earl Jones. So about a quarter of the episode is just Grammer and Jones talking to each other with their perfect voices. Their plot line has to do with Jones being blind—Walker’s got the most original ideas—and it’s a fine enough structure, albeit obvious, for a good guest star.

But Smith’s great too. She gets the deeper role, telling Gilpin all about aging while they suck down cigarettes.

It’s an oddly assembled episode—Grammer and Jones’s bit is just filler, the Hyde Pierce offscreen but fret-worthy subplot is just filler—and Gilpin doesn’t get the biggest laughs, she gets the serious stuff and Smith (rightly) runs those scenes. Though Gilpin does get the entirely solid end credit tag.

Still, it’s a far more uneven episode than this season’s seen in a while if ever.

Frasier (1993) s04e13 – Four for the Seesaw

It’s such a good episode. Clearly season four is where “Frasier” hits its stride, but even so, Four for the Seesaw is a really good episode. It starts with Kelsey Grammer getting his flu shot on air and it not going well to the point he faints—giving Peri Gilpin time to flirt with shot administering doctor, Andrew Heckler, which is important because when it’s time for Grammer and David Hyde Pierce (great Gilpin and Hyde Pierce banter too) to find a table at the café, Gilpin begs the single free one off them to meet him. It leaves Grammer and Hyde Pierce in a conundrum about what to do (for a second it seems like they might actually go somewhere besides Nervosa). Instead, Grammer talks a very nervous (no pun) Hyde Pierce into asking a couple women if they can sit with them while they wait for another table to open up.

The women, played by Lisa Darr and Megan Mullally, agree and the quartet sets about making small talk. Darr and Mullally are positive the brothers won’t be interested in their profession, but it turns out it’s right up their alley and they hit it off. There’s great writing—David Lloyd gets the credit—and directing (Jeff Melman), but Darr and Mullally are also key.

After coffee they go to dinner, then back to Grammer’s apartment to meet the fam, have some drinks, and suggestively flirt. John Mahoney’s very happy to see Grammer and Hyde Pierce with women he can stand. He also offers Grammer a cabin in the mountains for the weekend because he won’t be using it (it’s not the previously established fishing cabin they had a season ago). After some back and forth, Grammer decides to keep going with spontaneity and suggests they all head to the cabin for the week. Darr and Mullally agree, but Hyde Pierce is hung up on his separation from Maris… until Grammer reminds him it’s never happened attractive women have been willing to run off with the Crane boys for the weekend and maybe he should embrace it. Between Grammer’s persuasiveness and Mullally finding Hyde Pierce hilarious (in such a perfect way), Hyde Pierce agrees and it’s off to commercial break then the cabin.

The cabin sequence is going to end up funnier than anything before it, which is an achievement, as Hyde Pierce and Grammer’s separate (and individual) neuroses plague them as they try to ascertain their dates’ intentions. The episode’s got two perfect resolutions, first for the quartet, then for Grammer and Hyde Pierce (in the end credits tag). Grammer’s far more sure of the situation than Hyde Pierce, which leads to some valid conflict, internal and external, as well as some great scenes for Hyde Pierce. There’s also a very interesting contrast between Grammer and Hyde Pierce.

Mahoney and Jane Leeves get a follow-up to the flu shot opening scene which is hilarious too. It’s a brief aside, but wondrous.

It’s a hilarious, well-acted, well-written, extremely well-directed episode. Darr and Mullally—and Grammer, for that matter—don’t end up with a lot to do in the last few minutes, but they’re all just right.

Frasier (1993) s04e08 – Our Father Whose Art Ain’t Heaven

This episode is credited writer Michael B. Kaplan’s first; I may not be keeping good track of the writers on the show, but I’m at least staying familiar with the names and his wasn’t familiar. He does a fine job with it, getting to some good character work in both comedy and drama. Kaplan’s also good at delaying the actual A plot while deliberately laying the groundwork for it.

Art opens with Kelsey Grammer and John Mahoney arguing about the latest Jean-Claude Van Damme movie, which they went to go see as a bonding outing; it was Mahoney’s pick and not only did Grammer hate it, he didn’t let Mahoney pay, which aggravates Mahoney. Niles is hanging out at the apartment because… well, Niles is hanging out at the apartment and he’s introducing his B plot about he and separated wife Maris throwing a party for the same day and having to fight for guests.

When Jane Leeves gets home, threatening to cook a sheepshead stew for dinner, the boys run out to a restaurant. A snooty restaurant, where Mahoney wants to pay and Grammer doesn’t want to let him, leading to some conflict and priming the A plot.

So maybe nine or ten minutes in, we get to the full A plot, which has Mahoney getting Grammer a present Grammer really wishes he wouldn’t have gotten him and Grammer’s consternation over how to broach the subject. Simultaneously, Hyde Pierce is fighting to keep his guest list up. Leeves has a little subplot going, which eventually gets replaced by Peri Gilpin’s own nightmare gift situation. Gilpin only gets one real scene—at the station, providing emotional support for a sick-of-home Grammer, but it’s a very good one for the actors.

Where the episode really scores is in the resolution, which starts with Grammer, Hyde Pierce, and Mahoney before segueing into one of those great “Frasier” father and son scenes for Grammer and Mahoney. Grammer missed out on the last one (that episode where Hyde Pierce took over his plot and the corresponding bonding with Mahoney), but this episode’s even better for it. Hyde Pierce doesn’t get shortchanged, however; he’s got a fine resolve to his B plot too, playing into the A plot perfectly.

It’s another outstanding “Frasier,” with a “just right” end credit sequence for Gilpin and her C plot; Kaplan’s got a very good script, Melman’s direction is good, and Mahoney and Grammer get a nice character development arc.

Frasier (1993) s04e07 – A Lilith Thanksgiving

The title of this episode, A Lilith Thanksgiving, is simultaneously accurate and not. While the episode does indeed guest star Bebe Neuwirth and does indeed take place at Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving is tangential to the plot and doesn’t involve Neuwirth at all. The episode does one of those “Frasier” forecast and switches, where the opening introduces the idea the A plot is going to be Kelsey Grammer, David Hyde Pierce, and John Mahoney going to Hyde Pierce’s luxury cabin to celebrate the holiday, with Neuwirth accompanying she and Grammer’s son, Trevor Einhorn. It’s Einhorn’s first appearance of many as the kid; he’s good.

The first scene has Hyde Pierce on the phone with the caretaker while Peri Gilpin and Jane Leeves have quick scenes—Leeves is going somewhere else, Gilpin is house-sitting the apartment. There are a bunch of good one-liners for everyone, even if it’s obviously a way to get Leeves and Gilpin out of the action so we can just enjoy Mahoney being miserable around Neuwirth.

But wait!

Grammer gets a phone call and it turns out they can’t go to the cabin, they all have to go to Boston—Grammer and Neuwirth have to go to an entrance interview for Einhorn to go to a shishi poopoo private school on Thanksgiving morning. It’ll be Thanksgiving in Boston.

While Grammer and Neuwirth are at the interview, Hyde Pierce is in charge of cooking the turkey and Mahoney’s babysitting Einhorn. Despite the continent-trotting, it’s a very contained episode—there’s the apartment at the beginning, Neuwirth’s kitchen, then the large living room of school headmaster Paxton Whitehead. The present action is a few hours, as Neuwirth and Grammer fret over how they’ve done in the interview and continue to pester Whitehead, even crashing his Thanksgiving dinner.

Meanwhile, Hyde Pierce and Mahoney are breaking the very delicate Einhorn with baseballs, refrigerator doors, and anchovies.

Whitehead’s a perfect guest star, especially for the intensity of Grammer and Neuwirth, who are even more outrageous when acting in unison than against one another. It’s a great guest spot for Neuwirth, whose presence tempers the entire cast and they all get to react against it in different ways. She and Grammer are superb together.

Excellent script, credited to Chuck Ranberg and Anne Flett-Giordano—Gilpin and Leeves have a wonderful moment bonding over Grammer being so difficult—and fine direction as usual from Jeff Melman.

It’s not a “Lilith Thanksgiving” or even much of a Thanksgiving episode, but it’s still a hilarious episode with great performances from the guest stars and the regular cast.

Frasier (1993) s04e06 – Mixed Doubles

It’s another great episode for David Hyde Pierce. He shares the spotlight, but with Jane Leeves and the guest stars, with Kelsey Grammer and John Mahoney supporting the A plot. Their B plot involves staring contests with Eddie the dog. The A plot’s where it’s at.

Christopher Lloyd’s the credited writer and outside his easy jokes about Roz (Peri Gilpin) being promiscuous—the one about Dr. Roz and the Gabor method after Gilpin tells Leeves, who’s just been through a breakup, not to miss a man who doesn’t buy jewelry or perform well in the sack, is technically easy but also inventive—Lloyd writes an outstanding script. Great direction from Jeff Melman too. Melman toggles from sitcom laughs to sincerity quite well, though Hyde Pierce and Leeves do all the hard work. And there are still laughs, just different ones.

The episode opens with Leeves coming home after being dumped and Grammer, Mahoney, and Hyde Pierce all trying to comfort her. In that order because Grammer and Mahoney don’t want to let Hyde Pierce get too hands on while hugging her. Eventually Gilpin shows up because it’s a sitcom and she and Leeves go and commiserate properly.

Leeves’s new single status inspires Hyde Pierce—still indefinitely separated from Maris—to tell her how he feels, only to have Grammer strongly caution him. Give it a day to think about it, Grammer tells him, which becomes a familiar suggestion even after Hyde Pierce and Grammer find out—the next night—Leeves has found a new fellow. She and Gilpin went to a singles bar.

Upset with Grammer, Hyde Pierce calls Gilpin and asks her to take him to the same bar—turns out Gilpin’s an always successful wing-woman at this place. There, Hyde Pierce meets Allison Mackie and the two hit it off.

Fast forward three dates and Hyde Pierce is introducing Mackie to Grammer and Mahoney. Leeves brings home her new beau—Kevin Farrell—who turns out to be a clone of Hyde Pierce, leading to some great laughs for Grammer and Mahoney, then Hyde Pierce once he sees the resemblances.

There are a lot of good Grammer and Hyde Pierce bicker banter laughs before the twist and resolve, with the resolve being where Melman and Lloyd get to showoff their dramatic chops, all thanks to Hyde Pierce and Leeves’s excellent performances.

It’s a great spotlight for Hyde Pierce and showcase for the cast and show in general. Another exemplar “Frasier.”

Also—it’s awesome to see he and Gilpin get some additional time together. Even when they do have occasion to interact, it always seems hurried, this episode they get to take their time.