Category: Frasier
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I glazed over the director credit—I knew it was David Lee, but David Lee turns in particularly distinctive episodes, usually just competent ones. But this time he gets to do something special—half the episode is shot on location in Seattle (the only time in the series, apparently), with David Hyde Pierce and Kesley Grammer walking…
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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…
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Halloween buries the lede. The episode opens with David Hyde Pierce arriving at the apartment and talking with John Mahoney about costume problems. Hyde Pierce is throwing a costume party and isn’t having any luck finding Mahoney a Sherlock Holmes outfit. From background to foreground come Kelsey Grammer and Jane Leeves, who are giggling as…
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The Gift Horse is from a one-time writer (Ron Darian), which might explain the soft retcon regarding John Mahoney’s birthdays on the show. This episode turns the gift giving into a competition between Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce, as each tries to out do the other on the gift, leading to Grammer going all…
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There’s very little as satisfying as the season premiere immediately addressing my problems with the previous season’s finale and remedying them. That episode ended with Kelsey Grammer, lovelorn, following a woman (Lisa Guerrero) onto an airplane and pretending he was always on her flight. This episode opens with Guerrero getting very creeped out by Grammer’s…
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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…
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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…
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When I saw William Lucas Walker on the script credit, I figured there were going to be some easy, probably sexist jokes and Walker does not disappoint in hitting his standards, but it’s a successful episode overall. The eventual plot—after getting through the intro where Kelsey Grammer thinks only riff-raff hug each other (not sure…
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There’s some truly great stuff this episode—Kelsey Grammer directs and continues his extremely gentle look at the potential chemistry between David Hyde Pierce and Jane Leeves (he directed the previous Moon Dance episode, which was the first time the show really acknowledged the potential)—but there’s also some very messy stuff. The messy stuff starts, with…
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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…
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Ham Radio relies heavily on the situation in situation comedy; it gets some good laughs, but because of who’s in the episode—and how it’s written for those particular guest stars (specifically Edward Hibbert). But the David Lloyd-credited script only advances by one-upping itself, trying to appear chaotic but always coming through linearly and predictably. Not…
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I’m still waiting for the great Roz episode for Peri Gilpin. It’s actually her second one in the last handful of episodes but, just like before, she gets upstaged by a guest star. This time it’s going to be it’s going to be Harriet Sansom Harris as agent-from-Hell Bebe Glazer and not the voice of…
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It’s a fathers and sons episode, both for Kelsey Grammer and guest star Trevor Einhorn and then Grammer and John Mahoney. There’s also some nice stuff for Dan Butler—implying the possibility of character development, which hasn’t really been present before—and then David Hyde Pierce gets a hilarious subplot. Both Peri Gilpin and Jane Leeves get…
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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…
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“Frasier” has gotten to the point where—unless I miss the writer credit—I eagerly anticipate it. So after listing all the producers and executive producers (who’ve had writing credits on excellent episodes this season), the writing credit on Talking Bird is Jeffrey Richman, whose name wasn’t familiar (and it’s his first credited script on the show),…
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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…
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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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I just realized we never get to see the undoubtedly hideous antique Kelsey Grammer is supposed to get from Marsha Mason. Mason’s John Mahoney’s new girlfriend (who the show’s established sons Grammer and David Hyde Pierce do not like because she’s too… earthy) . Grammer and Hyde Pierce get back from antiquing and Mason promises…
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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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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…
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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…
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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…
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The last time David Hyde Pierce got to run an episode, he shared it with Jane Leeves; this time, after Kelsey Grammer heads off to a conference leaving Hyde Pierce guest-hosting the radio show for a week, it’s all Hyde Pierce. I missed the director credit—but did happily catch the Rob Greenberg writing one, so…
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This episode’s gimmick—Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce fanboying over J.D. Salinger analogue Robert Prosky, who just wants to drink Ballantine’s and watching baseball with John Mahoney—ages really well. We hit peak pseudo-Salinger four years later with Finding Forrester (raise your hand if you too had a friend who thought Forrester was a real guy…
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The Impossible Dream ages surprisingly well. Or, actually, maybe it doesn’t because you can imagine the exact same story being done twenty-five years later…. The episode opens with Kelsey Grammer waking up in a seedy motel, discovering a tattoo on his arm and a lover in the shower. The lover turns out to be Edward…
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The episode opens with Dan Butler—who’s a regular per the opening titles this episode (but not last; he wasn’t even in the previous episode)—on the phone breaking up cruelly with his latest romance. And, it turns out, her sister as well. It’s dated—at least I hope it’s dated—but, you know, it’s just Butler being Bulldog.…
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Joe Keenan for the win. I missed the writing credit on this episode and put off finding out who wrote this marvelous script until now. Keenan starts the season out on a very high point, with an endless amount of always good one-liners as the regular cast gets to do a group showcase episode. Jane…
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For the third season finale, “Frasier” goes with the wholesome flashback (with some bite) route. The script’s from Linda Morris and Vic Rauseo, which is appropriate for the flashback—although they’re executive producers, they haven’t had many script credits this season—but they wrote a bunch in the first and second seasons. The episode opens establishing it’s…
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The episode opens with a lengthy setup for the eventual A plot, getting most of the B plot out of the way in an early chunk. Both Daphne (Jane Leeves) and Niles (David Hyde Pierce) are upset; she’s mad at her boyfriend for ditching her on their anniversary weekend to go to Vegas (we learn…
The Stop Button 