Frasier (1993) s07e07 – A Tsar Is Born

This episode’s a great example of how a long-running show (probably specifically sitcom) can benefit from that longevity. There are new things in the culture relevant to the show, which it can now comment on. In this case, “Antiques Roadshow,” or whatever they call it on Tsar. “Roadshow” started in 1997, “Frasier” started in 1993. This 1999 episode offers a wonderful integration.

Both Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce are big fans of the program, making an evening out of watching an episode. They’ve got Grammer’s apartment to themselves because dad John Mahoney’s going out for a boozer. Only then Mahoney’s pal cancels, and the boys think they’re out of luck; Mahoney promises they can have the TV after his program’s finished.

Of course, his program is “Antiques Roadshow” too. For the first time in seasons upon seasons of episodes, Grammer, Hyde Pierce, and Mahoney find something they all enjoy. They even come up with a drinking game for whenever someone says “veneer.” It’s a fantastic bonding sequence, in some ways more touching than when they have their occasional heartfelt moments in episodes because it gets to be comedic. And let them all play to their characters’ eccentricities without anyone being the butt of a joke.

At the end of “Roadshow,” they find out the show’s coming to town, so they’re going to go and bring some of Mahoney’s family relics. It kicks off a hilarious plot about the Romanov dynasty, scullery maids, and Winnebagos. I’m not sure if A Tsar Is Born is an exemplar “Frasier” going back to the start of the series, but it’s definitely a mid-run exemplar. The episode goes all out, too, with a scene set at the touring “Roadshow,” where Grammer and Hyde Pierce can be appropriately snobby.

The script’s credited to Charlie Hauck, whose name seemed familiar but not from this show (Tsar is his first of two “Frasier” episodes). It’s a really good script. Especially since it gives Peri Gilpin and Jane Leeves a little more to do than usual.

Still lovelorn, Gilpin checks out a laptop from the station to get on the World Wide Web. Presumably firing up Netscape Navigator, she’s met a nice guy online, and Grammer tries to convince Gilpin she’s being catfished. The subplot only gets a couple scenes, but there’s a nice moment for Gilpin and Mahoney, who haven’t gotten to hang out lately. Then the punchline is absolutely hilarious and provides an excellent showcase for Gilpin.

Leeves gets showcased, too… though dressed as a go-go dancer. She and (off-screen) fiancé Saul Rubinek have different ideas of appropriate wedding attire, but Hyde Pierce gets some great reactions to Leeves in scanty sixties wedding dress. She also gets to make some good rejoinders to Grammer during his peak snobbery. It’s also nice to see Hyde Pierce have some—albeit highly inappropriate—passion. It’s been a while.

Good direction from Pamela Fryman, great resolution for the A-plot–A Tsar is Born is an excellent sitcom episode.

Frasier (1993) s06e19 – IQ

What I can’t figure out with episode director David Lee, whose name I’ve come to dread this season, is the obviously uneven enthusiasm. This episode’s got a couple literal set pieces—there’s an auction scene and a restaurant scene (in addition to the apartment)—and there’s a lot of detail during those sequences but the blandest three-camera sitcom. Maybe the answer’s simple, and the unbilled extras in the episode had more imagination than Lee, but this episode’s got all the right pieces to be tremendous, and Lee doesn’t put them together.

I missed the writer credits while watching, keeping them for a surprise until now (when I can also look up their track record). The credit goes to Rob Hanning and Jay Kogen, who’ve gotten solo credit before, with Kogen on better episodes than Hanning, but Hanning no slouch. It’s a Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce competitiveness episode, starting from the opening joke, with Hyde Pierce bragging about his new cufflinks. It’d be gauche for both of them to be wearing silver, Hyde Pierce best wear the gold. Then, they’re off to a silent auction with a recurring gag and delayed punchline as to the associated charity’s purpose, and there’s room for the whole cast.

Peri Gilpin gets to go along because one of the auction items is getting to sit in the booth with her during an episode of she and Grammer’s radio show. But, of course, it’s been a very long time since they’ve been to the studio, and this auction item becomes a nothing plot point just to get Gilpin into the episode.

The auction scene has Grammer and Hyde Pierce fighting over who should get to have lunch with geniuses, John Mahoney trying to con his way into a new grill, and Gilpin trying to get someone besides stalker co-worker Patrick Kerr from winning the show sit-in. It’s a lot of good acting—with one particularly good shot from Lee, finally seeming to get the potential for the scene—but the writing’s a little thin on everything for Gilpin and Mahoney. The stuff with Grammer and Hyde Pierce is good, though, and it’s going to be the A plot for the rest of the episode.

See, when they were kids—sadly no flashback—Grammer and Hyde Pierce took IQ tests, and their parents never told them the scores, just they were close. Now they’re adults and want to know the results. The episode glazes over how unlikely it seems neither had their IQs tested since, and it quickly becomes an absurd competition again, with only a few hours before their individual intelligence will be put to the test.

Hyde Pierce and Grammer both get a fair amount of physical comedy to do. More for Hyde Pierce, but thanks to Lee’s direction, the audience doesn’t get to see some of the best of it. Mahoney’s got some good moments, both conniving for a grill and being an exasperated dad. Jane Leeves gets a great monologue recounting her weird family, which is just tacked on to the episode to give her something to do, but it’s doesn’t matter because it’s excellent. Though, again, Lee could’ve done better with it.

IQ’s a pretty good brother vs. brother episode, but it should’ve been better.

Frasier (1993) s06e13 – The Show Where Woody Shows Up

For an obligatory Woody Harrelson finally guest stars on “Frasier” episode, they do all right. There’s a good mix of Harrelson with the regular cast–including some of the regular supporting cast—and there’s a little bit of an unrelated B plot. Station engineer Noel (Patrick Kerr) is trying to woo Peri Gilpin while everyone drops “Star Trek” jokes because he’s a nerd Trekkie. Or Trekker. I think he talks about it (but not on this episode). There’s additional synergy because it’s all Paramount—including directly making a William Shatner joke (but at Kerr’s expense). And it gives the script something to do besides make “Woody is dumb” jokes.

There are a lot of “Woody is dumb” jokes.

Rob Greenberg gets the script credit. Other than not knowing what to do with David Hyde Pierce—he hangs out with Kelsey Grammer and Harrelson for their bar buddy reunion, but since there’s nothing for him and Harrelson to interact on, Hyde Pierce just makes reaction shots to the “Woody is dumb” jokes. At least John Mahoney appears to be enjoying Harrelson doing the schtick. He’s beaming during some of the shots as he watches the energy buzz of Harrelson. Harrelson is genuinely great at playing a lovable buffoon.

Unfortunately, the episode can’t think of anything to do with Peri Gilpin (Harrelson’s happily married, though there could’ve been a fantastic baby bonding thing), so she’s only in it long enough to set up an offscreen gag for Grammer, Kerr, and Edward Hibbert. It’s okay—they all go to karaokeing offscreen, and then Grammer and Harrelson talk about it later, letting the audience imagine Kerr and Hibbert’s performances. There’s a reward for it too, so it does work out. But it’s a bit of a detour.

Because the crux of the plot is Grammer feels like he’s outgrown Harrelson and “Cheers” and wants to ditch him but can’t. Harrelson’s in town for a wedding, which never comes up after the first six minutes, even though it seems like it should. It’s an okay plot—a little meta with the now erudite Grammer unable to pal around with his working-class former regular bartender Harrelson; the writers’ room just gave up—and it’s funny. There are maybe too many of the “Woody is dumb” jokes but not too too many. Enough you remember why Harrelson couldn’t have led a spin-off plus one, but not so many a couple last-minute ones aren’t just fine.

Good direction from Pamela Fryman.

It’s a successful very special guest star episode.

Frasier (1993) s06e09 – Roz, a Loan

Roz, a Loan is a peculiar episode. It’s ostensibly about Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) lending Roz (Peri Gilpin) some money since they’re still out of work. The episode opens in the cafe with Grammer and Gilpin thinking they’re about to go back to work at their original station—the salsa format hasn’t been working out ratings-wise—but then new cafe waitress Tricia O’Kelley dashes their hopes. She heard the station owner (sadly Miguel Sandoval doesn’t cameo) pish-posh the ratings and say salsa’s staying. So Gilpin’s bummed out because she’s not rolling in dough like Grammer, and he loans her fifteen hundred to tide her over for three more months.

Fifteen hundred dollars in 1998 money, incidentally, is twenty-five hundred in modern money. It also means Gilpin’s rent is something like a hundred and fifty bucks a month. The economics in sitcoms are fascinating and utterly depressing.

Anyway.

The A plot is then Grammer fretting over Gilpin misspending the loan as John Mahoney, Jane Leeves, and David Hyde Pierce all tell him to leave it alone, but of course, he can’t because it’s one of the character’s standard tropes. The B plot is them maybe getting their jobs back after all. The C plot is Hyde Pierce getting Mahoney to take him to a day spa; Mahoney has a gift certificate for two, but it’s got his name on it, so he’s got to go. There’s a profoundly “over his head” moment when Hyde Pierce whines he can’t afford to go to a day spa and whines to get Mahoney to take him. Grammer had just been complaining about similarly broke Gilpin going to the same day spa.

So it’s like seventeen minutes of Grammer ruminating on whether or not to be a rude jerk while everyone tells him not to be a rude jerk.

The rest of the time is O’Kelley playing oracle and then short (and funny) appearances from Dan Butler and Patrick Kerr since the radio station is kind of back.

Pamela Fryman’s direction holds it together, and the acting’s fine—Mahoney’s great with the spa stuff, ditto Leeves as she gets fed up with Grammer’s griping—but, again, it’s just about Grammer being a dick to good friend Gilpin.

Janis Hirsch gets the script credit—her first on the series.

Frasier (1993) s05e23 – Party, Party

Despite last episode’s big changes for at least one of the characters (not to mention a party plot line), this episode does the same thing. Well, not big changes for anyone, just another party plot. This time it’s Kelsey Grammer’s birthday and he’s stuck trying to get out of two parties so he can go on a date with Lisa Waltz before she leaves town for a month.

One of the parties has David Hyde Pierce trying to impress his new girlfriend, Marcia Mitzman Gaven (Gaven lives in Grammer’s building, which allows Grammer to go up and down the elevators between parties), and Grammer tagging along so they can get into some elite club. As they’re wont to do, amusing complications ensue.

The other party is the birthday party. There are a bunch of people from work (including Dan Butler and Patrick Kerr) and Grammer’s constant attempts to blow everyone off again lead to complications. There’s a particularly good sequence where they’re playing charades and Grammer gets stuck with John Mahoney and Butler and, well, they’re not the best guessers.

The episode’s setup—Grammer missing dates with Waltz—establishes that plot line as the main, with everything Grammer ends up doing to get out of the parties tied to it. But there’s not much meat to the plot; David Lloyd has writer credit on the episode and the entire setup is a protracted, then delayed setup for a punchline in the finale. The episode’s excellent moments come from the incidentals at the party, particularly Hyde Pierce’s subplot with Gaven; there’s no plot running through the birthday party other than Grammer trying to get away. The final punchline is good, but it’s nowhere near as good as anything else in the episode. It’s like they came up with the setup, came up with the finish, then worked harder on everything connecting them.

It’s all very competent—with good direction from Jeff Melman—but not very exciting. It’s one of those episodes centered around Grammer and unable to make him particularly interesting. Tends to happen with the ones where the object of his affection doesn’t really factor into the plot.

There’s a really nice credits sequence for Hyde Pierce and fellow party guest James Harper, who’s got some highlights through the episode and after the somewhat pat punchline, it’s a nice reminder of the higher points.

Party, Party is good but a rote good.

Frasier (1993) s01e13 – Guess Who’s Coming to Breakfast

It’s incredible how well Kelsey Grammer is able to play Frasier making social faux pas. It should run counter to his character, but never does. When Grammer’s digging himself his deeper and deeper hole this episode—as Peri Gilpin looks on, astonished—it just makes sense. Of course he’s going to do it. What else would he do.

After the opening radio show sequence—with Elijah Wood calling in and complaining about being bullied for being too smart, which is a wonderfully twisty call and very funny but does have a mean punchline, and then Gilpin going out on a date with “Noel the Mole” (Patrick Kerr)—she’s giving nerds a try because her lucks been bad with the Chads—Grammer goes hope and tries to arrange for an evening alone so he can have a date. In return, dad John Mahoney wants him to clear out the night before.

There’s also the requisite phenomenal David Hyde Pierce crushing on Jane Leeves scene, with Hyde Pierce doing a complicated and hilarious bit of physical comedy.

But then it’s full steam ahead to the aftermath of Mahoney’s date night. The date (Linda Stephens) slept over and Grammer just can’t handle it. No matter what he says, it’s something embarrassing at best and humiliating at worst. The episode’s already established Hyde Pierce and Grammer as… comically crude when discussing their potential sex lives.

On the radio later that day, Grammer gets a caller upset about her daughter having sex—Piper Laurie as the caller, she’s fantastic—and Grammer turns Mahoney and Stephens’s sex life into an anecdote for the radio show. Here’s where Gilpin’s looking on in shock.

Neither Stephens or Mahoney find Grammer’s anecdote amusing, with Stephens dumping Mahoney. But does Grammer learn his lesson? Will he leave the situation alone or will he fix it….

Great performances from Grammer and Mahoney this episode; Stephens is a good guest star; Leeves gets a very funny moment or two.

There’s also an odd bit when Grammer appears to be flirting with Leeves, which doesn’t go anywhere, but does remind about Grammer’s date, the whole reason the episode started with the date night business. Grammer doesn’t have the date. Or they did have it and didn’t show it. But it doesn’t seem like he had it.

It’s a very weird oversight.

Oh, and great third celebrity call from Henry Mancini. As he drones on, Grammer and Gilpin do an excellent bit of physical comedy to keep themselves awake.

Very, very good episode.