Date of airing: April 8, 2000 (CBS)
Nielsen ratings information: 7.53 million viewers, 4.9/10 in Households, 2.3/9 with Adults 18-49
written by: Michael Katz
directed by: Deborah Reinisch
This was a heartwarming episode that is perfectly suited for the Hallmark Channel I watched this episode on (or, to be precise, I watched a copy of this episode that aired on the Hallmark Channel). In fact, the network could easily hire a random white writer, preferably male, to steal the story of this episode and turn it into a Hallmark Christmas romance movie, ready to be aired between mid-October and the end of December. And considering how many Countdown to Christmas movies there have been on Hallmark already, what are the chances that such a movie exists already? There was something charming about a troupe of amateur stage actors banding together in a moment of a slight crisis, and delivering a sleek performance that made them feel like they were a family and they just saved theater. That is a romance story without the romance, and while Hallmark movies annoy me for being the same old stuff in pretty much every movie, sometimes the light fare as depicted in this episode is needed to just calm my nerves and give me the sense of getting wrapped up in a warm blanket.
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| This pizza delivery man turned stage actor is about to make acquaintances with a 2x4. |
Gary was thrown into the world of amateur teenager a little randomly though, but I guess that comes with the premise he was given. Although I do have to say that the scene with the actor getting smashed in the ribs by a 2x4 off-screen to get Gary into the theater troupe was kind of hilarious. But it was very much a forced way to give Gary the time to catch the acting bug and not have him constantly run around Chicago to save lives, as well as giving the writers the time needed to flesh out the story and turn it into something more than just Gary finding the joy in performing Shakespeare.
And boy, was I glad when Bonnie revealed herself to be a fraudster and con artist, because that conflict made the episode a little more dramatic, and it gave the last couple of minutes the necessary moral to make this episode shine like the EARLY EDITION episode it was: Sometimes you do bad things, but sometimes you also get a second chance and you are making use of it. Bonnie did so by not showing her back to the troupe after she was found out, embracing the role of a stage director at the end. That was very nice and added some additional romance about life at the end. Of course, I was immediately interested in finding out whether Bonnie went back to her conning self, or if she stuck around and put on some more Shakespeare pieces for amateur actors, making a name for herself as director of professionally-looking amateur performances. All this time, she was waiting to get her break on Broadway, and she eventually found a way to make a career behind the curtain by helping aspiring actors find themselves.
Meanwhile, Crumb returned, and of course he did, because it was only a question of time before he would show his face again. Gone are his days as a detective, as a retired detective, and it looks like he even quit being a private investigator, because he is now an actor. It looks to me like the writers did not know what to do with the character, or when to resurrect him for another story, so they just dropped him in a random episode. At first, it was Crumb writing his memoirs, which were never mentioned again after that episode in which he wrote his memoirs, then it became all about being conned and lied to by a criminal mastermind, then Crumb went back into the business of investigating, but five episodes later he was out of it again and became an actor. Is this guy going through a midlife crisis or something, or did the writers plan to have that thing with Joanna in “Crumb Again” be a life-changing event for him and he did not know what to do with his life after that? If it is the latter, then I can say with certainty that it does not come over as such (mostly because Crumb is only a recurring character in a show that does not want to bother with him anymore). If it is the former, then I can say with certainty that Crumb has never looked happier. His character would be more interesting at this stage if he had gotten more screentime and a more consistent storyline to work with.
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| Kyle Chandler is an actor acting acting. |
And finally, why does it always have to be Shakespeare? I did not understand a single thing during the rehearsal montage with Gary (or the final performance), and it reminded me of the time I performed a Shakespeare play once, back during my high school days. Only it was in German, and we had to rewrite almost all of the dialogue scenes, just to make the whole play more understandable to a generic audience who did not care for Shakespeare or also had issues getting the Shakespearean dialogue. I am sure that only three percent of the audience that came that night to see this performance understood the play front to back, no matter how famous it is. You know, you can do Shakespeare and rewrite his words. Even on scripted television...
