Season 9 Episode 9: No Pot to Pease In

Kelly auditions for a part on a FOX sitcom, and in the course of the meeting she starts telling the producer about her family. He stops caring about the script. What the Bundys are watching a few weeks later is a series called Pease in a Pod, in which a thinly disguised version of their own household is broadcast weekly to the nation, and the episode’s best running device is the clip montage: as Kelly describes each family member, the show cuts to actual footage from its own past, scored to the instrumental break of “Love and Marriage.” Al’s reel includes the burning foot, the inflatable pool and the new toilet. Peg’s includes the salad and the candy bar. Marcy’s includes the chicken impression and the bank. It is eight years of the series used as evidence against itself. Then the reactions start. Jefferson is furious about how he has been depicted and demands to know whether he is meant to be some mindless, gold-digging gigolo, and the pause before anybody answers him is the funniest moment in the episode. Kelly’s defence of the one thing she lied about, her own education, is undercut within seconds by what her television counterpart does next. The show is eventually cancelled because one woman in Michigan complained.

What makes the half-hour work is that the show is not satirising some other series, it is satirising itself. Pease in a Pod is Married… with Children with the names changed and the edges filed off, and the Bundys watch it from the couch in the same postures the audience is watching them in. The clip package Kelly’s audition triggers is drawn from across the previous eight seasons, which turns the premise into a genuine retrospective smuggled inside a joke about network development.

Episode Facts

• Original air date: November 6, 1994
• Season and episode: Season 9, Episode 9
• Overall episode number: 192
• Written by: John Glenn Houston
• Directed by: Gerry Cohen
• Production note: The reason given for Pease in a Pod’s cancellation, that one woman in Michigan did not like it, is a direct reference to Terry Rakolta, whose 1989 campaign against this series cost it advertisers.
• Production note: The FOX executive is named Ronald N. Michaels, after series creators Ron Leavitt and Michael G. Moye.
• Production note: The closing credits replace the usual couch freeze frame with a photograph of the real cast and the fictional Pease cast together in the Bundy living room.
• Title note: A play on “no pot to piss in.”

Guest Cast

• George Wyner as Ronald N. Michaels
• Leonard Kelly-Young as Mel Pease
• Lisa Kaseman as Patty Pease
• Alex McLeod as Carrie Pease
• Bruce Fine as Ben Pease
• Steven Hack as Lou
• J.J. Johnston as the security guard
• Jennifer Massey as Marla ‘the Pigeon’ Darla
• Edd Hall as the announcer (voice, uncredited)

Pease in a Pod

The clip montage is the reason to watch this episode and the reason it works as a ninth-season instalment: it only lands if you have been there for the previous eight. Each family member gets a reel of their worst moments pulled from real episodes, and the selection is merciless. Al gets “Wabbit Season,” “A Dump of My Own” and the inflatable pool. Marcy gets the Elvis scene from “I’m Going to Sweatland” and the drunk dancing from “It’s a Bundyful Life.” Buck gets various shots of himself sitting on the stairs.

Al’s first exchange with the producer is the best scene in the episode. He introduces himself, the producer hands him car keys and gives instructions about the detailing, and Al’s attempt to correct the misunderstanding stops dead when he realizes what is in his hand. He pockets the keys before saying another word.

Jefferson’s outrage is beautifully timed. He lists the traits his television counterpart has been given, in ascending order of insult, and then looks around a room in which nobody will meet his eye, including his wife.

The posters on the producer’s office wall are the same gag from season 6’s “Kelly Does Hollywood”: fake show titles built from the names of the series’ own writers and creators.

Kelly is established in this episode as attending the Larry Storch School of Acting, which pays off later in season 9 when Storch himself turns up.

Famous Quotes

• Jefferson, after watching his own portrayal: “So what am I now? Just some mindless, pretty boy, gold digging, gigolo?!” Then, after a long silence from everyone including Marcy: “…Y-you’re darn right I’m not!”
• Jefferson, to Kelly: “So what did you tell them about yourself, Kel?! That you graduated from Yale?!” Kelly: “…Harvard.”
• Kelly, in her own defence: “Just be thankful at least one of our reputations is still good.”
• Al, introducing himself: “Excuse me, Mr. Michaels. I’m Al Bundy.” Michaels, handing over keys: “Here. It’s the black Cadillac with the gold trim and I want it detailed inside and outside this time.” Al: “No, no, no. I’m here to… Cadillac?”

Notes

• The milk carton with Seven’s photograph on the Missing side, first seen in season 8’s “Ride Scare,” is visible again on the table during the FOX viewing position scene.
• Al’s “FOX viewing position” involves the family holding aerials to improve reception, and the picture stays perfect after they let go.
• Kelly does a Jerry Seinfeld impression during her audition.
• J.J. Johnston, the security guard here, had played Louie in season 8’s “Luck of the Bundys.” Alex McLeod had been one of Bud’s dormmates in “Old College Try.”
• A goof: the blue screen used to insert Kelly into a photograph between Reagan and Gorbachev bleeds through along her left side.