Season 11 Episode 22: The Desperate Half-Hour (1)

Bud has a pen pal in prison, and she escapes. Starla arrives at 9764 Jeopardy Lane with two accomplices and takes the Bundys and the D’Arcys hostage, which gives the series one of its rare bottle episodes: the entire half-hour plays out in the living room and kitchen, something the show had only attempted a handful of times since season one’s “Johnny Be Gone.” The confinement suits it. With nowhere to cut away to, the comedy has to come from six people reacting badly to the same gun.

Marcy reacts worst and funniest. Her instruction to Jefferson not to mention the Mercedes no matter what is immediately followed by Jefferson volunteering the Mercedes and the keys, and her attempt to hide those keys down her blouse fails on the only grounds the show ever ribbed her about. She then tries rehabilitation, arguing that shooting the Bundys is a minor matter but grand theft auto is beneath Starla, and when that fails she loses her composure entirely and has to be restrained mid-threat with a gun against her forehead.

Kelly’s thread is the one that carries into part two. She falls for Lonnie, Starla’s accomplice, on the strength of a shared intellectual wavelength, and when the police take the pair away he proposes on the spot from one knee. Her acceptance and his reply, a promise to remain her husband regardless of whose wife he becomes in prison, is the most romantic exchange the series ever wrote, and it is entirely sincere on both sides. Al, meanwhile, survives being shot thanks to his lucky shoehorn.

Episode Facts

• Original air date: Monday, May 5, 1997 on FOX
• Season 11, Episode 22, part one of two
• Overall episode 260 of the series
• Taped March 21, 1997; production code 11.23
• Written by Valerie Ahern and Christian McLaughlin
• Directed by Gerry Cohen
• The title plays on the 1955 film The Desperate Hours, which also concerns escaped convicts holding a family hostage
• One of the very few episodes set entirely in the Bundy living room and kitchen

Guest Cast

• Tricia Cast as Starla

A Bottle Episode on Jeopardy Lane

Keeping the whole half-hour on one set is a choice the series made rarely: “Johnny Be Gone” in season one is the other obvious example, and it is a good fit for a hostage story. Nobody can leave, which is the premise, and the Bundy living room had eleven years of furniture, props and sightlines established for comic use. The gun simply gives everyone a reason to stay in frame.

Marcy gets the episode’s best run and it is built on the oldest joke the show had about her. Told to keep quiet about the Mercedes, she is betrayed by her own husband in under five seconds; told to hand over the keys, she tries to conceal them in a blouse the series has spent a decade insisting cannot conceal anything; told no, she attempts moral instruction and then collapses into a rant about the electric chair that requires Jefferson to hold her back. Amanda Bearse plays all three stages without easing off.

The Kelly and Lonnie material is played straight, which is why it works, and it sets up the following episode’s wedding. Tricia Cast’s Starla is the engine but Lonnie is the point: he and Kelly understand each other perfectly, on a level nobody else in the room can reach, and the proposal at the door with police on either side is delivered without a trace of irony. Cast herself had starred in It’s Your Move, an NBC sitcom produced by this series’ creators and featuring David Garrison.

Famous Quotes

• Marcy: “Now, remember, no matter how she threatens us, do not tell her about the Mercedes.” / Starla: “Hey, what are you whispering about?!” / Jefferson: “We have a Mercedes next door. Take it, here are the keys.”
• Marcy: “So you were gonna blow away the Bundys. What’s that, a $10 fine? But grand theft auto, you’re better than that. Inside you is a confused, misunderstood person who doesn’t need a Mercedes, just a second chance.” / Starla: “Yeah, I’ll think that over when I’m ditching your car in a lake.”
• Marcy: “I HOPE YOU FRY! THERE’S NOT ENOUGH VOLTAGE IN ILLINOIS AND I’M GONNA SHAVE YOUR HEAD WHEN THEY STRAP YOU TO THE…”
• Starla: “Now listen up, Pigs! I want a car to the airport, I want a plane to Brazil, and $50,000 cash!” / Al: “I demand the same thing.” / Griff: “And I need more Mountain Dew.”
• Lonnie: “Neither could I have dreamt of meeting someone as beautiful and perfect and smart as you. Kelly Bundy… will you marry me?” / Kelly: “I thought you’d never ask. I’ll wait for you.” / Lonnie: “I will too, my darling. No matter whose wife I am in prison, I’ll always be your husband.”

Notes

• Tricia Cast had starred in It’s Your Move, the 1984–85 NBC sitcom produced by Married… with Children creators Ron Leavitt and Michael G. Moye, which also featured David Garrison.
• Kelly reveals that Peggy took her to a male strip club for her twelfth birthday and that she had to drive her mother home.
• Damian Chapa, then known for Street Fighter and Blood In, Blood Out, appears uncredited as one of the police officers.
• Al sings his own version of “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” as “Old Chuck Bronson Had a Gun.”
• Goof: David Faustino and Katey Sagal can both be seen fighting smiles after Starla shoots the remote control out of Al’s hand.
• Goof: Marcy threatens Starla with the electric chair; Illinois used lethal injection.
• Goof: Al’s shirt has no bullet hole after the shoehorn stops the shot.