Season 11 Episode 20: Lez Be Friends

Marcy’s cousin Mandy comes to town, also played by Amanda Bearse, and befriends Al and Jefferson, which Marcy finds intolerable. Then Mandy tells Al she is gay, and Al, in possession of information Marcy does not have, has to decide what to do with it. The episode’s comedy comes from Marcy’s jealousy being entirely misdirected and from Al being the one trusted with a confidence.

The casting carries real weight. Amanda Bearse had come out publicly in 1993, four years before this aired, making her one of the first openly lesbian actors on American network television, and here she is playing both the character who is gay and the character who is shocked by it. The episode also completes a set: with this performance, every one of the series’ six main cast members has played a dual role in a single episode, after Ed O’Neill twice, Katey Sagal as Death, Christina Applegate in “The Stepford Peg” and David Faustino as Cool Bud.

The production had to use pre-recorded laughter rather than a live audience, because the scenes with both Marcy and Mandy required Bearse to be shot separately as each character, which is too slow to perform in front of a crowd.

The timing is remarkable. Ten days after this episode aired, Ellen broadcast “The Puppy Episode,” in which Ellen Morgan came out, one of the most publicised moments in American television history, with DeGeneres having come out herself shortly before. Season eleven had been dropping hints toward this episode for months, including Marcy’s emphasis on the last word of her song in “Breaking Up Is Easy to Do” and Peggy’s reaction to the hand on her shoulder in “Live Nude Peg.”

Episode Facts

• Original air date: April 28, 1997
• Season 11, Episode 20, and the 258th episode of the series
• Taped March 14, 1997
• Written by Pamela Eells
• Directed by Gerry Cohen

Guest Cast

• Amanda Bearse as Mandy, in a dual role alongside Marcy
• Elaine Hendrix as Elaine
• Lucky the dog as Lucky Bundy

Amanda Bearse Playing Both Halves

The dual role is why this episode looks slightly different from everything around it. Any scene with both cousins in frame had to be shot twice, or with a double standing in, which was far too slow to perform in front of a live studio audience. So the laughter in those scenes is pre-recorded, which the show did not otherwise do in eleven seasons.

There is real history sitting under the plot. Amanda Bearse had come out publicly in 1993, four years before this aired, which makes her playing both sides of this particular conversation a deliberate choice rather than a coincidence. It also went out ten days before Ellen Morgan came out on Ellen, the episode that carried a parental advisory and dominated the news that spring. This one aired with no fuss whatsoever.

It also completed a set. With this episode every member of the main cast had played a dual role: Ed O’Neill as Al and his father’s ghost, Katey Sagal as Peg and Death, Christina Applegate as Kelly and the neighbor who looks like her, David Faustino as Bud and Cool Bud.

Famous Quotes

• Mandy: “You saw that in a video, didn’t you, Al?” Al: “Yeah, my favorite!” Mandy: “Mine, too!” Al’s elaborate theory about how Mandy turned out gay, punctured in three lines.
• Mandy: “So you don’t have a problem with two women being together?” Al: “No… as long as there’s a guy watching.” Al being precisely as enlightened as you would expect.
• Mandy: “I hate to impose, but can I crash on your couch?” Al: “Well, that depends. Won’t turn it gay, will it?” Mandy at the Bundy door at midnight, after Marcy throws her out.
• Al: “I trust you’re enough of a lady not to whistle at my tight little behind as I go up the stairs.” Mandy: “Al, I told you, I’m gay.” Al: “That may well be but there are some things no woman can resist.” Al, undeterred by information.

Notes

• The title is a pun on “let’s be friends.” The shortened word in it reads as a slur now, which is worth knowing before recommending the episode by name.
• Elaine Hendrix had been on the show once before, as Sandy in the season 9 episode User Friendly.
• Marcy sings a variation on The Patty Duke Show theme when identical cousins come up. Charlie Verducci had already sung it in season 5’s “Oldies But Young ’Uns.”
• Paul Anka’s “Puppy Love” plays when Lucky and Frisky are set up, over Bud and Elaine on the couch.
• Al runs through a list of women to test whether Mandy would pick him over any of them, including Cindy Crawford, Phyllis Diller and Marge Schott, who was partway through a two year ban from running the Cincinnati Reds when this aired.
• Al mistakes Mandy for Marcy in a wig when she first arrives and calls her the fifth Beatle.
• Goof: Mandy falls asleep on the couch with nothing and wakes up with a pillow and a blanket.
• Goof: in the over-the-shoulder shots of the two cousins together, the double standing in for Marcy has a noticeably lighter skin tone.