Season 8 Episode 14: Sofa So Good

Al and Peg are away at a Wanker County family reunion, which leaves the house to the children, and Kelly’s latest boyfriend manages to set fire to the sofa. The damage is total. Peg’s couch is gone, and Peg is due back next week, which gives Bud and Kelly time to find an identical replacement. Then Peg calls to say they are coming home tomorrow. Jefferson, brought in as a consultant, delivers the bad news in stages: the couch was not a popular line, only two were ever manufactured, and only one of those sold. Kelly’s conclusion that this makes the search easier is the episode’s best joke and earns her the harshest thing her brother ever says to her. The hunt leads out into the woods, to the man who built the thing, a recluse named Mary who has lost his mind and constructed a shrine to the Three Stooges. He has the other couch. He is willing to part with it, but not for money, and the terms he proposes put Kelly in a position she has to think seriously about. She takes the deal. The couch comes home, the parents arrive, and the episode saves its punchline for the moment Al and Peg go upstairs and notice what is missing from the bedroom. It is one of the strongest Bud and Kelly episodes of the later seasons, because for once they are working together and both of them are desperate, which brings out the best in the writing for both characters.

Episode Facts

• Original air date: January 16, 1994
• Season and episode: Season 8, Episode 14
• Overall episode number: 171
• Written by: Doug McIntyre
• Directed by: Amanda Bearse
• Production note: Marcy does not appear, as Amanda Bearse directed.
• Production note: The opening scene of Bud on the phone was lifted for David Faustino’s clip in the season 9 opening credits.
• Title note: A pun on “so far, so good.”

Guest Cast

• Larry Hankin as Mary
• Bryn Erin as Naomi
• Mark Matheisen as Gunther

Only Two Were Ever Made

Larry Hankin is perfectly cast as the couch’s creator, and the detail that sells the character is the Three Stooges shrine, which the episode shows without explaining. Hankin went on to play Mr. Heckles on Friends, which premiered about ten months after this aired, and which also employed Matt LeBlanc and later Christina Applegate.

Jefferson’s three-step delivery of the production figures is the best-constructed joke in the episode. Bud guesses a thousand, then five hundred. The answer is two. Kelly asks how many sold. The answer is one. Her response, that all they have to do is find that one, triggers Bud’s assessment of her long-term prospects, which he repeats for emphasis.

Bud’s cold open is one of his great failures. He has built a makeshift bed on the front porch, explains that he finds making love indoors restrictive, and reveals in passing that they have already been thrown out of a photo booth. His date’s two questions are both devastating, and his closing attempt to salvage it, involving a dollar bill worn around his collar as cologne, is the funniest thing in the episode.

The final gag is the sort of thing the series did well: the problem is solved, the couch is in place, nobody is caught, and the cost only becomes visible when the camera follows the parents upstairs.

Famous Quotes

• Bud, to his date on the porch: “I know this might not be quite as comfortable as what you’re used to, my dear, but personally, I find making love indoors restrictive. So I’m glad that attendant threw us out of his photomat.”
• Naomi: “You’re as broke as a two-dollar wristwatch, aren’t you?” Bud: “And hornier than a funeral in New Orleans, baby!”
• Bud, as she leaves: “But I’m wearing ‘Simply Abe!’”
• Kelly: “Bud, they’re coming home tomorrow! Is there any way that I can talk you into taking full blame for this?” Bud: “Sure. If you can get me a woman who won’t say no.” Kelly: “So there’s no way?”
• Bud: “How many were made? 1,000? 500?” Jefferson: “Two.” Kelly: “Well, how many did they sell?” Jefferson: “One.” Kelly: “Great! Then all we have to do is find the one they sold. How hard could that be?” Bud: “Boy, when your looks go, you’re dead!”

Notes

• Kelly is seen reading The Little Engine That Could, the book that drove the plot of season 3’s “He Thought He Could.” Bud quotes its famous line back at her as a threat.
• A goof: Mary throws the cappuccino cups toward the couch and one lands facing camera with the fake coffee visibly still inside.