Farrah Fawcett

EMILY: Oh, yes, and there was a tee-shirt with a Farrah Fawcett face.
LORELAI: A hero to many who aspire to the perfect feather fluff.

Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) was an American model and actress. Having already appeared in commercials and TV shows, she became famous in 1976 after posing for a poster wearing a red one-piece bathing suit. That same year, she got her breakout role as Jill Munroe on crime drama series Charlie’s Angels, becoming an international star. Her hairstyle was a phenomenon in itself, with the “Farrah-flip” a sought-after look well into the 1980s (during Lorelai’s teenage years).

A link with other references in this scene is that Farrah Fawcett played Barbara Hutton in a 1987 TV movie.

Filofax

EMILY: You wanted me to get her a Filofax and a mermaid eraser.

A Filofax is a personal organiser in a large leather wallet with a six-ring loose-leaf binder; the name comes from the phrase “file of facts”. They were popular during the 1980s as an accessory for yuppies. Filofax is a UK company founded in 1921, and originally known as Norman & Hill.

This seems to be the “funky dayplanner” that Lorelai suggested that Emily buy Rory (or maybe to Emily, all dayplanners are Filofaxes). Either way, it actually seems like a good compromise between the mother’s and daughter’s tastes, as well as being useful to Rory who loves being organised. It seems a bit odd that Emily didn’t agree to it.

Barbara Hutton

EMILY: Please be serious, we’re shopping for Rory.
LORELAI: No Mom, I’m shopping for Rory. You’re shopping for your imaginary granddaughter, Barbara Hutton.

Barbara Woolworth Hutton (1912-1979) was an American socialite, and as heiress to the Woolworth fortune, one of the wealthiest women in the world. She was called “The Poor Little Rich Girl”, in part because of her unhappy private life.

Montblanc

EMILY: A Montblanc pen?
LORELAI: To put on her desk at the law firm?

Montblanc International is a German firm which makes luxury pens, founded in 1906. They are named after the Mont Blanc range in the Alps, to indicate that they are the “peak”; the A in the MONTBLANC logo is designed to look like a mountain.

A Montblanc pen can easily cost thousands of dollars, so Damien’s selling some lower-end ones for $200 actually seems pretty reasonable. A Montblanc pen would be something of a financial burden to a high school student though, as the ink refills are expensive.

The Queen of England

EMILY (showing Lorelai a hat): Oh, isn’t this lovely?
LORELAI: Oh, yeah. As soon as we have her crowned Queen of England we’ll give it to her.

The throne of England actually came to an end in 1707; after this the kingdoms of England and Scotland merged into the Kingdom of Great Britain. In 1801 this merged with the Irish kingdom to become the Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. After most of Ireland left the union, its name was changed to the Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, otherwise known as the United Kingdom. The last Queen of England was Queen Anne (1665-1714; became queen in 1702).

The Queen of the United Kingdom is Elizabeth II (born 1926), which was also the case in 2000. By tradition, the Queen (like other royals and the upper classes generally) always wears a hat in public during formal occasions. That’s probably why Lorelai connects hat-wearing with royalty. Her opinion is not shared by Amy Sherman-Palladino, who is a notorious wearer of hats.

Happy Birthday

This 1981 song by Scottish new wave band Altered Images plays when Rory is at Chilton, discovering that her grandmother has sent out invitations to all her classmates. It was released as a single from their album of the same name, and went to #2 in the UK.

Although it didn’t chart in the US, it would be familiar to many from being included on the soundtrack to the 1984 teen movie, Sixteen Candles. The movie about a girl’s 16^th birthday seemingly gone wrong mirrors Rory’s feelings when she discovers that Emily has sent out the invitations without asking her. The difference is that in the film, everyone has forgotten the girl’s birthday, while in Rory’s case too many people have been reminded of her birthday.

Lorelai Leigh

We learn in this episode that Rory’s full name is Lorelai Leigh Gilmore. This seems like an homage to the character Lorelei Lee (played by Marilyn Monroe), from the 1953 musical comedy film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, directed by Howard Hawks. It is based on the 1949 musical, which in turn was based on the best-selling 1925 novel of the same name by Anita Loos. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was the #9 movie of 1953, and both the film and Monroe’s performance were praised by critics.

In the film, Lorelei Lee loves wealthy men and the high life, and is also accused in court of theft. This may help prepare us for Rory’s own character arc.

Rory’s Birth Date

When Tristan shows Rory the party invitation he received from Emily, we can see that Rory was born on October 8.

This isn’t possible according to the script – Rory started school late, and she would only have been at Chilton for a short time by October 8, less than two weeks at the absolute maximum. Several weeks have now gone by, where Rory has attended multiple Friday Night Dinners, learned to play golf, helped out at a wedding, got her first D, failed to turn up in time for a big test, attended a cat’s wake, discovered her mother and English Literature teacher made a date, and confessed to Dean that she is interested in him. Furthermore, October 8 was a Sunday, not a Friday, in 2000.

If you carefully follow Rory’s adventures since starting at Chilton, you can see that her birthday would actually be October 27. A birthday in late October is confirmed in future seasons.

If you are in a nit-picky mood, feel free to join me in tut-tutting that the party invitation said that Rory was born in the morning twice in the same sentence, but neglected to mention that it’s her sixteenth birthday – no way would Emily have done such a shoddy job.

One might also wonder how Emily was able to get the names and addresses of all Rory’s classmates to send them invitations – did Headmaster Charleston let her access the school database just for her granddaughter’s birthday party?

Damien’s

EMILY: Well good. I’ll meet you at Damien’s tomorrow at three o’clock.

A fictional department store, perhaps an equivalent to the real life Filene’s department store in Hartford (originally G. Fox and Co.), which was sold to Macy’s in 2006. The scenes in Damien’s were filmed at the Burbank Town Center shopping mall in Burbank, California.

Jane

EMILY: This isn’t funny. I hardly get to see the girl and we only get to talk at dinner once a week and then it’s all about school and Jane.
LORELAI: Lane, Mom.

The fact that Emily mixes up Lane’s name and calls her Jane is a probable allusion to the MTV cartoon Daria (1997-2002), in which protagonist Daria Morgendorffer’s best friend is Jane Lane (I believe this to be source of Lane Kim’s rather unlikely first name).

Jane Lane is not Asian-American like Lane Kim, but her voice actress is Malaysian-born, and the character is drawn with some slight Asian characteristics, so that casual viewers sometimes assume she has Asian heritage. Besides both having black hair and being the less academic sidekick to an intellectual bestie, Jane Lane was a gifted artist, as a parallel to Lane Kim’s musical talent.

(By the way, if Emily only hears about Rory’s doings at Friday Night Dinner, whatever happened to that weekly phone call where she could catch up on Lorelai and Rory’s lives?)