RORY: I don’t know where it is! LORELAI: Where what is? RORY: My bracelet – it’s gone.
Rory runs home in a panic to tell Lorelai that her bracelet is missing. Jess is listening in the background, and he now discovers that Rory’s bracelet was made by Dean, and given to Rory as a gift. Jess has a good poker face, but you can tell this does not come as welcome news.
Jess also learns that Rory thinks Dean will be angry when he finds out the bracelet is gone, and she appears frightened of his temper. This seems like such a red flag – why isn’t Lorelai concerned that her teenage daughter is actually scared of her boyfriend? Instead she soothes Rory, reassuring her that Dean won’t be angry, and he can easily make Rory another bracelet.
Despite Dean apparently being so great and understanding, Lorelai never suggests that Rory be honest with him and tell him the bracelet is missing. Why not, if there is nothing to fear from Dean’s temper? And why doesn’t Dean deserve to know the truth?
Under pressure from Rory, both Lorelai and Jess make an effort to be polite to each other. It is the only time these two characters are ever shown having a civil conversation, which is a shame, because they have a lot in common. They get each other’s references, they both love Luke but love to rag on him, and they are capable of making allowances for each other’s quirks. This scene is a real “what might have been” moment.
A callback to the scene in “Richard in Stars Hollow” when Rory offers Jess an egg roll in exchange for information. He doesn’t take one, but leaves saying, “You owe me an egg roll“.
LORELAI: So, are you a healthy eater like Luke? JESS: No. No one’s a healthy eater like Luke. Euell Gibbons wasn’t a healthy eater like Luke … Many parts of a pine tree are edible.
Euell Gibbons (1911-1975), outdoorsman and early health food advocate. He promoted eating wild food during the 1960s, having begun foraging for food as a teenager to supplement the family diet. His books on wild food were instant successes, and he became a celebrity, appearing on TV shows such as The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour, and The Carol Burnett Show, often good-naturedly sending himself up by pretending to eat wooden plaques and so on.
A 1974 television commercial for Grape-Nuts cereal featured Gibbons asking viewers “Ever eat a pine tree? Many parts are edible.” While he recommended eating Grape Nuts over eating pine trees (Grape Nuts’ taste “reminds me of wild hickory nuts”), the quote caught the public’s imagination and fuelled his celebrity status.
How Jess knows about Euell Gibbons and the advertisement, which was broadcast ten years before Jess was born, is a mystery. Teenagers seem to have an amazing knowledge of 1960s and 1970s pop culture in the Gilmore Girls world.
JESS: So when was the last time you had those gutters cleaned? LORELAI: It’s been awhile. JESS: Yeah, I found an ‘I like Ike’ bumper sticker up there.
“I like Ike” was the campaign slogan for the 1952 election campaign of US President Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower. He won the election for the Republicans in a landslide victory, and became the country’s 34th president.
Hopefully Jess is joking – not having your gutters cleaned for half a century sounds pretty bad.
This is one of the many chicken-based Chinese dishes Lorelai and Rory bought the night before.
Szechuan Chicken is a spicy stir-fry of chicken cooked with Szechuan peppercorns and chilis. It originated from the Sichuan district of southwestern China. It usually contains vegetables, especially red peppers, and sometimes peanuts, as well as hoi sin sauce.
DEAN: You go look at the astronomy section, we’ll go see Lord of the Rings, and on the way home we’ll rent Autumn in New York and mock it for the rest of the afternoon.
Autumn in New York is a 2000 romantic drama directed by Joan Chen, and starring Richard Gere as a middle-aged womaniser who falls in love with a sweet young woman who is terminally ill, played by Winona Ryder.
The film received negative reviews, being judged as sappy with no chemistry between the two romantic leads, although Chen’s direction did receive some praise. It was nonetheless a success at the box office. The film was released on DVD in January 2001.
Although I think Rory would mock the film roundly, it has enough parallels with her relationship with Jess to also be uncomfortable viewing for her. The main characters share a love of poetry, just as she and Jess share an interest in literature, and there are references to Rory’s favourite poets, Emily Dickinson, Dorothy Parker, and Edna St. Vincent Millay.
There is a major plot point in the film where the young woman takes her lover’s watch as a keepsake, telling him she will return it when he no longer notices it is gone. This is quite similar to Jess taking Rory’s bracelet, and returning it – except he will return it when Rory notices it is missing.
Dean has proposed what sounds like an exhaustingly lengthy afternoon: hours looking at books, a three hour movie at the cinema, and then a 90 minute video “for the rest of the afternoon”. Just how long is this afternoon? It’s early spring, it gets dark early!
Dean’s plan apparently comes to nothing when he notices that Rory isn’t wearing her bracelet. Instead of simply telling him the truth, that she didn’t notice it had fallen off, she tells him a silly lie about having a rash on her wrist, possibly caused by her Spanish mid-terms (!), and needing to temporarily remove the bracelet.
Even though this version of events wouldn’t stop Rory watching movies, she instead spends the afternoon searching the entire town for her bracelet. Again, it would have made more sense for her to have been honest, said that she lost the bracelet somewhere (for all she and Dean know, it fell off that very day), and needs to look for it.
It’s never said how she managed to cancel all her plans to spend the day with Dean to look for her bracelet without confessing it was lost, or raising his suspicions.
After the book fundraiser, which was something Rory was interested in, Dean suggests they go and watch The Lord of the Rings at the cinema, which is something he wants to do. They have already seen the film three times together in the past three months, and even though Rory enjoyed it, she isn’t enthusiastic about seeing it again.
They can only be talking about the first film in the trilogy, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, which was released in December 2001. Directed by New Zealander Peter Jackson, it’s based on the novel, The Fellowship of the Ring by British author J.R.R. Tolkien, the first volume in The Lord of the Rings.
An epic fantasy adventure film featuring an ensemble cast, filmed and edited entirely in New Zealand, the story is set in Middle-Earth and tells of the Dark Lord Sauron who seeks the One Ring, which contains part of his soul, in order to return to power. The fate of Middle-Earth hangs in the balance as a young hobbit named Frodo Baggins (played by Elijah Wood) must take the Ring to be destroyed in the land of Mordor, accompanied by a fellowship of eight other companions.
The film was acclaimed by critics and fans alike, considering it a landmark in filmmaking, and the fantasy genre in particular, and was praised for its fidelity to the source material. It was the #2 film of 2001, and the fifth-highest grossing film of all time upon its release. It won numerous awards, including four Oscars and three BAFTAs, which included Best Film and Best Direction.
This is the book Kirk is trying to buy at the fundraiser, while haggling over the price with Gypsy.
Like Water for Chocolate (in Spanish, Como agua para chocolate) is a novel by Mexican author and screenwriter Laura Esquivel, published in 1989. It is about a young girl named Tita who is forbidden to be with her love, Pedro, and can only express her emotions through cooking. Each chapter of the book contains a recipe for a Mexican dish.
The novel is a magical realist romantic tragedy which has sold more than a million copies in Spain and Latin America, and was also successful in the US. Despite winning the 1994 American Booksellers Book of the Year Award, it received only lukewarm reviews.
The novel was adapted into a highly successful Mexican film in 1992; the screenplay was written by Esquivel. The phrase “like water for chocolate” is a Spanish phrase, referring to emotions that are hot and bubbling over, like water being boiled for making hot chocolate.
Kirk may have enjoyed the film so decided to read the book as well. It’s yet another reference to forbidden love (and food!) in the Gilmore Girls series.
Rory buys several books at the fundraiser, but only a couple of the titles are visible. Gypsy the mechanic is volunteering her time to work at the fundraiser, and she points Rory to the astronomy section, as if Rory has an interest in this area, and Gypsy somehow knows about it. Both quite surprising things to learn! The Buy a Book Fundraiser is held outside the library, and may be raising funds for new books.
Inherit the Wind
A 1955 play by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, fictionalising the events of the Scopes “Monkey” Trial. This was a legal trial in July 1925 where schoolteacher John Scopes was taken to court by the state of Tennessee for teaching human evolution. There was intense media scrutiny of the case, with publicity given to the high-profile lawyers who had taken the case. The prosecution had former Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryan, while Clarence Darrow defended Scopes – the same lawyer who had defended child murders Leopold and Loeb, previously discussed. Scopes was fined $100, but the case was overturned on a technicality. The case was seen as both a theological contest, and a test as to whether teachers could teach modern science in schools.
The play gives everyone involved in the Scopes Trial different names, and substantially alters numerous events. It is not meant to be a historical account, and is a means to discuss the McCarthy trials of the 1950s, where left-wing individuals were persecuted as Communist sympathisers, under a regime of political repression and a fear-mongering campaign.
Rory might be particularly interested in the play because of the focus it places on the media, with reporter E.K. Hornbeck covering the case for a fictional Baltimore newspaper. He is based on journalist and author H.L. Mencken, previously discussed as one of Rory’s heroes, who gained attention for his satirical reporting on the Scopes Trial for the Baltimore Morning Herald.
Inherit the Wind premiered in Dallas in 1955 to rave reviews, and opened on Broadway a few months later with Paul Muni, Ed Begley, and Tony Randall in the cast. It’s been revived on Broadway in 1996 and in 2007, as well as in Philadelphia, London, Italy, and India.
It was adapted into film in 1960, directed by Stanley Kramer, and with Spencer Tracey starring as the defence lawyer, Dick York as the schoolteacher, and Gene Kelly as the Baltimore journalist. It received excellent reviews and won awards at the Berlin Film Festival. It’s also been made for television in 1966, 1988, and in 1999 (starring George C. Scott, Jack Lemmon, and Beau Bridges). It seems likely that Rory watched the most recent version on television.
Letters to a Young Poet
A 1929 collection of ten letters written by the Bohemian-Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke, to a young officer cadet named Franz Xaver Kappus at the Theresian Military Academy in Wiener Neustadt, Austria between 1902 and 1908.
Kappus had written to Rilke, seeking advice on the quality of his poetry, to help him choose between a literary career, or one as an officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army. Kappus had been reading Rilke’s poetry when he discovered that Rilke had earlier studied at the academy’s lower school in St. Pölten, and decided to write to him for advice.
Rilke gave Kappus very little criticism or suggestions on improving his writing, and said that nobody could advise him or make life decisions for him. Over the course of ten letters, he instead provided essays on how a poet should feel and seek truth in experiencing the world around him. They offer insights into Rilke’s poetic ideas and themes, and his work processes.
Kappus did meet Rilke at least once, and despite his concerns about pursuing a military career, he continued his studies and served for 15 years as an army officer. During the course of his life, he worked as a journalist and reporter, and wrote poems, stories, novels, and screenplays. However, he never achieved lasting fame.
This is a book which features a future journalist – but one who yearns to become a poet. Is it a sign that Rory secretly wishes she could become a creative writer instead? Is she hoping that being successful in journalism will help her become a published author (it’s definitely a help in getting novels published, or at least considered). Is it even a hint that she will become a writer in the future, as she does in A Year in the Life, but is not destined to become famous from her writing? (Most published writers, even quite successful ones, don’t get famous, after all).
And is this correspondence between a poet and a student at a military academy meant to suggest that Rory is still thinking of Tristan, who went away to military school? Are she and Tristan actually writing to each other, or is the show leaving the door open for Tristan to possibly return in a future season, since they didn’t know how long One Tree Hill was going to last?
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 