EMILY: You spend five seconds with a person and if they say one wrong thing, you turn on them and never give them a second chance … You are extremely judgmental, Lorelai.
Hmm … I wonder where Lorelai gets that from, Emily?
Emily is incensed that Lorelai cancelled her date to the concert with Peyton, since she had a terrible time on their dinner date, and they were obviously unsuited to each other. However, Emily doesn’t care about any of this, she cares that Lorelai rejected her friend’s son, therefore making Emily look bad by association (somehow). I feel as if Lorelai should have seen this coming … has she never met her mother before?
This is the book that Rory is reading on her bed when Lorelai comes in before her date with Peyton.
Letters of Ayn Rand is a collection of letters written by the novelist and philosopher Ayn Rand, edited by Michael Berliner with the approval of the Rand estate. It was first published in 1995, 13 years after Rand’s death, and the paperback version that Rory is reading was published in 1997. It received generally positive reviews from Rand scholars and fans, but was judged “tedious” by The Washington Post.
Although Rory said she only liked Ayn Rand because of her novel The Fountainhead, reading her letters seems to suggest a stronger interest in Rand and her ideas than she let on.
This is the song which plays when Rory looks at the clock at Dwight’s house, while putting the African violets back. It’s a woven basketwork clock that a china figurine pops out of when the hour strikes.
“Midnight at the Oasis” is a 1973 song written by David Nichtern. It was recorded by Maria Muldaur for her self-titled debut album, and released as a single in 1974. It peaked at #6 in the US, and was the #13 song of the year, becoming one of Muldaur’s most popular concert songs.
“Midnight at the Oasis” is about an offer of a love affair in a fantasy desert location, and is considered to be one of the most sensual songs of the 1970s, apparently inspiring numerous sexual encounters. It seems as if Dwight has more than just board games in mind now he’s moved to Stars Hollow! Perhaps he’s even set his sights on Lorelai – the gossipy Babette would have told him Lorelai was single.
The clock reads eight o’clock at this point, providing the name of the episode, “Eight O’clock at the Oasis”. I can’t see how it can be 8 am – Rory is meant to be at school in five minutes! And although they were running slightly late, Lorelai still thought they could have breakfast at Luke’s, as long as she drove Rory to school. Why do the Gilmore girls seem to have all the time in the world sometimes, and at others, time just suddenly disappears? They weren’t at Dwight’s for that long.
While attending her mother’s charity auction, Lorelai runs into an attractive man at the bar, and takes an immediate shine to him. Although they don’t exchange names or details, Lorelai will later discover his name is Peyton Sanders. They go on a date together, but despite their initial attraction, Lorelai discovers that Peyton is a world-class bore and they have nothing in common except (apparently) both liking David Bowie.
Peyton is played by Jon Hamm. His first role was Gorgeous Man at the Bar (uncredited) on AllyMcBeal, so this was a return to his origins – at least this time he got a named role, and was credited! In 2000-2001, he had a recurring role on Providence, a quirky feel-good romantic drama about a woman returning to her home town in Rhode Island and getting help from her mother’s ghost.
Jon Hamm went on to have a successful career in film and television, gaining household recognition as Don Draper, the anti-hero protagonist of Mad Men (2007-2015), a drama set in an advertising agency in the 1960s. Alexis Bledel would later have a short role on Mad Men in 2012, which is when she began dating her husband, Vincent Kartheiser, who plays Pete Campbell on the show, a man who has an affair with Alexis’ character, Beth Dawes.
NATALIE: There she is, the Cobra … This woman gets her way or she squeezes ’til you comply.
Emily’s friend is Natalie Swope, played by Judy Geeson. You may remember her as one of the ladies from Emily’s tea party on the patio in “Presenting Lorelai Gilmore”. Emily introduces Natalie and Lorelai as if they are strangers, even though Natalie asked after Lorelai and seemed to remember her quite well in the previous season, despite not seeing Lorelai since she was a teenager (although, as Lorelai and Rory attended Emily’s Christmas party each year, this doesn’t seem plausible).
Natalie refers to Emily as “the Cobra”, because she squeezes people (puts pressure on them) until she gets what she wants from them. There are various snakes called cobra, but only those in the genus Naja from Asia are true cobras. They are notable for being able to rear up off the ground and flatten their necks to appear larger. They don’t attack prey by squeezing them, however – that’s pythons and boa constrictors. Cobras have highly venomous fangs instead, and all species are capable of delivering a fatal bite to a human.
Lorelai sometimes seems selfish and unreasonable in the way that she instinctively refuses her mother’s requests, but Emily’s reputation as domineering and manipulative, determined to get her own way at no matter what cost to the other party (the auctioneer is actually ill in this episode, but Emily has forced him to turn up and work) provides a good reason for that. She has no wish to be one of the Cobra’s many victims, and what seems like a reasonable request may well turn out to be something more sinister.
DWIGHT: Welcome to The Oasis! That’s what I named this place, The Oasis, my oasis, a little slice of heaven right here on Earth.
An oasis is a piece of fertile land within a desert or semi-arid environment, often featuring a spring of fresh water surrounded by vegetation. Figuratively, it can refer to a quiet, peaceful place or situation separated from the noise and bustle that surrounds it. Dwight clearly sees his new home as a place of refuge from the stress of life.
Note that Dwight is wearing a shirt with cocktails on it, as if he is already relaxing into vacation mode in Stars Hollow.
Dwight’s house, The Oasis, is the Warner Bros Ranch at the studio lot. It was also the Griswold family home in the 1989 comedy film, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.
LORELAI: Oh, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, Beenie Morrison’s old place.
Although Beenie Morrison was never seen or mentioned before, he used to live in the house directly opposite Lorelai and Rory. Oddly enough, they never noticed Beenie talking about selling, putting the house up for sale, erecting a FOR SALE sign, saying goodbye, or moving out. This has led many fans to the theory that Dwight simply murdered Beenie and moved into his house! Although this doesn’t explain why they didn’t also notice Dwight moving in, and why they never heard anything, when Stars Hollow is so gossipy. It’s strange how very, very oblivious the Gilmore girls have been to the house across from them until their attention is drawn to it.
Even Lorelai seems to suspect something isn’t right with this scenario. When Dwight says it’s “great” to be in his new house, Lorelai says, “Only if Beenie Morrison didn’t want to live in it any more”, as if she wonders whether Beenie was forced out in some way. Dwight says he paid Beenie a good price – even overpaid. That might suggest that rather than Beenie putting his house up for sale, Dwight picked it out on a visit to Stars Hollow, and made Beenie Morrison an offer he couldn’t refuse.
The Gilmore girls get a new neighbour in this episode, named Dwight, who moves into the house opposite them, previously occupied by a man named Beenie Morrison. Dwight is played by Jason Kravits, who had been involved with the Washington DC theatre scene, and then in a writer’s collective in New York City. From 1999 to 2001, he played the role of A.D.A. Richard Bray on medical drama The Practice.
As with so many of these characters, don’t expect to ever see or hear of Dwight again – he will disappear as mysteriously as Beenie Morrison after this episode.
RORY: I can’t believe you got into a fight with Pete.
LORELAI: Hey, you do not suddenly decide that garlic is an extra topping, not after five years, not after all we’ve been through.
The first mention of Pete as the owner/manager of the pizza store which Lorelai and Rory frequent, they have apparently been customers there since 1997, ever since Lorelai bought her own house. We met Joe delivering their pizza in “Kiss and Tell”, and Lorelai ordered a pizza from Joe in “The Break Up Part 2” – perhaps Joe is Pete’s son, and it’s a family business?
The bag Rory is carrying seems to have Bell Pizza written on it, but later the pizza store is called Antonioli’s Restaurant and Pizzeria. There is a Bell Pizza in the Los Angeles suburb of Bell, however.
LUKE: Why, why do they do this? This is a public place, people are eating here … This cannot be sanitary … When did that become acceptable? In the old days, a woman would never consider doing that in public. They’d go find a barn or a cave or something. I mean, it’s indecent. This is a diner not a peep show!
Luke is horrified when a woman nurses her baby in the diner. I have trouble accepting this “caveman” version of Luke, when he was depicted as intelligent and progressive in Season 1 – sometimes it feels as if the show couldn’t decide whether Luke was smart or stupid, progressive or reactionary.
He did tell Lorelai that he didn’t like small children very much, especially their messy, sticky side, and perhaps this is why he is having problems with seeing a baby fed, but it ends up being a judgement on the mother for putting on a “peep show” – therefore sexualising her need to feed her child, which is pretty creepy of Luke.
In Connecticut, women have been legally entitled to breastfeed in public since 1997, and it is prohibited for anyone to restrict or limit their right to do so. This includes restaurants and diners, so Luke has had five years to adjust to the law. As a responsible business owner, Luke would know of his legal obligations, and I don’t think he would behave like this, even if he did secretly feel a little uncomfortable.
As another mirroring scene, Jess is also shown being unable to handle seeing a woman breastfeed her baby. It’s not like this entire scene didn’t age well – it was outdated and unfunny at the time of first broadcast.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 