Tag: Reality Check

Tears for Fears

SOOKIE: You’ll give me lots of tips [on pregnancy]?
LORELAI: Oh, what I can remember.
SOOKIE: Get your diary out from that year ’cause I wanna know it all.
LORELAI: A lot of my diary from that year was, um, a debate over which member of Tears for Fears I loved more at that particular moment.

Tears for Fears are an English pop rock band formed in1981 by Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith.The band’s debut album, The Hurting (1983), reached #1 on the UK Albums Chart, and their first three hit singles all reached the top five in the UK. Their second album, Songs from the Big Chair (1985), reached #1 in the US, achieving multi-platinum status in both the UK and the US. The album contained two US #1 hits: “Shout” and “Everybody Wants to Rule the World”. The band broke up in 1990, but have since brought out albums together, and tour semi-regularly.

When Lorelai was pregnant in 1984, Tears for Fears hadn’t had any chart success in the US, except for “Change” making #73, and doing quite well as a radio track. Lorelai must have been ahead of the curve. This is another example of the teenaged Lorelai enjoying slightly obscure British rock music.

Encyclopædia Britannica

MAX: Well, I’m glad to hear it. And Rory’s good?
LORELAI: Oh, yeah, she’s the Encyclopædia Britannica definition of good.

Encyclopædia Britannica, (Latin for “British Encyclopædia”) is a general knowledge English-language encyclopædia, first published in the 18th century in Edinburgh, Scotland. Though published in the US since 1901, the Britannica has for the most part maintained British English spelling. Since 2016, it has been published exclusively as an online encyclopaedia.

If you look up “Good” in the Encyclopædia Britannica, you will find an article on Gnostic philosophy and spirituality, where the Good is a transcendent deity. Probably not what Lorelai was thinking of!

“There was a person inside that cow”

PARIS: Hey, I was trying to give the kid some human contact. He’s been talking to nothing but a cow for a year and a half.
BRAD: There was a person inside that cow, I’ve told you that!

The role of Milky White the cow in the 2002 Broadway production of Into the Woods was played by actor and singer Chad Kimball [pictured], who was also the understudy for Adam Wylie’s role of Jack. He has been in a few other Broadway shows, and several regional theatre productions.

Paris says Brad was in Into the Woods for a year and a half, but it was only about a year – perhaps she is counting rehearsal periods. However, Brad seems to have been missing from Chilton for around eleven months.

Paris Sings at Brad

PARIS: [sits down next to Brad; sings] I’ve got my beans at Grandma’s house, my magic beans at Grandma’s house … I’ll take my beans, my magic beans, who’s got the beans, we need some beans, I love the beans … Into the woods at Grandma’s house.

Paris sings a slight parody version of the “Prologue” to Into the Woods, previously mentioned. Although there is a refrain line of Into the woods at Grandma’s house, it doesn’t mention magic beans quite so often as Paris makes out. Nor are any of those few mentions sung by Jack.

Ruth Reichl

SOOKIE: They sent it back. My food. My four star, ‘you haven’t lived ’til you’ve eaten there, says Ruth Reichl,’ food.

Ruth Reichl (born 1948), chef, food writer and editor. In addition to two decades as a food critic, mainly spent at the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times, Reichl has also written cookbooks, memoirs and a novel, and been co-producer of PBS’s Gourmet’s Diary of a Foodie, culinary editor for the Modern Library, host of PBS’s Gourmet’s Adventures With Ruth, and editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine. She has won six James Beard Foundation Awards.

Reichl was a food critic for The New York Times from 1993 to 1999, so if she ever visited the Independence Inn to review Sookie’s cooking for this publication, it would have been in the late 1990s. From 1999 to 2009, she was the editor of Gourmet magazine.

1952 Chateau Petrus Bordeaux

SOOKIE: That’s it, get their names, they’re never eating here again … Wait, what wine was he drinking?
WAITER: 1952 Chateau Petrus Bordeaux.
SOOKIE: Hm. Okay, never mind.

Chateau Petrus is a vineyard in Bordeaux, France, producing red wine entirely from Merlot grapes. It is widely regarded as the outstanding wine of Bordeaux, and ranks among the world’s most expensive wines. An average bottle would be around $2000, and although 1952 was not one of the greatest vintages for Petrus, it is still highly regarded, and a bottle may cost as much as $8000.

Realising how much the customers have paid for their wine changes Sookie’s mind about banning them from the Independence Inn.

Nathan Lane

RORY: Hey Brad, good to have you back. How was Broadway?
BRAD: It was great, but Nathan Lane is a very bitter man.

Nathan Lane (born Joseph Lane in 1956), actor. In a career spanning over 40 years he has been seen on stage and screen in roles both comedic and dramatic. Lane has received numerous awards including three Tony Awards, an Olivier Award, three Emmy Awards, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. Lane received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2006 and was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 2008.

I’m not sure how Brad would have met Nathan Lane in 2002, as he wasn’t doing Broadway that year – three of his films were released that year, and he was in an episode of Sex and the City. Maybe he heard a lot of theatre gossip.

Into the Woods

TEACHER: Oh, I almost forgot to welcome back Brad Langford. He returns to us fresh from Broadway where he’s just completed a successful run of Into the Woods. Welcome back, Brad.

Into the Woods, 1987 musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Lapine. The musical intertwines the plots of several Brothers Grimm fairy tales, exploring the consequences of the characters’ wishes and quests. It won three Tony Awards, and has been produced many times since.

There was a revival of the musical in Los Angeles in February and March 2002, with the same cast that later ran on Broadway. The 2002 Broadway revival began previews on April 13, 2002 and opened April 30, 2002 at the Broadhurst Theatre, closing on December 29 after a run of 18 previews and 279 regular performances.

Adam Wylie, who plays Brad Langford, really was in the cast of Into the Woods, performing the role of Jack. This doesn’t quite fit into the timeline of the show, because Brad last returned to Chilton after a school transfer in late April 2002 – when he would have already been in Los Angeles for two months, and the musical’s main run was just about to begin.

However, it does explain why we haven’t seen him since then. Apparently he wasn’t frightened off by Paris after all – he was having a successful acting career. He has really come along since his first appearance on Gilmore Girls, when he said he couldn’t act in a school play because he got so nervous he threw up. Quite a transformation.

I’m not sure how Brad can take a year off school to do Broadway, and then simply come back to his senior class like nothing happened. Perhaps there was a private tutor attached to the Broadway production??? Also, Into the Woods finished at the end of January and it’s now the end of March – what was he doing for the past two months?