PARIS: I’m sorry, group leader, could you ask the Pigeon sisters if there is a point to this opus?
The Pigeon sisters are characters from the film The Odd Couple, previously mentioned. They are English sisters named Cecily and Gwendolyn Pigeon who live in the same building as Felix and Oscar. They were played by cousins Monica Evans and Carole Shelley in the original Broadway play, the film, and the 1970 sit-com, although their roles were gradually phased out in the television show.
The Pigeon sisters are friendly, flirtatious, ditzy, and as their name suggests, slightly bird-brained, rather like Louise and Madeline. Paris has no problem tearing down her friends in public; no wonder that Rory isn’t sure whether Paris is her friend or not.
An opus is an artistic work, especially one on a grand scale.
In this episode we meet Michel’s mother, Giselle, who is visiting from Paris. She and Michel adore each other, and are “best friends” mother and son, who love to tease and joke with each other, using a banter that sounds like something out of a Noel Coward play.
This makes them seem quite similar to Lorelai and Rory, who are also self-proclaimed “best friends” with a comic patter between them. Janet Hubert is only fourteen years older than Yanic Truesale, suggesting she is supposed to be a very young glamorous mother like Lorelai.
Michel addresses his mother by her first name at one point, and you can hear the French pronunciation of it – ZEE-ZEHL. Giselle may have possibly been named with the French ballet Giselle in mind, one of the world’s most popular classical ballets.
Instead of going to watch Dean’s game, Rory is shoe shopping with Lane. And afterwards, she has Philosophy homework to do (a new subject for Rory). Dean pleads with her to at least bring her homework to the game, which sounds like a terrible idea, and is. Rory reminds him they’re seeing each other that evening, and that’s all the Dean she feels like seeing that day.
It actually seems more healthy that Rory is making time for friends, and school, and Dean in her life, but both Dean and the viewer can feel that Rory is losing interest in him.
EMILY: So, tell me Richard, is this how it’s going to be from now on? … I just want to know what to expect from you. Because the bouncing from one thing to another, the moping and silence in your den for days, all of that I accepted … but your turning your back on Rory! … You adore that little girl, she means everything to you, remember? … Are you that lost? I’m incredibly disappointed in you Richard!
Rory asks her grandfather to be the group adviser for the Economics project, as Lorelai suggested, but Richard declines, saying he’s busy (restoring his antique car), and that Rory has given him very short notice. Really, because Rory said they had three weeks to prepare, and it seemed as if she asked Richard the very next day? Is three weeks short notice?
Emily is upset when she discovers Richard turned down the opportunity to help Rory, especially in her education – something which Richard values highly, and wants Rory to succeed at. Richard has been unhappy and rudderless since he retired, and now he has turned on his back on a chance to do something positive for someone he loves.
Emily lets him know in no uncertain terms how disappointed she is in in, and this appears to be the catalyst for Richard changing his mind and agreeing to be the adviser for Rory’s group.
Phoning dozens of times per day and arriving on the doorstep unannounced is no longer enough to satisfy Dean’s stalker instincts – now he’s following Rory to the diner before school starts and hanging around until Lorelai invites him to breakfast. Because all cool moms like to decide for their daughter who she eats with, right?
LORELAI: I know. Look how hard he worked on that sign and everything. Look at the handwriting, it’s so precise, so determined. It’s focused-Luke.
RORY: That’s Jess’ handwriting.
LORELAI: Really? How do you know Jess’ writing?
RORY: Oh, well, I lent him a book and he wrote some stuff in it.
Lorelai’s examination of Jess’ handwriting is a sign of how much more careful, focused, and determined Jess really is, deep down. That boy has hidden depths. Is it possible that it was Jess who convinced Luke to put a new special on the board – and if so, was it a tease for Rory, knowing that she usually orders French toast?
Lorelai also discovers that Rory can recognise Jess’ handwriting, and that’s because he wrote in her book – “vandalised it”, as Lorelai says. Rory is careful to say that she “lent” her book to Jess, not that he took it without asking, the very first moment he met her.
Note that the sign next to the chalkboard is for the Howland Mercantile Co., a reminder of Jess writing in the margins of Rory’s copy of Howl and Other Poems.
Surprisingly, Lorelai doesn’t seem to be able to tell Luke’s handwriting from Jess’, even though Luke writes on the chalkboard all the time. Unless Jess and Luke have the same handwriting?
It’s now around the middle of April, so Richard bought his antique car at the beginning of the month. It seems that Richard has gone through several hobbies since he retired earlier in the year – even though Emily urged him to try new things, she doesn’t seem that thrilled with any of his choices.
In real life, Edward Hermann, who played Richard, was a car enthusiast and did restore antique cars as a hobby.
(Technically it’s possible that this is the same Friday the previous episode ended on, but it doesn’t seem likely, because that finished with a big community feast at the diner. Lorelai and Rory shouldn’t be so hungry if they’d eaten only an hour earlier).
The episode begins with Rory and Lorelai sitting at the table with Emily, but unable to begin eating because Richard is not there yet. Emily says that she will never start dinner without Richard unless he’s out of town or seriously ill, but in fact there’s been a few episodes where Emily has started dinner without Richard because he’s been busy or on the phone. And in “Hammers and Veils”, she rushes them to start dinner without Richard because he has an early flight the next day.
What makes it even more unbelievable is that Emily has allowed the cook/maid to serve the meal, and there is actually roast beef and vegetables sitting right on the table in front of them, getting cold. Apparently Emily will serve a meal without Richard, but won’t start eating until he arrives. Emily’s annoyance with Richard’s tardiness is soon weaponised to make everyone else miserable.
RORY: See you for some tree planting over at the Arbor Day Festival, buddy.
Arbor Day is an international secular day of observance in which groups and individuals are encouraged to plant trees. It is usually held in the spring. In the US, Arbor Day was founded in 1872 by J. Sterling Morton in Nebraska City. By the 1920s, every state in the US had laws stipulating that Arbor Day had to be observed.
In the US, National Arbor Day is celebrated on the last Friday in April, so it is two weeks away from this episode, and Rory is anticipating another event she might be able to get Jess to attend. We never see an Arbor Day celebration in Stars Hollow, but of course they hold one every year. By the time Arbor Day arrives, Jess has left town.
RORY: You facilitated it, you made it happen, so I guess that means that you’re officially a part of our town now.
JESS: Hey, wait a minute.
Having pestered, nagged, and occasionally dragged Jess into helping Luke by working at the diner, just as she gave him a scolding and inspired him to fix Luke’s toaster, Rory now tells him that he is a part of the town. As well as helping Luke, it feels as if Rory was also trying to rehabilitate Jess, or improve his reputation. Jess seems slightly alarmed by this, and rejects the idea that he’s part of Stars Hollow – he’s always seen himself as “on the road”, a freewheeling drifter who’s just on his way through.
Luke worries that he and his uncle Louie were parallel to each other, but in fact it is Jess who is most like his great-uncle, Louie Danes. Both are unpopular in town, and considered to be rude, antisocial pains in the backside, given the cold shoulder by the good folk of Stars Hollow. Maybe like Louie, the town would soon turn forgiving should Jess actually die – a plot line Milo Ventimiglia urged upon the writers of Gilmore Girls, to no avail.
Of course, by roping Jess into helping out, Rory has ensured that she and Jess have spent most of the week (was it a week?) together, and working together respectably in public as well, so that everyone can see they are friends. Notice has exaggeratedly Rory addresses Jess as “friend” and “buddy” while she teases him, letting everyone know that she and Jess are just good friends.
What Dean thought about this volunteer work, we don’t know – he isn’t seen or mentioned in this episode. Since the Bid-on-a-Basket Festival, Dean only shows up in order to play the jealous boyfriend, never to just spend time with Rory or to help her out.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 