43 "Dudesbury"

"Dudesbury"

gs: Steve Pearce [Boyfriend] , Victoria Henning [Girlfriend] , Jo Ann Self [Woman] , Paul Guyot [Photographer] , Tracy Henry [Roy]

The local newspaper discovers Danny's talent as a cartoonist.

Submitted by Kyle Taylor, except where cited

Characters, in order of appearance:

Brad, Melody, Jake, Danny, [Roy], Lucy, Buddy, [Boyfriend], [Girlfriend], [Photographer], [Woman]

Plot Synopsis

Melody comes in from a date one night and finds Brad in bed reading a romance novel. Upon learning that Brad has spent the entire night reading rather than going on a date, Melody says, "Oh Brad, you can't live your life through romance novels!" But Brad says the guys in the novels are "just as exasperating as the ones in real life".

As Melody is about to describe her night to Brad, Danny and Jake show up at their door. Once the guys are invited in, Brad tells them that Mel is about to describe her date. The guys seem strangely amused by the prospect of hearing Melody's account of her date.

Melody describes the guy she went out with in nice, if not glowing, terms. But she is contradicted every step of the way by Danny and Jake. They seem to think the guy was a total loser. The guys confess that they have firsthand knowledge of Melody's date because they were spying on her the whole time, disguised as a couple of bald guys. Completely taken aback by the boys' ill-advised caper, Melody asks them, "Are we living in a cartoon?"

Melody's response to the prank leads to inspiration for Danny. The artistic young man decides to create a comic strip entitled The Dud Ranch (The 'e' fell off the sign, get it?). The strip is a very thinly veiled satire on the cartoonish lives of the Bar None staff, complete with clever take-offs on their names. Brad becomes 'Drab', Mr. Ernst 'Mr. Earnest', Melody 'Harmony' and so on.

When Jake finds him working on The Dud Ranch, Danny reluctantly lets him see his handiwork. Jake is amazed and amused by the strip and he urges Danny to let others see it. Danny, however, is afraid it will offend people and he vows to keep it private. As he put it, "Besides, what else would I do with it?" Well, just as an off-the-cuff question from Melody lead to Danny drawing a comic strip, Danny's question has inspired Jake. Seeing the commercial potential of Danny's artwork, Jake hatches a plan.

Soon a geeky newspaper man named Roy arrives at the ranch to meet with Jake, who has represented himself to Roy as Danny's manager. Perhaps 'misrepresented' would be the better way to put it, since Danny has no idea he even has a manager. The first person Roy encounters, however, is Brad. It's a love-at-first-sight moment for Roy (well, at least the guy has good taste), but Brad just finds Roy to be something of an oddball. She seems bemused by his reaction to her and by his request to see "Mr. Decker". She points Roy in what she believes to be the right direction and he goes on his on his way. Trying to stay focused, he tells himself not to think about "the girl".

Roy then comes across Lucy and Buddy, both of whom are busy moving a rather odd looking owl statue Mr. Ernst recently bought. Roy introduces himself (telling them he works for The Daily News) and says he has a business matter to discuss with "Mr. Decker". This arouses Lucy's suspicion. She and Buddy escort Roy to the main lodge to meet Jake.

There at the front desk is Jake, improvising a solo percussion performance using a telephone receiver, a stapler and a pen. The introduction is made, and Roy isn't too happy to see how young Jake is. He has pretty much the same reaction when he sees Danny. At this point Danny learns that Jake swiped his art book and submitted the strip to The Daily News. Roy tells Danny that his editor loves The Dud Ranch and wants to run it daily in the paper. Danny is hesitant to go along with this, but Roy strokes his ego enough to get him to change his mind. It's a good thing too, because Roy admits that one of the strips Jake submitted has already been published. At that instant, an angry Melody walks in with a copy of The Daily News demanding an explanation.

Roy has definitely not forgotten about Brad. He lingers around the ranch and repeatedly begs her to go out with him. She turns him down flat each time, but Roy is a stubborn son of a gun. Melody urges Brad to give Roy a chance, but Brad blows off the advice about as easily as she does Roy's request.

The staff is growing ever more upset with the way they are being portrayed in Danny's comic strip. His caricatures have certainly bruised a few nerves. Even "artist manager" Jake becomes angry when he is shown the latest chapter in the Dud Ranch saga. In it is a new character named 'Jerk', a dweeb who got a job at the ranch only because he's the owner's nephew. This hits a little too close to home for Jake.

His fame growing, Danny begins a spin-off venture—drawing caricatures of Bar None guests. Even this leads to disharmony. When one woman's boyfriend laughs hysterically at her portrait, she grabs it and smashes it over his head.

Danny's ego is now well out of control, and he seems to think he is too good to do traditional ranch work. When Brad angrily confronts him about neglecting his chores, Danny lets her know that he has "a better job now". He's of the opinion that Mr. Ernst has given him the green light to make drawing cartoons his full time job. Brad and Lucy are totally disgusted with his attitude.

Danny makes an overture he hopes will patch things up with his fellow staffers. He shows Brad, Mel and Lucy drawings he has done of them and offers to let them go for $10 each. To his way of thinking, this represents "a good deal" because the signed drawings "could be worth something someday". Naturally, all three ladies reject the offer.

Later, Jake tells Lucy, Melody and Brad about hearing Danny talking in his sleep. He says that Danny appeared to be going over a possible interview in his dream, even submitting questions to himself like a reporter. The four contemplate getting their boss' help to reign in Danny's ego, but that idea might involve telling the clueless Mr. Ernst that he is, in fact, the basis for the 'Mr. Earnest' character. So Lucy suggests they air their grievances directly to Danny at an evening staff meeting.

That evening, the staff members make their case to Danny. As they do so, they tend to behave very much like their Dud Ranch counterparts. When Danny points this out, Melody claps her hands in mock applause and says, "Congratulations, you've figured out what's wrong with all your friends. So what? Who's perfect?" Brad adds, "We're not material for The Dud Ranch, we're your friends." She urges Danny to think about all the good things they've done for him. "I'm not trying to hurt anybody", Danny exclaims. "It doesn't matter--you are", responds Brad. As a frustrated Danny storms off, he yells, "It's just a stupid little comic strip!" Jake watches Danny walk away and says to the others, "We've gotta do something about that guy."

That "something" turns out to be a collaborative effort that produces an ugly caricature of Danny and a plan to give the drawing to the artist himself. But Jake comes up with what he thinks is a better idea—try to get the drawing published in The Daily News. He suggests they submit it as a "tribute to the artist". To boost their chances, Jake persuades Brad to use her influence on Roy.

But when Roy shows up moments later asking for Danny, he seems very preoccupied and upset. He barely takes notice of Brad, and doesn't take the time to look at the drawing. The gang senses something is wrong, so they follow Roy as he enters the main lodge. They watch in disbelief as Roy questions Danny about his new "cute" and "nice" version of The Dud Ranch. Roy seems horrified when Danny tells him that he's taking the strip in "a new direction". Roy insists that the readers want the strip to be mean, nasty and sarcastic, and won't accept the change. But Danny won't budge. He even rejects Roy's idea for a compromise—alternating mean and nice strips. Roy tries to play upon Danny's sympathies, but Danny sticks to his guns. The result is the end of The Dud Ranch, and Danny's brush with fame and fortune. When his friends ask him why he quit, Danny says, "The truth is, a lot of people liked The Dud Ranch, but the most important people didn't. When that finally sunk in, there really wasn't a choice." The old Danny is back, and all is forgiven.

On his way out, Roy inquires about the drawing he was shown when he was walking into the lodge. He now seems interested in possibly printing it because, as he puts it, "I happen to have some extra space." But now that The Dud Ranch is history and none of the staff is angry with Danny, no one wants to acknowledge the existence of the caricature. So Jake and the other conspirators just try to act like they never wanted any drawing printed. As a curious Danny tries to get a look at what's on the sheet of paper, the others nervously pass it around and crumple it up. Bewildered, Roy exits the lodge.

Surprisingly, Brad follows Roy outside. She gets his attention and they both stop to chat. With some reluctance, Brad tells Roy that the ever-dateless 'Drab' character from The Dud Ranch made her take a hard look at herself. She concedes that she may have been too picky and too unwilling to give people a chance. She says she'd like to change and to begin by going out with him. She even suggests some possible activities, including bowling (she must have gotten over her hatred of that sport; see Ep. 12), roller-skating and skeet shooting.

But Roy is no ordinary man. Rather than seize this wonderful opportunity that God has seen fit to bestow upon him, he turns Brad down. That's right; after all that begging he did before, Roy says "No" to Brad's offer. He tells the befuddled beauty he has realized that any relationship the two of them might share would be destined to fail. "You'd hate me or I'd find out something about you that wasn't perfect. And then where would we be? So I think it's best if we just don't see each other", the twisted mind says. "Well, this is a first", Brad observes, "I've never been broken-up with by someone I wasn't even going out with!" Roy notes that he's "unique" (and late for something), takes one final look at Brad and says, "See you in my dreams." As she watches him leave, Brad throws her arms up and exclaims "Men!!" Roy Bigelow...could he be romance novel material?

That evening, Melody, Brad, Jake and Buddy throw a mini-celebration for Danny and his return to his normal, humble self. Buddy tells Danny that his father said he was sorry about the demise of the strip. In addition, Buddy reveals that Mr. Ernst was aware that he was the inspiration for 'Mr. Ear-nest'. Everyone is very amused to hear that. Jake says, "Y'know, Uncle Ben's got a better sense of humor than all of us combined." Melody adds, "Maybe we weren't such good sports."

Danny tells his friends he has learned the cartoonists' code, "pick on people who deserve it", and then ("speaking of which") pulls a piece of paper from his pocket. On it is the unflattering portrait of him Jake and the others put together. Somehow Danny found the "tribute", and the others are embarrassed to know he has seen it. But Danny assures them he's really not offended, and even offers a good-natured critique of the drawing. What I want to know is, how did the paper get smoothed out again? Oh well, maybe it was a copy.

The episode concludes with Buddy asking Jake to move the weird owl statue into the grill. "We'll tell my dad it flew in there", Buddy says. Jake picks up the owl and walks only a short distance before stumbling and dropping it. When it breaks into dozens of pieces on the ground, everyone gathered starts to laugh. "Mr. Earnest is going to be bummed", Jake says.

Hey, it's the senior staph infection
and other assorted quotes

Bradwatch

Horse Droppings

When the kids make the gag drawing of Danny, it gets all crumpled up when they try to hide it from Roy. But shortly thereafter, Danny pulls it out of his pocket, crisply folded and completely unwrinkled. [Dan]

The actor who played the Boyfriend, Steve Pearce, appeared in [30] "New Kid on the Block". In "New Kid", he played the male half of the couple that tried to use "Jake's Spa". His girlfriend in that episode was considerably better looking than his girlfriend in this one (no intended offense to Victoria Henning). His appearance in "New Kid" was uncredited. [Dan]

Roy kind of looks like a young Larry King. [Dan]

It's easy to mis-read the Dud Ranch name Danny makes up for Mr. Ernst. The way it's pronounced is Ear Nest. Two words. As in the sentence, "the source of his head lice appears to be that ear nest." Not to be confused with the word earnest, which means zealous. [Dan]

Real-Life References

Madonna
Leonardo DaVinci