Life in Pieces – Musical Motel Property Bingo

By starrymag | January 18, 2017

By: Julie Mante

 

Story One: Sam’s School Play

 

Heather Hughes (Betsy Brandt) is helping her daughter Sam (Holly J. Barrett) prepare her audition for the school play, Silence of the Lambs, the Musical: A Starling is Born. After two hours of feeling like her mother is taking up all the rehearsal time, Sam would rather focus on her singing. When Sam comes home from school, Heather and her husband Tim (Dan Bakkedahl) are anxious to hear about the audition. It did not go well. Sam was cast as the understudy. Heather is perplexed. She does not understand why her daughter did not get the lead role of Clarice Starling. She decides to talk to the drama teacher Julius Black (Andy Richter). Mr. Black tells the miffed mother that all castings decisions are final. Heather is more enraged when she sees proof that Georgette Sloan, the girl playing Clarice, is a horrible singer. When she realizes that Georgette’s parents donated the money for the school theater building, Heather understands why her daughter was cast as an understudy.

 

The next day, Heather drags her sister-in-law Jen (Zoe Lister-Jones), who is a lawyer, to meet with Principal Jennings (Gita Reddy). Heather wants the principal to see for herself that Sam was robbed out of the role of Clarice. The principal says that Mr. Black makes all the final casting decisions so Heather is out of luck. Heather continues to push until the principal walks with the two women to the theater building. The principal asks Mr. Black if both girls can perform. Georgette is horrible. Sam is incredible. Heather’s efforts have been vindicated. Mr. Black tells them to wait. When Sam starts speaking, her horrible southern accent is cringe-worthy. Jen put it best: “Legally speaking, she is terrible.”

 

Story Two: No Tell Motel

 

Joan (Dianne Wiest)’s creative writing teacher, Professor Sinclair Wilde, (Cary Elwes) is back to stir a little trouble in the Short family. When Joan is chatting with Professor Flirty after class, Heather stops by to see if her mom wants to have lunch. After seeing the way Joan and the professor are chatting, Heather feels uneasy and shares her concerns with her brother Matt (Thomas Sadoski) later that night. Heather is convinced that Joan is having an affair with the professor, but Matt does not believe his sister’s suspicions. When their younger brother Greg (Colin Hanks) overhears them talking, he wants to know what is going on. Reluctantly, they decide to tell him.

 

The next day, the siblings decide to drive to Joan’s school early so they can follow her to see where she goes after class. When Joan stops at motel and goes into a room, her children pound on the door demanding answers from their mother. Joan is shocked to see her kids outside the door. When they walk in, they see their father John (James Brolin) with his hands tied lying on the bed. Queasy, the kids are in a rush to leave. Heather apologizes to her brothers for letting her imagination run wild and for letting them all see their father tied up again.

 

Story Three: Tyler and Clementine Can’t Even

 

Heather and Tim tell their son Tyler (Niall Cunningham) and his wife Clementine (Hunter King) that the couple needs to start paying rent. Tyler and Clementine have been living with Heather and Tim since they got married and now Tyler’s parents think he needs to start pulling his weight. The couple is living rent free, but adding to the cable bill. Unless the young couple decide to go to college, Heather and Tim refuse to continue financially supporting them. The young couple feels attacked so they decide to take steps to finding their own place. If they have to pay rent, might as well live in their own place. The couple gets a hard dose of reality when they are filling out an application to rent an apartment, but do not have the funds to pay for it.

 

The couple decides to reach out to Tyler’s grandfather John for help. John tells the married couple they need to figure out a way to take care of themselves. Later, Tyler and Clementine shock Tim and Heather by telling them that they found a place to live. The young couple decided to check out local colleges in the area to find opportunities. College campuses are teeming with credit card applications so the naïve duo signed ten applications to buy a place. When Tim points out it is impossible to buy a house on credit, the “geniuses” point out the more money they spend, the more cash they get back. Despite that the fact the couple was duped, Heather and Tim ask them where the house is and turns out it is right outside. It is a mobile home called a “tiny house.” Tyler tells his parents that he and Clementine are fine with the house being in the front of his parents’ house or in the backyard. The naïve kids have massive debt. A tiny home. No cares in the world. Heather and Tim decide to let them discover the hard realities of being adults.

 

Story Four: Family Bingo

 

At Sunday brunch, Joan gives Greg the rooster plate and the whole family erupts in laughter. Colleen (Angelique Cabral) is confused and asks about the rooster plate’s significance. Jen is not eager to hear the story for the umpteenth time, but Heather starts the story and the other family members take turns telling the story. Heather used to order all her Christmas presents in a catalog. One year she wrote the wrong item number and bought the rooster plate instead of slippers for Joan. Since then, Joan hides the plate among other plates to see if she can fool family members into grabbing the plate without noticing. Colleen is confused why the story is funny, but Jen says that it is only funny to the Short family and not to the people marrying into the family like her and Colleen. Jen tells Colleen that she can predict everyone’s behavior. Colleen is able to impress Jen with her observations of everyone. Thus a game is born. Family bingo. Jen spells out the rules.

 

Rule 1: Whatever a family member says or does, put in a box.

Rule 2: First person to fill out their bingo card wins.

 

The women begin to fill out their bingo cards and Tim walks in and asks them what they are doing. They go somewhere private and tell him about their game and he wants to play. Jen says no, but Colleen says that he is an outsider just like them. Reluctantly, Jen agrees. As the three play, they find ways to get the Shorts to do or say things so they can fill out their bingo cards.

 

Jen and Colleen are tied with only one box left to fill. Tim cannot find his bingo card. Joan walks in with a paper in her hand and asks Tim what the paper means. Tim and Colleen throw Jen under the bus and make her explain it. Before Jen even opens her mouth, John tells his wife that the trio are playing people bingo. He remembers playing it when he served during the Vietnam War. He says, “You do it to survive an intolerable situation.” This makes Joan wonder if the brunch is an awful experience for Jen, Colleen and Tim and they immediately say no. Jen admits that it is hard being an outsider. The Short family have a lot of good memories that they can all laugh about and sometimes it feels hard to relate. Jen apologizes for making fun of the family and Joan also apologizes and emphasizes that Jen, Tim and Colleen are all important members of the family.