Man With a Plan – The Blame Game

By: Julie Mante

When Adam (Matt LeBlanc) goes through the mail, he groans as he realizes that the tickets his wife Andi (Liza Snyder) ordered for Lord of the Dance to see with Don (Kevin Nealon) and Marcy (Kali Rocha) have arrived. When Adam notices his kids throwing the basketball in the house, he tells them to stop. Adam decides not to follow his own rules so when he tries to dunk the basketball in the laundry basket, he accidentally breaks the vase Andi got from her late grandmother. Adam asks Don to help him clean up the mess before Andi comes home. As Adam is cleaning up the vase, Andi catches him red-handed and asks him what happened to the vase. As Andi starts yelling at Adam, Don surprises Adam by telling Andi that he was the one who broke the vase. When Andi hears this, she calmly replies, “Oh. Well… Accidents happen,” and walks into the kitchen. Quickly, Adam pulls Don to the side and thanks him for taking the blame.

Later, Adam rushes to Don’s house. Adam is confused why his brother wanted him to come over. Don replies, “It’s your turn to take the blame with Marcy.” Don wanted to see if a sandwich could be flushed down the toilet and the results were disastrous. Marcy demands to know why Don did what he did. Adam reluctantly takes the blame for the incident. Marcy accepts Adam’s lie and tells him not to eat in her bathroom anymore. The brothers are incredulous that it worked again. By taking the blame for each other, their wives are not angry at them anymore. Adam realizes that he does not have any baggage with Marcy so she would not be angry at him the same way she would at Don and vice versa with Andi and Don. Every time they do something to make their wives angry with them, it is not only about the current incident but all the past incidents where they have done something wrong.

For Adam, it all goes back to the delivery room hot dog incident thirteen years ago. He tells Don the story when Andi was in labor with Kate (Grace Kaufman), Adam was bored waiting and hungry so he decided to go order a hot dog from a cart outside the hospital. After he gets a call from the nurse that Andi is having the baby, he returns to the delivery room with the hot dog. When Andi offers him the baby, he tells her to hold his hot dog. Andi was so mad at him that she still brings it up thirteen years later when they argue. Don tells Adam that Marcy is still mad that he kissed the priest as a joke at their wedding during the “you may now kiss the bride” portion of the ceremony. The brothers realized that they can use this method to avoid their wives getting mad at them for the stupid things they do. Even though Adam says they should not do it all the time, they know they will use it every opportunity they get.

The brothers continue to blame each other for things without their wives questioning it. Don loves it, but Adam starts to feel guilty. When Andi comes home from the grocery store, she is not eager to see Don. Don decides to leave, but takes the ice-cream that Andi just bought with him. After he leaves, Andi tells Adam that she is grateful for him. She has been seeing how careless and clumsy Don has been lately and it has made her appreciate her husband more. Andi apologizes for accusing Adam of doing things he did not do. Already feeling guilty, Andi’s apology makes Adam feel worse. Andi decides to give Adam a foot massage to make up for her behavior. Adam tries to tell her she does not need to, but she will not take no for an answer.

The next day Lowell (Matt Cook) stops by the Adam’s and Don’s workplace to give Adam and Don tickets for a car show this weekend. The same weekend where the brothers are going to see Lord of the Dance with their wives. Don wants to use the blame game to get out of it so they can go to the car show. Lowell tells them that he thinks the blame game is a terrible thing. Adam agrees and talks about how he had to fake enthusiasm for the Andi’s foot massage because he felt so guilty about lying. Don tries to talk Adam into using the blame game once last time and then they will “go straight.” Although Adam is feeling conflicted, he decides to do the blame game with Don so they can attend the car show. Lowell tries to encourage the men to think about their wives and do something for them, but the brothers are not interested in his advice.

On Saturday, as Marcy and Andi talk about the reasons why their husbands are missing the show both women realized they have been lied to. Apparently, Don told Marcy that Adam scheduled a work meeting on Saturday. Andi is confused because Adam told her that Don messed up a client’s floors and they had to spend the day fixing them. When Don arrives to Adam’s, the brothers realize that they told different lies to Andi and Marcy so Adam is positive they will be caught this time. Once Andi and Marcy make it back to the house, they are not happy. When Don and Marcy leave, Adam admits that they blamed each other. Adam makes it worse by saying this whole thing is Andi’s fault. Andi is shocked that Adam would try to blame his behavior on her. Adam says it unfair that Andi holds past incidents against him every time he screws up. Adam gets Andi to admit that she thought about the delivery room hot dog incident when he broke the vase. Adam hopes that now she will let go of the past anger about the delivery room hot dog, but Andi refuses to let it go. She tells him to go to the car show and she will see Lord of the Dance with Marcy and walks away.

At the car show, Adam is not having a good time. He knows that he was right but he still feels bad that he and Andi are not getting along. When Lowell wants to talk more about Adam’s feelings, Don walks away. Lowell disagrees that Adam is right and feels that whatever baggage Andi is dealing with Adam gave it to her. Adam decides to cut their talk short and go make up with Andi at Lord of the Dance. At the show, Marcy feels that they should have forced their husbands to go, but Andi thinks it is wrong to force them. Andi is not feeling good about fighting with Adam so she goes to the car show to make up with him. Adam arrives when the show starts and he learns that Andi went to the car show looking for him. Andi does not have any success finding Adam at the car show. When Adam arrives home, Andi is sitting in the kitchen drinking tea. They admit that they left their shows to find each other. Andi admits that she missed him and Adam feels the same way. Adam apologized for eating the hot dog all those years ago. He admits that he was overwhelmed about becoming a father for the first time and he handled it badly. They reminiscence about the fun times they had in the delivery room for all three of their children. Andi decides to see their experiences as memories and not baggage. In the closer, the audience see a younger Adam order the hot dog at the hot dog cart.