Will & Grace – Three Wise Men

By: Kelly Kearney

Dating someone who lives in your apartment building seems like a great idea until it doesn’t. Sure, rendezvous in the building’s laundry room sound romantic, but what happens when the relationship fizzles and you still have to wash your delicates? On this week’s “Will and Grace” we take a look at the do’s and don’ts of dating life and why it’s never a good idea to throw yourself into the spin cycle of love… especially when you’re as awkward as Grace Adler.

Grace’s new boo

The episode begins with Grace (Debra Messing), quietly sneaking into her apartment after a date with James (Matt Letscher), a guy she met in the building’s laundry room. Jack (Sean Hayes) and Will (Eric McCormack) play Mom and Dad, waiting up to hear how it went with her new guy. Grace is over the moon for this new boo and definitely finds his address convenient. If there is one thing that’s universal about dating in New York City, it’s that nobody wants to ride the train to find love. Convenience is key but Will and Jack wonder if James’ close proximity won’t turn awkward if things went south in the relationship. Within seconds of Grace laughing of their concerns, she gets a call from James to say just that; living in the same building is making this awkward. With ice cream in hand and a shoulder to lean on, Jack and Will lift Grace’s mood with their post break up ritual. Jack even suggest Grace follow his fool proof heartbreak remedy and immediately get behind, under and sideways with the first guy she meets. Solid advice from McFarland but now that he is officially dating Drew, he won’t need to get sideways with anyone.

At Grace Adler and Associates, Will and Karen (Megan Mullally) are still ironing out the kinks of their working relationship. The over bearing ex-lawyer needs to get over the fact that Walker’s work ethic varies based on whichever mood she’s in… and when I say “mood” I mean liquor bottle. With their mutual snark out of the way, Will gets ready to leave for the gym but pauses when he notices Karen watching her staff on the security cameras back at the mansion. Like her own little reality show, Karen has the entire house controlled through her cell phone. She can raise the heat, add background music and generally control the home’s atmosphere for her own entertainment. At first, Will doesn’t approve of Karen’s spying but when he notices the smoking hot gay vibes between her two chefs, he instantly becomes a fan of her new work hobby.

Getting back in the saddle can be a rough ride

While Will and Karen are watching “The Gays of our Lives,” streaming live from “the mans.” Jack takes Grace out to find herself a new man. He wasn’t kidding when he said the cure to heartbreak was getting back in the saddle, but Grace doesn’t feel like a random sexual encounter is the answer. That is until she runs into her old college professor (Barry Bostwick). The two have a sexual past and it’s not long before Grace starts flirting with him. A random hook up might not be the answer to her problems but there’s nothing wrong with flirting.

Cue random hook up; a young waiter (Andy Favreau) is smitten after Grace’s spills her drink and the two head to the bathroom for some quick “break up” curing sex. Of course, when Grace gets home James is waiting for her at the door with a bouquet of flowers and an apology about ending things between the two. He panicked and thought their shared address would lead to awkward encounters neither of them wanted. He was wrong and asks Grace for another chance. Just as she’s about to give him the green light the hot waiter from earlier steps off the elevator and we find out he’s James’ son! If only Karen thought to sneak a security camera into Grace’s life she would have an award-winning series in her hands.

Back to Walker Productions, Karen and Will turn up the mansion’s heat hoping the two smoldering chefs will strip down for some sweaty action. Gazing at each other over the hot stove, the men lean in to kiss just as Karen cranks up the volume on the background music which ends up killing their moods. With the kiss ruined and Karen and Will’s shipper hearts on hold, they wonder how they can break the chef’s code to figure out what the men are talking about. The chef’s code is actually Spanish and you would think with all the domestics Karen kidnapped from South America she would be fluent by now.  Luckily, Will’s been sort of dating/avoiding an old fling named Neil (Dan Bucatinsky) whose video call interrupts the gay drama to ask Will out. Will agrees to the date the minute he realizes Neil speaks Spanish. He asks him to stop by the office before they head out, but Neil has no idea this all just a rouse to get him to translate their gay telenovela.

Three’s a crowd

The minute J.J. the waiter stepped off the elevator, the color drained from Grace’s face. Now that she knows he’s the son of the guy she’s dating, the red head goes into full panic mode. She pushes James in to the apartment telling him she wants to pump (no pun intended) J.J. for information about his dad. Once James is behind closed doors, Grace freaks and tells J.J. he has to leave and forget what happened in the bathroom. Only, he doesn’t want to forget, he likes Grace and even offers to fight his Dad for her heart. James comes out to see what’s taking Grace so long and invites J.J. inside for a drink before he heads to the Knicks game. The situation quickly unravels when J.J.  talks about Grace, without his father having a clue the luminous woman he met is actually his girlfriend. After tying to push him out the door, J.J. agrees to leave if Grace tells him who was better in bed, him or his father. Finally, she relents and crowns J.J. the champion of sexy times and thankfully his grandfather arrives to take him to the basketball game. Unfortunately, and yet predictably, his grandfather just happens to be the college professor Grace ran into at the restaurant with Jack. The very same professor she slept with! Sleeping your way through three generations is very definition of complicated and awkward, two things Grace does very well. What she doesn’t do well is lie and no matter how much wine she downs her panic starts to get the best of her.

At the office, Neil shows up ready for his date, but Will immediately puts him to work translating their reality show romance. The dialogue is decent, but the story could use a few new characters. Enter Will the tennis trainer. Will waltzes in to the kitchen in his tight white shorts and tennis racket ready to ignite the flames of jealousy between their “will they, won’t they” couple. The plan works and the two men kiss just as Karen inserts her porno music, giving Will a front row seat to his fantasy turned reality.

Back at the apartment, Grace is playing interference between the men and hoping to keep her sexcapades a secret. A task made harder when she realizes this family is extremely competitive when it comes to women. They all want to one up each other and the pressure to keep this under wraps is becoming impossible. All three men are reminiscing about once bedding the prettiest girl in the world and Grace can’t take it anymore. She screams, “I’m the prettiest girl in the world!” admitting she sept with all three but hopes she can continue seeing James. Unfortunately, that level of complicated and awkward is too much for James and they both agree to avoid each other, even in the laundry room.

In the end, Grace winds up alone but she does earn Jack’s respect. Through all of his meaningless sexual encounters, the father/son/grandfather triangle is a new one, even for him. Sure, she found out she slept her way through a family tree, but she still got a thumbs up from Jack and, if she’s lucky, Karen will turn your life into a reality show called “Female Fashion Fails and the Gay Husbands That Love Them,” a ratings hit if I’ve ever heard one.