Episode Report Card Niki: D | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Unfinished Business
By Niki | Season 1 | Episode 17 | Aired on 03.05.2000
Idiot starts to wrap up the "interview" by summing up Lily's position in life: "[She's] divorced, needs money, and is heading back into the job world." Wow, no wonder they pay her the big bucks. Her stunning insight is punctuated by a big fat "BUT," of course. She proceeds to give Lily the lowdown on the workplace, essentially making it clear that Lily's the exact opposite of the staff -- everyone there's like five years old and they have no lives and it's all done on computers. She points out that Lily has no computer experience listed on her resume and says that she's "just wondering why [Lily] thinks [they] might be a good place for [her]." She doesn't really sound like she's looking for an answer, though. More like she's letting Lily know she doesn't have a hope of fitting in. Lily takes a beat but then straightens her spine and stiffens her lip. Looks like Phil's pep talk paid off. She reminds Idiot that she was editor of her college paper "back in the Paleolithic Era." Idiot smiles widely at the joke, like old people are so cute sometimes. Lily also mentions her experience as an assistant editor at Chicago magazine. "For five months?" Idiot asks. Lily explains she left because she got pregnant, and Idiot jumps in to let her know she's not judging Lily's life decisions, she knows things were different "in those days" when "they didn't like pregnant women to work."
Lily's had enough. Making a visible effort to stay calm, she states that her skills are the same whether they're practiced on paper or a computer; what she does at the bookstore is harder that what Idiot needs; and what she does as a mother -- trust her -- is harder than both. So Idiot should just give her a chance to prove herself.
Cut to Lily pacing and ranting at Rick's office. "Can you believe [the Idiot] said that?" I wonder which particular remark out of the countless inane utterances she's fuming about. "Well you are old," Rick says. Even though he's joking, he's clearly a brave man. Lily hits him. She talks about how young everyone at the office is, and how much energy they all have, and it's pretty clear she feels inadequate. She complains about having to write synopses for the next day--"like an audition"--conveniently overlooking the fact that she has no portfolio or other body of work to show them. And the fact that she has to have them done overnight is really not such an outrage, it's actually called 'working to deadline.' Which I'm sure editors were expected to do even twenty years ago. Rick soothes Lily with a lovely little pep talk, and Lily wonders why she got mad at her dad for telling her the same things. Rick points out that he's not her father (we noticed), and Lily tells him she "[doesn't] want him to be." Right, that was Jake's job.