Previously, Richard told Dame Edna he was hot for Liza and her "itty-bitty little sexual package." In another conversation, Dame Edna called Liza a "slut." In yet a third and totally different context from the last situation, Liza -- wearing only underwear -- told Richard she is "not a slut." Richard told Liza he's falling in love with her. Ally told Victor that "it's time [they] took a little break." She's lying -- she cold dumped the guy. He looked all teary and said, "Bye." She said "bye" back. What a boring previously. Except for the fact that this show is canceled and never coming back -- that part makes me happy.
Lights up on Corretta, in a sweet, ditzy, flowered suit, helping herself to some office foodstuffs and reminding Richard that he has led staff meetings before and he probably needn't wait for Ally to show up before they start. Seriously, dude, let's get this party started. What, you're waiting for Cheech and Chong to show up? My bad. Nelle nastily says that perhaps Ally is too broken up about the Victor thing to come in, and has "jumped out of a window in front of a bus, or is sucking on an exhaust pipe...the possibilities are as endless as they are painful." Ray appreciatively cocks an eyebrow at her. Hey, is that going to be the season finale? A gruesome, ritualistic suicide attempt? Hmm. I can see it working. Maybe David E. Kelley can, you know, give Calista a really great line reading of it first in rehearsal, to see how it plays. Show her the right arch to get as she leaps from the window. Just act it out, DEK. Throw us a fricking bone, here. New Guy Wilson asks if it's customary "for the waif to stop the trains." Only when she throws herself in front of them. Then, they stop. Someone want to give us a demonstration on how that works? DEK? G'wan, toss yourself on the tracks for us. Oh, and having Nicky Katt shot on Boston Public? Isn't endearing you to anyone, either. Ally saunters in wearing a teeny, Pucci-esque basket-weave blue-green mini-suit with a 14-inch skirt, half-shirt, and belly chain. She tilts her head and coquettishly says that she was late because she was sorting out the menu with the caterer for her birthday party. She's going to be thirty-two, again, some more. Everyone's invited to the party, and is warned to "plan their outfits accordingly." Nelle asks, sotto voce, who planned the thing Ally's wearing. Ally says she did. Liza says she loves "sucking on bellybuttons," and says she may give Ally a "butterfly" for her birthday. That's when someone sticks the tip of their tongue into another's belly button and flicks it around like a butterfly. Funny, I thought a butterfly kiss was done with eyelash fluttering. Liza concludes with the factiod that she's turned "innies into outies." Richard pops a boner, and Ally looks hot for Liza. What the fuck is going on in this laffy-daffy sexy workplace situation? And how could a show this slutty ever get canceled? Oh world, thou art so unfair.
Vonda's been doooooown, she's been down, down down....
Boston by air, woo! Slow flying over the city, la la la. We land at the office where the lovely and talented Kyra "Loves Bacon's Bits" Sedgwick is seated and addressing Liza and Fish. She owns a chain of women's clothing stores -- "Dalton's" -- and doesn't want to complain, but "being in fashion means staring at women's bodies all day." That's a complaint how? I think the line existed only to allow Fish a "me, too" comment, which allowed La Sedgwick to reply, "People say [Fish is] cute, but I'm paying for this meeting, so let me talk." So La Sedgwick is a tough, no-nonsense businesswoman. Helena. Got it. She's married to a man who says she's not competent to run her business, so she wants a divorce. She "likes the guy," but no longer loves him, and if she stays hitched to him she'll "turn out as crazy as he's making [her] out to be." Fish is all, "Done." Liza asks why her husband has this opinion, and looks at her twitching, nervously drumming, red-manicured fingers. Helena is all, "Does it matter?" Liza says it's a mistake to think Helena can "out-bitch" her. Liza? You're fired. Anyway, Helena hands over her files, Fish takes them, and Liza snatches them from his hands. Helena tells them to send her a copy of the files, and takes off. She's wearing a great black dress with a lovely wide red sash thing, and red cuffs. Fish drools over Helena, and since he and Liza are "an item" now, and Liza needs "to train him," she licks two of her fingers and smacks his wrist with them. Hoo boy.
The Uni. Ally hops out of a stall with toilet paper stuck to her shoe. She hops, peels it off, and crazily washes her hands. What undignified comedy. She notices Kyra Sedgwick standing at the sink looking rather lost and spacy, and asks if she needs help. Kyra is all, "Where am I? Are we friends?" Ally is all, "We haven't met, but you seem...nice. You're in a law firm." Kyra is all, ohhh, shit. She explains to Ally that there's "a woman trying to ruin [her] marriage," more specifically, an "alter" that lives inside her. Kyra is a great actress, can I just say, for selling this performance as a woman with a dual personality. She's working it. Go Kyra, with your bad self. Give her an Emmy nomination for year, even if those always go to that tool Bruce Willis. Anyway, Kyra thinks Helena is seeing a lawyer. Duh! Fish walks in and is all, "Hey Helena, still here?" Kyra puts her head down balefully, full of bale. Ally stammers and asks Fish whether a woman named Helena came in to see him today. Fish is all, "Yeah. Her." Nope. Not her. This is Helen. Ruh roh!
Liza and Dame Edna get in a "move!" "No, YOU move!" snit, as if anyone cares about someone hating Dame Edna when there are just two episodes left, and Richard tells Liza that Helena is "a wackadoo." Liza says, "What?" You heard him. Wackadoo.
Ally's office. Helen has asked Ally to represent her. Her job? Housewife. Helena is the one who owns the clothing stores. Liza and Fish are all, "Helena hired us." Fish says that Helen "seems nice." Then, Helena snaps in, asking who the hell Ally is. Liza smiles. Helena stands up, says she wants the divorce papers filed, and that they are to "disregard" the persona of Helen. Is everyone is "up to speed" on the dual personalities now? Good. She leaves. Liza giggles, saying, "It's so weeeird!" Ally looks a little sad. Oh, so a woman with a mental disease is going to stand trial with this crew? Hoo boy.
Mariachi band, singing Tom Jones's "Delilah." Not a Mexican song. John really hits his "porque." Ally watches, looking sad. A few dancing Mexican puppets aid the transition as John sits down with Ally at a table. Ally says she "need[s]" him. John waves her away, but Ally tells him about the split personality of Helen/Helena, how both hired Liza, Fish, and Ally to do different jobs, and how "crazy" it all is. John taps his face with a maraca, musing over the predicament. Ally says Helen "seems nice," but is "being taken over by her overbearing side," Helena. Oh, what-the-fuck ever! You could also look at it as a woman who, after being submissive to her husband for years, is waking up and coming into herself and doing what she's always wanted to do. Oh, but in DEK's world, women are naturally submissive and want to be so, and having a career is something we're TAUGHT to want. To make it in the working (re: MAN'S) world, we women act tougher. Femininity is quashed out of us and needs to be "re-taught," so we can use our "natural wiles" to advantage, a.k.a. the Bully Broad seminar. DEK, your bad, unfunny show with its fucked-up mores ENRAGES me. I hate you with a passion. I hope every project you take on in the future fails, and that you have an unhappy life. You deserve to be punished for clogging up the ether with your stupid dreck, but I'll leave that to someone with better connections than I. Shame. Shame on you! I really, really hate you. The Mariachi band starts up with "What's New, Pussycat," and John hollers over the din. Is Ally okay with the Victor thing? Can John do anything? Ally wants John to help her with the case, that's it. Just this one last time. Yay! It's almost the last time for real! Thank you-know-who.
Ally's office. A soft-spoken bearded guy, Helen/Helena's husband, sits doormat-ily in front of Ally and John. John is leafing through a journal of Helen's poems, which are, supposedly, "beautiful." Lord, hear my prayer: I don't want to hear any fucking poetry tonight. The DEK poetry slam can fuck right off. I like Blake, Donne, Shakespeare's sonnets, and some Dorothy Parker verse. Everything else passing as a poem can blow me. I don't even look at the poems in the New Yorker. My eye bounces off them like a rubber superball. If I am vinegar, poetry is like oil. You get me? No. Poetry. Anyway, Helen is the writer. Helena reads them nightly, but never touches pen to page. And, the Bearded One "hasn't seen Helen in over a year." He's only seen Helena. They all set off to see the doctor.
While striding cowboy-like through the office, bells toll and some studio hack goes "huh!" to the pounding music. John, Ally, and Beard cross paths with Liza, Fish, and Helena. Helena tells Beard he "can't win this." And what is he doing here? He's Ally's client -- along with Helen. Ally cryptically asks to "speak with her." Helena barks, "NO!" Yeah, what does Ally think this is, a séance parlor trick with that fake Jamaican psychic?
Boston by air, whee, wooo! Judge Albert Hall, presiding. He's all, what-what-whaaat? One personalities...two personalities...ay, yi yi! ¡Dios mio! Liza and Cage stand in front of him and argue the "merits" of the "case." I guess Liza's choosing to forget she was ever hot for John, like, three weeks ago. John argues that he can represent Helen, since she has only "emerge[d]" for Ally. Liza is all, "SquarePants! Helena hired us to represent her!" John objects to the SquarePants thing. Fish says, "He watches SpongeBob, your honor." Judge Hall is all, "Who in the hell is SpongeBob?" Hee. John suggests that Helen's doctor come in and testify. Helena leaps to her feet and says that's Helen's doctor, "not [hers]." John says he was Helen's doctor until Helena "usurped" Helen. Helena corrects him: "Saved me." The judge says he wants to hear from this doctor after lunch.
Everyone exits the courtroom. Helena faces Beard and evilly says, you won't win! Hahahahahaha! Why you even try, foolish man? Beard is all, Helen? Are you in there? I swear I'm only paraphrasing a little bit. Ally steps up and gingerly says, "Helen? Can I talk to you?" Kyra Sedgwick's eyes turn from steely and determined to soft and confused. "Ally? Is that you?" Damn, she's a good actress. And I love her curly hair! Liza looks a little pissed off that Helen emerged. Beard hugs Helen to him. Helen asks what "she" is trying to do now. Helena is angling for a divorce. Beard says expositionally that Helena emerges when Helen's "scared or confused." Fish steps up and says, "BOO," his fingers right in Helen's face. Liza laughs evilly, and I have to say, this shit makes no sense. Like, what the fuck? Beard says he'll "never let [her] go," and Helen looks fawn-like and helpless. He cries that he missed her, and hugs her to him. She relaxes her body into his, then cries out. Her body stiffens. "Helen is gone. Helen no mas. [Helena's] late for lunch." She strides off. Beard cries out after her, "Come baaack!" Liza smiles hugely and follows Helena. Sick.
John's hole. Liza is yelling at Richard. She doesn't like being told, apparently, that Richard is in love with her. But he told her that last week! No -- he said "beginning to fall in love with" her. I guess Liza is only a part-time lovah. Liza yells that she's "not...what's that word...nice!" Fish says that she is, really, and that she's "got that Helen/Helena thing going on" herself, but that she's more like Helen. Liza says, "Eeeww! That is a horrible thing to say!" Fish one-ups that, with a "you're going to be a wonderful mother." Now, why the hell would he say that? Has he ever even seen her around a kid? Liza twitches a little, then says they need to get back to court, now. She uses the remote and gets the hell out of the hole, leaving Fish trapped inside.
Court. Helen's doctor is testifying about what it is she has: Dissociate Identity Disorder, apparently. Treated through therapy, until Helena took over. Helena discontinued therapy. The other suggested treatment is "radical," "could work," and guess what? Comes in a bottle. Risperadone is what he wants to dole out, but with Helena running the show, no way: she wont take the pill that "could extinguish her." Liza steps up to cross. Which core personality is stronger? Happier? In better mental health? Better physical health? Well, Helena. The doctor even says that Helen has higher blood sugar than Helena, and is at higher risk of developing diabetes. He knows this because the two personalities have "different personal symptomologies." Liza is all, thank you. She takes her seat and sits right on Fish's hand, which he left on her chair. The better to feel her ass with, I suppose.
The office. Liza tells Fish she wants him off the case now. Um, can she say that to her boss? And, WHY IS THIS CASE EVEN HAPPENING? Fish is all, you got weird when I told you I was falling for you! Wow, ding ding ding. Whoop whoop! Look who took a ride on the clue bus, all by himself! Liza says that lots of men fall in love with her. Fish asks how many of them call her "nice." She shoots him a look. He pushes it: "You're a nice, kind-hearted person." She hates him so much right now. Why? Because she "doesn't like it when people see both sides of [her]. It makes [her] feel all naked." Fish says, "Love is about being both soft and hard. It's like a penis. Fishism." Oh, fuck off. Richmondism. Liza says, "The meek get trampled. Just look at me like a lawyer, and as a sexual object." Fish says something that doesn't sound like himself -- he points out that they're not having sex right now. She smacks him and tells him to look at her like he really wants to, then.
Ally's office. Ally, John, and Beard are talking. Beard says that Helen "created" Helena because she hated and couldn't deal with conflict. Oh my god, we get it about the dual-personality thing. The judge needs to see Helen in order for them to win. And, Ally told her sitter she'd be home by ten, so can she.... Wilson walks in, looking mightily pissed. Ally's client is in Wilson's office and wants to speak to Ally.
Kyra-Helen sits in a chair, sketching in a notebook. Beard sees her and says, "Baby?" They hug and kiss. Ew. John steps up and says that Helen needs to be in court, and that there are drugs she can take that act "almost immediately." Cool. Give me some of them. NOW. Hey, did you ever look at your hand? I mean, really look at your hand? John asks Ally to take Helen home with her tonight, since Helen comes out for Ally, and Ally's house is big enough for a whole Brady Bunch of crazies. Then Ally can have a fun party, and bring Helen to court tomorrow. Helen hugs Beard and says she just wants her life back. Beard says he knows. Barf.
Ally's Very Very Very Fine House. Maddie takes down notes on what Ally wants on her cake. Sprinkles? And thirty-five candles, is it? Ally says that's funny. Helen says that Maddie has Ally's "delicate face," and that she'd like to paint a watercolor of the two of them. Maddie's all, do you paint? It's been a year since she has, says Helen. She and her Beard "so want children. Twice [she's] been pregnant, and both times Helena took care of it." Dude, Helen talks like she emerged from a bodice-ripper. Do you want children ever so much? Do you want them so? Maddie is all, "took care of it"? How do you mean? Ally shushes her and says they'll talk about it later. Helen says she can't blame Helena, since she runs a "mini-fashion empire, and you can't work and have children." Oh no, no one ever does that. How can you? Why, when you have a kid, you have to just stop everything until the child becomes an adult. Why, I can't imagine anyone even wanting to work when she has a child! God, it must be horrible for the poor. How do they survive? Helen says that Helena will "come out in court tomorrow," since Helen "can't survive places like that," and in those stressful situations, "Helena has always come running to the rescue." Ally says that court will "be safe, and that [Helen] needs to stay focused on [Ally]." Oh yeah, that'll make everything so much better. Because Ally is so strong and certain. A real pillar of salt. I mean, "strength."
Court. Helen is on the stand, speaking softly and with trepidation. She admits that she "needed Helena," since she was "borderline agoraphobic." She says she could never even have made it out the door, or met her husband Beard, without Helena. She "was Helena by day, and Helen by night. It seemed a healthy balance, in a strange sort of way." Wow, DEK is a master of subtlety, no? He's never written a character as complex as this before: all his characters are one-note blunders; neurotic, messy, all one thing and unable to change or commit to any other way of being. It's why Ally dumped Victor. It's why Fish can't find anyone to love him. It's why John left. DEK can't write characters any more complex than those in a Cathy cartoon. It's not in him. But a Jekyll and Hyde thing, he can pull off. With the help of Kyra Sedgwick. Anyway, Helen says her dualities used to be more integrated, but then she got blackouts and memory losses. She realized Helena was taking over. And though she loves her husband, and "loves being in love with him," she's "happier and healthier as Helena." Ally stammers, "Wh-wh-what?" John stands up, asks to approach, and asks Helen to read something off a piece of paper. She can't. John says that it's Helena masquerading as Helen, since Helena is farsighted and needs reading glasses. Oy. John asks that the record reflect that Helena is lying under oath, and asks rhetorically whether this is a person we want the court to protect. Liza and Fish object. Helena becomes obvious to the eye, as she adopts a steely gaze and tight lips. She starts hissing at John, that "this has never been easy" and that she isn't "having fun," being unaware where she was the night before and unsure of how she got from the law office to court: "Helen has no social skills. She is dysfunctional!" The music holds an ominous chord. Helena goes on: "I have a life here! Why won't you let me live it? There's a reason I've become what I am, for god's sake!" Woo! And, what is that reason? I'd really like to hear it. But, we don't get a chance to, as the scary scary music fades, and Helen asks for a chance to be heard. Oh, by all means. This hearing is not at all a sham or a joke. Go right ahead, timid lady. Helen admits, "I'm not prolific professionally or socially, but, I have my poetry and painting and my husband, and I won't apologize for it. She has no right to take me away from it. No right." So, only women can "take away" their own "right" to work, or choose not to work? Women are doing it to themselves, without any input from the other gender? Because the CHOICE NOT TO WORK is a self-determined thing? Fuck you, DEK. The piano is sad. Me? Furious.
Ally's office. Helen is giddy because she "actually stood up for [her]self." She asks if Ally heard. Christ. Ally stammers around asking how Helen feels about Helena, and does she realize that if they "win" the case, the drug Beard gives her will "extinguish" Helena. Helen sketches her pencil drawing of John some more, and says that Helena is trying to extinguish Helen, and that she just wants to write and paint and have her husband back. La la la! Life, she is so simple. Not.
Ally and Helen head to the elevator, where they come across Dame Edna. Hellew! Ally tries to shush her, but too late -- Helena snaps back and asks if "there's a parade in town, because they're missing a float." No floats are that scary. Not even the giant balloons at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Even if you're high. Helena goes off to find Liza, and Maddie steps off the elevator. Ally tells her she can't leave just yet; she has to go to closings. She sends Maddie to hang out with Elaine. Maddie cringes: "She sings to me." Aww. I remember when I was a kid, my mon worked at NYU in the alumni office. I'd go after school sometimes and hang out, because one of her co-workers had a giant poster of Christopher Reeve as Superman. I loved that poster. Sigh. Does that date me? Like I care. Anyway, John walks down the stairs and sees the touching tableau of Ally, working "mom," setting her daughter up as she does "just one thing" before leaving for her birthday. More sad piano. More me saying, "Whatever."
Closing arguments. Liza gestures to a bunch of people sitting in the back of the courtroom, all of whom depend on Helena. If Beard gets to give his wife drugs, it's signing a death warrant for Helena. Judge Hall is all, "But Helena is killing Helen." Liza says that the "stronger personality should win out." Judge asks how he can decide such a thing. Liza says no one should. The judge says that doctors decide that sort of thing every day. Liza says, "Yes, to remedy illness. But Helena is more competent than Helen." John steps up and makes a pretty weak argument to the effect that Helen came first, and therefore should stay. Judge says that Kyra is Helena 95% of the time, so why shouldn't he care more about Helena? John has no answer for that. Liza leaps up and says, "You stumped him, Judge." John says the judge did not, and tells her, "Sit down, Ms. Stump. Rump. Bump!" Liza rolls her eyes and sits with a thump. John says, "Balls," walks over to Ally, and says, "You see this person here? She has hallucinations. Sees things. Has a hundred personalities. Some people say she's in need of mental health. But I never, ever question who she is." Because "what defines her most is her soul." And at Helena's soul is Helen: "That's where she loves, where she paints, where she writes her poems. Even Helena knows that." And the thing about Helena being more successful than Helen? "Says more about our world than about her." Go sad oboe, go!
Chambers. Ally asks John whether he meant what he said back there. No, he was totally bullshitting. Can I just ask, is the firm getting two paychecks for this gig? One from Helena, one from Helen? Does Beard have a gig? Maybe singing cabaret somewhere? Ally meant her soul. John says she is "nothing if not a soul." Yeah. Duh. Ally says that the best things "ever said to [her] always come from John." John says that Ally "helped save Helen," and that their souls "connected." Hooray. Whoops, the judge has his ruling.
The judge finds that Beard should be custodian of Helen. Helena stands up and says that the judge "just signed [her] death warrant." He bangs his gavel, the ultimate "whatever." Beard steps up and is all, "This is the right result." Kyra Sedgwick digs into her bag of acting tricks and roots around, conjuring up Helen. "Did we win, baby?" They won, baby. They hug. Fish and Liza barf in unison. Ally nods and smiles, satisfied.
Fish races after Liza, who is trucking to the elevator. She's pissed they lost. Richard jumps on at the last moment and asks if she thinks she'll have to "extinguish [her] cold, bitchy side" for him to love her. He says he fell for that side, too. She pleads for him to tell her why he fell in love with her. He likes that she's "cold, bitchy, smart, extremely sexy, and soft." She teases him by asking if he's ever fantasized about making love in an elevator. He says he has. She says she hasn't, not ever.
Ally's very very very fine house. Maddie wheels in a giant sheet cake with a million candles on it. Everyone sings. Ally blows out her candles with a stammer, pausing to laugh between puffs. There's a band in her house. Fish says he didn't know what to get -- they were "going to give [her] a getaway with Victor...bygones." Ally says she has everything she wants, but she is curious about the butterfly Liza mentioned earlier. Liza says she can only do one of those a night, and she already promised Fish she'd give him one. What a tease DEK is. Vonda starts singing "Yummy, Yummy, Yummy, I've Got Love in My Tummy." Everyone dances like spazzes. Liza's phone rings, and then, kaboom, party's over and everyone has to go.
The lawyers march over to another Boston home. It's Helena's. She's moving out of her home with Beard. The drug "took Helen, quite possibly forever." Helena strides down the stairs in her home, suitcase in hand. "She said to say goodbye. Look, I loved her, too." Liza looks sad. "Technically, you should be happy," says Helena. The soft sad piano starts up. Vonda starts to sing. We see a watercolor of Ally and Maddie. My tape shuts off, at one hour, one minute and forty-five seconds. Aww! Well, that was closure enough for me.