Episode Report Card Wing Chun: D | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Northern Lights
By Wing Chun | Season 3 | Episode 13 | Aired on 01.25.2000
Backstage at the play, the girl who's playing Corie is needling Pacey, asking him how they're supposed to "go up tonight" if he keeps forgetting his lines. Pacey says that he knows them, but that he has a bit of "recall delay." The camera pans over to Andie "Jane Crampion" McPhee who is screeching that she can't find Mr. Broderick, adding, "Our play is falling apart at the seams!" On the fly, she tells Pacey to take it from the top; he forgets what that means, so she reminds him in a frazzled way that it means he should start at his entrance. As she stands in a doorway freaking out, Jack "Back in Angry's Arms" McPhee jogs up behind her. Before he can say anything, she snaps, "Not now, Jack," and bitches about the play some more. Instead of saying "I can pack those bags and go back to Grams's before you take your daily dose," Jack tells her that half an hour ago, in English class, Mr. Broderick -- "'Mr. Broderick' what?" Andie demands. Jack tells her to come with him.
Cut to Mr. Broderick in a hospital bed. He's saying that "the nurse thinks it's a kidney stone," and that his wife's on her way to pick him up. Andie anxiously protests that he can't go home because the play goes on in eight hours. Mr. Broderick tells her that he isn't going to make it to the play and that she'll have to take his place. As Jack hovers nervously behind her, Andie babbles on about the tickets she has to sell and the after-party she has to set up (which, when I was in school, usually took place after the last performance, not the first, besides which, nice priorities, 1AD) and yelps that she can't do everything by herself. Jack wearily tells her that he can do the tickets and the after-party. Mr. Broderick moans, "There you go. Jack will help you. I have faith in you, Andie. I mean, who am I kidding? It's been your show all along. This is your night." He hands Andie a leather portfolio which she identifies as his "director's binder," and he tells her that it's hers now: "And as the house lights fall over that magic place we call the theatre, all I ask is that you give pause for a fleeting moment and think of me." I'm sorry, is he a drama teacher or a drama queen? It's a kidney stone, not a tumour. Jack tries unsuccessfully not to crack up at Mr. Broderick's histrionics. Meredith Monroe mugs for the camera.
Back at school, Jen "Bacon Bitch" Lindley calls Henry's name over a railing. The camera pans down to show Henry "Getting Less Fresh by the Day" Parker and his greeeezy hair, hurriedly slamming his locker shut and rushing toward the exit. Jen trots down the stairs calling his name again and asking him to wait. She runs around a corner in time to see him, down the hall, turn around, make eye contact with her, and run away. She stops to make a quick calculation, then runs in the other direction and cuts him off at his chosen exit. That'll do, pig. Henry stops long enough to roll his eyes at her a bit, then keeps running. She chases him and asks why he's avoiding her. He asks why she's cancelling dinner tonight. She asks what makes him think she's cancelling. He says, "Ever since you agreed to this dare-I-call-it date, you don't even make eye contact with me in hallway. It's like you've got this giant blind spot in my exact shape and size." I wish I did. Jen asks whether he thinks he might be paranoid, and he asks her again if she plans to cancel. Jen insists that she's not cancelling anything -- just postponing. She's also wearing a very un-Jen-like pastel cardigan with these totally ridiculous yarn balls hanging down around her neck and bobbing back and forth whenever she moves. Like, it's a sweater, not a 1983 tennis sock. Anyway, at the news of her postponement, Henry huffs at Jen and goes on his way, but she follows and explains that it's Pacey's opening night and that she wants to be there to support him. Henry asks her to assure him that her non-cancellation is only about the play; she says it is, and he says, "Great." She asks why it's great, and he says that he'll go with her. A look of vague disappointment (or maybe just "a look of vague") comes over her face, and in a stunned voice she confirms the curtain time and tells him it's okay with her if she joins him. The hell? Okay, after all the hassle they went through getting these two back in the chemistry-free zone, why doesn't Jen want to see him, now? Oh, forget it, I don't care.
At the PB&B, Joey is fending off the eyelash-curling ministrations of Bessie "Bodie Got Back" Potter. There's a knock at the door and Joey hisses, "That can't be him!" Joey's hair is wack. I mean, I know the Potters are po', but if they can afford an eyelash curler, they can afford a. Hair. BRUSH. Bessie tells Joey to relax and let Bodie get the door, and to remind Bessie again why she shouldn't be worried that Joey's dating "some much older guy." Joey scoffs that A.J.'s not that much older -- he's only nineteen. There's another knock at the door and Bessie opens it, glances at the person on the other side, and quickly closes the door again, saying, "Well, it's a boy, just not the one we expected." Bessie opens the door again and, after a beat, Pacey carefully steps inside. Bessie brushes past him and closes the door behind her. He starts to tell Joey that he "completely tanked," and Joey serenely tells him to calm down, because he's just nervous. She stands up, putting in an earring, to show that she's wearing a long skirt in an inoffensive floral print. She looks nice. Except for her hair. ["And her posture -- although I don't know what I expect, since she no longer has a spine of any kind." -- Sars] Pacey tells her that he's "way beyond nervous" and that in the read-through they had that afternoon he couldn't remember a single line. The day of the play, and they're having a read-through instead of a dress rehearsal? Joey says that she doesn't know why he's psyching himself out, because he knew the play perfectly well when she practiced it with him two nights ago. Pacey says that's because he was with her: "When I got to do it with actual human beings -- nothing." Joey says, regretfully, "I know I suck for not being there; I'm sorry." Very agitated now, Pacey says, "You do," but tells her that she can redeem herself by coming to the after-party: "And, you know, don't say no too quickly, because you're definitely going to need a shoulder to cry on if this whole northern lights thing doesn't work out." Joey laughs and says that she'll try to come, but that he shouldn't count on it, and rhymes off some science talk that boils down to there being a great likelihood of northern lights tonight. Pacey asks where this "scientific mumbo-jumbo" is coming from, since Pacey thought A.J. was "a poetry geek." Joey defensively says that A.J. is a Renaissance man. Pacey dismissively says, "Fantastic! He can bore you in seven languages." Joey sniffs, "Just three, actually -- English, French, and Latin." Pacey says the usual Latin-is-a-dead-language crap. Bessie opens the door and says, "He's here." Pacey puts his palm...over Bessie's face...and...in her own home...pushes her out of the room and closes the door. Okay, actually it was kind of funny -- Joshua Jackson does know from comic timing -- but by rights Pacey should have been out on his ass via the window for that, and I don't care if he did hang said window. At the news of A.J.'s arrival, Joey freezes. Pacey tells her it's not too late for her to "back out" of her northern-lights party. Making final adjustments to her ensemble, Joey asks why she'd want to do that, and Pacey tells her that A.J. is clearly "an operator," and that the first thing he'll do when he comes in is pay Joey "some lame compliment about how incredible [she] look[s] tonight." Joey looks taken aback by his saying something nice, and nervously mutters, "Pacey..."
As they walk out of her bedroom, he goes on: "I'm just lookin' out for you! And then he'll try something cute, like a negligible but not insignificant amount of physical contact, you know what I mean? Like helping you on with your coat, hmm?" Joey mutters that "it's called being a gentleman," and that she's surprised he's heard of it. Pacey, really racing now, tells her that the party to which A.J.'s invited her probably doesn't even exist, and that if it does, he'll take the first opportunity to get her alone. As he says the last bit, Joey watches A.J. idly leaf through a book on a foyer table, then confidently strolls toward him, and then abruptly switches gears to mincing around in a semi-circle just inside his line of sight, without saying anything. Finally he says "hey," and she says "hi" and he says she looks "amazing." Pacey watches protectively while she gets her coat out of the closet, and A.J., as predicted, helps her on with it. Pacey looks wounded. Joey catches his eye just before she heads out the door, and looks slightly guilty. That scene was well done. Too bad A.J. had to be there.