Episode Report Card Pablo G: A- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT It's My Party and I'll Lie If I Want To
By Pablo G | Season 1 | Episode 5 | Aired on 10.06.2009
the ladder in front of everyone. END FLASHBACK AND SCENE.Out in The Complex Courtyard, Riley finds Lauren. Riley is all "hello, stranger" about the encounter. Lauren plays along like she can't remember Riley's name. She calls her Ella. Thanks for trying to keep the most interesting character present in every scene, guys, but it's just not the same. Riley asks Lauren to come help her pick a wedding dress. They make a date for tomorrow afternoon and are all smiles.
At Coal, Violet is pouring drinks trying to practice bartending when Auggie walks up. She wants to ask Marcello to be a bartender. Auggie's a bit skeptical about her chances since she just started out as a hostess. Violet's wanting some extra cash from tips because she's jealous of Ella and how nice she and everyone at The Complex dresses. Auggie tells her she doesn't need expensive clothes because she looks great. What? Violet eerily basks in the compliment.
Lauren's at the hospital when she gets a call from Wendi. In the middle of getting her first escort assignment, a patient codes right in front of her. Nice way to illustrate how the character is being pulled in two separate directions. We all know it's just as difficult to remember a location, a time and the pseudonym Nikki Bloom (come on) as it is to deal with a person going into cardiac arrest. Oh, the parallels. We're practically in a geometry class right now.
Jonah shows up at the mansion seen before in his footage at the Love Nest excited about said footage he's handing over to his real estate agent friend. His friend isn't as excited. A $65,000 pendant is missing from the house. The guy starts accusing Jonah of being a thief, which Jonah denies, but nobody else had access to the room but him. As much as I wish Jonah's character would go away it's pretty shitty to watch him take the fall for David. Jonah's all flustered as he denies the allegations, but dude doesn't care. He dials the police right in front of Jonah and asks if Jonah would be interested in a one-room efficiency with bars on the windows. OK, he didn't really ask him that, but he should've. It would've had the same gravitas as Jonah turning back to the camera with his stupid, wide-eyed face.
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Lauren's in a nice hotel room frantically straightening things up while David Guetta's "Sexy Bitch" plays in the background. A man walks in and introduces himself as Frank. He immediately kisses her. Then he questions her letting him do so and laughs to himself as if to call her a beginner. No matter; he begins peeling her clothes off. Lauren goes for the kill, but Frank is in no hurry. He walks over to the stereo system and puts on some Santigold and asks her to dance. Dance for me, I say! The request makes Lauren visibly uncomfortable and she tries to reason her way out of it. Frank's visibly frustrated. I really feel for Frank here. He threatens to get another girl. Hell yeah, Frank. Who refuses to dance to Santigold? Lauren gives in and starts awkwardly swaying, but Frank isn't putting up with this weak shit. Frank knows what he wants. Frank gets what he wants. Frank is frank with her. "Stop thinking," he says. Frank tells it like it is. Lauren heeds the advice and...OK...this is yummy. For the first time in the series, Lauren comes off smoking hot. Stephanie Jacobsen's body is pretty amazing and the camera makes sure we don't forget it. Her dancing fades to them lying in bed after the deed is done. Frank compliments Lauren as she sits up in bed. Lauren looks over at the clock to see that it's five o'clock. She's late for her wedding dress date with Riley. She starts to leave, but Frank wants her to stay. Lauren points out they've spent an hour together, but Frank keeps a second hour optional. Damn right Frank does. Lauren asks if she can make a phone call, but Frank scoffs at the idea. Lauren heeds his request, effectively blowing off Riley.
Night time by The Complex Pool as Ella is walking home and texting Dante Zaretti, insisting they need to talk. FLASHBACK. Ella is out to dinner with some friends when the waiter comes over to inform her that her credit card has been declined. That's absurd because it's her platinum card with a $20,000 limit. As she says this, she looks over across the way to see Sydney sitting at the bar smiling diabolically at her. Ella walks over to her and begins an argument that spans Sydney's relationship with Dr. Mancini and David and who walked out on whom in their own friendship. Ella threatens to have Syd arrested, but Sydney just reminds her she has a maxed out credit card now and leaves. END FLASHBACK. Somehow Ella has teleported up to David's apartment during the course of her flashback. She's waiting on him to get dressed for her birthday party. While she's waiting she starts snooping around for her birthday gift from David. She stumbles upon the pendant which was stolen from the mansion. David walks back into the room, but Ella manages to put it back and act natural so he doesn't suspect she's seen it. To make sure he doesn't suspect anything, she brings up her encounter with Detective Rodriguez and makes sure they get on the same page about changing their alibi to two a.m. Before David will agree to anything, he wants to know the truth about what Ella was up to the night Sydney died. Ella admits that she slept with a client that night. The problem with that is his wife is also a client so she can't let anyone -- including the cops -- know about it because of the potential fallout for her in the publicity industry.
We do the quick, neon cuts that let us know we're going to a glamorous party. Jonah and Riley walk in talking about his interrogation. Again, I'm curious why they let him go, given the facts of the matter, which indicate he's the only suspect. Instead, the police are going to run a background check on him and call his past employers. Wow that sucks, I guess. Jonah worries he'll get blacklisted once everyone in the industry hears he's a suspected criminal. In L.A. and Hollywood? Please. Riley does her usual calming of Jonah's paranoia and offers to go get him a drink. As she walks up to the bar, we zoom past her to Ella opening gifts. She opens David's gift and is obviously disappointed when she sees it is not the pendant. David notices and asks what's wrong. Ella brazenly admits she was expecting the pendant and starts describing it as Jonah walks up. "Son of a bitch," he says to himself.
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Back at Ella's party, Jonah is telling Riley about his suspicion. Riley brings up his supposedly misguided suspicion of Violet and teases him about being caught up in his own Hitchcockian paranoia. He admits it doesn't make sense since David could probably afford to buy those necklaces with his trust fund. Across the way, Ella checks her email on her phone and opens a message from Jonah, which brings up her birthday video. Ella loves the gesture and calls Jonah over to her to watch along with her and David. As Jonah walks away from Riley, Lauren enters and goes straight into apologizing. Riley's mostly mad she didn't even call to let her know she was being ditched. Lauren tries to lie about something coming up at the hospital. Nice try, but Riley called the hospital and you weren't there. Busted and can't be trusted.
Violet helps out Kyra at the bar just long enough to see her put a $100 bill under the register till.
We cut to a close-up of Ella's Blackberry where Jonah is on the screen walking on top of a giant CGI Blackberry with a birthday cake on its screen. *Shakes head* A group of Ella's friends has gathered around to watch the end of the video and everyone lets out an "aww" as Jonah concludes his message about why everyone loves her. She turns and hugs Jonah right in front of Riley who looks none too pleased about it. Ella proposes a toast to all her wonderful friends. She feels so lucky to have met such wonderful friends and to have them all in the same apartment complex. We cut to everyone's faces as they look with contempt at each other. Awesome. Let's break it down. Auggie's pissed at David. Jonah's pissed at David, too.