Discuss - Ep #1049

Robservations #1049

(This ep marks the final appearance of Denise Nickerson on DS.)

We're back in the English country house murder groove, with Carolyn making sure to let everybody know that she knows who killed Angelique and several other juicy secrets so that she'll end up getting herself killed - although we don't know for sure yet that she'll be killed.  Very likely Quentin will come back to the room and save her in the nick of time, and together they'll try to bundle the knife wielder out of the way under the bed, wrapped up in the secondary afghan, only to find that Trask's body is already there, wrapped up in the primary afghan.

Of course the pleasant thing for Dan Curtis about having Carolyn let everybody know that she's got secrets to spill is that "everybody" doesn't comprise so many people as it used to.  We've lost Cyrus, Sabrina, Bruno, and Hoffman, and although Chris is theoretically available as a murderer, most viewers know he's not likely to be picked.  So I think we saw all the suspects today with the exception of Buffie Harrington, and yet there were still only six people in the episode.  Or did I miss a suspect?

But how can anybody be sure that Carolyn knows what she said she knows?  Not so long ago, as she says herself, she was absolutely sure that her mother killed Angelique.  Why should her current certainty be any more credible than her previous certainty?  I didn't hear anything that sounded like proof today, and nothing like clues from Carolyn.

Aw.  I wonder if leaving DS made Denise's grades go up.

That's some reaction of Roger's to Ang!   Go Louis!   Carolyn is VERY comfortable in Angelique's presence... I thought it was a mistake at first, but no, it's very cool.  She's being fatalistic and morbidly ironic, which is how you get when you have enough taken away, including any power to do anything about it... if you're lucky.   I've got one foot planted in that place mentally all the time, so I know.

I enjoy Extreme Dripping Irony Carolyn very much, putting herself in Ang's face, inches away, saying "I can't imagine much of anything shocking you!"   I always like characters who do ironic running commentaries on events.   I'd be that in real life, if I could.

I like Joan Bennett very much here.   I tend to think of her as a former film star slumming on daytime TV (not happily, so slumming's the wrong word), cringing as they go farther and farther into the supernatural, less willing to commit as it all gets too "out there" for her.   I'm reading that into things to some extent-- that impression goes back to childhood and takes a lot of time to undo.   Anyway, Liz is in visible turmoil from what's happening to Carolyn, even before knowing she'd died.   That's one terrible part of it, if she's this torn up even before hearing the news, what happens after?   Well handled.   It gets the viewer thinking.  We can see Liz thinking too.   Suddenly we get what we hardly ever get in later DS:  someone emotionally processing.

Who decided that a stuffed wolverine or whatever in the hall was decorative?   The Ang murder storyline is now moving too fast.   At this point in viewing, I thought that they'd better switch to Claude North fast.   Which they didn't.   [spoiler]Carolyn's dead,[/spoiler] making us think PT's winding up, but it can't be.

We get the first of many mind-numbing repeated shots of "Hi, like my medeival frisbee?" Guy.   (the stained glass window.)

Lydia-- Yes, I thought at the time (a week ago?  I'm too far ahead.)  that of course Carolyn doesn't know allthe secrets, she just knows most, and that's close enough for jazz in a drunken rambling...  Then it turned out that she did, even though I have no clue as to any viable reason for her to know this particular secret.

7/2/70

“I’ll tell you what I believe!” then Louis grab his nose!  “I’ll tell you exactly what I believe”  LOL I find that hysterically funny for some reason?

Everybody is so 70S but of course it is 1970 so I guess it's par for the course!

One can tell that Nancy B is relishing her part as the drunken Carolyn as she is truly tearing it up every day!

Everyone @ Collinwood apparently was in love with Angelique which I find really weird.  Why can't we have someone who hates her guts?

I love how Nancy slowly and gracefully caresses the alcohol bottle! These are the spying us people I have ever seen!
OMG…it’s the long forgotten kitchen set. Oh kitchen set how I have missed you  How I have longed to see your wall again.

Bye bye Denise! You did some wonderful work on this show!

OMG…it’s the long forgotten kitchen set. Oh kitchen set how I have missed you  How I have longed to see your wall again.

Oh, yeah, I forgot we saw the kitchen.  But is it the kitchen?  I didn't notice a stove but I did notice a refrigerator and a bunch of cupboards, so I'm saying it's the pantry, because can you imagine paying a cook to turn out meals worthy of Angelique in that small space?  And we know there's a cook because the cook was nervous – or something – just before the disastrous costume ball.  Conceivably the cook was hired for just that occasion, but that's not the impression I got.

These are the spying us people I have ever seen! OMG…it’s the long forgotten kitchen set. Oh kitchen set how I have missed you  How I have longed to see your wall again.  

Bye bye Denise! You did some wonderful work on this show!

I like your post, therefore I humbly request clarification on sentence #1 Taeylor...   Do we know that this is the same kitchen set that apparently appeared (if that isn't redundant, which strangely enough, it isn't)?   It is a kitchen though Lydia, as it has a cutting board on the counter, which obviously hasn't been used once in its life.

I want to know what happened to Denise N now, after.

I like your post, therefore I humbly request clarification on sentence #1 Taeylor...

I took "spying us" to mean "spyingest."

It is a kitchen though Lydia, as it has a cutting board on the counter, which obviously hasn't been used once in its life.

I am charmed by the idea of a cutting board being the defining component of a kitchen, but I don't buy it.  Did you see a stove?  Or a sink?

I am about to charm you relentlessly, Lydia.   We didn't see below waist level!   I put it to you that there is no other earthly location where one might slice stuff on a square block of wood than a kitchen!

Are you suggesting that in parallel time, cooking is something that one does down on one’s knees?  Sorry, that's not charming, that's excruciating.  And what is wrong with my suggestion that what we saw was the pantry?  Mind you, I think we were intended by the set designers to believe that it was the kitchen, but what do set designers know?

It's not the complete kitchen set.  It looks like they only used part. However I am almost 99 % sure that the walls and everything are from the original kitchen set in the early episodes.  Maybe MB and Midnite can confirm it. 

In 2003, MB posted over/under comparisons of the PT and RT kitchens.

Re:There's a KITCHEN in that house!!!!

I figured that in a case like that, where they needed a basic, functional everyday place like a kitchen, they'd probably have an actual kitchen in the studio someplace and would use that, rather than building a set.

Though they did indeed build a RT kitchen set. And later on the set morphed into Julia's office at Windcliff. 

Today, what with advanced editing and all, they may been able to shoot in an actual kitchen in the studio. But back then that never would have happened. For one, all the sets were constructed on the first floor and all the offices, dressing rooms, rehearsal hall, etc. were on the second floor - and down on that first floor they had a hard enough problem maneuvering the cameras around the sets for the various shots, much less trying to use a camera up on the second floor.    However, I'm not sure if there even was a kitchen in the studio. Back in '89 part of the Fest activities was a tour of the former studio with DS cameraman Nick Besink and he impressed upon us how the studio had very little in the way of facilities and amenities. The building really is quite small.

Thanks for all that, MB.  I suppose when you see this or that set, you know where they really are in relation to each other, and you might even know where the studio exit is...?