Episode 21 - Substitute Father

Weird being way media him. Mister Walters is see that guy with it now, he's an actor at the phone the name, I'm a cam driver and the only camp driver in his place. Hello and welcome once again tonight mister Walters a taxi podcast. I'm your co host HP and with me as always is my co host falla alone, follow alone. How are you doing HPO, My Sonny boy. A reminder, we are doing these shows in broadcast order and not in order of filming. This is episode twenty one. This

is the last episode of season one. The episode is called The Substitute Father. It's written by Barry Kemp and of course directed by James Burrows Resident Directors Burrows that was his term, a resident director, a director who shapes the entire series. The episode begins and we're starting off in the garage once again. You had mentioned in the last episode about pans, about Burrows's thoughts on doing a pan pensiont he does, and we start off this episode with a

pan. We're following Jeff. We pan passed the length of the garage on Jeff. We go past the poker table, which I don't know if you noticed, but for one of the few times in the series thus far, there's a bunch of extras playing poker around the table. It's not the Cabby's that we know. I like it. It's a nice touch. You know. They shouldn't just be an empty table because our leads aren't sitting there, Like what about everybody else? They don't get a chance to sit at that

table. It's reserved somehow. Although you could see Banta going like, nobody sit at this table even when I'm not here. One of the things I love about the shot is at least two of the Cabby's at this table. They're older, and they're all wearing these awesome newsboy style hats like you would see a Cavey maybe wearing it. What I keep returning to in my mind is a few episodes ago you mentioned you thought that there was a Marxist meeting going on. They show up in this episode too. Man, they're in

the background here. They keep popping up the background actors. God, they're perfect. They just feel like old New York caves that have been doing this forever. You say you want a revolution, I still get the sunshine calf. Elaine rushes in. She's looking like she just walked right out of Annie Hall. She has this sort of trench coat with I don't know, like a bret. Very fashionable, but she's in a rush. She was great as always. I gotta say I'm not exactly stoked with her reason for being

here. It should never be a plot point that Elaine Nardo is going to be absent in an episode. That's not something they should repeat. Ever, it felt a little bit Brady Bunch like because she rushes in and loudly announces that she has a sick aunt in Buffalo that she has to go take care for. I think that was actually a plot point. I think Alice and Brady Bunch went somewhere to take care of a sick relative. And that's when remember she had a twin sister who was in the army. It makes everybody's

life miserable. I'm sure Lucy Ricardo had a sick aunt in such and such at some point. This is the oldest trope in sitcom history. She goes to Alex and she says she needs to go take care of her sick on for a couple of days, and she's taking her daughter with her, but her son Jason has a big spelling bee coming up. And she would hate for him to miss out on this, so could Alex take care of her son Jason for a couple of days. After some hemming and hawing, Alex

kind of reluctantly agrees. Elaine goes, Okay, I'm going to go get Jason. He's waiting in the car, so she's going to bring him in, and then while she's gone, Alex says, to no one in particular, I can't do this. He's not looking forward to this in the least. You know why he's not looking forward to this in the least HP. Potentially it's because he's wearing seven hundred layers of clothing. He might just be

delirious here, which is why he said he has to begin with. He's wearing a turtleneck, a button down shirt, a vest, and a jacket, not to mention burgundy pants. Those are automatically going to give you at least some sort of topsy turvy brained imbalance. They definitely went too far with Alex's costume choices. In this opening scene, he's saying, Oh, I can't do this. I'm going to have dinner with my sister one night, and then I have a hot date the next night, he can't possibly watch

Jason for this whole time. Perhaps ill advisedly, he goes and asks Bobby, who, let's face it, Bobby should be the last person if you ask Bobby couldn't keep a goldfish alive for twenty four hours. Honestly, I would ask Wheeler, but if he said no, I would take him at his word that he had good reason to not engage. But I wouldn't ask

him in the first place. I wouldn't trust him. I don't know, you know what, And I would ask an actor, because once the kid starts flattering him and talking about his career and stuff, can't get enough of him. So we lose a narcissist. And that's what he that's what he craves. But he doesn't know. At this point, we haven't met the kid. That's the problem. Riager is preemptively asking around for help without realizing that the kid is Nardo's kid, and it's going to be kind of special.

And I mean that in the traditional sense is special, and not like you know, mental or anything. I think we've all been in situations where we commit to things that we have a knee jerk reaction of. I really don't want to do this. You know, you're going to a party that you're not really that enthused about. You're gonna go see somebody you're not really that But oftentimes, at least my experiences, those can turn into great opportunities. Like you go there, you have a better time than you thought.

That's what we're gonna end up seeing here. He asks Bobby if he can help watch Jason, and Bobby protests, and Alex gives Bobby what I can only describe as the gas face. He gives him this look that is right out of Prime Minister Pete Nice's playbook. Oh my god, you're going deep at the third base keeping oh yeah, oh yeah. And just the look, the look that Alex gives Bobby is enough to make Bobby acquiesce. He says, I can watch him on Thursday, but I have an acting class

on Friday. Then Alex goes over to Tony the Simpleton, who I probably wouldn't trust with the child for completely different reasons, because I think he's like Lenny from of Mice and Men. I think, without really really trying to, I think he would hurt this child, like break his arm or something. My god, this is just getting dark. All of a sudden, and you know what, I can't even focus on Taxi right now. I'm

thinking about mc search. Alex does go to talk to Tony and and ask him for help, but Tony says he's got sparring plans on Friday, which is an odd thing to say, Like I got a spar with somebody on Thursday. Wait a minute, Wait a minute. Were you implying that Banta might hurt that child? Yeah, but I but not meaning to. I honestly was really just daydreaming about MC search, So I didn't understand what you were saying at all. Like what that's I'm correct, you are going dark.

That's horrible. Now, Banta would never hurt that show. No, No, I don't think he would do it intentionally. I don't think he would hit him out of danger back Torrence, like kid got into my papers and I just pulled on the arm. No, I think that he might accidentally break his arm without realizing his own strength, or or do something that he would immediately regret. He's a man child, he doesn't know his own

strength. I got empty search, take me away. He can't watch the kid on Friday because he's got sparring plans and now I also took a note that we've got another tough guy pose for Gold. It's a tough guy productory pose. He's sitting on the hood of the cab, but he's straddling the left fender. It's it's very very discomforting. It's very weird. I don't know why he's doing it. He's like the top monkey in the cage, you know, just like just like he's like in a jungle book, you

know, King louis dejected. Burns asks why did Alex ask him? Which I think is another clue that Burns is a done deal. Maybe Burns is a ghost. At this point, have we considered that possibility that Burns has

been a ghost this entire time? Sixth sense kind of a thing absolutely like maybe, you know, and not for maybe the run of the series, but at a certain point, maybe when Cab eight oh four was wrecked, maybe Burns ceased to exist on this mortal plane and he's and that's why we haven't seen much of him, and he's had no impact since that day. We've not seen his lovely bride, Dorothy Hamilcut since the accident. Oh my god, HP, I think we've done it, We've unraveled it, and

it's fitting that this is the final episode. Okay, here's the thing. I could totally watch a spinoff series, Ghost Taxi with John Burns navigating the paranormal world. In that case, I would totally be on board with what a rube he was, because we would all be a rube, because none of us have been to the paranormal world, nor have we ever considered that we would need a taxi. Glenn lest Charles, are you listening? This is gold. Let's make this happen Ghost Taxi. I think the cabbys have

already written Burns off because they just don't. He doesn't seem to matter anymore in the grand scheme of the workings of the garage. Alex, he says, oh okay, yeah, I for some reason, it slipped his mind. He asks Burns, but Burns, like the demon that he is, says he has class on Friday, but he just wanted to be asked. I would hit the guy like he makes this big show of being hurt that no one asks him. Then when Alex asks him, he says, I'm

busy, you prick say that cat mind? Can you consider Burns his feelings for once, nobody's asking him anything anymore. Plus, that's true, he's about to lose his job or is it life, or maybe he's gone on to a fulfilling career in the forestry Forestry Service. Hey, that's a possibility we haven't considered yet. I hope I'm now pulling for good old John Burns. But he does say that he can take Jason Friday morning if Tony can switch his sparring session. So look at that. He's out there trying to

do good. They're all rearranging their schedules, trying to make sure this because it's only for a couple of days. The spelling Bee is on Saturday, and I want to say, this is maybe a Wednesday or a Thursday, so it's not like they got to watch the kid for a week. It's a very short span of time. Elaine comes back in with Jason and it introduces him around the garage. I also noted here this is the first time we've seen this, but when we see Bobby Wheeler, his shirt is legitimately

unbuttoned more than halfway down his chest. It's very off putting. I mean, there's a young boy in the and he's walking around like Casanova, very disturbing. Whiller is not going to tamp out his sexuality just because some kid has shown up unannounced in the garage. He's a line, he's got a he's got a prance, and he's got that mane of hair that he likes to shake around like a lot of tame him while can't be broken HP.

Elaine says some hurried goodbyes to Jason, she hustles out. Unfortunately, she hustles out for the balance of the episode, putting that aside, putting him that we're now going to be robbed of Elaine Nardo for the rest of the episode. How about the fact that she's dropped her son off for an indeterminate number of days with no change of clothing or like food. Did she give him any money? Like it was just like they were driving by and kicked

him out of a car. He's got no bags. You would figure they would make a show of her saying, here's twenty dollars if you need anything, here's the number that you can realise me at. Here's the phone number of my ailing aunt. Please call me and keep me abreast of the living situations with my child, like saying is he still breathing the little things like that, I'd like to know while I'm away. It does cast some doubt on her story. She could be anywhere. Who knows. Do we even

know that? Are we sure that her daughter is going to be with her? We don't know, We don't. Maybe she pawned off the daughter on her art gallery people, and she's off with Tom Selleck for the weekend, and you know what at the end of it, what she'll have at HB A lovely me. So she leaves. Now the Cabbys and Jason are in this awkward silence because they don't know how to treat a boy, and he's he doesn't know these adults, so they all end up kind of amscraying to

make lame excuses. Oh you gotta go do this. Everyone leaves except for Alex and Bobby and Jason. Alex grabs before he can rush off and asks him to watch Jason while he gets something out of his locker. So Alex goes upstairs. Bobby awkwardly starts a conversation with Jason by saying, Hey, so you're a kid, Huh. That's pretty much how I start conversations. That's the same level of comfort. I feel usually like, so you're what

the child? Okay, how's that going for you? Jason already like immediately turns the charm on these adults, and he says his mom told him that Bobby's an actor and that he's actually a great actor. And as I alluded to earlier, this pushes just the right buttons on narcissist Bobby, and all of a sudden, Bobby's face lights up and he leans into the conversation. He's totally into the conversation now. All the awkwardness is evaporated because he's been

complimented by this kid. That's right, Wheeler knows what the kid knows what signed the bread is, butter is on. And this leads to a conversation where Jason admits to Bobby that he's kind of nervous about this the spelling Bee, and he asks Bobby how does he keep from getting nervous when he performs? I'm sure you notice this. This kind of took me out of the

scene a little bit. Bobby's response to Jason is clearly looped in. He says, everybody gets nervous in front of an audience, but if you look his lips aren't even moving when he says the line. Did you notice this? It's a rare misstep. I did not notice it. Does anyone step on Bobby's line at that point? Just like Louie interrupt or something? No, no, no, no. What happens? He says the line and Alex is coming down the stairs. Alex Conway doesn't even have a line.

All he's doing is laughing, And somehow they decided maybe to make it more clear that he's conversing with his boy and not just laughing. Oh no, I understand their motivation for doing it. I'm just wondering how they got out of it. And I guess that would be that'd be Rigger coming into the scene. Alex comes down the steps and he announces it's getting two layers of clothing and added a new one. That's what Alex riger just went up to

Dore. I'll take off this coat and I will take off the puffy vest, cortex cortalics, and instead I will replace it with a corduroy blazer. Well, he's probably sweated through all of those layers and he had to and now he needs a sponge, so he put on a corduroy blazer. So he says to Jason and out they're going to get some breakfast. But suddenly Bobby is totally invested in this kid, and he says, no, no, no, don't worry, I'll take him out for breakfast, and they

rush out of the garage. They're laughing the whole way. After they've gone, suddenly very timid, and this lends credence to my theory. By the way, a very timid Tony creeps out of wherever he's been hiding in the garage, and he asks if they're gone, and he admits that he panicked because he doesn't know what to do around a kid. Probably out of sympathy

to this naive simpleton, Alex offers to then take Tony to breakfast. But this just proves my point, by the way, the idea that Tony is afraid that he will cause bodily harm to this meaning to he's frightened that this child is going to be his mental superior. That's ultimately within his heart of hearts, that's what he's concerned about. Meeting the meeting Nardo's child about,

or I would like to pause it. Another theory that Banta is in fact the child's father, you gotta look at that kid, looking a lot like Banta get the same hair. Actually it's the same hair complexion, looking a little bit tony ish. Also, the last episode, we had a lack of good background players. You're saying here, we certainly got a return of the Marxist revolution, and in this particular scene, the return of Leggy blonde

in pantsuits. She's sitting in the back having a conversation. I just wanted to call her, really, the one who was in the aluminum foil colored no no, no, no, no, no, no, no no, that's that's space girl. Uh okay, Lady blonde in pant suit is this it's like this all red pant suit with this like orange shirt. And she missed mystically appears once in a while, I guess, just so good luck on the cab. He's so. We cut to a b roll of a cab rolling into the garage, the cab number eight o four. We've

seen this fucking shot a lot. Man. I hope they're I hope they're going to send out a new second unit crew for second season. Here eight oh four is like the Mary Celeste of cabs. Yeah, man, And you know what, in the end, credits of this show, like they follow a cab through the streets of New York at night and it's eight oh four. Again, it's the ghost cab that you just maybe it is not right because Burns died in that cab, so maybe it's just a tribute.

Oh geez, I take it all back. And you know what, earlier in the episode, when the establishing shot of eight oh four arriving in the cat at the cab company, they do that shot from the back of the cab of the silhouette of a driver. We don't know who the driver is, but really, who's the passenger, because who would be going to the cab company. It's Burns. It's the ghost of Burns returning for his scene.

So we're back in the garage now and Louis is taking a complaint call in his cage and I have to say, this is one of my favorite Louis bits. I remembered this as it was going on. Yeah, he says, you say one of the drivers was rude to you, and he's as he's doing this, he's taking notes down with a pencil and he says, well was it he said, exactly? I see, And how fat

are you? I love the casual, insulting way that he responds. Danny DeVito is the master of delivering these lines with just the perfect note of passive aggression. I don't know's he just there's something so brilliant in the way he delivers these lines, I think. And he's got quite a few good lines in this episode. I had to say, this is a really good episode for Louis to palmer Tony runs into the garage. He's sort of chasing off after it. Hold on, I got to say, this is something I

always wished one of my managers would have done for me. Not necessarily that I'm out there like making fun of people or anything, but you know somebody who would go, let me just ascertain what kind of an idiot you are complaining, you know, like, oh, I see, you're actually the problem. It's not my employee. The wonderful thing is, through the course of the scene, we'll see him finish up this call, and at no point are we led to believe that the person on the other end of the

call is catching on to what Louie's doing like that. The call begins and it ends, and I think he even says, Okay, I'll make sure that person is reprimanded. He's able to deliver these sort of zingers without the person on the other end of the of the phone really catching on to what he's doing. Yeah, that's a rare talent. I've only known a few

people in my life who can do that, and they always marvel. This is sort of an odd episode, but we do see quite a bit of Louis in this, and we get some insight more insight into his character, which I think is really great. It's a good showcase for Danny DeVito. Tony runs into the garage playfully chasing after Jason. He's gotten over his reluctance to to watch Elaine's son. He recognize, I guess or he accepts that he's his intellectual superior. Tony tells Louis, oh, two boxing lessons and

he can already beat my brains in. And here we get another great Louis line. Louis replies, what took him so long? It's classic to Palma. We get a lot of that in this episode. I love when he gets after Tony. It may be like I really appreciate that because of my

history with this series so far. But we talked about this at length a couple of episodes ago, that Louis is really the only person who can get away with insulting Tony in this fashion because he's Tony's boss, and even though Tony could literally punch him into oblivion, Tony will never do that because Louie is his superior and it's a wonderful dynamic between the two of them, and we see it here. Tony goes to get Burns, who's apparently going to

be taking over watching Jason. He's going to take Jason out. Louis wraps up his complaint caller and he starts his own conversation with Jason. He admits to Jason that it's kind of funny he doesn't dislike Jason as much as he does other kids, and he's in a rare bit of candor. Louie says, well, it must be because they both have a single mother raising them in common. Without being saccherin about it, they're peeling some of the layers

of the Louie onion back and giving you some insight into him. Oh, make a mistake, this is a Louie episode. It really kind of is, isn't it. Oh? Ye, as we'll see we get shades of everyone's reactions here. They're all involved, they all have the little mini arcs. This is about Danny DeVito's Louis de Palma figuring out his place in the universe and whether or not he can have children, or whether or not he would want them. I wasn't thinking of it in those terms, but you're

absolutely right. As we'll see, Burns comes out and he says that he and Jason are going to go see Death on the Nile. Oh, it's a perfect kids film. Agatha Christie, Yeah, really, played by Peter Houston. Okay, so look, this episode aired on May fifteenth of nineteen seventy nine, which means that probably filmed a few weeks beforehand. Death on the Nile was released in September of nineteen seventy eight and ended up playing for

about two years. For those of you who are under the age of one thousand, movies used to play in movie theaters for long periods of time. They'd stay around forever, So Death on the Nile was definitely around in the spring of nineteen seventy nine. But it begs the question, since that's the age, these are other movies that were playing that he could have taken the child too, like The Whiz or Lord of the Rings to Ralph foxt how

about Watership Down. You could have taken it into that, but I think in keeping with the Death on the Nile theme, like why not take him to go see hardcore? That was also playing time. How about the Deer, That's a perfect kids movie. I think the absolute perfect kids movie would have been Paradise Alle featuring Sylvester Stallone and armand De Sante as brothers in Hell's Kitchen in the nineteen forties. Tom Waits is in that movie too. Oh

my god, it's a trifecta of greatness. All those would have been interesting options. We can only hope that they don't end up at the Circus Cinema on the forty three was playing right then. I guess Jason admits to Burns that he feels bad because he hasn't really started studying for the spelling Bee that's going to happen in a couple of days. Burns rather childlike. He doesn't

pout, but he sulks about right. I guess we won't go to the movie, and I'll have to tell Susanne that we're not going to meet her afterwards and seeing how did you acted? Burns is and this shows how mature Jason is for his age. He insists, no, let's go to the movies. Let's go. I have plenty of time to study. I'll put us oute of my studies. Let's go see your movie. Silly, silly

man. When I say mature, obviously he should be studying. But he's at least able to recognize the disappointment in Burns, and he tries to make him feel better. And I think that's admirable for a boy that young. Here's the last I'll say about Death on the Nile. Yeah. I saw Death on the Nile in the theater. I was taken to see the movie by my grandmother. Really yeah, and oh I loved it. I thought it was like the most adult thing in the world. I thought, oh

my god, look at adults being adults solving trimes. Was it an R rated movie? I don't think it was R righted I out of curiosity, But this is the last episode of the season. Let's just want to break this down a little bit. What was your first R rated movie in the theater? Do you remember? Does a drive in count Absolutely? I remember we're seeing the film Orca with Richard Harris and uh, what's her name but Jacqueline Bessett. Who oh, no, jacquelbe said bo uh Derek, oh,

Derek, Yes, yeah, Orca with those two. Yeah, that's the first R rated thing I remember seeing projected, and that was at a drive in and it was in a double feature, I'll point this out with Star Wars, and it was the opener for Star Wars. So I had to struggle mightily not to sleep through Orca in order to get to Star Wars. I got as far as Darth Vader showing up at the in the doorway of the Tanta four, and then I was asleep on the top of the

car. You must have been pretty young if if Star Wars was the main feature, it might have been a re release of Star Wars. See. For me, the first R rated movie that I saw in the theater was Beverly Hills Cop with Eddie Murphy, so I would have been eleven. I remember my dad, my brothers were away. It was just me and my mom in the house. I don't know where my brothers and my dad were. And yeah, she just decided to take us go to the movies.

Maybe we had nothing else to do, and I had this a similar reaction. I thought, Wow, this is such an adult movie that I'm seeing, you know, like, there's not a lot of sex. There's really no sex in it. None. There's a strip club scene only putting myself in my mom's place. It wasn't a lot of moments where she would have had to cover my eyes. It's because something objectionable was happening. It was a lot of language and in violence, obviously, but I'll never forget that

was the first I remember walking out of it saying wow. Actually because by then I had seen many rated movies on cable, but it was a big deal to see them in the theater. I guess, yeah, HP. Let me tell these two stories together. A decade later, in nineteen eighty nine, my grandmother and I went to the movies and she wanted to see Beverly Hills Cop too, and I wanted to see whatever the fuck I wanted

to go see. So we went to separate movies and at the end I asked her how Beverly Hills Cop Two was, and she said to me, why won't they just let Eddie be Eddie. I just want to let that out into the world that my grandmother was a cool lady. So they're going to go to this movie. You barely can hear it, but Bobby, when Bobby hears it, they're going to go to the movies. Bobby does

say, but it'll be g rated. So by now, I think Bobby's really feeling himself as a surrogate parent looking out for Jason, which is great. Alex tells him to be back by six because he's got Nicks tickets. Oh my god, they're running this child ragged. Don't they understand He needs to study, He needs to know how words are spelled. I think there's a moral in our future, but we haven't gotten there yet. Burns and Jason go to see Death and then Nihle and good movie. Peter used to

know hercy. It's what every ten year old kid wants to see. Madam already the fun. That's why Peter used to know. So Alex checks with Tony to see about additional coverage for Jason because they've run out of options now they you know, neither Tony nor Bobby nor Burns can cover him for a

period of time. And at this point, Louis starts to loudly cough to try and get their attention to indicate that, hey, he'd like to watch Jason, because clearly Jason and he have shared this moment and he feels like he'd like to watch Jason. It's like Burns all over again, except Louis means it. Clearly. Alex and Tony have figured out what Louie is after, but they keep playing this charade to make him become even more ridiculous with

his coughing. And he's coughing, and I guess the point where Louie is almost hacking up alung. He's coughing so dramatically that's too much. It was exhausting. It is too much, And we get another vaudeville moment because Tony finally says, I got it. Let's ask Louie. And Alex's reply is I don't want him to catch his cold, so but up up, we need a sounder for that. Every time that happens. As we fade out, everybody's all smiles. They're all coming together because they all love taking care

of this Elaine's sun. So we cut to this is this part was interesting? We cut to a nighttime b roll as we fade into what I believe is Alex's bedroom and his apartment. This is another interesting sort of set decorating situation where he's getting changed in his bedroom, he's putting on a shirt. But in the doorway, you see it's like a corridor and there's even a radiator. Did you see on the wall there's at least eight pictures of what

look like child drawings of trains just plastering this part of the hallway. And then ominously, right on top of that is a giant piece of paper that I could The only thing I could read on it was the word in large letters, the word collection. Did you see this too? I didn't, but now I'm frightened. I'm intrigued, because, I mean, the train thing is weird enough as it is, but this leads me to wonder is Alex is he getting evicted? Is he in trouble with a collection agency?

Why is there this giant paper on his wall covering all these trains? Now that you put it that way, is this a child criminal organization that is threatening him, but they're letting him know that the train is coming for him? Is there an enforcer named the train or because it's a child criminal organization, is he that chow chow. So is this like a Bugsy Malone situation?

I hope so Alex has dressed for it in the past. We mentioned in an earlier episode he was just very much like a like an extra from Bugsy Malone. So maybe that gang is showing up. Fat Sam's gang is going to show up here to let him know he can't be parading around like them sending him a message, that's what they're doing. So Alex is changing in his bedroom and Louis and Jason arrive. Jason's wearing a sport code and button down shirt and the collar, I swear to God is about twenty inches

wide. It's the biggest caller you've ever seen on a ten year old boy. Jason announces that that Louie took him to the wrestling match, which sounds like a lot of fun. Actually, I'd love to go to the wrestling match with Louis and Louie's mom, right, Hell, yes, that would have been I would. I wish we had spent a little time there with

them. It was probably like really old school wrestling matches with like gorgeous George, George the Animal Steel and all these great It's gonna yeah, and it took place in like a community center or some sort of like like a gym somewhere like a hall. Yeah, exactly, like some high school auditorium. I'd love to have been part of that experience. And they just judging from their demeanor, they had a great time. And it's nice to see that

Louie has really stepped up, that he's really enjoying. As we said, this is kind of Louie's story. He's enjoying taking care of Jason, spending time. All the cabbys love this kid, so Elaine is doing something right. Louis asks what Alex and Jason are going to do, and Alex says they're going to go out for ice cream, which begs the question. We see Alex getting dressed. He's putting on a nice button down shirt and he has a nice pair of slacks. It's like the middle of the night.

Why is he dressing up so fancy to take the kid out for an ice cream cone? I couldn't figure out staking him to the plaza, getting up some golds like the ice cream something. It's very fancy and it's very late to be having ice cream too. Why wouldn't riger just go buy some ice cream and make Sundays at home like Welcome home, Jason. Let's have some ice cream and get some studying done, get a little bit of hot fudge, make their own Sundays. Right there would have been great. It made

perfect sense. Jason once again says that he really needs to study for this spelling bee. Now it's Friday, the Friday before the Saturday where the spelling bee is going to take place, so he's run out of time. Effectively, Alex admits that they've kept him so busy all the cabbies that he hasn't had time to study, and he kind of feels bad about it. Alex asks, are you gonna be okay tomorrow for this spelling bee? And Jason says he just needs one good night to study. At that point, there's

horn blasts outside. It's Louie's mother hawking the horn comes My favorite line, my favorite line reading in the entire episode. It's Louis shouting down to his mother. What does he say, Tom down, you crazy lady. Look, keep your pants on, crazy lady. And that's on, crazy lady. I don't know something about crazy lady. When you're talking to someone you love is hilarious. It's quintessential Louis de Palm. It's perfect the way he yells that down, Like you said, the dichotomy, because we know that

Louis loves his mother very much. She's a single mother, raised him alone. But they have such an funny, antagonistic relationship, but there's real love there. I love to see that. Equally acceptable is devil Woman. It's charming the way that he treats her and calls her these names, but you know that he loves her. Alex leaves Jason alone in the bedroom to study. The kid takes out like a big pile of books. I think there's

a dictionary mixed in there. And sure enough he opens the books and just as quickly, Jason shuts his eyes and falls asleep right there in the bed, right on the books. So he's had no time to study. Oh my god. On a very special tax day, we fade in. It's a school auditorium. It's time for the spelling bee. Look, the last episode, you didn't like the set decoration for the Plaza Hotel. They more than make up for it with their rendering of a school auditorium. It was

amazing. Well, let's talk those goddamned exit doors because I want them in my house right now. The exit doors are painted in an arrow pattern with the word exit on it. It is a work of art. It is gorgeous. I would sit in that auditorium and just stare at those doors. People who like us, old people who have lived through the period that's sort of rendered in this show. We saw this. This was a thing that you saw in public buildings. There must be a name for that style of

design. But yeah, it was an arrow, pointing, straight up, giant arrow that covered the door with the word exit written vertically going up the door. It was brilliant. There's a stage. There's an actual stage with American flags on it and a moderator. On the left hand side. There's seating for what appears to go on for rows and rows of chairs with parents filing in. It was one of the best set decorating that we've seen yet

on this show. I thought it was wonderful. Yeah that's saying a lot, because yeah, look, but in the last episode it was the lackluster third ap a new location. But every other episode has just been topping itself over and over and over again. We're always impressed with how amazing they make their world whenever they step out of that garage, and this is a topper. What a way to go out. They topped themselves. I mean like we've seen them build gyms with a boxing ring in them, We've seen them

build out reception halls for high school reunions. This topped at all. The only thing that they just didn't top was Bobby's basement apartment, which I think is still the gold standard. But this was great Bobby's basement apartment. That was a recurring location. We're talking about the third act locations that take place in a location that we'll probably never come back to. At this point, a nervous Alex and Jason file in the rest of the cabbys arrive to watch

Jason compete, and he's thrilled. It's like all of these surrogate fathers come in here to watch Jason. It's just a fun little scenario where these cabbies, these sort of some of them, like Louis, we didn't know that he had this in him to be kind of an expectant father figure in a way, and it's just wonderful to observe. And Louis says to Jason he's got nothing to worry about. He's had to look at the rest of him,

and they're all loses. Something in the way that De Palma says the word loses, It rolls off his tongue like honey, it's perfect, and he says that a bunch of times in this scene. I love it. HP. I'm I'm gonna hire Danny DeVito in a cameo to call you a loser. I would love that. The moderator, as I said on the stage, announces the start of the beat. All the kids file in, the moderator announcing the name of each contestant, and after the first girl is

introduced, I love this moment. The father who's sitting near Louie proudly says to Louie, hey, that's my daughter, and Louis says, will she's a loser right to the guy's face. It's so great. Jason is introduced and the Cabby's it's like they're at like a Yankees game. They go nuts cheering for him. At this point, Louis bets the father whose kid he

just insulted. He bets the parent twenty bucks that Jason's gonna win the spelling beat and his father has understandably taken aback, and he says, I do not bet on my child, to which, yes, you guessed it. Louis comes back and says, that's because you know she's a loser. Couldn't

get any better. So carnucopia of losers for you here. I'm in love with the idea that it's this guy's doing nothing more than cheering his daughter on, and he's got this yahoo in the audience who calls her repeatedly a loser. It's perfect. In season two we should have a segment like Loser of the Week. A bit of trivia. By the way, one of the kids on the stage is introduced as Mary Lou Hartman. As you might guess, this is a relative of Mary Lou Henner. In fact, this is

Mary Lou Henner's niece Suzanne. In a little cameo, Wow, good good for her keeping here in the family. Better than Conaway's sister scamo right where they just during that soap opera the beginning she got laughs though, so maybe Conaway's sister is the victor here. What was it it was like? For better or for worse? Was that better? For worse? My god, man, I keep getting it wrong. The spelling bee starts and Jason takes

the stage. Banta says, oh, the first round is always the toughest, and again Louis can't help but give it to him, and he replies, you ought to know, Banta, that's the only round you fight in. Of it, He's giving it to Tony any chance he gets. It's great, Louis, heaven, I didn't think of it until you mentioned it. But this is really Louie's episode. I keep returning to that central notion

right now. We used to feel doubly robbed that they were so interested in the goddamn plot of this episode of keeping this kid from studying that we did not get to see Louis de Palm and this kid at the wrestling match together, with Louis falling in love with him and wanting to be a dad. And that would have been a great set. They would have built the whole wrestling ring, maybe like an auditorium or a hall of VFW where if they're

fighting, would have been great. I'm in this high school auditorium. Put a ring in there. Instead of the seats, we still get the doors. Uh perfection. Jason correctly spells the word phosphorus, and again the Cabbes are cheering like they're at a baseball game. Alex is embarrassed and he says to know in a particular you know, excuse our excitement, to which Tony adds, yeah, we're his father, which is actually kind of sweet. I've been beating up on Tony for this whole episode, but that's kind of

nice to see him feel like a part of Jason's life. He didn't think he could handle it, but he is. Yeah, man, you know that's you beating up on Banta. I don't have any problem with that guy. Hey, look, I'm admitting that I'm a little wrong in this case. I can change. So we fade out or we fade in. And it's clearly later on in the competition. I think a lot of the kids have been knocked out. It's Jason and I think a couple of other kids.

Oh a note, by the way they cut to the Cabby's. Did you notice they cut to the Cabbys and Jeff Conaway really makes a meal out of this yawn to sell the idea that they've been sitting in this auditorium forever watching this play out. Did you notice that it's right, Bobby Wheeler registering to everyone in the auditorium. Eat things up there, man. He's supportive, but he ain't that goddamn supportive. He just yawns like nobody's business.

It's crazy how much he yawns. The third to last kid is knocked out, and now it's just between Jason, and ironically it's the daughter of the man that Louis repeatedly insults, and they go back a few times, and unfortunately, in a head to head matchup, Jason loses on the word for meal. And that's the word I wasn't familiar with. You know what? Vermal means something green. I don't know what. According to the Mirriam Webster Dictionary, for meal is a noun which means gilded silver. Who knew?

You learn something new every day. The other girl in the spelling Bee nails the word and she wins, and Louis, of course, jumps out of his chair and starts yelling fix, Fix, and the other caves hustle him out of the auditorium before he can cause any more trouble. They cut to the garage and the rest of the caves are trying to cheer Jason up. About his spelling bee defeat. Again, Alex admits that the Cabby's should feel bad because they kept him too busy to study. At that point, Elaine

hustles back in. She's still wearing her trench coat beret combo, but it sounds like her aunt is on the mend, which is good. Looks like Elaine didn't bring any clothing for her selfie either. She's clearly too irresponsible to be a parent. You got that phone call and just hustled out the door. It casts doubt on what she was actually doing. I think you're I agree with you. I think she was spending that time with the art collector

played by Tom Selleck from the Caveto four episode. She's still wearing the same clothes she wore three days ago. She gives Jason a kiss and says, how are you? I missed you? How is the spelling beat? And Jason tells his mom that he lost, and Alex again takes the bullet for Jason and says it's all their fault because they kept him too busy, But Jason admits it's his responsibility to do the studying and he didn't do that, and it's his fault for not studying, and Elaine is so proud of him

for taking responsibility. Jason says, is goodbye to all the caves. And after Elaine leaves, all of the cabby's there, and again it's Burns, it's Tony, it's Bobby, it's Louis and Alex. They all become really pensive. They're missing their proxy fatherhood and they get very reflective about it. And Louis, of all people, breaks the silence by sharing a bottle of twelve year old scotch that he's been saving for a special occasion. I noticed

it's almost a twelve year old bottle of scotch. To me, that's realistic, because you can't expect a bunch of New York cabbies in this garage to have something that's like a Louis the thirteenth, like a bottle of super expensive scotch. That to me seems realistic. That's the best they can afford. Well, I think Louis didn't Louis say they found it in a cab Did

he say that? I don't remember that part, which begs the question can you imagine what the lost and found at a cab company in nineteen seventies New York looked like it must have been a treasure trove of the weirdest and coolest stuff ever. Everything in that garage just looks like it has soot all over

it. Imagine that the the Lost and Found is just so gross. When you dig through that box of biline that probably yeah, it'd be Saturday Night Specialists and afro picks Galore Louis pulls off this bottle of scotch, and all of these men admit that they're thinking about having kids now or wondering about what

it would be like because they've got this. They've had this glimpse of what it would be like to be. Of course, it's not the same thing, because this kid is fairly mature, and it's not like they're changing diapers or anything. The experience has been positive enough that they all feel like, well, are we missing out? Hug of the Pole, the poll of fatherhood, the title pull the primal Pole. Yeah. Even Bobby, who's the most self absorbed of all of them, even he is now wondering about

what he might be missing. Not because he says, well, I've been I spent my whole life avoiding this, but now I'm wondering what am I missing? Then, Alex, of course, being Alex, he bringing them back down to reality a little bit, and he says, they're only thinking about the good stuff, not about all the money and the heartache that goes into it. What I found interesting, Father Malone, and I'm curious if you had a similar reaction, is not once does he ever talk about the

fact that he is a father. Yeah, at no point during his laundry list of all of the woes that come along with being a father, he never says, now I hear that this is what it's like because he didn't go through any of this because he didn't raise that job. I think it would have been a very interesting choice head, because he could have then made the point like, well, I'm feeling it even more acutely than all of

you because I had fatherhood and I gave it up. I willingly gave it up, and now I'm not a day goes by that I don't think about that decision. But he doesn't do any of that. That I think was a little bit disingenuous. I think they missed an opportunity in the writing to really nail it, you know, Yeah, you think about all the bad stuff I certainly did, and I ran as far as I could, all

the way to the Sunshine Cab Company like the rest of you losers. So don't think you're just going to run out and have a kid now suddenly, because Nardo has a good one. But it's sweet that they're all sitting around wallowing a little bit in there uncertainty and their sadness over possible missed opportunities. We actually have a bumper in this episode, and it's actually cute. All

these men, these cabs are still in the garage drinking. Louis breaks into the song Sonny Boy with Alex, and eventually all the rest of the cabbes join in and they finished the song together and it's a sweet note and the show on. But by the way, we also get for the season finale to get another Pan's a tough guy sitting on the cab moment. Did you notice that? Oh, certainly he's on the hood of the cab again. He can't help it, He's got to sit there. He doesn't belong.

Can I say that the Sonny Boy sequence were because Alex keeps doing that like jokey Mystery Science Theater three thousand d kind of thing. Maybe like you know calin response where he's asking questions where the next lyric of the song will be the answer. It's it is very cute again, it keeps it from getting two sugary sweet and saccharin. It's a little funnier that way should have ended with Jeff getting on the microphone and going, could somebody go pick up a

passenger? Are all of you drunk right now? Is that really? We have no Cabby's Great Laca since the Mama Gravis episode. I believe we haven't seen hide nor hair of Laka. I don't know where he went. Did he go back to the old country? Is he living in shame because of what his mother did with Alex? Still? Who knows, but we haven't seen him for a couple episodes. Now, as is our custom, we're going to talk about yellow lights. Now, what doesn't all light mean?

As a reminder, we grade each episode on a score of one to five yellow lights. Five yellow lights is the perfect quintessential episode of Taxi. One yellow light is it doesn't get any worse than this. This is the worst that Taxi has to offer. As is also our custom, I'm going to throw it to you father alone, how many yellow lights do you give Substitute Father. This the season finale of season one of Taxi Substitute Father. I give two yellow lights. It is neither here nor there. It is neither

hot nor cold. It is lukewarm. Therefore I spew it from my mouth. Really. Wow, that is very terse and to the point. It just didn't really make you feel anything either way. No, it's good to see the gang and particularly the relationship between Louis and the boy, but it only made me wish that it was an entirely Louis episode with the boy and made me obsess on a scene that didn't happen, But they brought it up,

so I feel justified in doing so. Which is the deleted scene of Louis to Palma and the child at a wrestling match released the DiPalma cut. I can't disagree with what you're saying. Well, I can, but I,

on the other hand, I gave this episode three yellow lights. Actually, when I came into this episode to watch this episode, I had a memory of watching it however many years ago at the last time I watched it, and just the memory of the plot and the synopsis made me think, going in, Oh, this is probably going to be a two yellow lighter. But then I watched it again it was better than my memory led me

to believe it was going to be. It is a very SITCOMI plot, there's no question, but I think it's really nice to see the male leads of the show showing this different side to their personalities, especially Louis, because to the point that You've made several times, it becomes a Louis episode because he's probably the least likely to go on to have kids, so it becomes more special for him this bond that he makes with Jason, and I really

like that. Yes, it's a fairly predictable episode. You know that they're running this kid so ragged that he's bound to fail at the Spelling Bee, But I really liked seeing these cabbes band together to take care of e Lane's son. And there's some really, really solid laughs during the spelling be scene. Particularly it's all Louis. I mean, if I'm being honest, Louis is really the driving force to the humor in that part of the episode,

So I still found it genuinely funny. I love his line readings. We talked about keep your pants on crazy lady. That is quintessential Louis de Palma right there. For those reasons, I'm going to give it three yellow lights. This is slightly above average for me. If Burns had taken him to see Halloween, which was still playing theaters, then I would get a bit of three yellow lights. If he had tried to do that, then Bobby would have objected and said, no, no, it has to be a

g rated movie. I'm taking him to see a holiday movie. And then Bobby Wheeler would leave and he'd say, I wonder if Halloween is still scary in the middle of June. It's the end of season one. Folks, Thank you so much for sticking with us, and we look forward to more taxi talk for season two coming soon. Follow alone. When you're not clocked into the garage, where can folks find you? I just want to stop before I plug anything and say farewell, John Burns. We'll meet again.

Don't know where, don't know where. He might have been a ghost the whole time. We're gonna have to re examine all of that. Anyway, if you want to hear anything I'm doing, over to Weirdingwaymedia dot Com. I do a couple of shows over there, including Midnight Viewing, the Night Gallery. No, well, it's kind of a night Gallery podcast, but it's also Attempt the Dark Side podcast. It's an horror anthology podcast. Check that one out. Also check out Dark Destinations, which is a half hour

and sometimes our long radio drama I write and produce over there. Check those things out, Or you want to support me in any way, go to Patreon to fatherm Alone. That's me there, so go to those places for myself. I'm also involved in other podcasts on the weirding Way network. I do a music podcast called Noise Junkies with fatherm Alone and Mondo Heather's Heather Drain, which I would encourage anyone who loves music or is as obsessed with it

as we are please check that out. And I've also helped out fatherom Alone in musical in some non musical ways on Dark Destinations. I would doubly encourage you to check that out as well. Additionally, I have a band camp site for some of my musical nonsense. It's hpmusicplace dot bandcamp dot com. Please check that out. If you so does so, that's going to do it. For this episode of Night Mister Walters. Thank you so much for listening. If you like what you hear, please feel free to subscribe to

the podcast, write a review, rate us. We'd love to hear from you in any manner that you see fit for myself and for father alone. Thank you and we will see you again next season. Night, mister wals