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Time to Pause the Poise

This week's episode of Ally McBeal picks up where last week's left off - with Ally realizing that the two men she's dating are father and son. Her polished, professional reaction? She lamely excuses herself to go to the bathroom.

Ally fantasizes, however, that she could have handled the situation smoothly if only she had had "poise remote" - which seems like a personal version of TIVO, allowing her to go back fifteen minutes and replay her past life and then react with more poise than she did initially.

Ironically, viewers who actually have TIVO can, if they want, pause Ally, as she pauses her life - and then as she restarts it, they can restart her too. This should satisfy all those viewers out there who actually want to be Ally - that is, if there are any left. And it's only one step from virtual reality. But it's also a mighty big step.

Father, Son, and Pass the Toast

At dinner, once Ally's secret is out, the father and son compete with each other as to who can give up Ally faster - and then the son, Jonathan, actually flees from dinner. Later, though, Jonathan appears at Ally's slumber party with her girlfriends to ask if she's really attracted sexually to his dad; she tells him she can't talk just then.

Then the father, Michael, shows up at Ally's office to ask what the nature of her feelings for Jonathan might be. Ally insists she must (chastely) continue dating both of them, until she decides whom she prefers. Way to trigger a little masculine rivalry. We'll be lucky if they don't kill each other, Ally.

Luckily, however, Dad resolves the contest quickly by singing some particularly terrible Neil Diamond and completely disgusting Ally. The son, however, doesn't have much of a chance, either, once Robert Downey Jr. arrives on the scene - more on that below. So it turns out that the incest issues that made Oedipus put his eyes out are only a sidelight on Ally McBeal. Next week: Titus Andronicus, The Abandoned Subplot version.

Superfreak; She's Super Freaky

Meanwhile, Nelle confronts Marc, claiming he'll embarrass himself and the firm by dating Cindi, basically because Cindi has a penis. Cage, too, advises Marc to dump Cindi. Cage tells Marc he's not "tolerant enough to support this" and that Marc's reputation will be hurt. And Marc confesses to Cage he'd never want to sleep with Cindi, anyway - thus chickening out of the only interesting aspect of this subplot (Next week: Boys Don't Cry, The Abandoned Subplot version).

Later, though, Cage comes to Marc's office and apologizes. He also confesses the sources of his homophobia - he inadvertently asked out a man as a teenager, mistaking him for a beautiful woman; and that he once dated a woman with a mustache, the result of which was that he acquired a twitch. I wonder if there's a homophobic source for all Cage's twitches - was there a gay ten-year-old with a squeaky nose in Cage's hometown?

Finally, Cage advises group therapy with other couples who have difficulty getting society to accept them. Marc and Cindy go to therapy but the group is weird - and Cindy's angry that she's implicitly termed a "freak." Marc then breaks up with Cindi, saying he is too much influenced by "the way others see us."

As she is leaving his office, Cindi horrifies homophobic Fish by kissing him to "thank him for all his support." Fish spends the night gargling Listermint. (Next Week: The Product Placement, Abandoned Subplot version).

Liable for Libel?

During that initial father/son dinner, Ally also has the bad luck to run into her old law school "friend" Kimmie, who is a weird adherent of two religious groups: the Christian coalition and the bar association (The bizarre beliefs of the latter include the tenet that memorizing huge amounts of material in short amounts of time will make you a better lawyer).

Ally then blurts out a weird, random offensive comment, in front of the Bar Association's Women of Virtue chapter, about Kimmie's slipping Ally spermicide and "munching" Ally's boyfriend. Ally also confesses that she's "on a date with a father and son team, and tonight they brought the sister; it could really get wild." All these comments can only be excused by the severe stress Ally is under. Or the severe stress David E. Kelley is under.

Later, Ally runs into Kimmie again and calls her a bitch - in front of a nun - then claims Kimmie's "diaphragm is pinching." Like George Carlin's famous "Dirty Words" monologue," this entire segment of Ally seems designed to demonstrate all the words you can say on Fox that you can't say on the other networks. Was even the Playboy Channel ever this crude? Ally's really pausing the poise now.

Kimmie reacts to Ally's nasty remarks by suing her for defamation. Ally hires Larry (Robert Downey Jr.) for her lawyer. And, in an Ally McBeal insta-hearing, Larry challenges libel law by arguing it is gender-biased.

Specifically, Larry contends that it is sexist that imputations of unchastity are libelous for female plaintiffs, but not for male plaintiffs. Here, his point is a good one. He also contends further that in the modern world, Ally's comments shouldn't even be considered libelous, for libel must lower reputation and, he argues promiscuity doesn't lower women's reputation; it enhances it and attracts male attention. Here, his point is ridiculous. There are some kinds of attention you really don't want, unless, perhaps, you're a porn star.

The court rules that because Ally made the remarks to a group where she knew she'd cause embarrassment, the motion is denied. This is a bizarre ruling since the question whether or not a statement is libelous (or, actually, slanderous, since Ally's comments are oral) is judged not based on the standards of those who actually heard or read the statement, but rather on a more general "reasonable person" standard.

Having lost the motion, Larry decides to depose Kimmie quickly. He cleverly gets her to concede that no one among the Women of Virtue's members could, knowing Kimmie, have possibly believed what Ally said about her (I guess no one is deposing the nun as to whether she would have believed Kimmie was a bitch). This is a clever strategy since if everyone who heard the statement disbelieved it, then Kimmie suffered no actual damages.

Also, as characters on the show mention several times, for a libel per se such as an imputation of unchastity, damages need not be proven by the plaintiff, but rather are presumed - so Larry is particularly smart to try to zero these damages out now.

Unfortunately, Larry's next move is to go out with Nelle on a date. Seeing them together, Ally pulls Larry aside. Larry reveals that Nelle asked him out. Ally complains that he shouldn't date Nelle since he's married (a fact she's heard from Renee); he informs her that he's actually divorced, leading Ally to realize how much she really likes him after all.

Larry's victory leads to what appears to be a settlement conference between the parties. (When adversaries on Ally disclose all their best arguments to each other in a room, I have to presume it's a settlement conference rather than, say, mass insanity). Larry tries to persuade Kimmie that suing might make her friends, who would never otherwise have believed Ally's remarks, wonder if they might be true. And he urges Kimmie to settle for an apology; Ally, teeth gritted, apologizes. Kimmie also asks for attorney's fees and Larry agrees over Ally's objection - a move that is technically unethical, since the client has the last word, but wise here, since the client is, after all, Ally McBeal.

Then (drum roll please) Larry makes clear his true intentions and Ally makes clear her true intentions - and they get rid of other people - and they start dating. Finally! America cheers. Next week Ally and Larry kiss, and Fox is promoting it just as heavily as it promoted Ally's kiss with Ling last season, or Ally's initial carwash sex scene in last season's premiere. Let's hope it gives the show's ratings the boost they need.

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