From Method to Madness
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From Method to Madness is the 18th episode of the 3rd season of the American television show Family Guy. The title of the episode is derived from the phrase "There's a method to my madness" and also references the technique of Method acting.
[edit] Plot summary
Brian and Lois attend a poorly acted one man show. Afterwards, Brian boasts that he could easily do a better job. Lois dares him to "put up or shut up", by auditioning for local theater. The judges are bored with Brian but are delighted with Stewie, who is immediately enrolled in a children’s performing arts school. When he overhears that both he and a bitter rival, Olivia, are in danger of being cut from the program, the pair hastily work together and end up becoming a massively popular duet. They share fame and success until their fighting breaks up the act; Olivia goes on to greater fame while Stewie, obsessed with his fleeting fame, loses touch with reality.
When Peter saves a drowning man, the Griffins are invited over to share dinner with his family. Lois and Peter are shocked to discover that the family are nudists. The man had been nude when Peter rescued him but Peter simply assumed the man's shorts were lost in the ocean. Their teenaged son (who is also a nudist) takes an interest in Meg. After devastating Meg with their refusal to accept the lifestyle, Peter and Lois shed their clothes to make him feel more welcome. This traumatizes Meg in different ways.
[edit] Notes
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- The instrument Stewie tries to play before breaking wind from the strain of it is a French horn.
- The poster on the door of the school of performing arts reads: "Today: Auditions. Tomorrow: Principles of Catering".
- Simon's "hierarchy of performance" goes: legitimate theatre, musical theatre, stand-up, ventriloquism, magic, mime.
- This episode introduces Olivia; she is seen later in the season five episode Chick Cancer.
- When Olivia and Stewie argue over the F# note, they are actually singing a G.
- Mark Hentemann, who does the one-man show in which all the characters sound the same, maybe a veiled comment on Seth MacFarlane, who does many of the voices on the show (some of which do sound alike).
- While sitting on the piano, Olivia's dress turns from pink to the blue dress she wears during the their last show where they kung-fu fight.
- After Stewie and Olivia fight, Stewie asks Simon to come with him. Simon refuses and begins to walk away. Simon fully disappears before leaving camera view.
[edit] Cultural references
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This article or section contains too many minor or trivial fictional references. Mere trivia, or references unimportant to the overall plot of a work of fiction, should be deleted. See also what Wikipedia is. |
- Mark Hentemann, who does the one-man show in which all the characters sound the same, is named after the producer of the same name.
- In the car after meeting the nudists, Chris can't stop saying "Boobies!", so Lois uses a neuralizer (a device used in Men in Black to erase the memories of people who have seen aliens) to make Chris believe he just came back from the circus.
- Stewie's sexy party is a reference to similar sketches on The Benny Hill Show. His sexy parties were also seen in Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story.
- To critique Stewie's solo acting exercise, Olivia quotes Anne Robinson's catchphrase on The Weakest Link: "You are the weakest link... Goodbye!", prompting Stewie to launch on a lengthy tirade in which he asks "Have you any Titanic jokes you want to throw at me as long as we're hitting these phenomena at the height of their popularity?"
- Stewie warns Olivia that she might "get booted out of here and wind up like Linda Evans". A cutaway implies that Evans, an actress, is now working in a supermarket.
- To illustrate Peter's concern about child acting, a cutaway features Elroy Jetson, a character from televised cartoon The Jetsons who, as an adult, is kicked out of a pub bruised and drunk. It also shows Bamm-Bamm, the child from The Flintstones has now become a taxi driver.
- After a solo performance, an angry audience member describes Stewie's show as being worse than Seussical, a Broadway show that opened in November 2000 and was panned by the critics.
- This episode could be a reference to Laverne and Shirley as in that show there was intense fighting between the main actors, but they pretended to like each other for the show. Also, in this episode Stewie tries to do the show on his own, just as Laverne and Shirley tried to go on without Cindy Williams, who played Shirley.
[edit] References
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This article or section includes a list of references or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks in-text citations. You can improve this article by introducing more precise citations. |
- S. Callaghan, "From Method to Madness", Family Guy: The Official Episode Guide Seasons 1–3. New York: HarperCollins, 2005. 152–155.
- A. Delarte, "Nitpicking Family Guy: Season 3" in Bob's Poetry Magazine, 2.August 2005: 53–54 http://bobspoetry.com/Bobs02Au.pdf
