A Nice Day for a Posh Wedding

"A Nice Day for a Posh Wedding" is the seventh episode of the second season from the dramedy series Ugly Betty. It is the 30th episode in the series, which aired on November 8, 2007. The episode was written by Silvio Horta & Marco Pennette and directed by James Hayman. The episode's title is a play on the Billy Idol song "White Wedding" (which features the line "It's a nice day for a white wedding") and Victoria Beckham's nickname in the Spice Girls, "Posh."

Plot

The episode begins as Ignacio comes into Betty's bedroom telling Betty, who has the covers plunged over her head, that breakfast is ready. But when he leaves, its Hilda who pops up from under the covers and climbs through the outside window into her room where Iganacio tells her the same thing in the other room. As Hilda covers for Betty, the real Betty who is climbing up through the window bumps her head leading herself to tell Igancio the truth - she was out all night with Henry. They then got into a fight, eventually causing Betty to move out. She plans on not going to his citizenship ceremony which is also the day of the wedding. Betty also comes clean to Hilda about betraying Daniel in order to get Ignacio back to the United States by giving in to Wilhelmina, which was another reason why she didn't feel like going, but Hilda tells her that maybe its time to come clean to both Daniel and Ignacio.

As Betty arrived to work with her suitcase, Henry comes in and tells Betty that instead of staying with Christina (as planned) she should stay with him. As Betty arrived to Henry's apartment, she now experiences her first taste of freedom for the first time. Betty has made plans for her and Henry to go to the New York Transit Museum, but Henry thinks that she should go to Ignacio's citizenship ceremony instead, which Betty wants to distance herself from.

Meanwhile, Marc's life is centered immensely around the wedding. As he is planning, Cliff walks in and asks Marc what he should wear, and tells him he was planning on wearing his jacket "with the stains." Not thrilled but preoccupied, Marc finally agrees.

As that happens, Wilhelmina is still fretting over the wedding—especially the fact that her maid of honor, Victoria Beckham, is stealing all of the fame and glory from her big day. As she tries to make changes to what Beckham wears and does (even having Vera Wang around!), Wilhelmina never comes out on top, as the Spice Girl herself takes advantage of her "Second Mum" (referring to Wilhelmina).

In the office, Alexis and Bradford share a drink as they celebrate the fact that ad sales have increased now that companies like Louis Vuitton, Cartier and Ralph Lauren have returned from their boycott. Bradford is not impressed that Winthrop Jewelry, the deal that Daniel brokered, is only for an eighth of a page in the March issue, so he tosses it aside and emboldens the ones his daughter made. Daniel is hurt further when Bradford asks Alexis to stand up at the altar with him instead of having Daniel as his best man, prompting Daniel to tell Alexis that she should definitely stand up at the altar because if she doesn't, "The disappointment might kill him. And you wouldn't want that, would you, Alexis?" This causes Daniel to leave in a hurt storm, saying that he isn't going to the wedding.

Around the same time, a visitor shows up and Amanda notices his accent and description very quickly. When Christina sees him, she takes Betty to Fey's love dungeon to hide out and tells her that her husband Stuart has found her after five years, ever since she told him that she was going to the pet store to buy dog food! As Stuart later bonds with Christina in Fey's sex room (where they also have sex), they talk about what has happened to them over the past five years after she walked out on him because of his abuse due to alcoholism. Then, while looking through his bag, she discovers he's on drugs because he is sick and needs money for a life-saving operation. Stuart tells Christina that he's on medication for damage that he'd done to his liver. She says she'll pay for him when she gets it (100,000 dollars), but only if he stays in New York for the six months he says he has left.

As the big day approaches, Daniel drops by Wilhelmina's to deliver the fact that he will not attend the ceremony. While he is there, he hears the water running and asks who is there, only to have Wilhelmina try and cover the fact up, claiming that "Posh Spice Girl can't handle spicy foods." He then sees Dwyane and suspects she has slept with him. When he tells Betty this back at MODE after she and Henry sees him looking for evidence in Wilhelmina's office, Betty pretended that she didn't know as she tried to cover her tracks after he mentioned that he was going to tell Bradford, making Betty feel more guilty than ever.

At the wedding, Marc sees Cliff in a tux and has never been prouder. Cliff stated that he is really trying to impress Marc and wearing shoes that make Cliff "really hurt". However, Marc become mad when Cliff was talking seductively to a guy, which ended the two in a lunatic conversation. Marc really jealous to the guy, even after Cliff said the guy is straight. Marc denies Cliff's reason and said that they are gay and there's no such things about straight or not. Marc said (for the several times) that their relationship is over. Afterwards, Amanda said that Marc is so stupid to ended their relationship because of that. Amanda tells Marc to do anything to have Cliff back, even if he had to go to the airport and beg him in front of a lot of people. Marc agrees, he goes to Cliff, but without speaking any word, Marc and Cliff hug and their relationship back. While that was going on, Wilhelmina finally got even with Victoria...by locking her up in the confessional room.

As his citizenship ceremony arrives, Ignacio is upset that Betty hasn't even called him, even though she lied to him. At the same time Henry brings Betty to the court for Ignacio's ceremony and he talks her into going in. He tells her that he knows how much her family means to her and when he leaves they are going to be the ones who are there to care for her, so Betty does go in and Iganacio breaks into a smile when he sees her. Then they both apologize and Betty tells him about what she saw four months ago and Ignacio (who learn about this earlier from Hilda) tells Betty to tell Daniel the truth, now that nobody can take his citizenship away. Betty then takes off to the wedding to stop the union.

As she makes it to the church before they say "I do", Betty runs in and says, "Stop!" Then, Daniel takes Betty aside to ask her how she knows about Wilhelmina's affair with Dwayne. He feels hurt and betrayed when he learns that she's known about the fling for four months, but didn't tell him about it. After hearing this, Daniel gets angry, upset, and asks her how he can ever trust her again, then he fires her before she could tell him why she did it. After she leaves disappointed, Daniel returns to the altar to tell Bradford, who follows his son to the lobby, prompting Marc to force Amanda into entertaining the crowd with her rendition of Kelis's "Milkshake."

While in the lobby Daniel tells his father what Betty saw, only to the disappointments to have Bradford not believe the story and blamed him for firing her because of this claim, since Betty isn't there to corroborate Daniel's story. As Bradford walks away Daniel notices his father looking reddish. As he returned to the altar, just as Wilhelmina says "I do", Bradford, who looks directly at Dwayne, only to start sweating, collapses to the floor and has a heart attack as the room is in absolute chaos, with Wilhelmina screaming and pounding on Bradford's chest. As Daniel rushes in to perform CPR on his father, the unemployed Betty watches the tragic event unfold on the big screen at Times Square.

Production

This episode would be the last one that Marco Pennette and James Hayman would co-produce or write in the series. On February 11, 2008, both Pennette and Hayman were axed from their jobs on the same day that Ugly Betty was renewed for a third season. This would be Pennette's sixth episode that he would co-write or produce, and Hayman's seventh during this tenure.^[1]

Casting

The news of Victoria Beckham guest starring on Ugly Betty garnered a lot of attention prior to production. There were rumors going around that she would play herself in two episodes and will be paid a large sum of money to do so, which led to a dispute about this story. While Kristin Veitch revealed that this wasn't confirmed in June 2007, another program, Extra, had a interview with Vanessa Williams, who hints at this one happening. On July 27, 2007, producer Marco Pennette confirmed that Beckham would guest star on the show as a wedding designer,^[2] but at the last minute settled on having Vera Wang play the designer instead.

Reception

The episode was well received in a review from TV Guide,^[3] and Entertainment Weekly.^[4] This episode had 10.9 million viewers in the US, placing first in its timeslot with a 26% audience share and placed 9th in weekly ratings. It got less than the pilot episode there (10.1 million), but placed higher in weekly ratings ("Pilot" came 12th).

Notes

Jeff Buckley's cover of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" plays as Bradford Meade suffers a heart attack at his wedding. The same song was used at the end of The O.C. episode featuring Caleb Nichol's wedding. A year later, Caleb would die in the same way - from a heart attack. Both characters were played by Alan Dale.

The episode itself made the cover of TV Guide's November 5–11, 2007 issue,^[5] with stars America Ferrera, Vanessa Williams and Michael Urie appearing as their characters.

During the Bradford Meade/Wilhelmina Slater wedding scene, when Daniel lures Bradford away to talk to him, Amanda Tannen (played by Becki Newton) is encouraged to entertain the crowd. She sings the song "Milkshake" by Kelis; a song which seems to perfectly support the character's male-pursuing, outgoing attitude. This hints once again at the idea of a completely musical episode of Ugly Betty, which is often discussed by Becki Newton and Michael Urie in their talks in the 'Official Ugly Betty Podcast', hosted by ABC.com.

There was a reference to Dynasty when Wilhelmina slaps Bradford when he is dying is like when Alexis slaps Cecil.

References

Also starring

• Alec Mapa as Suzuki St. Pierre
• David Blue as Cliff St. Paul

Guest stars

• Victoria Beckham as herself
• Vera Wang as herself
• Rick Fox as Dwayne
• Derek Riddell as Stuart McKinney