S02.E11: The Bender

[OnceSane]

Grace and Frankie nurse their emotional wounds.  Frankie performs a ritual on the beach and Grace goes out drinking.  Bud and Coyote meet Jacob.

[Chaos Theory]

This was probably my favorite episode so far.  I enjoyed watching Robert and Sol in that dingy hotel room.  Watching Grace in her...well bender was fun.  Jane Fonda usually place the straight man to Lily Tomlin so u enjoyed watching her go a little crazy. 

Edited May 7, 2016 by Chaos Theory

[AuntieMame]

I like that Grace still knows the bartender she tried to mentor, but wish that they'd made up and continued the mentoring. That young woman really does have potential and I understand that Grace came on too strong, but it shouldn't be irreparable. 

Grace is an alcoholic and while I don't want to see a storyline about changing that, I would like it acknowledged that she's a functional alcoholic. Poor Grace, she has such strong emotions. I think Frankie is the only person she's ever felt safe enough with to reveal even a corner of the depth of her feelings.

[OnceSane]

I liked that the bartender cut her off and laid some truth on Grace.  Very necessary. And I understand that Frankie has become Grace's safe place, but that doesn't mean alcohol can be used as an excuse for what Grace said.

I'm with Bud and Coyote I. Love. Jacob.  And I LOVED that Bud started accepting Jacob after he stopped Grace's drunken antics.  Bud being overprotective of Frankie was so great.  How do you accept a new man in your mother's life after "the nicest guy ever" broke her heart?

Robert and Sol looked so comfortable in that dingy place.  I'm glad they are looking for something new that doesn't have the memories.

[Maysie]

I love Jacob too.

Grace's bender was interesting - I guess it really shed a light on her problem, because she does have a problem. The fact that she has booze stashed all over the house surprised me a bit. I don't have enough experience with serious alcoholics to know if they hold up as well as Grace does - you'd think that all that drinking would show a bit (I mean, Jane Fonda does look fabulous). I agree with AuntiMame that it would be nice to have some kind of acknowledgment that she is at least struggling with that issue. I don't want to have Very Special Episodes dedicated to it either, but it's a little jarring to have her alcohol dependency be a funny plot point.

Quote

How do you accept a new man in your mother's life after "the nicest guy ever" broke her heart?

I'm kind of over Sol being "the nicest guy ever." That hovel he chose to live in as a form of self-punishment made me roll my eyes. "Yes, I'll eat cereal out of the box and endure the guy upstairs playing loud rap music early in the morning so I can feel better about myself being a liar and a cheater." Sol's that guy that punishes himself so that everyone, including him, can know what a great guy he is.

So when they sell Robert and Grace's house, will Grace get anything out of it or will Robert and Sol get everything since she got the beach house, which she's sharing with Frankie? Somehow it seems Grace keeps coming up with the short end of the stick. No wonder she drinks. Don't get me wrong - she's doing just fine - but Robert got the house. Sol and Frankie got to sell their house and I assume at least split the money. Grace got a house that she's forced to share with Frankie?

[JBC344]

The writer's have intentionally skirted the issue of who the beach house actually belongs to legally.  Sometimes I feel like they allude to it being Grace's but not sure.  Or what probably happened is that the men probably gave up their rights to the beach house so that it just reverted to Grace and Frankie as owners, with Frankie and Sol selling their house and splitting the profits, and Robert buying out Grace in regards to their house.

[OnceSane]

In season 1, Grace told Robert he could keep their house as long as she kept the beach house.  I think Grace does own it outright, but allows Frankie to live there as her roommate.

[JBC344]

Oh yeah, the first thing out of Grace's mouth was that she wanted the beach house but that doesn't automatically get rid of Frankie and Sol's ownership.  Also I'm going to guess that Grace and Frankie were treated fairly in the divorce and that would include Grace getting more than just the beach house.

Or technically I could see Grace owning 75% (her and Robert's 50%, Robert convinced Sol to give up his 25%) with Frankie owning the other 25%.

Like I said the writers have skirted the issue because they sometimes play it as it is Grace's place and she allows Frankie to live there but Frankie has always had a legal right to the house, and they never addressed her giving that up. 

[AuntieMame]

On 5/10/2016 at 8:10 PM, Maysie said:

I love Jacob too.

Grace's bender was interesting - I guess it really shed a light on her problem, because she does have a problem. The fact that she has booze stashed all over the house surprised me a bit. I don't have enough experience with serious alcoholics to know if they hold up as well as Grace does - you'd think that all that drinking would show a bit (I mean, Jane Fonda does look fabulous). I agree with AuntiMame that it would be nice to have some kind of acknowledgment that she is at least struggling with that issue. I don't want to have Very Special Episodes dedicated to it either, but it's a little jarring to have her alcohol dependency be a funny plot point.

I'm kind of over Sol being "the nicest guy ever." That hovel he chose to live in as a form of self-punishment made me roll my eyes. "Yes, I'll eat cereal out of the box and endure the guy upstairs playing loud rap music early in the morning so I can feel better about myself being a liar and a cheater." Sol's that guy that punishes himself so that everyone, including him, can know what a great guy he is.

So when they sell Robert and Grace's house, will Grace get anything out of it or will Robert and Sol get everything since she got the beach house, which she's sharing with Frankie? Somehow it seems Grace keeps coming up with the short end of the stick. No wonder she drinks. Don't get me wrong - she's doing just fine - but Robert got the house. Sol and Frankie got to sell their house and I assume at least split the money. Grace got a house that she's forced to share with Frankie?

Maysie, I'm with you on the giant eye roll with Sol and the hovel. I wonder if the fight Robert and Sol ultimately have about Sols cheating is less about the cheating and more about the fact that these guys aren't easy to live with and that fight gives them an excuse not to have to do it.

Functional alcoholics can go either way. It can affect their health and looks or some seem to tick over better than the rest of us and have the constitution of oxen. A friend of mine was lamenting the unfairness of this just the other day.....that friend needs a new hip at fifty and pointed out that he had taken care of his health all his life, unlike others he knew. Depends on the individual, but I think Grace would have some mighty hangovers.

[bybrandy]

On 5/17/2016 at 8:32 AM, AuntieMame said:

Functional alcoholics can go either way. It can affect their health and looks or some seem to tick over better than the rest of us and have the constitution of oxen. A friend of mine was lamenting the unfairness of this just the other day.....that friend needs a new hip at fifty and pointed out that he had taken care of his health all his life, unlike others he knew. Depends on the individual, but I think Grace would have some mighty hangovers.

Eh, my father was a functional alcoholic.  He drank a 5th of Jack a day for at least a decade.  He didn't drink during the day.  He worked in high powered, high paid jobs a the executive level. He never had a hangover (he believed that it was the impurities in the mixers that gave hangovers... but I suspect he just didn't get them.  He had 4 kidneys would that have helped?).  He cut back on drinking significantly when he and my mom split as not drinking was a condition of joint custody.  He had a couple of slips and I found stashes of hidden alcohol which I confronted him about.  But mostly he worked pretty hard at sobriety because if my mom found out I wouldn't see him again and he didn't value much about his life or his health but through it all he was a pretty fantastic day to day parent.  

We went to a wedding of a woman he worked with when I was in high school and it turns out the guy who owned the liquor store he frequented during the worst of his drinking was the father of the bride.  He was shocked to find my father alive and healthy and not drinking because he'd sold him a 5th and 3 packs of pal mal unfiltered a day for a decade.   My dad quit the cigs cold turkey when I was 11.  

He replaced the alcohol and cigarettes with Sausage and died of a massive heart attack when I was 21.   So there you go.   

But seriously, people who interacted with my dad from 6 am to 6 pm had no idea, NONE.  After six my father was an incredibly sleepy drunk and he'd drink himself into a stupor and we lived our lives around him.  

I found out in college that I had a large alcohol tolerance and I only ever got one hangover.  But it became very, very, very obvious to me that like my father drinking was too easy and there would be too few consequences and because I'd like to think I'm less self destructive than that I quit drinking to get drunk by the time I was old enough to legally drink.  I'll have a glass of wine with dinner.  But I won't have more because if I don't pay attention to it I will drink a bottle of wine with dinner and feel fine the next day and that's a slippery slope I don't want to be on.   

[Bastet]

I'm really tired of everyone on television who drinks a lot being an alcoholic, but if you're hiding booze in your own home and drive drunk to get more... yeah, Grace doesn't just like to drink, she has a problem.  But I hope the show doesn't go all AA on me, because I really like the Grace we've seen.

It was pretty brutal to watch her get that drunk and lash out at Frankie, but I know the aftermath will be interesting.

And it's always fun to see Estelle Parsons on my screen.  I love that Babe's reaction to Frankie's recap of all that's happened was, "You're living with Grace?!"

[Chaos Theory]

On May 13, 2016 at 0:37 AM, OnceSane said:

In season 1, Grace told Robert he could keep their house as long as she kept the beach house.  I think Grace does own it outright, but allows Frankie to live there as her roommate.

If I remember correctly both couples bought the beach house together.   Robert and Sol had been business partners for years and the kids had basically been raised as siblings so it made sense to share a vacation home.  I think Sol agreed to give the beach house to Frankie and Robert agreed to give it to Grace.  

Edited May 31, 2016 by Chaos Theory

[Turtle]

On May 27, 2016 at 8:54 PM, Bastet said:

I'm really tired of everyone on television who drinks a lot being an alcoholic, but if you're hiding booze in your own home and drive drunk to get more... yeah, Grace doesn't just like to drink, she has a problem.  But I hope the show doesn't go all AA on me, because I really like the Grace we've seen.  

I agree with all of this.  And, I wish shows would acknowledge that sometimes people go through heavy drinking phases but aren't alcoholics.  Sometimes, especially during high stress situations, people drink too much, and it doesn't always mean alcoholism.  I'm not even sure that I would think Grace has a drinking problem, if it wasn't for the hidden booze.  The other shitty decisions, including driving, I can see as her drinking too much because her life has been totally uprooted and she's "handling" it by numbing the pain.  But when you have booze stashed all over the house (and kayak), your drinking has turned the corner from temporary self-medicating to something more serious.  

That said, it drives me crazy that on tv, whenever someone goes on a bender after a tragic event, they're an alcoholic.  Sometimes depressed/ stressed people drink too much, eat too much, sleep too much, whatever- doesn't mean they're an alcoholic, or addicted to food, or suffering from narcolepsy.  I'd love to see a story line on tv in which someone suffers tragedy or chaos, drinks a shit-ton for a while, and then has to deal with the ramifications  of that, without going to rehab and never drinking again.  

[JBC344]

Yeah, I think that in television world they haven't deciphered the difference between someone who is addicted to alcohol and someone who may be abusing alcohol. 

[theatremouse]

I mean, to be (temporarily) fair, up until they went the whole "hiding booze in the kayak" route, I actually thought the show was doing a decent job of just that with Grace. But then it turned...

[Julia]

I come from a long line of people who have/had parlous relationships with alcohol, and without addressing any other issue, nobody drinks that amount of hard liquor for any meaningful amount of time and has Grace's BMI.

[theatremouse]

I think they might if they drink instead of eating.

[AuntieMame]

On 6/3/2016 at 1:17 PM, Julia said:

I come from a long line of people who have/had parlous relationships with alcohol, and without addressing any other issue, nobody drinks that amount of hard liquor for any meaningful amount of time and has Grace's BMI.

 

On 6/3/2016 at 6:26 PM, theatremouse said:

I think they might if they drink instead of eating.

They might have her Bmi, but it might not be distributed so nicely. Lifelong heavy drinkers often don't eat a lot, but they have nutritional deficiencies that tend towards skinny limbs and a tummy. I'm the one who called Grace a functional alcoholic. Sorry, no judgement intended and I don't want to see the alcoholism trope but I thought wed gotten clues over the course of the show that Grace has been drinking to cope for quite a while. More people than we realize are functioning heavy drinkers. I was just commenting on it. It makes complete sense for her character.

[stcroix]

I LOVE Grace and Frankie.  But..... I'm a little over the guys.  I mean, they've been together for 20 yrs and they are just so mushy and thoughtful all the time :(   It's great in small doses, but these two act like Romeo and Juliet.  I thought the seedy motel scene was disgusting and trite.  Not believable at all.  Two lawyers would be very concerned about what might be happening to their car in that neighborhood and less about dancing cheek to cheek to gansta rap or whatever it was.  I can take only a small amount of them.  Love everyone else on the show.  I'd especially love it if they'd flesh out the part of Brianna's male assistant into something along the lines of the flamboyant and witty Marc from Ugly Betty!! 

[hnygrl]

Oh my God YES stcroix! Sol is a freaking MILLIONAIRE and he chooses the worse apartment in the worst neighborhood he can find, and Robert is OKAY SPENDING THE NIGHT in that bed bug infested roach motel? Yeah. No. That super fancy ride (and Sol's super expensive classic car) would've been gone before they closed the front door.

It bugs me that Sol is such a drama queen he chose the worst place he could find to live as some kind of penance for cheating. What about the 20 plus years of cheating on your wife, Sol? That's okay? Oh yeah, he gave her a butt-load of money...okay then. That makes things okay!