S04.E06: Open Mic

[ElectricBoogaloo]

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David and Patrick throw an open mic to promote their shop; David gets nervous when Patrick states he will be performing. Johnny and Alexis rebrand the motel, but Stevie fears they are overexpanding. Moira tries to keep secret the gender of the Schitts' new baby.

Edited February 14, 2018 by ElectricBoogaloo

[reneforkelly]

I am dying for this episode.  I read an interview with Daniel Levy and supposedly this one is a tearjerker.  

[giovannif7]

Daniel Levy was right. It's been years since I've teared up at a sitcom, but when I realized which classic Patrick chose to dedicate to David, my eyes welled up along with David's. It also helped that Noah Reid did a terrific acoustic version of Tina Turner's The Best.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Hahaha, I can't blame David for dreading open mic night. I have been to my fair share of those to be supportive of various friends over the years and there are a lot of tone deaf and otherwise untalented people that I've politely sat through. But awwww, Patrick!

I still don't care about Roland's baby. The only funny thing to come out of that storyline this week is that he chose Gloria Estefan's birthday as the combination to the safe.

You gotta give Alexis points for sheer chutzpah. That girl has no shame when it comes to trying to land herself a job. She was just as cheerfully aggressive when Ted interviewed her to work at the vet's office. And the things that she pointed out were all basic things that any business should have in this day and age. How can you not have a website? It's so freaking easy these days (unlike 10 years ago when you had to either know how to code HTML or pay someone to construct your website for you). You can easily use premade templates at Wordpress, Wix, etc. and then just type in the text you want, drag and drop photos, and voila, you have a website. If that's too much work for you, then at least set up a Facebook page and an Instagram account for free.

The awkward photoshoot with Ray was so Johnny. Loved that part of Stevie's reluctance to improve business is because it means Johnny will leave and she'll be stuck running the motel by herself again. As has been pointed out before, Moira is the only one who is still actively trying to get the hell out of town. Johnny and David have definitely put down roots.

I think Alexis would be easier to convince to leave town, partly because Ted is seeing that 50 year old goat farmer, but even she is no longer spending all her time talking about what she'll do when she leaves or trying to find a way out of town. I think she would have the easiest time readjusting to living in a city and miss Schitt's Creek the least, but if/when Ted breaks up with his girlfriend, then all bets are off. She has stopped complaining about the town and seems pretty happy for the time being.

Between the apothecary and Patrick, I think David is also pretty happy living in SC right now. If he suddenly became rich again, I could see him asking Patrick to open more locations of their store which would allow them to travel together and keep the two things he loves in his life.

I don't think Johnny is necessarily happy in SC but I think that he has settled in and isn't actively trying to claw his way out anymore. I think he enjoys the challenge of trying to make the motel more successful and that he also enjoys Stevie's company. If he suddenly became rich, I don't know what he would do. He defended the town when he and Moira ran into their old friends a few seasons ago, so I think he has grown to enjoy some aspects of their small town life. He sees the motel as a true partnership with Stevie, so I'm glad that they finally discussed it and she now knows that he won't abandon her if a pile of money falls on his family.

[reneforkelly]

I have been looking forward to this episode for weeks as you can see from my post up above.  It's going to air here in the US tonight and we're expecting stormy weather.  Ima be hella pissed if it disrupts my cable.

[Fake Jan Brady]

Renaming the motel to include Stevie's [partial] surname was a nice touch, but Johnny just told her "whatever decisions we make, we make together".

I'd really like more Stevie/Alexis scenes; especially when Alexis is overconfidently pushing ahead with a plan. The return of Ray for the photoshoot was inspired.

Nitpick: it seemed strange that Stevie and Alexis weren't there for the Open Mic - it's not like Schitt's Creek has many competing options on a school night.

[Lemonemm]

Patrick and David are so fucking cute together. I just love them, and they have great chemistry.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Clips:

Keeping secrets:

Marketing meeting:

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Alexis acting out the construction worker "we'll be back sign" made me laugh harder than it probably should have.

[iMonrey]

I knew Patrick was going to be good. I had to go look up Noah Reid and he is indeed a professional musician as well as being an actor. My word, that song was so sweet. If I had to nitpick, I'd say it's maybe a stretch that Patrick would be so open about his relationship with David this soon.

I got a chuckle out of Jocelyn saying Roland's ancestor correctly predicted the sex of her unborn child and was hanged as a witch.

[strippedhalo]

I loved Patrick's song and I loved David's reaction and I loved Moira's unexpected turnaround from "let me know if I should pull the fire alarm" to "my boy is getting serenaded". All so lovely. (If I had to nitpick, I would give David the side-eye for being so skeptical of Patrick performing at open mic night after Patrick was present at a public performance of David and Moira's routine in a previous episode.)

The past few episodes, I've been wishing for Johnny to have a non-Roland storyline, and this one was good! And Ronnie was funny (so was Bob, even)!

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Inside the episode:

[Portia]

I thought Alexis was showing a decent amount of business acumen (not to mention confidence and initiative) for someone who had only recently begun attending college, and you could see on Johnny's face how proud he was of her.  Eugene Levy was doing some sure-nuff acting there. 

I LOLed at how the more Alexis demonstrated posing "cute," the more physically awkward and unattractive Stevie became. I am exactly that ungainly and uncomfortable on camera, and no amount of coaching can relax me!

[LilWharveyGal]

Moira's first scene killed me, from, "mucho dias," to thinking the sonogram was a picture of a ghost.

This whole episode was so great.

[iMonrey]

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I LOLed at how the more Alexis demonstrated posing "cute," the more physically awkward and unattractive Stevie became

"You're a simple country gal who doesn't care about things like wearing nice clothes, or how you look."

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I thought Alexis was showing a decent amount of business acumen (not to mention confidence and initiative) for someone who had only recently begun attending college, and you could see on Johnny's face how proud he was of her. 

It's sort of ridiculous, thought, that Johnny himself wouldn't already put these improvements into motion, especially the website. He's the one who ran a successful company, after all. 

[dstv]

30 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

 

It's sort of ridiculous, thought, that Johnny himself wouldn't already put these improvements into motion, especially the website. He's the one who ran a successful company, after all. 

I think last season proved that Johnny had been out of the day to day work of creating and running a business for quite some time. And given that he continually works on pen and paper instead of on a laptop, had a lot of difficulty learning how to use the front desk computer, and was the genius behind “find us on tweeters/tweet us on Facebook”, I don’t think his focus is online.

[Portia]

38 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

It's sort of ridiculous, thought, that Johnny himself wouldn't already put these improvements into motion, especially the website. He's the one who ran a successful company, after all. 

A video rental company that failed because Time Marches On.  It seems to me that Johnny is regularly portrayed as a lovable dinosaur.

Edited to add: @dstv and I were thinking similar thoughts at the same time. 

Edited March 2, 2018 by Portia

[Enginerd]

On 3/2/2018 at 11:29 AM, LilWharveyGal said:

Moira's first scene killed me, from, "mucho dias," to thinking the sonogram was a picture of a ghost.

This whole episode was so great.

I loved that entrance. Not a good day, just lots of days. Day after day, still in this town. But she said it with signature pretentious flair.

[Surrealist]

Patrick's cover of "Simply the Best" was outstanding. I loved everything about this episode, especially the fact that Alexis is coming into her own. I look forward to seeing how she evolves next season.

Edited March 5, 2018 by Surrealist

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I loved how Alexis kept giving herself more impressive titles. At the end of her presentation, she declared herself the motel’s VP of marketing and communications and by the photoshoot she added CEO of in-house publicity. 

Of course in the previous episode when David told Heather that Alexis was an intern, Alexis upgraded that to “in training to be CEO of executive buying.”

Edited March 5, 2018 by ElectricBoogaloo

[Jordan61]

On 3/1/2018 at 10:59 AM, strippedhalo said:

(If I had to nitpick, I would give David the side-eye for being so skeptical of Patrick performing at open mic night after Patrick was present at a public performance of David and Moira's routine in a previous episode.)

Frankly I thought David was being a real jerk about the whole thing.

Good to see Ronnie & Bob again! I loved how Ronnie walked into the cafe, Moira called her over, and she just turned around and walked back out. Ha!

[iMonrey]

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A video rental company that failed because Time Marches On. 

Actually they lost their money because their accountant embezzled from them I think. It wasn't because the stores went belly up. That business would have gone the same route as Blockbusters, to be sure, but by then they were rich beyond measure anyway.

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 I loved how Ronnie walked into the cafe, Moira called her over, and she just turned around and walked back out. Ha!

You know what else I noticed? The seats in the booths are duct-taped together at the corners. 

[dstv]

21 hours ago, Jordan61 said:

Frankly I thought David was being a real jerk about the whole thing.

Actually I thought that Patrick was leading him on the whole time, right up to the spoken introduction, encouraging him to believe it was going to be bad and embarrassing.  Perhaps to enhance the surprise, which quite frankly took a lot of planning. Patrick has always struck me as very self-confident. He doesn’t mind people doubting him, or even playing on those doubts a bit, if he knows he can deliver in the end. 

[iMonrey]

Patrick also obviously gets a kick out of teasing David. He's been doing it since the day he met him. And it's so easy to do. David has this recurring thing I'd call "escalating horror." Like, someone will start telling him something, and his face will just grow more and more horrified as the story goes on. So I think Patrick was deliberately letting David believe this would be horrific just because he gets a kick out of it.

[Surrealist]

On 3/5/2018 at 12:51 PM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

I loved how Alexis kept giving herself more impressive titles. At the end of her presentation, she declared herself the motel’s VP of marketing and communications and by the photoshoot she added CEO of in-house publicity. 

Of course in the previous episode when David told Heather that Alexis was an intern, Alexis upgraded that to “in training to be CEO of executive buying.”

I loved it when she said, "I prefer to be called a freelance brand invigorator."

[Enginerd]

1 hour ago, iMonrey said:

Patrick also obviously gets a kick out of teasing David. He's been doing it since the day he met him. And it's so easy to do. David has this recurring thing I'd call "escalating horror." Like, someone will start telling him something, and his face will just grow more and more horrified as the story goes on. So I think Patrick was deliberately letting David believe this would be horrific just because he gets a kick out of it.

I agree. Patrick has a calm, composed demeanor, but you can see by his subtle smirks and eye twinkles and the things he says very nonchalantly that he is clever and confident and has a great sense of humor. He definitely enjoys giving David reasons to be dramatic, and also loves giving him a genuinely nice surprise. He wanted David to think it was going to be horrifically embarrassing, and after Patrick supportively sat through David and Moira's performance, it was a well-earned tease.

[DXD526]

Patrick is well aware of what an emotionally high-maintenance person David can be, I think it's one of the things he finds endearing about him. That song was a lovely gesture, it obviously took some practice. He didn't merely do the song, he did his own 'style' of it, I didn't even recognize it right away. 

[PhilMarlowe2]

On 3/5/2018 at 1:41 PM, Jordan61 said:

Frankly I thought David was being a real jerk about the whole thing.

Good to see Ronnie & Bob again! I loved how Ronnie walked into the cafe, Moira called her over, and she just turned around and walked back out. Ha!

I am new to Schitt's Creek, binge watching it, and while I am enjoying it, I have no clue what Patrick sees in David. I know I'm in the minority, but I find their scenes so repetitive.

[Brookside]

On 3/2/2018 at 3:42 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Inside the episode:

 

I hope Noah Reid dyed his hair for a role and not because he thought it was attractive.

[Chewy101]

On 3/6/2018 at 3:25 PM, Enginerd said:

I agree. Patrick has a calm, composed demeanor, but you can see by his subtle smirks and eye twinkles and the things he says very nonchalantly that he is clever and confident and has a great sense of humor. He definitely enjoys giving David reasons to be dramatic, and also loves giving him a genuinely nice surprise. He wanted David to think it was going to be horrifically embarrassing, and after Patrick supportively sat through David and Moira's performance, it was a well-earned tease.

I thought the funniest thing about Moira in this is the irony. She has made a dang fool of herself repeatedly by inserting herself into various roles around town and doing them so badly. David has watched that ego of hers for decades. I kind of can't blame him for dreading another "Act" from a loved one. And yet Moira can't see that she is the one who has filled David with that perpetual horror.