Joel Grey and Linda Lavin go all Mickey and Judy and put on a show! This was a delightful two-part episode that makes the most of its expanded time to pile on the songs and the laughs.
Alice is excited to be the featured performer in "I Happen to Like New York," a revue of songs celebrating Gotham slated to open at the Palace Theater in Phoenix. But alas, the producer is arrested and Broadway director Mickey appears at the diner to break the news to his leading lady. Without two-thousand dollars, the show can't go on. Suddenly a deus ex machina appears in the form of Jimmy the Bookie, bringing Mel his winnings for the exacta, which coincidentally is the exact amount needed to keep the spotlight shining on Ms. Hyatt.
Jolene jokes that Mel's the exception to the rule of a fool and his money are soon parted. But lusty Mel's resistance melts when into the diner come two ingenues in leotards. Strange bedfellows! Mel a theater producer? In black cape and mad with power, Mel orders changes to play, such as insisting the young lady dancers doff their coats during the "Autumn in New York" number to show more flesh (Alice, he adds, can keep her coat on).
Another crisis! The scheduled leading man has left to take a film role--being shot to death in a Charles Bronson thriller--but Mickey found an apt replacement--Joel Grey, the Oscar and Tony Award-winning star of "Cabaret"!
Mel is plays to the hilt the uncultured boor we know and love. I felt a kinship to Mel and his underwhelmed reaction when meeting Joel Grey. Okay, I'm a philistine, I admit, for only knowing Joel Grey from the 1985 movie "Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins," where he played the ancient sage Chiun in heavy makeup and minus the singing and dancing, so these episodes were a revelation to me of the man's abundant talents. Grey's audition take on "Swanee" left me astounded and infused new life into that century-old song. I was familiar only with the Al Jolson version that Jimmy the Bookie hewed close to in his audition. I loved both versions, and the fact a song can be interpreted so differently is a testimony to its composer George Gershwin and lyricist Irving Caesar.
Even after the cast breaks into spontaneous applause after Grey's showstopper, Mel is unmoved and sticking with Jimmy the Bookie as the leading man, much to the outrage of the cast. Mel finally relents and agrees to a coin toss to decide between Jimmy and Joel. And with the coin spinning in midair part one ends on a freeze frame.
