This episode is ludicrous. It's like a Mad-TV version of "A Streetcar Named Desire" which star Tandy debuted to acclaim on Broadway. Main difference is that the episode is set in 1910 NYC not 1940s New Orleans.
Tandy's Edwina Freel here is not that dissimilar from Blanche DuBois and shares the same consignment to a mental institution at the end -- although far more happily as Freel had only recently escaped from such an institution and was longing to return. The men from the asylum or sanitarium are as pleasant as possible. The other characters also roughly replicate characters from "Streetcar": Mr. McGurk (Stanley Kowalski), Mrs. McGurk (Eunice Hubbell), and, of course, Mr. Birch, who is a kinder, smarter, more mature Mitch.
The ending, in which Edwina's "baby", "Toby", is revealed as a black cat (and left in Birch's care), is hilarious.
Tandy must have seen the similarities to "Streetcar". I wonder what she thought. She certainly played it straight.
Tandy's Edwina Freel here is not that dissimilar from Blanche DuBois and shares the same consignment to a mental institution at the end -- although far more happily as Freel had only recently escaped from such an institution and was longing to return. The men from the asylum or sanitarium are as pleasant as possible. The other characters also roughly replicate characters from "Streetcar": Mr. McGurk (Stanley Kowalski), Mrs. McGurk (Eunice Hubbell), and, of course, Mr. Birch, who is a kinder, smarter, more mature Mitch.
The ending, in which Edwina's "baby", "Toby", is revealed as a black cat (and left in Birch's care), is hilarious.
Tandy must have seen the similarities to "Streetcar". I wonder what she thought. She certainly played it straight.