Cheers 2.18: “Snow Job”

Airdate: 2/9/84

Carla lets Diane in on a secret: Sam usually goes up to a Vemont lodge “with the boys” to engage in all manner of bacchanalia, and usually debauchery, that their wild, heedless imaginations can dream up. Diane scoffs, until Sam lays on her a whopper that he’s got to go to Vermont to attend his uncle’s funeral. Cool and coy as can be, Diane says nary a word about her inside information, only dropping casual reminders that a relationship is built on honesty. Shortly after Sam leaves he returns, and nervously tries to set the record straight with his beloved that it’s coincidence the funeral is near a ski lodge. She reminds him that she could easily call up the obituary dept. at the local paper to call his bluff, and back he comes again, this time enraged at her smug, condescending tone. When he trots off, finally, she fights fire with fire, admitting she may not fight off the advances of the local supermarket boxboy. He returns.. for now.

Another examination of the Sam/Diane repricocity of paranoia, superbly scripted by David Angell, effectively marginalizes the other two rather forgettable subplots: Coach tries for an extremely conservative world record of only breaking 7 barglasses, while Cliff is jealous of Norm’s “bromance” with a tediously unfunny coworker. Standoff between Sam and Diane, makes one realize that this is not a pairing of love and tenderness at all, but of insecurity and egotism: indeed, the stuff that comedy is made of. Perhaps this is why healthy romance is anathema to the sitcom!

Cold open: Cliff shapes up a fellow postman out of his disheveledness, before the lad flatters him with news that his name has attained legendary status in postal circles everywhere… as code for “ass!”

Norm’s opener: Coach: “What’s shakin’, Norm?” Norm: “All four cheeks and a cupload of gin!”