Daria: "Depth Takes A Holiday"

Premiered March 10, 1999

Jane: "The more debased [the holidays] become, the less reason to celebrate them, and the less reason for my family to get together, until presto! I'm finally alone on Thanksgiving with a TV dinner."
Daria: "Sometimes I wonder if you're too cynical, even for me." 
Jane: "Really?  You think?"
Daria: "No, I was being sarcastic."

In this episode from season 3 of the series, Daria (Tracy Grandstaff),  our deadpan heroine,  finds herself face to face with teen personifications of Valentine's Day (an oversized Cupid) and a St. Patrick's Day leprechaun while walking home.

Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day claim that they've come to Lawndale in search of Christmas, Halloween and Guy Fawkes Day, who've left their home on Holiday Island to start a band with a hip-hop punk electronica vibe in Daria's hometown.

Daria is unconvinced by this, so the anthropomorphic holiday personifications attempt to convince her using various strategies including breathing green beer fumes in her face ...

Causing her to reveal the name of "that particular someone who makes [her] feel like Queen Cleopatra" ...

and zapping her parents Jake (Julian Rebolledo) and Helen (Wendy Hoopes) with Cupid's love taser!

This is enough to convince Daria that something is up and she heads to see her best friend Jane (Hoopes again!) where she meets the three errant holidays, who've come to jam with Jane's brother/Daria's crush Trent (Alvaro J. Gonzalez).  

Daria offers to take them all out for pizza to talk things over.    Christmas, Halloween and Guy Fawkes Day say they don't want to return to Holiday Island (which can be reached via a wormhole behind a Chinese restaurant, naturally) because it sucks.   Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day show up and warn that there could be dire consequences if the three do not return, to wit, their respective holidays will cease to exist.

Daria and Jane aren't convinced this would be the worst thing ever,  so Cupid and St. Patrick's Day take them to the mall to see that Christmas and Halloween sales are dying as are steak and kidney pie sales due to the loss of Guy Fawkes Day (aka Bonfire Night).   Daria and Jane remain unimpressed. but Christmas, Halloween and Guy Fawkes Day are proving to be annoying houseguests and an overly amorous set of parents prove to be the last straw.

The gang travels to Holiday Island which turns out to be suspiciously like high school and in the absence of the "cool kids" has been taken over by President's Day.  

Meanwhile, Daria's younger sister Quinn (Hoopes again!!) is concerned about her parents' amorous behavior because she thinks they're planning to have another child and is willing to do anything, including risking being kicked out of the Fashion Club, to stop this horrible up-cutes-manship from taking place.

Will Christmas, Halloween and Guy Fawkes Day be cancelled?   Will Daria and Quinn get a new younger sibling?

RigbyMel says:

I am a big fan of Daria generally.  It was regular must-see viewing for me in the 1990s and overall, I find the series holds up very well.  "Depth Takes A Holiday" is an unusual and somewhat surreal episode, though.  The series tended to keep itself on the ridiculous/sarcastic but sort of realistic side of things most of the time and this is a departure into pure fantasy.

There are a lot of folks who really dislike this episode for that reason.    However, if you're willing to go along with the premise, it's quite fun.

Halloween, Christmas and Guy Fawkes Day have a disagreement at band practice

The teen characterizations of the various holidays are amusing.  Cupid is an overgrown frat boy in a diaper who speaks with a Barry White type voice when using his powers.  St. Patrick's Day is a short excitable fellow clad in a green hat and be-shamrocked Hawaiian shirt.

Christmas wears a red shirt, green trousers and a Santa hat and demands sugar cookies.   Halloween is an orange and black clad Goth chick (naturally).    Guy Fawkes Day is portrayed as a Sid Vicious like punk -  which is a bit of an oddity for a UK celebration (also known as Bonfire Night) based on a failed 17th century attempt to blow up Parliament.   Maybe it's meant to be some kind of commentary on what teenagers interpret anarchy to be?

The show's trademark snark is used to good effect -- there are some awesome/depressing comments about similarities between high school and "real" life, as well a one liner from Jane about the consumption of out-of-season nog that never fail to amuse me.

We learn that in the absence of the "cool kids" at Holiday High,  Presidents' Day has staged a bit of a popularity coup and we see them bossing around Memorial Day and Arbor Day, which is a nice touch.

Although "Depth Takes A Holiday" is a bit of an oddity in the Daria-verse, it's still pretty snark-tacular and definitely worth a look if you are a fan of 1990s pop culture and holidays.

RigbyMel's rating:

3 episodes of "Sick, Sad World"

Holiday Inn

Premiered August 4, 1942.
(Note:This film was released 75 years ago today - 8/4/17)

Jim Hardy (Bing Crosby), Ted Hanover (Fred Astaire) and Lila Dixon (Virginia Dale) are a popular song-and-dance trio.  Jim decides he wants to quit the act, marry Lila and retire to a farmhouse in Connecticut.

Lila has other ideas and informs Jim that not only is she not ready to quit show business, but she has fallen for Ted! So Jim moves to his farm alone, but discovers that life as a farmer isn't all he thought it would be.

The following year at Christmas time,  Jim decides to convert the farm into Holiday Inn, a hotel with dinner and floor show that's only open during holidays.  He makes a trip to New York to tell Ted & Lila of his decision and try to maybe recruit them to participate, they're not convinced.

Meanwhile, Ted's agent Danny (Walter Abel) runs into a flower shop sales clerk named Linda Mason (Marjorie Reynolds).  She recognizes Danny and seizes the opportunity to ask him if he can help her break into showbiz.  

He recommends her to Jim, who hires her and she arrives at Holiday Inn on Christmas Day.   Jim realizes he rather likes Linda and would like to see more of her -- maybe their partnership at the Inn will lead to romance?

Ted and Lila's business and romantic partnership comes to an abrupt end when Lila dumps him on New Year's Eve.  Having no place better to be, a drunken Ted shows up at the Holiday Inn's New Year's Eve party.  He dances with Linda and they put on quite a show for the New Year's Eve crowd. 

Ted is smitten with his new dance partner but the next morning, he can't remember what she looks like since he was drunk.  Jim, fearing he will lose another romantic and performing partner to Ted, does what he can to obfuscate Ted's search for her -- up to and including inviting his old flame Lila to come perform at the inn as a distraction!

But Ted is determined to learn the dancer's identity and decides to stick around Holiday Inn each holiday until he can figure it out.

Can Jim keep Linda's identity secret from Ted?  Will Ted steal another partner from Jim?  Will the Holiday Inn be a success?

RigbyMel says:

This is a special holiday film for a number of reasons, the great song and dance performances by the cast and the wonderful Irving Berlin music being the most notable.   It's really not about the romance plot so much as it is about the various holidays portrayed and the musical numbers.

Holiday Inn is the film that introduced Bing Crosby's signature number "White Christmas" to a worldwide audience.  The song went on to win an Academy Award for Best Original Song and the single has sold hundreds of millions of copies making "White Christmas" one of the best selling songs of all time.   One imagines that the mix of nostalgia and melancholy inherent in the song really resonated with WWII audiences and contributes to its enduring popularity.

The film also focuses not just on Christmas and New Years, but on other holidays throughout the rest of the year as well.  

There's an interesting comedic minuet/jitterbug number for George Washington's birthday.  The switch in styles is one of Jim's ploys to sabotage Ted's dance partnership with Linda.

The Valentine's Day number "Be Careful It's My Heart" was, I suspect, intended to be the "breakout hit" from the movie and it's nice, but doesn't quite hold a candle to "White Christmas."

"Easter Parade" also makes an appearance to good effect.

There's a standout Fourth of July dance number in which Fred Astaire sets off firecrackers onstage while he's dancing which really adds flash and bang (literally AND figuratively!!) to the proceedings.

A couple of other fun facts:

*  According to multiple sources,  Fred Astaire took two shots of bourbon before the first take of the "drunk" dance for the New Year's Eve sequence and the same after each successive take.  The seventh (!) take was the one that was used in the film, so Astaire's performance was really a couple of sheets to the wind.

* There's an animated sequence for Thanksgiving featuring a confused turkey running back and forth between dates on the calendar which was a topical (at the time) reference to the "Franksgiving" controversy of 1939/40.   

President Franklin D. Roosevelt attempted to change Thanksgiving from the 3rd Thursday in November from the 4th Thursday in order to extend the holiday shopping season and bolster the retail economy.  Eventually, an Roosevelt signed a 1941 act of Congress designating the 4th Thursday of November as the official day.  No wonder the 1942 animated turkey was confused!

* The movie also lends its name to the Holiday Inn motel chain, which first opened its doors in the 1950s.

The one thing that keeps me from unreservedly naming Holiday Inn an absolute must watch classic is some unfortunate racial humor that while common at the time is decidedly not respectful to people of color.  There's is a blackface number for Lincoln's birthday which is just straight up unpleasant to watch.   It's of it's time, but that doesn't make the stereotyping okay.

That being said,  Holiday Inn is fun to watch -  my advice is to just skip the Lincoln's birthday sequence and enjoy the rest.

RigbyMel's rating:

3 candy canes.

J.A. Morris says:

I’ll echo what my co-blogger said about the blackface scene.  It’s ugly and was wrong then and now. That scene may be why Holiday Inn is often overshadowed by its cinematic "descendant" White Christmas.  It's mainly remembered today for introducing the most popular Christmas song of all time.  

Holiday Inn is entertaining and has some great song and dance numbers and Bing Crosby has great onscreen chemistry with Fred Astaire.  Their co-stars Marjorie Reynolds and Virginia Dale aren’t well remembered today, but they hold their own with Astaire and Crosby.  

The cast includes Louise Beavers, who plays Jim’s maid Mamie.  

Beavers acted in dozens of films in a career spanned from 1927 to 1960, usually playing maids or slaves.  She made TV history when she played the title role in the series Beaulah, the first TV sitcom to feature an African American lead.

It's worth noting that this film was released during the first year of the United States' entry into WWII. During Jim's 4th of July performance, a very patriotic film (some would characterize it as propaganda) is projected on the stage.

It features footage of soldiers and pilots preparing for war, war production in factories and it ends with an image of Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt. If you're fascinated with history (like I am), you'll appreciate this scene.

As RigbyMel said, here isn't much of a plot here, just great singing and dancing by two of the biggest stars of Hollywood's Golden Age, with songs written by the legendary Irving Berlin.  Since this blog covers programming related to every holiday, Holiday Inn is tailor-made for us.  

This film is available on DVD and also streams on Amazon and iTunes.

Holiday Inn is generally good in spite of its threadbare plot.  However, it has a few too many songs for my taste (I’m not a big fan of musicals).  That, combined with the blackface scene keep me from giving it a higher rating.  

J.A. Morris' rating:

2 and a half candy canes.