The Facts of Life - Season 1, Episode 2

"You have zero chance with this MILF,
Mr. Bradley. Here, eat some popcorn."

"Like Mother, Like Daughter"
Original airdate: 8/31/1979

Episode summary: Blair's MILFY mom drops by for Parents' Night and causes a scandal when she openly flirts with the married father of another student. 

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Recap: The girls are busily decorating their residence hall for Parents' Night - the chosen theme for which is French Cafe. Sue Ann - who's dressed in a pair of unspeakably short shorts that, let's be honest, those of us who grew up in the '70s probably wore a lot - tells Molly that going with a French theme was a super great idea. Molly gears up to deliver her lines in her annoying overly-exaggerated line delivery style and replies, "Yeah. The old dump looks tres magnifique!" [Cue superfluous laugh track.] Natalie jokes that their parents will be impressed 'cause they're breaking out the good plastic. Cindy and Nancy rush into the room to announce that Mrs. Garrett is on her way in and that she's wearing a French outfit they put together for her, which, Nancy warns, she's kind of shy about. Mrs. Garrett emerges from the kitchen wearing a tight red and black striped sweater and dark leather skirt, and she's self consciously trying to cover her ample hips and bosom. Molly tells her to hold that pose so she can look up what it means in her Big Book of Body Language. The girls assure Mrs. Garrett that she looks great, so she throws all insecurity to the wind and starts singing, "I love Paris in the spring time!" and thrusts her bountiful hips. Mercifully, she throws on an apron to cover up the risque outfit and gets back to the business of being a housemother. Blair comes downstairs in a pair of purple short shorts and a velour top (haha! remember those??), and she's carrying a painting she did of Quasimodo. She tells Mrs. Garrett she hopes her mother likes it when she drops by later for Parents' Night, and then prattles on and on about how gorgeous and charming her mother is. Mrs. Garrett announces that she has to go check on the quiche, then exits the room while performing another hip-thrusting jig, which the laugh track also finds hilarious. 

Mr. Bradley and Miss Mahoney enter the dorm...and Miss Mahoney hands out hello badges for all the girls to wear for Parents' Night. Mr. Bradley tells the girls to change into nicer clothes, so they all rush upstairs at once. He heads over to the door and somehow he's not paying attention to what he's doing and bumps into a hot blonde woman who has just let herself in. As he dumbly stares at her like the emotionally stunted man-child he is, she introduces herself as Blair's mom. She then gives him a coquettish little smile and says she doesn't have to hear him say his name and says, "I knew who you were the minute I saw you." He's all, "Huh?!" until she points at his name badge. Womp womp! He welcomes her to Eastland, compliments her devastating beauty, and tries to fish around for information that will reveal to him whether or not she's married. MILF comes right out and tells him that she and her latest husband have been divorced for three years...and he likes the sound of that. Mrs. Garrett enters the room, gets introduced to MILF, and then shoves a bowl of popcorn between the two of them. A few seconds later, Blair and her little friends run downstairs (I notice that none of them changed into nicer clothes), and Blair hugs her mom hello. She introduces MILF to all her friends...and Nancy stares at her in awe and tells her she's the most beautiful lady she's ever seen, and Sue Ann asks her what she has to do to look so good. MILF tells her young admirers that she gets lots of rest, exercise, and milk...and this prompts Tootie to announce if she could look that good from milk she'd drink a cow! After the laugh track dies down, the girls get back to work setting everything up for Parents' Night - except for Sue Ann and Cindy, who continue to admire MILF's enviable figure. We get it, show. The woman is an exquisite angel.

"You're an angel, a beauty, a goddess."

"Uh oh. Something just exploded in my pants."

"Mmmm...aaaaaaaahhh"MILF hands Blair a big box and gleefully tells her, "It's your first Christian Dior!" and Blair opens it excitedly. Meanwhile, Mr. Bradley tells Mrs. Garrett he's quite smitten with MILF and wonders if he should ask her out. Mrs. Garrett points out how completely inappropriate that would be - considering he's the headmaster of Eastland, and MILF is the mother of one of his students. Bwahaha!! I'm totally kidding, course. Mrs. Garrett tells him she thinks it's an awesome idea, and strongly urges him to give it a shot - as though it's within the realm of possibility that a nitwit like him could have a shot at a hot MILF like Blair's mom.

A man named Justin Brand arrives at the school, introduces himself to Mrs. Garrett as Nina's father (dunno who that is), and says that his wife has the flu and is unable to make it for Parents' Night. Blair and MILF enter the room a few seconds later, and it looks like MILF and Justin know each other. The two hug hello, and then Justin creepily admires the collective beauty of MILF and Blair. MILF explains to her daughter that she and Justin have known each other since they were kids, so Blair says hello and politely shakes his hand. MILF tells her that that's no way to greet an old friend of hers and orders her to give him a big kiss. Blair looks icked out at the thought of kissing a middle-aged male who's a complete stranger to her, and MILF shames her by saying, "I'm sorry...I thought you were my daughter." Blair leans in and gives Justin a quick peck on the cheek, and he smiles at her and says, "Well, thank you very much", then creepily tells MILF, "She's going to break a lot of hearts." MILF tells Blair she wants to show Justin around the campus (apparently she used to attend Eastland when she was a girl), so she and Justin head out, their arms wrapped around each others' waists...and Blair stares after them unhappily.

"Go give that middle-aged man you've never met a big juicy kiss."

"Those young lips probably shouldn't have felt as good on my cheek as they did."

Tootie rolls into the room with Natalie, and Molly says, "Boy! Blair's mom really knows how to talk with her body!" and Mrs. Garrett quips that people tend to listen when MILF's body talks. Molly needlessly lists all the ways that MILF gives off confident body language, then mumbles something about how she'd like to study Miss Mahoney's body language next. Good God...what for?? By scripted coincidence, Miss Mahoney enters the room at that moment and excitedly asks for a pen to fill in more hello badges. I guess she's pretty jazzed about Parents' Night. Mrs. Garrett happens to mention to her that Justin Brand's wife is at home, sick with the flu, and Miss Mahoney's eyes widen as she reports that she just saw a woman kissing him. Mrs. Garrett's eyes also widen and she's all, "Wha-a?!"

Tootie and Natalie inform Sue Ann that they just caught MILF and Nina's dad making out. Tootie gleefully exclaims, "They're having an affair!" Sue Ann says she doesn't believe it, so Tootie and Natalie do a re-dramatization of what they witnessed, then cackle at each other and call the kissing part disgusting. Sue Ann orders them to stop laughing and chides them for spying...but then a second later she's totally up for some dish and asks what else they saw the couple doing.   

Mrs. Garrett is shortening the hem of Blair's new Dior dress. Blair tells her she never learned how to sew due to her mother's general policy that "beautiful women were not put on the earth to do menial tasks". She quickly backtracks and assures Mrs. Garrett that even though she's hemming, she's not an uggo...and Mrs. Garrett tells her that nothing is menial as long as you feel good about yourself. Blair asks her why she's not fawning over her mom's beauty like everyone else is, and Mrs. Garrett treads carefully and says that she thinks MILF is...um, "nice". Blair presses the issue and asks her if she thinks her mom comes onto men too much, and Mrs. Garrett fake assures her that there's nothing wrong with being a little flirty. She then suddenly "remembers" she forgot to refrigerate the chocolate mousse and flees the room. Blair heads downstairs and overhears Justin telling her mom that he got them a romantic booth at the Candlelight Inn. MILF giggles and calls him "a devil", and he saucily tells her he's looking forward to a long dessert. The two slink off together without noticing Blair, who's staring after them in stunned silence.  

"Do you think my mother's a loose tart?"

"I just remembered...I have to go to the kitchen and check on an imaginary chocolate mousse. Tee hee hee...da da da.."

Blair is so disgusted with MILF that she announces to her friends she's giving away her new Dior dress. Sue Ann eagerly snaps it up, but Nancy self-righteously declares that it belongs to Blair, and grabs it back from Sue Ann. Blair proceeds to toss it in the trash, so then Sue Ann grabs the garbage can and makes off with it. Blair, meanwhile, is sitting in front of her mirror, trying her best to transform herself into an uggo by applying cold cream on her face and putting up her hair in ponytails. Mrs. Garrett enters her room and asks her whassup with her giving away her new dress, so Blair tells her she gave it away 'cause she doesn't want to be anything like her trampy mother. She tells Mrs. Garrett that she overheard her and Justin make plans to hook up, then wails, "He's a married man!!" Mrs. Garrett looks visibly uncomfortable at the thought of having to discuss the slutty MILF again and tells Blair it's probably just an innocent reunion between friends. Blair retorts by putting on a thick ugly pair of glasses and declaring that she has no desire to act in such a sleazy manner when she's old enough to be a MILF. Tootie rolls in to report that MILF and Mr. Bradley are doing something unholy on the couch downstairs, and Mrs. Garrett rushes out of the room to check it out.

MILF and Mr. Bradley are on the couch - but mercifully they're just chatting. Miss Mahoney glares at them from a few feet away...and I guess we're supposed to interpret this as she has the hots for the milquetoast. Mrs. Garrett comes barreling downstairs and tells Mr. Bradley she needs to talk to him, like pronto...so he reluctantly tears himself away from MILF. Mrs. Garrett tells him that Blair is very upset because she overheard MILF secretly planning to hook up with a married man, then advises him to counsel Blair through this troubled time. Mr. Bradley, who looks crestfallen that MILF has dallied with another, says it's not his problem and would prefer not to interfere. Mrs. Garrett begs to differ and decrees, "When one of our girls has a problem, it becomes our business." Fair enough...I guess that is the general premise of the show.

Blair comes downstairs and snippily tells her mom she wants to speak with her. MILF asks her why she's not wearing the Dior she just bought her, and gives Blair's dorky ponytails a look of derision. Blair snarks, "That's your kind of dress, not mine." She says she wants to be as unlike her as she possibly can, then accuses her of plotting to sneak away for a romantic evening with a married man. MILF looks fake startled and says that she and Justin have been good friends for years, and that the alleged "romantic evening" is just a harmless get together. Blair tells her to cut the crap 'cause she overheard her and Justin planning it, and MILF just kind of throws up her hands and asks what she's supposed to do when men are relentlessly attracted to beautiful women such as herself. Blair snarls that she doesn't want to be like that and is ashamed to have such a loose tart for a mother. This provokes MILF to slap Blair across the face in full view of the rest of the girls, and Blair silently flees the room. Mr. Bradley enters the room in his usual I'm-an-oblivious-dumbass manner and asks anyone if they'd like punch? Or pound cake, perhaps? 

Blair's sitting on her bed, looking visibly upset, when Mrs. Garrett comes in for a post-slap one-on-one. Blair snaps that she's not in the mood for a lecture and has no intention of changing her opinion about her slutty mother. Mrs. Garrett holds up Molly's Big Book of Body Language and chastises her for the way her arms are crossed in front of her chest, 'cause it makes her look all judgey. The fuck? Blair explains that MILF and her slutty ways have messed up a lot of lives over the years, including hers...but Mrs. Garrett glosses over that valid complaint and tells Blair that her life has "just begun". Blair wails about how much she hates her mom's affairs and broken marriages, and that too is glossed over when Mrs. Garrett tells her that MILF is just flirtatious...then points out that her presence at Parents' Night proves how much she's devoted to her. Blair doesn't think to argue back that if MILF were truly devoted to her, she'd actually be raising her instead of dumping her off at a boarding school. Mrs. Garrett tells Blair she needs to accept "the whole package" that is MILF, and that she (Blair) isn't necessarily destined to become a hussy when she grows up. "Beauty doesn't have to be a curse", she soberly declares. Blair mulls that over and recalls that her good looking grandmother has been married to her husband for fifty-two years...but then, he's loaded. After the obligatory laugh track winds down, Blair loosens up and lets out her ponytails. Sue Ann enters the room clutching the Dior dress and asks Mrs. Garrett if she can lengthen the hem. Blair and Mrs. Garrett just stare at her mutely, and Sue Ann correctly assumes that Blair has changed her mind and wants her dress back.

Blair and Mrs. Garrett head back downstairs and find MILF hanging with the other girls, carrying in a large pot of food she just helped cook. She's pleased to see Blair wearing the Dior dress, tells her she looks beautiful, and says she was thinking maybe she should start acting more like her daughter. Either that or a mature adult. Sue Ann invites MILF to have a gal's night in and spend the night, and MILF says there's nothing she'd rather do than spend time with her daughter. (I guess the date at the Candlelight Inn with Justin is off..??) Blair suddenly realizes that her MILFY mom may possibly have more sides to her than just being a vacuous tramp, and then everyone clumps together and starts singing.

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