This week Modern Family deals with Tooth Fairies, Careers and Novels. Let’s get started, shall we?
Tooth Fairy: Cam and Mitchell are excited Lily lost her first tooth. This of course leads Cam to tell a story about his days growing up on the farm.
Cam: “When I had my first loose tooth my momma tied one end of a string to it and the other to the tail of a Guernsey Cow, fired off a twelve gage shot gun and the cow went running out of the room.”
Lily however is smart, too smart. She fakes being asleep while hiding a butterfly catching net with a flashlight under her covers in order to catch the Tooth Fairy when she gets to her room. This is going to be harder than Cam and Mitchell thought.
Lily must have fallen asleep because the next morning she wakes to find an envelope from the Tooth Fairy. It contains fairy dust, stickers a tooth brush and a hundred dollar bill. Lily is pretty excited, obviously. Cam however is sorry, in the dark last night he made a mistake. Mitchell thinks maybe it is the wine that played a part in the mistake. Either way, they don’t want to be the parents of a six year old who got $100 from the Tooth Fairy. Later that day Lily gets another letter from the Tooth Fairy, this time in the mail. She hopes it is more money but the letter is to tell her the Tooth Fairy made a mistake. Lily needs to leave the $100 under her pillow and it will be exchanged for $1. Lily is really not loving this idea. Cam and Mitchell think they need to give the Tooth Fairy the money back but Lily says no, she is keeping it. “I’m scared she is the one who will be taking care of us when we’re older,” Mitchell says.
Desperate to get the money back Cam and Mitchell have roped Haley into playing the Tooth Fairy. She is decked out in a pink outfit, a pink wig and a masquerade mask to hide her identity. Did they just have this outfit laying around I wonder? Haley aka Tooth Fairy wakes Lily. Lily wants to know if she is really the Tooth Fairy and Haley assures her she is, but then Haley makes a grammatical error and Lily says she knows it’s Haley. Haley takes off her mask and says Lily is pretty smart. Lily says she can’t give the money back because she has plays to buy a scooter with it. Somehow Haley comes through with the right thing to say. She tells Lily she would probably keep the money too, she doesn’t care what Santa thinks. After further questioning, Haley says Santa sees everything and keeping the money will probably put Lily on the naughty list. What does Lily care about getting presents every year, she has $100 and she will have a scooter to ride around the empty Christmas Tree. Cam and Mitchell look on in grateful awe. Lily wants some time to think about it. Eventually before going to bed for the night she does the right thing and puts the $100 under her pillow.
Career Day: It’s Career Day at Luke and Manny’s school and Phil is super excited Phil just barely starts his spiel when Gil Thorpe, his nemesis, arrives. Phil tries to shrug Gil’s interruptions off and instead starts his presentation. Unfortunately his presentation is a video of himself dressed as a kid who Phil talks to about his life. I say unfortunately because it is completely ridiculous. “Kid Phil” uses words like “Cray-Cray”. It’s not good. Gil keeps interrupting, throwing Phil’s timing off. Phil gets frustrated and leaves. Gil finishes his pitch and the teacher says they have some time left. Claire is still in the classroom having been there to support Phil so the teacher wonders if she will talk to the class about her job as a stay at home mom. Claire gets up and starts talking about what she does with her days. The kids ask why she didn’t go back to work after her children got older and Claire says she always thought she would but it’s not easy to get back into the work force. Gil stands up for Claire against the rude interrupting student and says stay at home mom’s rock.
Out at the car Gil makes sure Claire is okay. Then he offers her a job as a liaison with the planning commission on a project he has in the works. She needs a few days to think about it.
When she goes home to tell Phil he is not okay with Claire working for Gil. He reminds her Gil is his nemesis and Claire reminds him he isn’t Batman. Apparently only Batman can have a nemesis. Phil and Luke are driving around later in the day when Gil calls. He rubs in the job offer he gave Claire. Despite Luke being in the care Gil makes a number of inappropriate references regarding Claire.
Claire is at home getting her briefcase out for her first day of work, she has decided to take the job over Phil’s objections. Phil tries to tell her about Gil and his phone call but Claire says she has been happy all day. Someone finally values her. She knows Gil isn’t the greatest guy but she needs this. Phil tells her he wants her to take the job. When she runs out of the room, to take her shoulder pads out of all of her old suits, Phil tells Luke if it makes Claire happy he can handle a few rude phone calls from Gil. Just then Phil gets a text from Gil he reads it and gets teary eyed before leaving the room himself.
The Great American Novel: Jay and Manny are talking about Career Day as well. Manny didn’t ask Jay to participate because he figured he didn’t want to, which he doesn’t. It’s one of those, it would nice to have been asked, moments. Besides, being in the closet business isn’t what Jay wanted to do with his life, but it pays the bills. What he really wanted to do was write spy thrillers.
Gloria finds Jay’s typewriter and some paper for him. She puts it in front of him and tells him if he wants to write he should write. Jay says he has a busy day but Gloria has cleared his schedule. Now he can write.
Jay is trying to write his novel but he only gets a few sentences typed before drawing a blank. This blank leads to Jay finding a spot on the table that needs to be cleaned. The spot was food so that leads Jay to remembering it is lunch time. Eating lunch gets mayo on the typewriter which ends the writing for the time being. Manny gets home from school to ask Jay about his book. When Manny looks at what Jay has written he can’t come up with a single compliment. Jay tries to tell Manny what is happening in the plot and Manny starts spit-balling. It is so good Jay gets up and lets Manny type out his own ideas.
When Gloria gets home Jay pushes Manny out of the chair and pretends to be the one who did all of the work on the novel. Gloria asks to read it and as she makes constructive criticism Manny starts to get defensive over his story. Manny can’t hold it together and says it was his story, his ideas and stomps out of the room.
Voiceover (Manny): We all weave a web of lies. Some we tell to try to help the ones we love. Some we tell to try to fool ourselves, and some we tell because when you are out of bullets and staring down the barrel of a Kalashnikov, the only weapon you have left is guile.
Jay: She’s nuts. That’s fantastic.
This episode of Modern Family ends with Phil rallying the kids to clean up around the house before Claire gets home from her first day of work. Haley is to laundry, Alex is on kitchen and vacuuming and Luke is on bathrooms. Claire gets home almost immediately after Phil finishes giving the kids their chores. Phil wonders why she is home so early. Claire says Gil is a pig, he treated her like a servant and she was shown no respect. Phil choses that moment to ask Claire what’s for dinner. She glares at him and storms into the house.
Modern Family airs a brand new episode Wednesday 9/8c on ABC
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