Frasier, was that the author Dr. Gordon Edelstein?
- Yes. - I wasn't aware that you knew him.
We just met. You see, the station is hiring another call-in psychiatrist
for a one-week trial period.
They've asked me to choose among the finalists.
Well, he'd be wonderful.
I just finished his book on the victims of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Poor tic-ridden devils.
Niles, before you take out your utensil chamois, I've got to tell you,
I've got another interview in just a few minutes,
though it's gonna be hard to top Dr. Edelstein.
- I'd say you're taking this rather well. - What do you mean?
Many people in your position would feel threatened at the thought of,
well, another cat sharing the litter box.
Your flattering analogy aside, Niles, I take it as a tribute.
Obviously, the station is so pleased with my show
they're looking for more of the same.
They can hardly ask me to do another three hours.
You can imagine how exhausting that would be.
And for you as well.
Anyway, moving on to me, what's the verdict?
- Verdict? - On my new look.
- I say you deserve some of the credit. - Really?
Yes, you keep saying I should accept Daphne's relationship with Donny
and find a paramour of my own. Well, the hunt is on.
I thought to bolster my self-esteem, I would adopt this raffish new look.
Well, it suits you.
Dashing and yet understated and...
Oh, I give up. What are we talking about?
My moustache.
I grant you, it's at an early stage.
What stage? Research and development?
- Dr. Crane. Dr. Nora Fairchild. - Oh, yes, of course. Welcome.
I can't tell you what a privilege this is.
I listened to your show today and I was amazed.
Well...
I hope that doesn't sound too fawning.
Fawning is just fine. Fawning is fun.
I hope I'm not interrupting another interview.
No, no, this is my brother, Niles Crane. He's just about to leave.
I should have known you two were brothers.
The same superb fashion sense,
the same refined yet masculine good looks.
You must be so proud of your kid brother, the radio star.
Well, yes.
Congratulations on your new job. I hope you'll be very happy at KACL.
Isn't that a bit premature?
Oh, well, let's just say I know my little brother.
- Well, here's where it all happens. - Dr. Nora, welcome. Please come in.
I see you've already met our crack station manager.
Yes. I wanna thank you both
for making me and my producer feel welcome.
Is everyone around here as friendly as you two?
- Well... - Well, hello there.
Some are even friendlier.
This is my producer, Roz Doyle.
Dr. Nora. And this is my producer, George.
- Nice to meet you. - Hello.
Follow me and I'll give you the lay of the land.
Let's just hope that's a figure of speech and not a sales pitch.
Well, Nora, please, please, do come in. Make yourself at home.
Here we are. Get settled in. Here's your headset.
Of course, the phone lines. Everything's self-explanatory.
Cough button, on-air button.
Listen, I want you to remember, it's all right to be nervous.
Even my first show was a tad bumpy.
Bumpy?
It was a train wreck. Medic, we got incoming.
Thank you, Kenny. You weren't even here then.
I got a tape of it from my Secret Santa.
- Break a leg, Dr. Nora. - Thank you.
I'll get out of your hair.
Godspeed, Dr. Nora.
What are you smirking about?
Oh, gosh, it's just so much fun to have a protégé.
Do you see the way she behaves towards me?
It's like a shy Japanese novice bowing before her Frasier sensei.
I feel a bow coming on myself. Could you pass me that wastebasket?
Stop it. All right, she's about to start.
I just wanna catch the beginning,
make sure she's got those first-show jitters under control.
Let's get right to our first caller. Who do we have?
We have Jenny from Tacoma on line one.
Hello, Jenny. I'm Dr. Nora and I'm here to help.
Hi, Dr. Nora.
My boyfriend and I have been living together for about two years.
Are you having sex?
Our sex life's not the problem. It's great.
But whenever I mention marriage, he changes the subject.
Do you think that he's afraid of commitment?
No, that's not it.
Let me help you see this from a different perspective.
You're a whore, Jenny.
You're sleeping with a man you're not married to.
In my book, that's a whore.
Well, I'm not a whore. I'm a flight attendant.
Oh, you think there's no overlap?
Well, she's got her jitters under control.
Wake up, Jenny, you've blown it. Dump this creep.
Find a new guy, and until you're Mrs. New Guy,
you keep those knees together, okay? Staple them.
I don't care if you have to hop to the altar.
God bless, honey. Who's next?
- Hello, Daphne. - Hello.
Notice anything?
Oh, yes. Don't you look dashing.
Blue really is your colour.
Hold still, though, there's something on your lip.
Oh, wait, it's some sort of hair.
Actually, it's a moustache.
Oh, yes, so it is. Still a bit on the wispy side.
Yeah, it puts me in mind of me Grammy Moon.
Or rather, it will do, once it's grown in a bit.
- Turn on the radio. - Is something the matter?
Just turn the radio on to KACL, please.
Listen to me. You have a child.
You think you have the right to get divorced
just because you're tired of your husband?
But he's gay.
You picked him. You made a baby with him.
Maybe you got him drunk,
maybe you dressed up as Antonio Banderas, I don't care.
Just make it work.
Well, that's a bit harsh.
Please, this is a woman who believes the Spanish Inquisition
was just tough love for heretics.
We were listening to her while I was doing my exercises,
- and I don't think she's so bad. - Excuse me?
Well, it's nice to have someone stand up for old-fashioned values.
Like sex. I mean, I'm no prude, but in my day,
sex was still something sacred and mysterious.
Nowadays, you can't even turn on the television
without hearing all this... stuff.
Well, I think that explains our 90-dollar cable bill this month.
I liked her too. She reminds me of my old mum.
She'll point out every little flaw you've got,
remind you of every mistake you ever made.
Tell you you're lazy, you'll never amount to anything
and no good man will ever have you.
But it's just because she loves you.
In fact, I think I'll give old Mum a call.
You know, if you hate her so much, why did you hire her?
Well, I didn't know she was going to behave this way.
She said all the right things at the interview.
She certainly did.
She complimented his clothes, his looks,
she even pretended to think I was the older brother.
Of course, the moustache may have clouded her judgement on that.
She has a moustache?
Well, like it or not, I am responsible for her being here.
I'll just have to have a talk with her, tell her to soften her approach
before she alienates her entire audience.
People can tell the difference
between constructive criticism and outright abuse.
No, Mum, me boyfriend hasn't dumped me
for someone prettier and smarter yet.
She's such an old tease.
Until tomorrow, then, this is Dr. Frasier Crane.
Dr. Nora.
Such a frosty tone. Is something the matter?
I have just one question for you.
What kind of vicious, judgemental, name-calling,
machete-mouthed bitch are you?
I was going for the less feisty version.
I heard what you said to that single mother yesterday.
For your information, I happen to be a single mom too.
That doesn't surprise me, after watching you pounce on poor George
like a Kodiak bear on a salmon.
- That does it! - Roz, Roz, stop it.
I've got to talk to Dr. Nora before her show.
Just pencil in the hair-pulling for later, all right?
All right, but this isn't over between us.
If you want to, I'll take this out on the street.
That would hardly be fair. You'd have the home-field advantage.
Roz, Roz, Roz, get out. Out.
Well, I don't even know where to begin.
Save it. Whatever it is, I've already heard it.
"Dr. Nora is mean. Dr. Nora hurts people's feelings."
Too bad. I'm not here to coddle people.
- I'm here to help them. - Oh, really?
And just how were you helping that poor confused bisexual woman
by calling her an equal-opportunity slut?
The worst thing about this is how you misrepresented yourself to get this job.
You're hardly one to question my ethics.
We both know you hired me
because you hoped I might sleep with you.
- That thought never occurred to me. - Now who's lying?
You won't admit that, like most men,
you leave all major decisions to your penis.
Fortunately for Seattle, your penis chose right.
It just didn't know why.
Yes, well, you're just forgetting one thing, Dr. Nora.
You are here on my recommendation. You may consider it withdrawn.
- Hey, Dr. Crane. - Kenny, just the man I wanted to see.
Dr. Nora. Don't hit me.
I wanna talk about Dr. Nora's show.
Get in line. The switchboard's been going nuts.
- I don't doubt it. - They love you.
Excuse me?
Except for the ones that hate you. Either way, they're listening.
So you consider that option picked up.
- Ten seconds. - Thank you, Kenny.
Now get out of my booth.
Yes, ma'am.
Kenny.
You can't be serious about hiring that woman full-time.
Putting that woman behind a mike
is like putting Typhoid Mary in a kissing booth.
I'm sorry, doc. Ratings are ratings.
Hello, Dr. Nora.
My name is Tom and I have this co-worker
who's really driving me up the wall. What can I do about it?
Not a thing, Tom. Not one damn thing.
Nothing I ever do is good enough for her.
I baked a cake for her birthday and she said it tasted like sawdust.
I know she's my mother,
but sometimes I just wanna shut her out of my life.
Oh, Denise, burning bridges solves nothing.
I'd like to suggest that you seek family counselling
to help you and your mother get to the root of these issues,
provided your mother is willing to cooperate.
If not, perhaps individual counselling would help.
Will you stay on the line so Roz can give you some numbers?
Okay. Thank you, Dr. Crane.
It's my pleasure.
Well, I see through the glass that Dr. Nora either disagrees with me
or has just eaten a bad clam.
I'm sure she'll tell us which when the Dr. Nora Show begins,
right after this traffic report from Chopper Dave.
Okay, Denise, I've got the numbers for you.
- Do you have a pencil? - Come on, Roz, hurry up.
I wanna get out of here before her trainer shows up
with a bucket of live mice for her pre-show feeding.
I'm sorry to cut you off, Chopper Dave, but we have a therapy emergency.
- Denise, are you still on? - Yes.
- That's my caller. - Denise.
I want you to ignore everything Dr. Crane just told you.
I know more about mothers than he does.
And here is fact number one: They don't change.
Cut this woman out of your life.
- I don't believe this. - You don't think that with counsel...?
When you have a tumour, what do you do?
Do you sit it down and say, "Hey, tumour, let's get along, okay?"
No, you take a knife and you cut it out. Well, Denise, your mother is a tumour.
My heart bleeds for you, because I have been there.
I know how hard it is to look at your mother's face and say:
"Bye-bye, you toxic harpy. You're not hurting me again."
But that is what you have to do.
I think maybe you're right.
I'm always right.
And you know what else?
I bet your cake was yummy. God bless, honey.
- Who's next? - We have Frasier from here.
How dare you ambush Denise that way?
Well, what a surprise.
I dare to give one of Frasier's callers a second opinion,
and what does Frasier say?
Yes, sound effects, the therapist's best friend.
You realize what you're doing is unprofessional.
Denise called my show. She didn't ask for your opinion.
And I didn't ask for yours. Back to you, Chopper Dave.
She just cut me off.
All right, let's just settle this.
We don't like each other, but we're gonna have to coexist here.
So why don't we agree that I won't criticize you
and you won't criticize me. Deal?
- No. - No?
No, I will undermine you every chance I get,
because you, Dr. Crane, are a dangerous man.
- I'm dangerous? - Yes.
Seattle's great enabler.
You tell tramps and fornicators that their problem is low self-esteem.
They should have low self-esteem. They're going to hell.
I take it back.
You're not unprofessional, you're a freaking loon.
Five seconds.
All right, if it's war you two want, it's war you'll get.
Right, Roz?
You don't actually buy all this no-sex stuff of hers, do you?
- Yeah. - Well, it's war!
- Oh, hi, Niles. - Hey, Dad.
As you've probably noticed, I shaved my moustache.
I decided a better way to change my look was to pump some iron.
- So, what, you joined a gym? - I certainly did.
I start the minute my weight belt gets back from the monogrammer's.
Frasier, you free for dinner?
Well, I suppose so, yes.
Hey, look who I bumped into in the elevator.
- Roz. - Hey, Roz.
I've been on the phone all day digging up dirt on Dr. Nora,
- and you will not believe what I found. - Really?
I called the station where she worked and they couldn't wait to dish her.
For starters, she has no medical degree.
Her doctorate is in Physical Education.
She's a gym teacher.
Wouldn't wanna be the chubby kid in that gym class.
Or the boy in the monogrammed weight belt.
Well, this is just dynamite, Roz.
Oh, that's not even half of it. Her name isn't Fairchild.
She was born Mulhern.
And Little Miss Family-Values has two divorces behind her
and an affair with a married man.
Tomorrow, I am going to drop this little bombshell
to start my show and end hers.
You know, Fras, when I was on the force,
I went through a feud like this with Charlie Drucker,
and believe me, it's not worth it.
I started out by making a joke about his chest.
- His chest? - Yeah.
He was, like, a heavyset guy and he had those, you know, man bosoms.
So he heard about it and he got mad at me
and he wrote something about me on the men's room wall,
and I should have just called it quits right there and then,
but his name being Drucker brought out the poet in me.
And it just got worse and worse,
and we both ended up looking like idiots.
I don't intend to get into a feud with her, I just wanna get her off the air.
But if you attack her like that, aren't you just descending to her level?
You know, Roz, maybe they're right.
Look at what this woman has reduced me to already:
Trading barbs, yelling over the air. Now I'm spreading rumours about her.
Is that any way for a psychiatrist to deal with conflict?
Don't you wimp out on me.
Now, Roz, just think about it. There may be a better way.
You know what, Dr. Nora is clearly a damaged and angry woman.
Maybe I could find out
what's at the root of that anger and help her,
also proving that my method of therapy is the more valid one.
Why are you doing this to me? Look, if you have a tumour...
Roz, stop it!
If you wanna analyse her, you might start with that whole mother thing.
I caught her show yesterday. That seemed to be a hot-button issue.
Yes, it did, didn't it? They've been estranged for years.
Perhaps we could find the woman
and discover what caused this rift between them.
- Maybe even effect a reconciliation. - Of course, it won't be easy.
We don't even know if the woman's still alive.
Yes, all sorts of things could happen to a woman her age.
Her mother could've had a heart attack or a stroke.
Exactly.
She could be hit by a bus as she's coming out of the pub,
or fall asleep smoking a cigarette
and be burned to a crisp right there in her smelly bed.
Or she could fall off a ferry and be pulled down under the water,
the roar of the waves drowning out her cries for help,
until no one could hear that shrill voice of hers, not ever again.
Well, I'm all done with me darks.
Listen to me.
You should be shunning this woman, not rewarding her with gifts.
A baby shower for an unwed mother. Now I've heard it all. Who's next?
Roz. Did her mother get here all right?
Yes, but I'm begging you,
we could drive a stake through that thing's heart right now!
Roz, please, trust me. My way is better. Get in there.
Mrs. Mulhern, I'm Dr. Frasier Crane. It's such a pleasure to meet you.
Dr. Crane, I can't thank you enough for finding me and bringing me here.
Well, I was so moved by your story, it's a joy to do this for you.
For 20 years, I've wondered where my little girl was
and if I'd ever see her again.
What did you two fight about to begin with?
Oh, I blame myself.
I thought the man she wanted to marry wasn't good enough for her.
So she eloped, and I've been so afraid the emphysema would finish me
before I could ask her forgiveness and tell her I love her.
Well, tell her you shall.
Roz?
Forget couples therapy, Allison. He is a loser.
If you don't drop him right now,
you deserve every bit of misery that you get.
God bless, honey. Who's next?
We have Frasier Crane on line one.
Frasier, you wanna yell at me for that last call?
No, although I do believe that a gifted therapist
can help two people put aside their anger
and heal the differences between them.
I have someone here with me today.
Someone you haven't seen for quite a while.
There's something she'd like to tell you.
Something she's wanted to tell you for a very long, long time.
Mrs. Mulhern?
You little whore!
Mother!
So you thought you could get away from me, did you?
Thought you could leave me to rot in that dump
without barely enough cash for a bottle of Mateus.
You'll pay for that, missy.
I was wrong, Frasier. Your way is better.
- Mrs. Mulhern! - Keep out of this!
- Mother, please, I am doing my show. - Yes.
You're Little Miss Perfect now, aren't you?
Telling everybody else how wicked they are.
They should hear about your past.
Mrs. Mulhern, please.
The shame you brought on me, you ungrateful tramp.
Please, I'm a good girl now.
How you were paid. Paid to leave town by that nice boy's family.
For God's sake, Nora, go to commercial.
There, Seattle, now you know what I mean
when I say there's people you just don't need in your life.
- Help me out, George. - What do they pay you here?
I want my cut.
I knew that you hated me, but I just can't believe you could be so cruel.
I was trying to help. She seemed delightful on the phone.
I want $50 right now.
How many times will I have to move before I'm finally free of her?
Nora, I'm sorry.
- You owe me, missy. I gave you life. - Mrs. Mulhern.
How could you?
Frasier, we've got dead air.
Hello, this is Dr. Frasier Crane.
I'm sure Dr. Nora's listeners join me in hoping that she and her mother
can resolve these differences very soon.
They're off to a bit of a bumpy start...
...but at least the lines of communication are open.