Nancy walks in on Jeff and finds him with another woman and moves back home. Buddy overhears something Kate says about her children, and runs away.Nancy walks in on Jeff and finds him with another woman and moves back home. Buddy overhears something Kate says about her children, and runs away.Nancy walks in on Jeff and finds him with another woman and moves back home. Buddy overhears something Kate says about her children, and runs away.
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Featured reviews
Kristy (or Kristie, as she is credited in the opening credits!) just looked so darn cute, and her acting was brilliant. In one scene, she overhears her Mother and Father fighting and her mother mentions that while pregnant with Buddy, she wasn't sure she wanted to go thru with the pregnancy. The hurt look on Kristy's face at that moment was so real and convincing. I think it was at that point that I bonded with Kristy, because what little kid, at one time or another, hasn't thought that his/her parents really didn't want them? And to hear you parents actually admit something like that (even though deep down you know they really DO love you) is a traumatic experience, and Kristy portrayed that experience wonderfully. Not many child stars could have pulled it off as sincerely.
A little bit later in the plot, just after she is caught by the caretaker, and he is threatening to call the cops on her for breaking the windows of the greenhouse, she has the cutest little pout on her face as she sits there wondering what her next move should be. Seeing it after all these years just re-affirms my admiration for Kristy and her talent. No wonder she won the EMMY AWARD three years in a row.
For me, watching FAMILY is all about KRISTY!! I can't wait to finish watching the first and second season, and hope for the release of the rest of the seasons!!
The episode starts when Nancy comes home to her apartment to see, much to her horror, that her husband Jeff (John Rubinstein) is sleeping with one of her girlfriends and decides to move back to her parents' house, with her having no intention of returning back and Doug and Kate learn that Nancy's pregnant again, but considers an abortion. Buddy's smart-aleck behavior at dinner, later that night, only heightens tension in the household. Doug and Kate, soon after, get into an argument about Nancy's unborn child, as well as her fractured marriage. Buddy overhears the conversation when an angry Kate admits she wanted out of pregnancy before Buddy was born. Hurt, she takes off in the family car around the same time Jeff shows up at the house to talk some sense into Nancy. Of course, things do work out for everybody in the end.
Did you know
- TriviaSeason One originally aired as a six part miniseries before it was picked up as a regular series, beginning with Season Two.
- GoofsKate reminds Doug that she has borne three children, referring to Nancy, Willie and Letitia. It is later revealed that they had a son Timmy, three years younger than Willie and three years older than Buddy, but he drowned. Thus, she had in fact borne four children. This inconsistency is explained by this being the pilot, and then the main series was like a separate thing, and often scriptwriters either forget, or are not the same for every episode. This happens often in a number of series.
- Quotes
Doug Lawrence: [to Willie, who both witness Kate angrily slamming dishes and silverware on the counter] Willie, take a piece of pie up to Buddy. See that she's doing her homework.
[Willie cuts a piece of pie onto a plate and leaves the kitchen, as Doug attempts to massage Kate's shoulders to calm her down]
Kate Lawrence: [fights him off] Don't! And I don't want to talk, either. I'm too angry.
Doug Lawrence: At anyone in particular?
Kate Lawrence: Yes, at you! Don't make it sound as if I don't want my own daughter here. Don't make me angrier than I already am. I just said you've judged and condemned Jeff without listening to a word of defense. For you, Nancy's perfect, maybe she's not to Jeff and she's married to him and has a child by him and another one coming. Without a moment's hesitation, you say "Come home, we'll send for your things. He's not worth your little finger".
Doug Lawrence: If you see...
Kate Lawrence: I don't have to have been there. I know how it was. She cried and looked helpless. Doug, she is not helpless. For her sake, you must not allow her to manipulate you like this.
Doug Lawrence: You sound like some crazy jealous female, not like a mother, whose own daughter is being pushed around by that twenty-five-year-old infant!
Kate Lawrence: She is MARRIED to that twenty-five-year-old infant and anyone who tries to push Nancy around, he had better be wearing protective padding.
Doug Lawrence: For God's sake, Kate, why do you always have to be so tough on her?
Kate Lawrence: Because you never are. You think Nancy's just perfection, but, believe me, she does have a few little faults. One of them is she wants everything.
Doug Lawrence: What does that mean, everything?
Kate Lawrence: Well, four years ago, she was dying to be Mrs. Jeff Maitland III. She threw over everything, quit school, grabbed him out.
Doug Lawrence: SHE grabbed HIM out?
Kate Lawrence: Married him. Then, she wanted a baby. Now, she parks the baby for one week at a time. Then, she wanted to go back to school. Now, she's playing hooky from school. She thinks she can reverse field anytime she feels like it. Well, she can't!
Doug Lawrence: How can you possibly condone what he did, fooling around with one of her friends? What kind of humiliation do you expect her to take from him and go on with the marriage?
Kate Lawrence: Exactly the kind I took from you, Doug.
Doug Lawrence: That was twenty years ago. Don't you ever let it go, ever forget?
Kate Lawrence: Oh, I forget most of the time when I remember. When sometimes I do remember about you and Margaret. It hurts me just as much as it did, then, and I hate you for it just as much as I did, then.
Doug Lawrence: That's stupid AND destructive.
Kate Lawrence: That's right. I don't see that Jeff's behavior is so different from yours and I wonder if Nancy hasn't given him more reason. I married a man, she married a boy. If he's still a boy after, four years of marriage, maybe, it's partly her fault. She hasn't done anything to get out of his playpen. She just crawled in with him, 'till she got bored.
Doug Lawrence: Kate... what about the baby? She doesn't want the baby.
Kate Lawrence: If I got rid of a baby, every time I thought I didn't want it, we wouldn't have much of a family.
Doug Lawrence: Oh, you don't mean that.
Kate Lawrence: Don't tell me to presume what I mean! I'm forty-six years old, I've borne three children. Some of the time of those pregnancies, I wanted out! It's the body that makes the baby and hangs onto it for nine months. Why can't men understand sometimes women just want out? My god, when I found out I was pregnant with Buddy, I got as far as even tracking down an abortionist.
[Buddy, hurt and who overheard the whole conversation tip-toes back upstairs and tears start to run out of her eyes]
Kate Lawrence: Why can't you understand eventually I wanted all of them. Now, I can't imagine life without them, but sometimes, sometimes just for a minute... I didn't.
[Doug goes over to hug and comfort Kate, who starts crying]