Many of the stories this week take place at a school fair. Phil and Claire’s are celebrating their 20th anniversary (which means that Claire may have been pregnant with Haley at their wedding) and Phil has been preparing a song to sing to his wife with a band performing at the concert stage. Manny has prepared a decadent cake for the fair’s baking competition and his parents are concerned that he is losing his social status by partaking in that contest. Luke has a crush on Sienna, a girl that Alex is trying to become friends with (“I’m only one rung on the social class below her,” she tells the audience), and Cam is worried about his lackluster coaching abilities for the school’s football team and tries to motivate them to be a more cohesive group.
As the paragraph above would emphasize, the characters are not extending far from their types: Phil is doing something goofy that he hopes will please his wife; Manny cares deeply for more ‘feminine’ interests and risks his social standing; Luke is skittish around girls; Alex is skittish around potential friends and Cam is a nervous wreck and in over his head. We think we know exactly what is going to happen. However, while the conclusions are sometimes predictable, the paths to these ends are filled with offbeat and funny surprises.
Also surprising is that the episode makes callbacks to earlier episodes to strong comic effect. “A Fair To Remember” opens with the Dunphy kids bringing breakfast to their parents, but loudly announcing their arrival to ensure they do not catch them having sex. It is a great reference to “Caught in the Act,” the Emmy-winning episode from season 2, that opened with an earlier anniversary’s breakfast in bed go awry. Another story element making an appearance is Cam’s coaching of the high-school football team. Although this plotline does not get a lot of screen time, Eric Stonestreet gets some great material (in a flashback to a botched call, he yells at a referee, “That’s the worst call since they cast Russell Crowe in Les Mis!”)
Another friend from a past episode, male nanny Andy (Adam DeVine), returns in what is hopefully a recurring role. His story with Haley, who implausibly skips the fair to tan at Jay’s and drink some beer, is awkward and unnecessary. Andy frowns upon her underage drinking and despises how she flaunts her midriff-covered breasts to appease him. While DeVine is a strong presence, watching Sarah Hyland try to manipulate and boss him around through her sex appeal is questionable, even by the standards of her typically shallow, dim-witted character.
The episode’s most resonant storyline, however, comes from a rivalry between a cranky Jay and smooth talking dad Williams (Jordan Peele, from Key & Peele). The two get into a shouting match while dueling for the same parking space (“I don’t care if parking here is on the bucket list,” Williams yells) and then they have to partner up to be – get this – fair cops. The catch is that people at the fair give charity for the cops to fake-arrest someone. The two share a cop dynamic not unlike the one between Andy Samberg and Andre Braugher on Fox’s comedy, Brooklyn Nine-Nine. (Coincidentally, Beth McCarthy-Miller directed both “A Fair to Remember” and Tuesday’s Brooklyn Nine-Nine episode.)
Not all of the cast gets much to do here – Gloria’s decision to sabotage Manny’s cake feels forced and unlike the character – but there are enough creative alterations to the majority of the Pritchett-Dunphy Clan to make “A Fair to Remember” a, well, episode to remember. The one-liners, visual gags and double entendres are all aces, the guest stars a welcome change of pace, and the situational comedy (mostly) inspired.
Without the benefit of being an hour-long program filled with character arcs that develop from week to week, Modern Family will likely never return to the heights of inspired hilarity from earlier seasons. However, it is a delight to see some big laughs and some original situational comedy in what, at first glance, seem like mundane storylines.
