Mallomars
S1 E4: Nuchslep
The Nanny, Sony Pictures, 1993.
Fran Fine is temporarily in charge of dinner because Niles is sick, which is how the crisis all began.
She does not cook. She orders Chinese food, explaining that she is merely trying to expose the Sheffield children to other cultures: “We order Chinese food, they learn how Jewish people eat.” The food takes an hour and a half to arrive, which is irritating right up until Fran opens the door and discovers that the delivery boy is Eddie, the young waiter who recently gave Maggie Sheffield her first kiss. Suddenly no one cares about the shrimp.
Maggie likes Eddie. Eddie likes Maggie. Fran likes the idea of Maggie liking Eddie, because Fran approaches adolescent romance the way an enthusiastic aunt approaches a clearance rack: there is no situation that cannot be improved by getting involved immediately and with both hands. Eddie asks Maggie out, Maggie says yes, and Fran now has to tell Maggie’s father.
Maxwell Sheffield receives the news approximately as any father would upon hearing that the teenage waiter who kissed his daughter has returned to the house under cover of moo shu pork. He initially proposes the simple solution of forbidding the date altogether. Fran argues that Maggie cannot be protected from boys forever and that if Maxwell refuses to open the front door, eventually she will start climbing out a window. Maxwell reluctantly agrees, but only on the condition that Fran goes too. She will be the chaperon, or, in Fran’s terminology, the nuchslep, “the tag-along, the pathetic loser living on the cusp of other people’s lives.”
This is not the role Fran had envisioned for herself, but Maggie is delighted. She has never been on a real date before and is terrified of having to sit alone with a boy she likes. Fran’s presence means that if conversation fails, an adult woman in an animal print can step in and keep the evening alive. This turns out to be both the solution and the problem.
At the movie theater, Maggie worries she is being too quiet. Fran advises her to relax and “be yourself, only louder,” which may be the most concise explanation of Fran Fine ever offered by the series. Then Eddie returns with popcorn and sodas, Fran makes a joke about the size of her drink, Eddie laughs, and Fran keeps going. Maggie, meanwhile, participates in the evening primarily by existing near the refreshments. Fran is not trying to monopolize the date. Fran is simply being Fran, which unfortunately produces many of the same visible results.
The following morning, Maggie is convinced she has ruined everything. She sat there “like a lump,” she says. Fran reassures her that mashed potatoes also sit there like lumps and everybody likes them. This is solid advice if your problem is low self-esteem and slightly less solid advice if your problem is dating. Then Eddie calls, not for Maggie, but for Fran. He wants to see her Friday night.
At this point, Maggie discovers sarcasm. She accuses Fran of stealing her boyfriend and retreats to her room to die, declining even Maxwell’s offer of ice cream, which is how the household knows the situation has become medically serious. Maxwell blames Fran for overstepping. Fran blames Maxwell for blaming Fran. Maxwell points out that sometimes Fran seems less like Maggie’s nanny than her girlfriend, and Fran hears this and immediately realizes he is a genius.
The solution, apparently, is not to establish firmer professional boundaries. The solution is to formalize the friendship. Fran goes upstairs carrying Mallomars (the show’s recurring chocolate-covered answer to emotional distress) and tells Maggie that perhaps she is too old to think of Fran as her nanny. They should instead be girlfriends, a relationship governed by the Official Girlfriends’ Code, or O.G.C.
Fran has rules. Rule number one is that you never gossip about your best friend, although this rule is immediately dismissed as “totally moronic” because nobody follows it. Rule number two is more relevant: if a girl falls for a guy and the guy falls for her “effervescent but totally blameless friend,” the friend is obligated to dump him. Rule number three concerns chocolate: every girl for herself. Maggie accepts these terms. She also accepts a Mallomar. This is the great strength of The Nanny: emotional repair is rarely allowed to occur without snacks.
Fran prepares to reject Eddie on Maggie’s behalf. She dresses nicely, because apparently rule number twenty-seven of the O.G.C. states that just because you are dumping someone does not mean you should look bad while doing it. Eddie arrives carrying spareribs, which Fran interprets as seduction. Naturally. First he dates Maggie, then he calls Fran, and now he appears at the door holding pork. “What are you,” Fran asks, “some kind of delivering Don Juan?”
But Eddie does not want to date Fran. He wants her help. He is an aspiring actor and would like Fran to give Maxwell his headshot and résumé. He did not want to ask Maggie because he genuinely likes her and did not want her to think he was using her. Fran, on the other hand, he is perfectly comfortable using. This is fair. Fran is not shy. Fran is, as Eddie carefully agrees, pushy.
The misunderstanding collapses, Maggie gets her boyfriend back, and the Official Girlfriends’ Code survives another day without having to litigate a conflict of interest. The episode’s title suggests that Fran is the unwanted third wheel, but “The Nuchslep” is really about how impossible it is for Fran to remain at the edge of anyone else’s life. Maxwell hires her to supervise his children, and within four episodes she is negotiating Maggie’s first romance, rewriting the household’s dating policy, supplying emergency Mallomars, and establishing a private legal system for female friendship.