“Eugenia Bremer, Master Spy” 8 November 1997		Written by Rupert Holmes. Directed by Julian Petrillo.
MAIN Season Three Episodes: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17

One almost thinks Rupert watched our reaction to the first episodes and concocted this episode to gently spoof our rush to find spies lurking incognito among the cast. However, Kevin O'Rourke's posting to the newsgroup dated 1 July mentioned that 7 episodes were "in the can." Assuming one episode per week, the 13th episode would have wrapped by the 12th of August, 4 days before the season premiere. This is only the 12th episode. Taking into account that the script must be ready for prop selection, the director to review, etc. some time before filming, it's obvious that if a gentle spoof was intended, it was based on a reaction he expected, not that he had seen. (Although some speculation regarding Victor working undercover for the government had been put forth to explain his mysterious reappearance at the end of "Magic", it was his mention of a "contact" "In the WENN Small Hours..." that sent us scurrying to examine each member for tell-tale signs of an operative.)

Mr. Eldridge's comment that "a lot of our programs sound like they're out of order" brings to mind the many times the WENN mike has been deserted by one of the thespians leaving the others to vamp and how mad it must have sounded to the radio audience ("Oh look, the pumpkin vendor selling his wares!").

Again, it almost looks as if Rupert's playing with our reactions. Last week, as Gertie is explaining the genesis of her play* she describes her romantic conception of Scott as "a soldier of fortune...an adventurer. I mean, Cairo, Peking, Madrid, Rabat." This week, as Eugenia is passing a box of scripts to Scott, he says, "I got it, Eugenia". Eyes bright with adoration, she replies, "You sure do!", and she's not talking about the box. This is followed immediately by Scott asking Maple to join the box-passing line, "Hop on the chain gang, Mapes?" "The chain gang? Sure I'll wear leg irons if it means shackling up with you." It almost seems as if some of the swooning reactions to Scott on the newsgroup have been transferred to the screen. We thought the range of romantic possibilities for Betty was large; Scott's is growing in leaps and bounds. "Remember WENN" now tenders a treasure of tempting trysts to try telling.

And poor Mr. Foley. Any hopes he had must be completely dashed by now. First the Congressman and now he walks into the hall to hear Mapes offer of...well, offer of however he interpreted. "...wear leg irons if it means shackling up with you." But that doesn't keep him from trying to help Maple with her pronunciation later in the studio (notice he's indicating the second pronunciation while Mackie mischievously points her to the wrong pronunciation.)

And that brings up to the WENN-word-of-the-week: cognoscenti, oddly broken up this way: co gno scen ti. (Is it okay to have two colons in a sentence like that? Bah, I'll be like Eugenia with her sliced bananas on cinnamon toast, an "impetuous fool.") Cognoscenti are those who have or are held to have superior knowledge and understanding of a particular field, especially in the fine arts, literature and world of fashion. Singularly, it's cognoscente.

*(When/WENN. Hmmm, Gertie did seem to be explaining the genesis of her play as speculating where Scott would have gone had he not returned to WENN as he did in episode 4 of this season. She also placed the beginning of her writing efforts as 7months ago. So "From the Pen of Gertrude Reece" takes place 7 months after "The New Actor"?)

In an effort to prevent other coded messages from being broadcast ("Magic"), the cast is now asked to paraphrase Betty's scripts. As Mackie would say: That's like saying, "Those of us 'round here parts wanta get together, appoint some coppers, stop in-fighting, create a militia , just sorta try to make everybody happy and do what we wanna do, so we're gonna try this Contitution-thingie."

Eugenia continues to act suspiciously and Desmond finally confronts her just as she finishes a organ lesson (no wonder she identified so much with Hilary's piano teacher.) Somehow, she manages to explain away everything. I can't help feeling her answers were too pat and I'm going to keep an eye on "Eugy."

The episode hints at a first strike at the McCarthyism of the fifties. Interestingly, if WENN continues into the fifties, this could be more directly approached. Since Communists were part of the Popular Front Scott fought with in Madrid, Scott might be targeted as allying with Communists. Of course, for the moment, Communist Russia will be our allies in WWII.