Yokel Chords

"Yokel Chords"
The Simpsons episode
Guest stars (from left) Andy Dick, James Patterson, Meg Ryan (as Dr. Swanson), Stephen Sondheim, and Peter Bogdanovich (as a psychologist)
Episode no.	392
Prod. code	JABF09
Orig. airdate	March 4, 2007
Show runner(s)	Al Jean
Written by	Michael Price
Directed by	Susie Dietter
Couch gag	The couch is replaced by a vending machine filled with some secondary characters (Apu, Selma, Mr. Burns, Smithers, etc) and the Simpson family. Ralph Wiggum selects C5 and a Homer figurine falls. Ralph retrieves his Homer figurine and bites its head off before leaving.
Guest star(s)	Meg Ryan as Dr. Swanson Andy Dick as himself James Patterson as himself Stephen Sondheim as himself Peter Bogdanovich as psychiatrist
Season 18 September 10, 2006 – May 20, 2007 "The Mook, the Chef, the Wife and Her Homer" "Jazzy and the Pussycats" "Please Homer, Don't Hammer 'Em" "Treehouse of Horror XVII" "G.I. (Annoyed Grunt)" "Moe'N'a Lisa" "Ice Cream of Margie (with the Light Blue Hair)" "The Haw-Hawed Couple" "Kill Gil, Volumes I & II" "The Wife Aquatic" "Revenge Is a Dish Best Served Three Times" "Little Big Girl" "Springfield Up" "Yokel Chords" "Rome-old and Juli-eh" "Homerazzi" "Marge Gamer" "The Boys of Bummer" "Crook and Ladder" "Stop or My Dog Will Shoot" "24 Minutes" "You Kent Always Say What You Want" List of all The Simpsons episodes
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"Yokel Chords" is the fourteenth episode of the eighteenth season of The Simpsons, which was originally broadcast on March 4, 2007. It was written by Michael Price, and directed by Susie Dietter. Guest starring Meg Ryan as Dr. Swanson, Peter Bogdanovich as a psychiatrist and Andy Dick, James Patterson and Stephen Sondheim as themselves.^[1] This also marked the return of director Susie Dietter who had taken a hiatus to work on Futurama and the film Open Season. This was her first episode in nearly nine years. It won the 2008 Annie Award for Music in an Animated Television Production.^[2]

Plot

Marge oversleeps, and not having made the children's lunch for the day, Homer makes the lunches instead. Lisa gets a drawing of a sandwich, Bart gets Grandpa's medication, and even these are mixed up. Bart decides to scare an alternative lunch out of his friends by making up a story about a cannibal cafeteria worker named Dark Stanley, who killed all the students in the cafeteria and put them in his kids' head soup after repeatedly being taunted for not graduating from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. At lunchtime, Bart pretends to be killed by Dark Stanley, leading all of the students to run screaming into the woods while he takes their lunches. Groundskeeper Willie is sent to fetch them all back, but he brings seven extra kids who are Cletus's children. Their names are Whitney, Jitney, Dubya, Incest, Crystal Meth, International Harvester, and Birthday^[3]. Principal Skinner tells Superintendent Chalmers that the kids have been refused education in fear that they will lower test averages and cost the school federal funding (after SES has already lost state, local, and city funding), which Lisa overhears. To appease Lisa, Skinner and Chalmers appoint her tutor of the children.

Meanwhile, Skinner punishes Bart by having him spend five sessions with a qualified psychiatrist named Dr. Stacey Swanson (Meg Ryan) (Skinner was going to use the school psychiatrist, but after she freaked out about Dark Stanley, Superintendent Chalmers decided Bart should see someone who was better qualified). Bart is initially unwilling, but Homer insists Bart goes through with it (because there is a Chinese restaurant next door to the psychiatrist where he can get drunk). Initially dismissive, Bart develops a close bond with Dr. Swanson, who uses a Mad Libs-like game and violent video games to get Bart to open up about Homer's alcoholism and other matters. When his sessions end, Bart starts to miss the time he spent with her and enters into a state of depression in which he talks about his problems to an empty chair while lying in bed. He also peeks into her window and sees her counseling Milhouse, and hangs his head while biking in the rain when he looks through a window and sees her dancing with the owner of the Chinese restaurant that Homer had visited earlier in the episode. Marge, worried, uses the funds she had been saving up for Homer's breast reduction surgery to get her son one more session with Dr. Swanson. Bart then reveals that Homer and Marge were young and not ready for parenting when he was born, and that he acts out largely so they will focus on him instead of fighting with each other (the theme of which would be revisited in "Postcards from the Wedge"); he also adds he got the name "Dark Stanley" in part because Homer used to hit him with a Stanley-brand hammer. Bart is happy and leaves therapy feeling good, but Dr. Swanson is visibly saddened when he leaves, and she goes to see her own psychiatrist (Peter Bogdanovich) where she says she cannot stop thinking about Bart. It is revealed during this discussion that "Dark Stanley" was in fact real, and had killed her own son: the therapist believes Swanson is projecting onto Bart, though Swanson claims she is not ready to go into that.

Lisa's initial tutoring efforts are unsuccessful and so she decides to take the children to downtown Springfield to introduce them to culture in the outside world. However, Lisa's plans are diverted when Krusty spots the kids singing, decides to use them as a musical act for his show, and offers them a contract, which Cletus signs with an "X" (in sharp contrast to his elegant signature in the episode "Sweets and Sour Marge"). Lisa is worried about the way that Krusty and Cletus are exploiting the children with their plans for a national bus "No-Collar Comedy Tour", so she sends an e-mail to Brandine, who is currently a soldier in Iraq, and trying to 'stop 9/11' as said by Cletus. She arrives by helicopter to tell Krusty that the contract Cletus signed is null and void, since he is only the father of two of the seven kids—one who cannot sing, and one who cannot ad-lib. The story ends with Cletus telling Brandine that they owe Krusty $12,000, but Brandine tells him that they can live on that, and Cletus is happy to have things back to normal.

Cultural references

• The whole storyline involving Lisa shows many references to The Sound of Music.
• The style of the artwork in the sequence in which Bart tells his classmates a story about a murderous cafeteria worker resembles the work of Edward Gorey. A piece of music is used in this scene that is reminiscent of Ástor Piazzolla's "Introduccion" from the Suite Punta del Este (also used in the film 12 Monkeys^[4].) This story also referencing Sondheim's Sweeney Todd.
• The music played when Groundskeeper Willie rounds up the kids is the main title theme to the 1965 John Sturges film The Hallelujah Trail, composed by Elmer Bernstein.
• The video game, Death Kill City II: Death Kill Stories, played by Bart and the psychiatrist has a reference to the Grand Theft Auto series of video games, notably the city stories prequels (Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories). The rating for Death Kill City II is "Bad for Everyone," which spoofs the ESRB rating, "E for Everyone". The game's cover artwork is also very similar to the cover artwork of said series.
• During "My Favorite Things," the beginning of the surrealist film, Un chien andalou plays.
• Krusty the Clown mistakenly thinks Stephen Sondheim wrote the musical Cats, which was actually written by Andrew Lloyd Webber.
• During the musical number, Agnes Skinner is shown starring in the titular role in a production of Auntie Mame.
• When Krusty asks Stephen Sondheim to write something "peppy," he plays a vamp similar to one from the Broadway musical Pippin, written by Stephen Schwartz.
• The ending, with Cletus saying, "Baby, you're the greatest," Cletus and Brandine kissing, the pan to the skyline and moon, with Cletus's face, and the music are all a direct reference to the 50's sitcom The Honeymooners.
• Krusty introduces the Spuckler children as "The Smashing Bumpkins", which is a reference to alternative rock band The Smashing Pumpkins.
• The scene where Dr Swanson's character goes to see her own psychiatrist, Peter Bogdanovich, parodies The Sopranos where Jennifer Melfi the psychiatrist of Tony Soprano sees her own psychiatrist also played by Peter Bogdanovich.

References

1. ^ Yokel Chords @ IMDb
2. ^ Peter Debruge (2008-02-08). "'Ratatouille' nearly sweeps Annies". Variety. http://www.variety.com/awardcentral_article/VR1117980588.html?nav=news&categoryid=1983&cs=1. Retrieved February 2, 2009. 
3. ^ Cletus' Profile @ About.com
4. ^ 12 Monkeys Soundtrack - IMDb

External links

The Simpsons portal

• "Yokel Chords" at the Internet Movie Database