[Lance is watching television as Martin enters]
Can you write a note to my teacher explaining that our TV set is busted?
LLance
Well, our TV isn't busted. Now shut up, Martin, I'm trying to watch the fight.
Dad, if our TV set isn't busted, I have to write a homework assignment on the opera that just started on PBS.
LLance
(quickly grabbing a pad and pencil) What's your teacher's name?
[Cut to the classroom, where Martin hands the note to Mr. Schidtler.]
Well, this is amazing. Must be an epidemic. All you kids come from homes where the TV set broke down last night.
[Lisa wakes up a sleeping Lance. The background is completely black.]
Dad? Where did the house go?
LLance
Oh, well, Lisa, I told you it would happen and it finally did.
LLance
Your dog. She ate us out of house and home.
Moose, you promised you would go on a diet!
[Doug is looking around the living room for something. He can't find it and leaves in frustration.]
It's driving Dougie crazy. He can't find his Christmas presents anywhere.
LLance
Where did you hide them?
Oh, I found a place he hasn't looked in years. Under his bed.
[Lance is angrily trying to assemble something.]
LLance
Every Christmas Eve, it's the same thing, I can't put these things together!
LLance
I'm a senator, I'm not an engineer.
Well, let me see that, Lance. [Lance hands over the instruction sheet.] Well, maybe you're having trouble, dear, because you're using the Japanese instructions.
LLance
Let me see that! [He grabs the sheet back.] I know.
LLance
I just happen to like a challenge, okay?
[Lisa and Marjorie are in the living room]
Marjorie, I thought you said that your parents were getting a separation.
They are, but since neither of them could afford to move out, they separated the house.
[Camera switches to a wider shot, revealing that the living room is divided straight down the middle by a solid white line, which divides the sofa and table in half. In one chair, on the same side of the house as the TV, sits Valerie, knitting, and in the other chair on the other side of the white line sits Lance, reading the paper. Lisa and Marjorie are seated on Valerie's half of the couch.]
Marjorie dear, I'm afraid your little friend is going to have to go home now.
Aw Mom, she just got here!
Marjorie dear, you know the rules - no company after eight o'clock.
LLance
Yeah? What is it, Marjorie?
Can we come over to play?
LLance
Why sure, kid! You know what I always say, my house is your house.
[The girls get up, cross the white line and move to the other side of the sofa.]
Dad, this is my friend Lisa.
[The girls sit down on the couch. Marjorie sits right on the dividing white line, Valerie cautions "Uh-uh-uh!" and Marjorie scoots back over to the other side.]
Marjorie, I can't see the TV.
Oh yeah, I know that. Mom got custody.
LLance
[holding up his beer can] But I got custody of the fridge. Heh heh.
You Can't Do That on Television · 355 quotes