Wednesday, November 17, 2021

"Supermarket Sweep," Scenes E and H

It's back to the girls' apartment, at an unspecified time.  All the business at the beginning, like with Laverne throwing Shirley's coat on the floor, is in the script, in detail.

This closes out the scene and the act, after the girls decide they'll have to take Dave/Gunther back to Phister's [sic again] Plaster Palace:

LAVERNE
Before we lug him back there, there's one thing I want to do.

LAVERNE GETS HAMMER AND CHISEL AND HEADS FOR DAVE.

SHIRLEY
You wouldn't.

THEY EXIT TO BEDROOM.

The tag is set in the same place, the "next day."  Onscreen, Shirley says they can't take the statue back to PPP, but in the script she says it's because of "the damage" Laverne did to him.  Then Laverne replies, "What damage?  I still got the fig leaf," and she "points to the bag."  And we can see a paper bag at the statue's feet.

Onscreen, the scene and episode end with Edna eagerly agreeing to take "Gunther."  Here's what was left out:

EDNA
Oh, please.  I got the perfect spot.  I'll get rid of my refrigerator.  The light burnt out anyway.

EDNA EXITS.

SHIRLEY
You know, Laverne, I'm gonna miss the big guy.

LAVERNE
Yeah.  But at least we got our memories.

SHE JIGGLES THE BAG.

My main thought is it seems like the censors stepped in twice.  I suspect an earlier draft made it clearer that Laverne wanted to chip off part of the statue's anatomy for (prudish people, avert your eyes while we go PG-13 here) a dildo.  Then the writers changed this to her keeping the "fig leaf."  But even that might've been too much for ABC in late '70s prime time, so that got stripped out of the aired episode.  (This is just my theory, unless I come across an earlier version of the script.)

Overall, this script is close to what aired, but we lost some naughtiness and other verbal humor.

3 comments:

  1. It's amusing enough that everyone is horny for Dave but wow, this takes it to Married with Children levels of "Laverne is going to use Dave's wang as a dildo" levels.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, I don't think I'm just reading that into it. And poor Edna is in for a surprise!

      Delete

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