Watching Studio60

We’re taking a second look at “Dear Louise…,” the seventh episode of Sports Night. Following up on the review, here’s a recap of the episode. Still to come: memorable lines from the episode.

It’s another end of another show, and Dan’s planning to head to a place called El Perro Fumando to drink giant blue margaritas. He tries to get Casey to come along, but his partner’s not going for it … until Dan mentions that Dana will be there, and “boogie shoes” may ensue. That changes Casey’s mind pronto.

But the likelihood of Dana getting half a margarita in her and dancing on a tabletop isn’t enough to get Jeremy to join them, and neither is Natalie asking him to come along. He’s got a letter to write to his sister Louise, to whom he writes because she can’t hear. So as the gang heads off to drink giant blue things, we move into one of those letter-writing flashback episodes.

Via voice-over, Jeremy explains to his sis that he’s been with the show three months, that he loves the place, that it feels like home, and that tonight was the first time he’d been asked to go out with the guys after work. He writes about Dan and Casey, and how they deal with the pressure of writing and performing. In the flashback, though, Dan’s not dealing very well. He’s got writer’s block — not just writer’s block, but emergency writer’s block, the kind of writer’s block that prevents him from composing anything other than simple, colorless sentences. That’s death for a sportswriter.

As Casey tries to help, Isaac stops by their office, and Jeremy’s letter follows him through the hallways, expositing on his long career in journalism — starting as a stringer, ending as London bureau chief for CNN, and coming out of retirement to run a sports network. In flashback land, though, what’s on Isaac’s mind is not so much the show or the ratings but the fact that his 16-year-old daughter is dating a Republican named Chad. His plan, as he tells Dana, is to install a dungeon and moat.

Natalie stops by Isaac’s office to see whether he’s heard of someone named Archibald Russell, who was carjacked in Kansas City. The name sounded familiar to the reporter there, but not to Isaac. Natalie mentions that there’s a run-down meeting coming up, and that’s where Jeremy’s letter-writing quickly heads, as he explains to Louise that a recent run-down involving Archibald Russell has stuck in his head.

The flashback, though, starts before Jeremy gets into the run-down room. If he’d been there, he would have heard Natalie tell Isaac that Archibald Russell played in the Negro Leagues, and Isaac remember him as A.K. Russell, and feel terrible that the guy was badly hurt, and resolve to call his kids. Isaac asks Dana to do a segment on Russell, and that’s when Jeremy comes in and is asked to put something together. Having missed the background, Jeremy wonders why they’re going to use airtime early in the show on a story like this, then feels terrible about it later, when Dan and Casey do the segment and have to update the graphic during the commercial when word comes in that Russell has been pronounced dead.

After commercial, though, things lighten up with Jeremy’s letter-writing thoughts on Dana, who we find out has six brothers, one of whom plays for the Denver Broncos. Her education at elite all-girl’s schools at her mother’s insistence has led, Jeremy writes, to “brilliance inside the office and something a little less than brilliance anywhere outside of it.” To illustrate, we see her determined to get Casey to like her hair, because she’s going to a dinner at the mayor’s with Gordon and she wants everything to be perfect.

Jeremy talks about the Casey-Dana situation, and then we see Dana taunting Casey about Gordon’s post-graduate degree, of which Casey allegedly has an envy. Casey’s got an ace up his sleeve, though — Gordon, an assistant D.A., failed to get a conviction against a notorious mobster, after four-and-a-half years of work, and though Dana insists Casey dare not taunt him about it, Casey’s clearly planning to.

Then we’re back in a run-down meeting, and the subject is back to Dan’s writer’s block. Natalie’s got an idea that with shock therapy — surprising him with the unexpected, like a glass of water to the face — she can knock him out of it.

Later, Casey’s going to try to win one against Gordon by teasing him about his loss, but once again, Gordon easily gets the upper hand, suggesting that perhaps a full audit of Casey’s finances, including his involvement in an office betting pool, might be of some interest. Casey retreats to the safety of his anchor desk, where Dan is still melting down over his sudden loss of talent. Natalie’s on the job, though, surprising him with an air horn and then yet another glass of water in the face. If you can’t fight it, you might as well laugh.

During a break in the show, Natalie gives the guys a heads-up about a Teleprompter error that left the letter “s” out of the word “disk,” and that’s the cue for Jeremy’s letter to finally get around to Natalie. He explains to Louise that the uproar over the Christian Patrick situation has died down, and that things have been awkward between him and Natalie since they’re almost-dinner in the previous episode. He wants to ask her out, but is afraid that will make things even more awkard …

… except now we’re back in real time, and the gang is coming back from their blue-margarita-drinking adventures, Dana’s dancing being too hot for the Smoking Dog. As the party continues at the office, Natalie pulls Jeremy aside, acknowledges the awkwardness between them, and kisses him to bump things up to the next level.

She’s also brought him stamps, and wants him to dance with her, so it’s time to wrap the letter up. But not before Jeremy tells Louise that Dan got over his writer’s block with the help of a female professional volleyball player he met at the bar, who reminded him of why men write: to impress women.

And with that, we leave everyone dancing to “My Boogie Shoes.” C’mon. You know you want to get up and dance too.

Sports Night, ABC, Dear Louise, recap