Top Banana (Arrested Development)

"Top Banana"
Arrested Development episode
Episode no.	Season 1 Episode 2
Directed by	Anthony Russo
Written by	Mitchell Hurwitz John Levenstein
Production code	1AJD01
Original air date	November 9, 2003
Guest stars
Patrice Oneal as T-Bone Lillian Hurst as Luz Scott Atkinson as Roger Danish Michael Bartel as Young Michael Bluth
Season 1 episodes
November 2003 – June 2004 Pilot Top Banana Bringing Up Buster Key Decisions Visiting Ours Charity Drive My Mother, the Car In God We Trust Storming the Castle Pier Pressure Public Relations Marta Complex Beef Consommé Shock and Aww Staff Infection Missing Kitty Altar Egos Justice Is Blind Best Man for the Gob Whistler's Mother Not Without My Daughter Let 'Em Eat Cake
All Arrested Development episodes

"Top Banana" is the second episode of the TV comedy series Arrested Development. The story takes place a week before the banana stand is burned down. George Sr. attempts to control the Bluth company from prison using his recently paroled cellmate T-Bone.

Plot

The local news station reports that the Bluth banana stand burned down. To reveal how it happened, we flashback to a week earlier. Michael visits his father at prison to ask the location of some papers so he can run the business. George says, "There's always money in the banana stand," then asks Michael to give his about-to-be-released cellmate a job.

George Michael asks for more hours at the banana stand to escape his intense feelings for his cousin Maeby. Michael promotes George Michael to manager. Seeing Tobias, Lindsay and Gob still lazing on the couch, Michael asks whether they are attempting to find work. Lindsay says her job is supporting her husband, so Michael, wanting to set an example, has his son hire Maeby as his banana stand employee. Maeby spends her first day taking money from the register and, after George Michael explains that the cash in the register must match the number of bananas, throwing out bananas so the numbers will match. Meanwhile, Michael visits his mother to ask about business records he needs. She says vaguely that they're in a storage unit, then asks Michael to give his brother Gob a job to make him feel important.

The next day, Tobias looks for acting work without much luck. Michael sees him despondent and points out a flyer advertising open auditions. Tobias snatches it and Michael spots another flyer that gives him an idea. He calls his mother and says the SEC wants to drop by and check if she recently bought any big ticket items with company money. He then follows Luz, the maid, as she is sent to hide the evidence in the storage unit. Meanwhile, Tobias has arranged an audition for a local "Fire Sale" commercial and Lindsay goes along for support. Tobias bombs the audition (he acts as if there is an actual fire); Lindsay gets the role instead. Michael arrives to find the storage unit in flames.

At home, Lindsay giddily informs Michael of her new acting role and Tobias tries to put on a brave face, then excuses himself to cry in the shower. Michael confides to Lindsay that he thinks George Sr. is trying to run the company from prison, so he's heading off to confront him. On the way out, he gives Gob a very important job: mailing a letter to the insurance company (Gob later defiantly throws the letter into the sea). Michael then confronts George Sr. about the burned-down storage unit, telling him that he's not giving T-Bone a job and he won't let his father run the company from prison. His father brushes him off, saying again that there's always money in the banana stand. Michael informs him that George Michael is running the banana stand, and T-Bone goes to work with George Michael and Maeby at the stand. Maeby and George Michael sneak off for dinner, where he begins to add up the numbers; he panics when he realizes his dad will obviously know they've been stealing money. Maeby tells him to relax and just figure out what George Sr. would do in this situation.

Michael drops by the banana stand and sees T-Bone at the helm. Michael asks T-Bone point blank if he burned down the storage unit and T-Bone readily admits to it. Frustrated, Michael heads to the beach to think; Gob confronts him about being treated like a "goofball," Michael commiserates with Gob, telling him that George Sr. still treats him like an employee. At that moment, Maeby calls Michael to inform him George Michael is about to do something irresponsible. Michael arrives at the banana stand to find his son crumpling up newspaper around the stand. George Michael admits that he screwed up the banana stand and apologizes profusely. Michael realizes that he was doing to his son what his father did to him. Thinking of an opportunity to take back some control, Michael tells him to light it up anyway. Michael, George Michael and Gob watch as the banana stand burns. Later, at prison, Michael gloats that he torched the banana stand and George should remember who's in charge now. Irate, George Sr. tells his son that the walls of the stand were lined with $250,000 in cash, and demands to know how much more clearly he could have told him that "there's always money in the banana stand."

Episode notes

• Buster does not make an appearance during the episode.
• The title refers to George Sr.'s position within the family, as well as to the banana stand.
• This is the first time the theme song is heard, though it sounds slightly different in this episode from later ones because volume levels on certain instruments hadn't fully been worked out. In this episode, an electric guitar is prominent in the theme song.
• There is "always money in the banana stand" is a reference to money built into the walls of the banana stand but this is inconsistent with the episode Afternoon Delight (season 2 episode 6), which says rebuilding the banana stand is a yearly tradition.
• On the next...: "Gob protests the pet store's frozen-dove exchange policy, and Michael, realizing the banana stand is the only profitable part of the Bluth Empire, decides to rebuild."

Cultural references

• Handkerchief code - Early in the episode, one of the prisoners in the visiting room has a navy blue handkerchief in his back left pocket.
• Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne - Tobias says that with Lindsay working as an actor as well, they're like "the Lunts," referring to the legendary theatrical husband-and-wife duo of Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne.
• Steve Martin - Tobias says "Excuuuuuuse me," imitating Steve Martin's trademark catchphrase, but his motions actually emulate Martin's character from the Festrunk Brothers (a.k.a "The Wild and Crazy Guys") sketches with Dan Aykroyd on Saturday Night Live.
• Gob's attempt to return the dead dove is a reference to the Monty Python Dead Parrot Sketch.

Callbacks and running jokes

• Dove - This is the first of many instances of Gob keeping a dove inside his suit jacket for use in a trick, and unfortunately also the first of many instances of accidentally causing its demise.
• Fireball - Gob's fireball trick fails by only shooting out lighter fluid, something which later became a running gag in "Burning Love", "Sword of Destiny" and "The Ocean Walker".
• "From whence you came" - Gob says this phrase while throwing the frozen dove into the ocean, a phrase he would later repeat in "Charity Drive" and "Out on a Limb".
• Hiding in the walls - George Sr. has a propensity for hiding valuable secrets in walls, a fact revisited in "The One Where Michael Leaves".
• Ice cream sandwich - George Sr. mentions his love affair with ice cream sandwiches, a fact that is noted throughout the first season.
• In the banana stand - George Sr. hides $250,000 in the banana stand, a fact that is mirrored by Lucille in "Spring Breakout".
• Missed phone call - Tobias is offered his first big break in the commercial for South Coast Boutique, but misses the phone call. In "Afternoon Delight", he misses a call for his next big break, the Blue Man Group's call to perform with them.
• Trick v. Illusion - Gob refers to the fireball as his "least consistent trick." However, in the "Pilot", Gob corrects Michael's calling the Aztec Tomb his "trick," rather than his "illusion." Gob is inconsistent about this throughout the series, illustrating Gob's short attention span and hypocrisy.
• "No Touching" - This line, used often by the prison guards, is repeated many times throughout in the series, sometimes in an altered form.
• Never-nude - Tobias is wearing cutoffs while in the shower, a first clue to his condition as a never-nude.

Hidden/background jokes

• When Maeby decides to work at the banana stand, Lindsay remarks, "If I know my daughter, that banana stand won't be there in a week!" The episode is a flashback showing the events leading up to the burning down of the banana stand one week later.

Character cameos

• This is the second time we see the character T-Bone, but the first time we see him portrayed by Patrice Oneal. In the "Pilot", he is played by another, uncredited, actor.
• This is the only time we see Luz as Lucille's housekeeper. By "Charity Drive", she had been replaced by Lupe.
• The uncredited guard at the prison who yells "No touching!" in this episode appears several more times, most notably in "Visiting Ours" and "Not Without My Daughter".

Foreshadowing

• In scenes showing Tobias crying in the shower, the tops of his cutoffs can be seen, hinting that he can never be naked.

Goofs

• At the beginning of the episode, as Michael is talking to his father in prison, the couple in the background sit down at a table and start having a conversation. In the next shot, the same couple arrive at the table and sit down.
• In the scene after Lindsay gets the role in the commercial and she and Michael are in the kitchen, the scene opens up with Lindsay taking flowers out of a bag and arranging them in a vase. The camera cuts to Michael and then back to Lindsay where the flowers are back in the bag.

External links

• "Top Banana" at the Internet Movie Database
• "Top Banana" at TV.com
• "Top Banana" at The-OP.com