Show:  Friends (The One Where Estelle Dies)

Role:  Helpful Honda-esque dealer

Best Line: Reaction to Janice’s “OH .  MY .  GOD !”

According to her credits, Jane here plays “Ellen,” a real estate agent? who is showing the house next door to the one that Chandler and Monica are planning to buy.  Once there, the Bings run into Janice, who was sort of the Urkel of Friends, but never quite as annoying or loveable.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Play:  The Real Live Brady Bunch

Character Type:  Carol Brady

Best Line:  N/A

A super sweet fan, MC, emailed us this gem: Jane Lynch as Carol Brady in The Real Live Brady Bunch.  In 1992, Jane toured with Chicago’s Annoyance Theater in this verbatim, screen-to-stage version of The Brady Bunch.  The clip here is of the gang – which includes Andy Richter!! -  performing on a Very Special Episode (VSE) of Geraldo. This was way before Geraldo fancied himself a serious journalist and embedded himself with the military to prove it.  The VSE is followed by an MTV clip with Kurt Loder.  The gem-iest of all gems.  Thanks MC!!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Movie:  Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby

Character Type: Mother

Best line:

Ricky bobby’s son Texas Ranger (the other son is named Walker), complaining about picking up trash as a community service: “When do we get to stop doing this, Grandma?”

Lucy Bobby: “Well, I don’t know, honey.  When are you boys going to stop tossing me the radio in the bathtub?”

One of our new goals for 2010 is to convince a friend of ours that Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby is a great, great movie.  Because it really is.  We’re not even rabid fans of Will Ferrell, but we still love this movie.  For those who have yet to see it, Talladega Nights is Days of Thunder if Days of Thunder realized that it was a parody of itself.  Will Ferrell is Ricky Bobby, NASCAR racer; Jane Lynch is Ricky Bobby’s mother.  We’re not sure what the best part is: Jane Lynch’s Southern accent, her long grandma hair, or the fact that she more than adequately holds her own against Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly.  This is the sort of movie that frustrates us, too, because she was so great in this movie, yet it took Glee – three years later – to give her the recognition she deserves. Jonah Hill, we hope you’re counting your blessings.

Ok, another clip – a deleted scene from the movie.  So great.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Movie:  The Fugitive

Character Type: Scully

Best Line:  “Wait a minute … Half of the samples he approved were signed [beat] the day he died.”

This is one of those sweet moments when you’re like, “Jane Lynch was in what?!”  Because even though it makes sense that Jane Lynch has been in everything, it also doesn’t.  How is it possible that she showed up in everything like the gnome in Amelie?

Context:  Jane Lynch begins her career in 1988 with Taxi Killer and Vice Versa.  Five years and two movies later, here she is sharing valuable script time with none other than Harrison Ford in the pretty great movie version of The Fugitive. Harrison Ford, by the by, is pretty much at the height of his career – this is way before Six Days, Seven Nights with our favorite desert wanderer Anne Heche.  Speaking of deserts, Jane explained a little more than a year ago in an interview with The AV Club how this movie is the reason why she came out to our little desert town:

[I]t ended up being kind of a big deal for me. It’s what gave me the confidence to come out to Los Angeles and go, “Maybe I can do this out here.” … The Fugitive, I thought would be my big break too. And actually, … I did hope The Fugitive would lead to something else right away, which it didn’t. But it was really exciting[.]

In The Fugitive, Jane Lynch is Dr. Kathy Wahlund, a doctor who works Dr. Kimble’s [Ford] hospital.  She is very serious, and she is very smart.  She’s Scully to his Mulder: she’s the only doctor who can give him the analysis he needs to solve his case, and she’s the only person he can trust.  For your viewing pleasure, then, Jane Lynch is Dr. Kathy Wahlund at 2:32, cracking the case but not so much a smile, other than one out of disbelief (you’ll see).

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Cleveland Show

As we mentioned earlier, Jane Lynch popped up on The Cleveland Show earlier this week, playing an animated teacher to Roberta Tubbs, Cleveland Brown’s step-daughter.  As Ms. Eick, she’s tough (she gives Roberta her first C-) and lecture-y (she schools (heh, schools) Roberta a bit about tardiness).  Also, her boob drops (“Ignore that”).  In the end, she challenges hot Roberta to succeed in life without relying on her awesome good looks to get away with her mistakes, deficiencies, and poor life choices.  Awesomely, Ms. Eick gives Roberta a fat suit to test drive – yes, a la Tyra.  A la Tyra so much that Roberta dubs her more bountiful self “Tyra” in her search for How the Other Ninety-Nine Point Nine Nine Percent Lives.

Jane Lynch was wonderfully sardonic, sarcastic, and sincere in her grudging admiration for Roberta.  Her voice is scratchy, like her nails/claws on the chalkboard.  The full episode can be watched for the next few weeks here on Hulu.

Here goes, all courtesy Yvanka.  You guys are making this easy for us.  Keep ‘em coming!!

NEWSRADIO: “The Cane”
Character Type: Secretary (the ballsy kind)
Best Line: N/A

NewsRadio was kind of a great show, I thought.  Maura Tierney, as always, was lovely; Dave Foley was not yet the oafish posturing d-bag he became circa Celebrity Poker Showdown; and Phil Hartman, in his post-SNL prime, was playing the kind of Phil Hartman role only Phil Hartman was meant to inhabit.  In this episode, Jimmy James – the bossman – calls all the WNYX employees together for a staff retreat.  Lisa and Dave (Tierney and Foley, respectively) have a bit of a tiff, professional/personal relationship issues, etc.  It all works out in the end, and we all win because we get to see JL with big shoulderpads and a swagger.  Only for a moment, but still.

She, as Carol the secretary, interrupts the ‘retreat’ to deliver a hand-written note to Jimmy James (08:02).  She’s all “Excuse me sir, sorry sir, yes sir,” but she does it with a little “We all know who really runs this office, but you sign my check so I’ll patronize you” in her tone.  Or maybe that’s just me.  Also she gets to walk across the room and look good doing it, shoulder pads and curly hair and all.  Hello, Carol, lookin’ good.

And then, bonus! A throwaway appearance a little later – no lines, just a visual. Gander at 15:12. Remind you of a certain Sue Sylvester zoot suit?  Yes, I thought so.

[From the editors: This episode actually was pretty damn funny, so if you have 25 minutes to spare, this isn't a bad way to spend it.]

:: Drumroll :: Without further ado, Yvanka’s review:

Character type: Authority Figure (coach)

Best line: “We’re on our backs, knees are apart, pelvis contracted forward, aaaaaaand, release.”

IMDB tells us that Ms. Lynch played ‘Tammy’ on an episode of Empty Nest, the Golden Girls spinoff that was a fairly popular mainstay from 1988-1995.  The show focused on Dr. Harry Weston, a pediatrician and a neighbor of Dorothy, Blanche, Sophia and Rose in beautiful Miami.  The premise? He’s a widower, and his two daughters, both grown, have come back to live with him after their own marriages went to crap.  Generally a series of dates for the daughters, Barbara and Carol, with set-ups for Harry, a sprinkling of not-quite PC southern black woman stereotyping in Harry’s nurse, and a man-whore neighbor.  I actually watched this show, back in the day.  Oh, Harry, you’re so cantankerous!

Well, Carol’s pregnant, and she keeps thinking she’s having the baby, but no.  She isn’t.  That’s about all you need to know, contextually.  Jane Lynch plays the lamaze coach, ‘Tammy’, and she’s appropriately poofy-haired, thick-lensed and lecture-y at Carol’s in-home lamaze class.  At least, I think that’s what she looks like… the texture of the video is something like watching television through both a screen door and pudding.
JL is using her Tilex commercial announcer-y voice, wearing an open denim shirt over a tee (all the rage in the early nineties), and has the following just-right line that made me laugh like a pubescent boy:

“Well then, let’s review some of our exercises, starting with the push.  We’re on our backs, our knees are apart, pelvis contracted forward, aaaaand release.  Good!  Forward, and release.”

(That’s what she said.  I know, I’m a child.  Forgive me.)

JL then leads the class in some shallow breathing (hee hee hooo!) and is forced to make the best of some crappy writing, wherein  this ridiculous show makes a predictable dork-assed joke featuring Dreyfuss the dog.  “Well, now he’s got it perfectly!”  Sigh.  And then Rachelle, a lamazee, isn’t doing it quite right – “No, Rachelle, you’re GASPING.” – because, of course, she’s actually about to pop.  Aaaand that’s about all we get of Tammy the Lamaze Coach, and about all of this video I can watch without needing a barbituate.  Check out the squinty-making clip linked [below]; Ms. Lynch features prominently in minutes 5-8.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Webseries:  Supermarket of the Stars and Easy to Assemble

Character Type:  Knowledgeable co-worker and Swedish authority figure, respectively.

Best Lines:

• “Well, back in my day, I had to dress like a man to get a promotion.  I got a crewcut, I wore a suit, I bandaged my chest … of course, for me, it was a life choice.”  (Supermarket of the Stars)
• “Välkommen to Ee-kay-a!”  (Easy to Assemble)

Once upon a time (i.e., last year), Illeana Douglas apparently got tired of being out of work and pitched a series called Supermarket of the Stars to the Oxygen network.  It starred her as a Hollywood star wanting to go back to the peoples by working at an upscale grocery store in Los Angeles.  Our guess is that her circle of friends is very different than, say, Lindsay Lohan’s circle of friends.  How else to explain the appearance of Justine Bateman (aka Mallory from Family Ties) as a fellow disgruntled star; Jeff Goldblum as a not-so-secret shopper; and our very own Jane Lynch as an old-timer grocery store clerk who lavishes her role as experienced mentor to the stars?  Oxygen passed on the show – apparently, it didn’t fit in with the rest of a lineup that included Tori & Dean: Inn Love and Dance Your Ass Off.  Clearly, America is not ready for a post-Lifetime cable channel.  Oprah, as usual, was ahead of her time.

Jane is pretty frumpy and funny as the all-knowing co-worker in Supermarket of the Stars.  Actually, the entire series isn’t half bad at all, and Jane pops in and out here and there.  Episode 1 is below.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Next, Illeana decided that the Supermarket of the Stars was hiring too many stars, and was turning into something she didn’t like as it grew in popularity.  Hard when supermarkets go corporate.  She decides to move on to another local business to fill her application for street cred: the Burbank Ikea.  For those of you who do not live in our cement jungle that is Los Angeles, Burbank is located east of Hollywood and is the choice Ikea for filming.  We like to imagine/hope that the next time we go to Ikea, we’ll find Jane Lynch sitting ironically on a Janne while she busily types away at her BESTÅ BURS, as if it really were her office.

In Easy to Assemble, Jane makes a brief live appearance as Ileana’s supervisor, then shows up in a training video valkommen-ing Ileana to Ikea.  Overall, we don’t think Easy to Assemble is as good as Supermarket of the Stars; regardless, it’s worth it to see Jane Lynch pulling of a Swedish accent.  Hat tip to Vice Versa contributor Marie for pointing us to this series.

Title: Vice Versa
Character type: Assistant to an authority figure
Best line: “Salesperson, Mr. Avery.”

Jane smirks peripherally at the hideous bowtie to her left while ignoring the Lexus "December to Remember" gift bow draped on her own hood

…

Today on the Jane Lynch menu: Vice Versa from 1988, number 133 on the Lynch List and her first genuine appearance on the big screen, since the only copy of number 134, Taxi Killer, belongs to Meryl Streep and she ain’t sharing. (All this and much more is explained in Jane Lynch’s hilarious “Off the Cuff” interview with Peter Travers.)  Vice Versa is a body-switch comedy (à la Freaky Friday), which stars Judge Reinhold as a workaholic executive vice president of a big department store in Chicago and Fred –Kevin Arnold- Savage, who plays his neglected son. Uproarious fun ensues and valuable life lessons are learnt when the two miraculously switch bodies. (Incidentally, years later Savage would direct Jane Lynch in a number of Party Down episodes.)

Jane Lynch as Ms. Lindstrom (personal secretary to the department store’s president and dressed the part in a 1980s power suit + requisite enormous shoulder pads) appears for a few minutes halfway through the movie when she and a bevy of bespectacled male execs accompany said boss to the store’s music department to stare incredulously at Judge Reinhold (or rather, Fred Savage’s character inhabiting Judge’s body) as he demonstrates his mad drum skills to an ecstatic crowd of shoppers. “You are not a salesman, Mr. Seymour!” Judge’s furious superior shouts. “Salesperson, Mr. Avery,” Ms. Lindstrom dryly corrects him.

And there you have it: Jane Lynch’s first line, delivered in the way only she can. It’s great to discover that in spite of the rather unsettling permed fringe and Grace Kelly chignon the unmistakable Lynch smirk, snark and spark is already there. Scene stolen? I most certainly think so. (FF to 0:40:40)

The vast majority of us X-Files fans would like to pretend that the series ended when David Duchovny left the show.  Really, you can’t just remove a series’ raison d’etre and expect to create a spin-off within the same series.  We like to pretend that the post-Mulder seasons in which the exhausted writers fell into typical the-unborn-child-is-the-answer-simply-because-the-leading-character-is-a-woman plot trope (see also Battlestar Galactica and the earth-shattering disappointment that was hapa Hera) was just a bad dream, or wishful thinking, or a bad story written by Jose Chung, or anything other than what it actually was.

The only saving grace, then, appears to be that our very own Jane Lynch was in an episode in the series’ limp towards its finale.  In season 9, she plays someone named Mrs. Lokensgard, mother of a boy who apparently attracts flies better than honey.  The episode is called “Lord of the Flies,” and it’s coming to a DVD near us.  This is our first step towards completing our goal in the Jane Lynch Project.  Stay tuned …