# Bottle Episodes **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 24, 2010, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582 "2010-05-24T16:19:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![TWDuke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e495f1/32.png) [@TWDuke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TWDuke)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2010, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/41 "2010-05-27T19:28:06Z")
> [@Small\_Hen](#): > > The first that came to mind was Hollywood Babylon from Supernatural. Basically the entire episode took place on a movie set. The crew was played the show’s crew, the trailers were the star’s actual trailers, ect. It certainly felt cheaply made. They may have saved money on the location, but it seems to me they would still have to abide by the SAG basic agreement when it comes to paying actors. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2010, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/42 "2010-05-27T20:16:01Z")
> [@Mooch](#): > > Didn’t **Family Ties** have an episode that was just Alex P. Keaton in a sort of theater-like “black box” setting grieving over a dead friend? No set whatsoever. IIRC that episode was also filmed live. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2010, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/43 "2010-05-28T05:12:39Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > as I’ve explained before, I have a theory that similar-themed episodes of TV shows are the result of writers having attended the same writing classes, and reflect assignments they’ve had. When crunch time comes, they dust off an old script and re-use it. I’ll juwst bet that, for a time, “Trapped in an Elevator” was a common screenwriting assignment. “Having a Tax Audit” used to be, but seems to have fallen out of favor. For a while, it seemed that EVERY show had a “pregnant woman is having a baby NOW” episode. Never mind that it usually takes women more than half a day to have a baby…she’s gonna have that baby NOW, in half an hour or less. And sometimes, yes, she was Trapped in an Elevator as well. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2010, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/44 "2010-05-28T05:28:43Z")
Road trips and cars are also good for bottle episodes. Requires a car set obviously but any studio would have one of those. There was a _Facts of Life_ episode in which the entire episode was the four girls driving around Peakskill cruising guys, lipsynching and chewing the fat. An episode of _Roseanne_ featured a couple of road trips and one in the final episode of Roseanne and Dan trying to sort out their marriage from their cars on cell phones. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2010, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/45 "2010-05-29T00:40:24Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > For a while, it seemed that EVERY show had a “pregnant woman is having a baby NOW” episode. Never mind that it usually takes women more than half a day to have a baby…she’s gonna have that baby NOW, in half an hour or less. And sometimes, yes, she was Trapped in an Elevator as well. Just off the top of my head, Night Court and 7th Heaven had “give birth NOW while trapped in an elevator” episodes. ---
**Author:** ![fusoya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecccb3/32.png) [@fusoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fusoya)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2010, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/46 "2010-05-29T03:54:01Z")
> [@Wheelz](#): > > Incidentally, “Chinese Restaurant” was the last _Seinfeld_ episode to not include all four of the main cast members. Every character besides Jerry was left out of at least one show during the first couple seasons, but this particular episode became so iconic, and Michael Richards subsequently got upset enough at not being a part of it, that the Powers That Be (Seinfeld & David, basically) agreed that all four would always appear from then on. Wrong again. The Pen (a 2 parter!) aired a season later and didn’t have Kramer OR George - and Jason Alexander was the one who stepped up and said that if they did any more episodes without George, then he was done with the show. This is why a couple of seasons later, when Julia left the show for her pregnancy, they still included a couple pointless shots of her being on a romantic vacation in Europe. However, The Chinese Restaurant did cause Michael Richards to rethink Kramer - since he was originally a guy who never left the apartment, he was forced out of that episode, and Michael didn’t want to miss out on any more iconic adventure episodes, which later led to The Keys, a _3_ part episode where Kramer finally re-enters society. ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2010, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/47 "2010-05-29T05:02:58Z")
Couldn’t tell you the name of the ep, but there’s an episode of Law & Order: SVU that takes place almost entirely in the interrogation room, that featured just the main cast (mostly Stabler) and the actor playing the bad guy. No new sets, no extras to pay, even the “Doink doink” guy got a day off. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2010, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/48 "2010-05-29T05:42:29Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > Just off the top of my head, Night Court and 7th Heaven had “give birth NOW while trapped in an elevator” episodes. So did _The Jeffersons_, _Saved by the Bell_, and _All in the Family_. No idea how Lucy and Ricky and Fred and Ethel actually managed to make it to the hospital as Lucy would have seemed prime to give birth while hanging from a clothesline or whatever. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2010, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/49 "2010-05-29T05:48:23Z")
When Gloria went into labor on _All in the Family_ she was trapped in a phone booth that had to be laid on its side, but they got her to the hospital before it was born. (_Reno 911_, which is always over the top, had a character who went into labor while popping out of a cake to give a lap dance to the gay officer she’s in love with while he was on his way to his gay wedding.) _Saved by the Bell_ and _Amen_ are two shows I can think of offhand- but I know there are others- in which babies were born without umbilical cords. Once the babes were born the characters who delivered them (Zach and Deacon [Sherman Hemsley’s character]) wrapped them up and put them in the mother’s arms, no cord or afterbirth or ‘goop’ of any kind. (On the AITF elevator baby episode I don’t think you ever actually see the baby.) ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2010, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/50 "2010-05-29T08:22:22Z")
> [@fusoya](#): > > However, The Chinese Restaurant did cause Michael Richards to rethink Kramer - since he was originally a guy who never left the apartment, he was forced out of that episode, and Michael didn’t want to miss out on any more iconic adventure episodes, which later led to The Keys, a _3_ part episode where Kramer finally re-enters society. Kramer first leaves the building on screen in The Jacket (2.3), a full eight episodes before The Chinese Restaurant (2.11) and a season and a half before The Keys (3.23). He comes and goes freely in nearly all of the episodes of season two and season three. His “never leaves the building” quirk was quietly dropped after the first season and was never a major plotpoint to the show. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2010, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/51 "2010-05-30T01:30:24Z")
Yeah, I put “Kramer never leaves the apartment” in there with Jerry having no bedroom and Jerry calling Kramer “Kessler”. ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2010, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582/52 "2010-06-21T22:33:59Z")
[Here](http://www.avclub.com/articles/tv-in-a-bottle-19-great-tv-episodes-largely-confin,42284/)’s the Onion’s list of great bottle eps (a few already having been listed in this thread). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bottle-episodes/540582.md?page=2)