Here is the full recap of Ugly Betty episode 4.04, The Wiener, The Bun, and the Boob.  Based on the comments in my Quick Thoughts post, you guys REALLY liked this episode.

Even though I initially thought too much was going on, it looks like that’s when the show works well – and now that I think of it, what happens on a quick-paced episode is that there isn’t time for the story to get bogged down.  The show has gotten in trouble in the past when the situation was set up, then we had 20 minutes of navel-gazing. 4.04 was better because it kept moving.  As usual, you guys were right.

It’s funny how Daniel made things better by telling the truth, and Betty made things better by lying.

The Amanda kissing scene was even funnier the second time.

Oh, and “the boob” may have referred to Lexie’s, but it could have also referred to Hilda’s impression of Meghan McCain.

This was a great episode!

That being said, the ratings did not improve.  Sigh.

Full recap after the jump.

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 Here are some quick thoughts about Ugly Betty, episode 4.04, The Wiener, The Bun, and The Boob.

• I LOVE Betty’s new attitude.  I wasn’t sure if I would, but it’s not annoying or abrasive, it seems to fit her new situation.
• Marc’s face when he learned he would be Betty’s assistant was hilarious.  So was Betty’s.  At the same time, Wilhelmina’s expression when she thought Marc was going to get info out of Nico was priceless.
• Wilhelmina kissing Claire and Cal’s butt was very funny.  Uncomfortable, but funny.
• Brooklyn Decker was used perfectly.  Beautiful, but totally hideous.  Man, that is one tall woman!
• I can’t believe they told Betty and Marc that the associate editor’s position was settled by a coin flip!  And Marc calling her “tails” was pretty funny.
• I TOLD you who/what the “boob” would be!!!! HA!
• I wish they could have spent more time on Hilda’s sexting episode.  Archie’s original reaction was the funniest his character has been so far.
• Of course, Marc and Betty as hot dog and bun were sublime.  The comedy quickly turned to drama, and that was pretty good, too.
• Matt kissing Amanda morphing into Betty kissing Amanda morphing into Betty as a hot dog and Amanda screaming was the funniest thing on the show this season!  Isn’t it amazing how Becki Newton can be so funny in so little screen time?
• Marc and Betty’s relationship has to be one of the strangest on TV.  But, they are wonderful onscreen together.
• The ending was nice – they really know how to do endings on this show.

OK, one quibble.  Brian Tanen, one of Ugly Betty’s most talented writers, tried to fit too much into this episode, IMHO.  There were five major concurrent story lines.  It’s usually tough to fit in three.  But then again, many times in the past when I’ve thought an episode was too “busy”, it turns out to be one of the most popular, so what do I know?

But otherwise, it was a good episode.  The second half was the funniest on the show in a long time. 

Image: Bauer Griffin

Grant Bowler says the Ugly Betty cast “consider themselves to be a bunch of East Coast theatre geeks who got lucky”.  Well, it would only be natural for Becki Newton (Amanda) to star on the stage, and that’s exactly what has happened.

Newton, along with her husband Chris Diamantopoulos will find love on stage in the Encores! presentation of the Gershwin musical Girl Crazy, under the direction of Tony-winner Jerry Zaks in November.  The two will play lovers Danny Churchill and Molly Gray.  Wayne Knight (Chicago) is cast as Gieber Goldfarb.

The show will run Nov. 19-22 at City Center. Finian’s Rainbow director and choreographer Warren Carlyle will choreograph, with musical direction by Rob Fisher.

Girl Crazy has music and lyrics by George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin and book by Guy Bolton and Jack McGowan. According to Encores! notes, "The Gershwins’ fanciful Depression-era musical of 1930 is the tale of a sophisticated New Yorker (Diamantopoulos) marooned in a dusty Western cow town with no one who understands him but the Yiddish-speaking cabbie (Knight) who brought him there and no one to love but the only woman (Newton) within 50 miles."

Becki has shown glimpses of musical brilliance in snippets on Ugly Betty.  Though farce, her performances of My Milkshake and Gene Simmons is My Daddy revealed some pretty good pipes.

Becki and Chris have some pretty big shoes to fill, considering the roles were initially filled by Allen Kearns (Mickey Rooney in the film) and Ginger Rogers (Judy Garland in the film).  Becki, here’s the standard you have to live up to

Seriously, though, this is going to be awesome!  If you are in the New York area Nov. 19-22, you REALLY should go see Becki and Chris in this one!

Image: SplashnewsOnline.com

Here is the promo for Ugly Betty episode 4.04, The Wiener, the Bun and the Boob.

OMG, I’ve been waiting for this one!  It looks to be over-the-top campy, and I mean that in a good way.  As a reminder, here’s the synopsis for the episode:

Betty is overwhelmed with her editorial work, so Wilhemina assigns Marc to be Betty’s temporary assistant. Betty’s story idea to cover the worst jobs in New York goes south when she has to dress up as a hot dog and do a Bollywood dance number. Meanwhile, Marc frets that he’ll never be taken seriously by his idol at Vogue magazine, Hilda gets Archie’s campaign in trouble, Daniel hires a gorgeous but inept assistant (supermodel Brooklyn Decker), and Natalie introduces Daniel to the Community — a group whose charismatic leader (Dylan Baker) zeroes in on Daniel.

(BTW, most have speculated that “the boob” is Daniel.  That’s probably right, but any episode that has “Brooklyn Decker” and “boob”, well…I just can’t help myself )

Anyway, this one appears to be another great episode to showcase Marc (“She-diculous!”), and the fact that Betty’s going to start giving as good as she gets in the insult department will mean there will be even more great quips.

But, Betty and Marc dressed as a hot dog and bun, singing a Bollywood song and dance number, that’s just sublime.  And they are both in pitch, too! (Both America Ferrera and Michael Urie are good singers; the musical talent on this show is amazing, when you think about it).

Add in Hilda getting Archie’s campaign in trouble, and this one might be one of the best.  C’mon Friday!

Here are some photos of America Ferrera filming scenes for Ugly Betty in Lower Manhattan.

Two things stand out: Betty looks more stylish than ever, and she seems kind of flummoxed.

I like the pink empire-waisted thing (is that considered a coat?  a sweater?  Forgive me, I’m showing my fashion ignorance.  To me, a coat should have buttons.  )  The hat is a nice touch, as well.  The only “Betty-fied” part of her outfit is the purse, which really stands out.

Betty seems upset about something – but I have a feeling we’ll be seeing a lot of that this season (Being an editor is WAR! – as Wilhelmina told Betty).  Amongst all the scheming by everyone she’s surrounded by, it’s no wonder.

What Betty needs to do is what America is doing here…exhale.

Images: SPlashNewsOnline.com

Here is the latest Mode After Hours, the webisodes of Marc and Amanda from Ugly Betty.  This one is entitled Stress-Orcism.

This one is mostly Marc and Mandy physical humor, but gives great clues where Amanda’s storyline is headed.

It starts with Amanda putting the final touches on an outfit on Marc (complete with butt grab).  Marc thinks the outfit is too plain, but Amanda says he looks good.  Amanda says he’s stressed.

She then starts to show him the relaxation program she’s designed to increase productivity at Mode.  Then she proceeds to almost kill Marc.

She first has both of them put on bright fedoras, and turns on relaxing ocean sounds, which Amanda has cranked up so loud neither one can hear the other speak.

She then uses an automobile buffer on his back.

Finally, Amanda puts electrodes on Marc’s face, and starts to hook them to a car battery – but Marc stops her before she can do any harm.

Then, Marc tells her, looking at the clothes they are both wearing, that her true talent is in being a stylist.

They hug, and he then grabs a lead from Mandy’s electrical contraption and shocks her butt.

This webisode gave me one of those “duh!” moments, and gave me a pretty good idea of where Amanda’s storyline is going.  I think she is going to get close to Matt, not to become his lover, but to get him to give her Christina’s job.  I mean, she would most prefer to marry a billionaire, or start out as a designer, but that’s not going to happen.  BUT, working in the closet can lead to a career as a designer, as Christina showed.

I assumed at the end of last season that Amanda would finally try to weasel her way into being Daniel’s assistant (she always wanted the job).   It never occurred to me that she might want Christina’s job, but she’s always in the closet anyway, knows her way around the sex room, and knows a thing or two about design. 

When you look at it that way, it does seem like a perfect fit (Amanda will have to develop a work ethic, though).

Here is the full recap for Ugly Betty episode 4.03, Blue on Blue.  Quick thoughts:

• All in all, I thought this was a great episode.  Instead of alternating between comedy and drama, this one had both within the same scenes.
• I like both of the new characters.  Sammy is altogether likeable (he has a touch of Gio in him).  Natalie is also quite a compelling character.  Even dressed so strangely, I couldn’t take my eyes off her.
• The writers aren’t going to be able to resist hooking up Daniel and Natalie.  I’m convinced of it.  Maybe they could wait just a few episodes??  Please???
• The scene where Mark is “negotiating” between Amanda and Matt was hilarious.  You could just see the wheels spinning in his head.
• It looks like the writers listened to many of us and didn’t follow the usual plot pattern of Betty saving the day at the end.  This one was different, yet they found a way to still give the episode a profound ending.
• The restaurant scenes were very well done.  Hilda’s interfering, Matt and Betty trying to make each other jealous – it was all good.
• Amanda was the dupe and used throughout the episode, yet, when she told Betty it was time to move on from Matt, didn’t it seem like she had her own reasons for saying that?  Is Amanda going to start scheming now?  I guess that’s where the hinted-at love triangle is going to come from.

As good as I felt about this episode, the ratings were awful – just awful.  There’s no way to spin it.  A 1.2 in the “demo” and 4.55 million viewers overall is very bad.  Not Dollhouse bad, but Betty’s got to find a way to get back to a 2.0 demo and it absolutely HAS to beat Dateline, I think.

Betty fans, tell all your friends to watch – and tell them the show has been creatively improving since the middle of season 3.

Full recap after the jump.

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Here is a little more in-depth preview of Ugly Betty episode 4.03, Blue On Blue, airing tonight on ABC at 9/8c. (Hat tip – BuddyTV).  All of this info has been floating around piecemeal, but BTV is the first place I’ve seen it all summarized in one place.

Betty is going to try to get a scoop in her new job as features editor at Mode: 

She goes all out in her pursuit of Gucci’s fresh designer, Evan York (Hamish Linklater) but she needs help.  Enter Hilda, and her well-connected customer Sammy (Adam Ferrara).

Marc, of course, is still angry with Betty and tries to sabotage her. He gets the help of Amanda (as usual), AND Matt (this is why we’ve seen the two of them together – I really don’t think Amanda and Matt are really going to become a couple).

Things come to a head in the restaurant where Ignacio works.  Apparently, there’s going to be a showdown between Betty and Matt/Amanda.  I would imagine Betty is going to temporarily lose her mind.    It’s going to get so bad, Ignacio COULD lose his job over the scene that gets made.

Daniel decides to take control of his own life again.  He starts to go to meetings of a bereavement group, where he meets Natalie (Jamie-Lynn Sigler),  described as “sexy and wild”.  She ends up taking him on a wild night on the town, which “Daniel will never forget”.

(This may be one of those scenes where things are spiraling out of Daniel’s control, and he’s embarrassed – Eric Mabius is hilarious in these type scenes, like in his dream about Betty seducing him).

This will also be the episode where Wilhelmina learns that Connor is in Bermuda.  That should make for an interesting eyebrow raise.

I can’t wait to watch this episode tonight!

Image: Bauer Griffin

There’s a great feature in venerable checkout-favorite Self Magazine with Ugly Betty’s Becki Newton.  The “Week of Why Nots” feature challenges the subject (and readers) to create and check off a “why not?” list – things you’ve always wanted to try, kind of like a bucket list.

Her seven things?

• Writing for a magazine (which she did with this story)
• Gymnastics – she face-panted trying to do a handstand, but still had a blast.
• Be a real-life magazine assistant.  She hung up 3 times on The Biggest Loser’s Jillian Michaels!  HA!
• Kayaking!  She did this on the Hudson with Self’s editor-in-chief Lucy Danziger.
• Learning the proper way to hold a paintbrush from her artist mom (awwww…)
• Having her husband photograph her first thing in the morning, sans makeup (Gutsy — awesome!)  Check it out here.
• Learning Salsa from choreographer Luis Salgado (I sense a Dancing With The Stars future for Becki)

This was a very endearing feature (but what’s not to love about the beautiful Becki Newton?).  Newton is a very good writer.  I like what she said about the view when kayaking:

“…And when I looked behind me, I saw my New York: beautiful, surreal, majestic. Who knew a kayak could give you such a fresh perspective on a city you thought you knew from all angles?”

Check out the whole thing!

Image: SplashNewsOnline.com

Here is a clip from TV Guide Network’s InFanity, profiling Ugly Betty’s Becki Newton and Michael Urie (or Amanda and Marc, if you will).

My apologies if this is restricted internationally.  I hope it isn’t, though.

Some of the feature is a kind of recap of the two characters for people who have not seen much of the show.  There are some neat behind-the-scenes snippets of on set filming (including a quick shot of Amanda and Matt).

Newton mentions that the writers have allowed their characters to evolve, showing their good sides.  They  say their favorite episodes are those in which Amanda, Marc, and Betty have to team up (what Urie calls the “Scooby Doo episodes”).  I have to agree.

They are both thankful that the writers put them together, because they get along so well in real life.  That also gets Amanda out of “the donut hole” and Mark from behind Wilhelmina’s shadow.

Urie walks about the fact that Marc will have more scenes with Justin in season 4.  Those are interesting to me, because Marc is simultaneously sabotaging Betty AND helping her family.

Newton talks about how Amanda is going to be wanting more out of her life, and puts and emphasis on AT MODE, so I guess she’s going to try to work her way into an assistant’s job (maybe Matt’s?  He has one already, but who knows?  She might fall out of a window )

The two also say how much fun it is to shoot in New York City, and make a joke about LA pigeons. 

Remember, TV Guide Network will be airing encore versions of each new episode of Ugly Betty the following Thursday after its original air date.