Two big things happen in this episode, one extremely plausible, one extremely implausible. First, Emily makes a French friend. This is actually implausible. Or maybe I’m just the worst? But I spent most of my first year there having coffee dates and language exchange sessions with Frenchies who, they were proud to share, had made all of their best friends by the end of lycée and, tragically, were not taking applications for new ones.
As for the plausible department: Gabriel had a girlfriend this whole time! Here she is, right there, at the florist’s.
Of course, these two things are linked. As we open, Emily is shopping for flowers, though the proprietress doesn’t want to sell her her the nice flowers — Emily can only have the bad ones. (Such is the tax an American in Paris must pay.) Enter Camille, who promptly shames the florist into parting with the better quality roses. For shame, Claudette!
They walk toward home (this will be key later, of course) and Camille offers some suggestions for what to check out, including the Marché des Enfants Rouges (the oldest covered market in Paris, wouldn’t you know!), ultimately inviting her to her gallery’s opening, also in the Marais — which will be attended no less than Chicago hotel magnate Randy Zimmer. Emily accepts.
They bise sort of in the middle of their faces and honestly it’s too bad they don’t date, instead of Emily and Gabriel, right?? She’s everything, he’s just a Ken with a crêpe pan.
Speaking of: Gabriel shows up just in time to carry Emily’s many, very heavy boxes from Chicago up to her apartment. But oh là là: The Trader Joe’s peanut butter got smushed. Replacement: Gabriel (chef) will prepare an omelette, in his very own cast-iron pan. Can you guess the joke they are about to make, with the cast-iron pan?? Can you? The tension in this scene comes not from the conversation around the La Perla bra sitting on her table (you’ll recall, an undesired present from Antoine, who has both a wife and a mistress (Sylvie)). The tension in this scene comes from wondering how long it will take Emily to try to put Gabriel’s pan in a dishwasher, or drip some Palmolive all over it. Meanwhile, Emily somehow finds herself in a position to say the words “I like my meat uncut”, right in that order, “I-like-my-meat-uncut,” in the context of explaining to Gabriel how she doesn’t like messy relationships. Emily was literally a communications major (probably) — why do they keep having her say the dumbest things?? In English, no less??
And right before we leave: The other shoe drops, the liquid detergent is held over the pan. Gabriel stops her just as she’s about to deploy the soap. “See, that’s the thing — we never clean. Things…season.”
Man, it has been a busy morning for Emily — so we’re off to Savoir, where she discovers Sylvie and Antoine mid-argument.
Antoine is threatening to leave Savoir, so Emily naturally barges in. (I cannot describe how quickly I would have been fired interrupting my boss arguing with her lover??? But tbh she has a pretty good point about how if Antoine takes off right after she arrived, it’ll make her look bad.) Emily puts forth an idea, which she credits to Sylvie: She’s pitching Maison Lavaux to Randy Zimmer (remember, the Chicago hotel magnate) that very evening, at Camille’s gallery show, for the creation of a signature hotel scent. It’s a really good idea! Credit where credit is due.
Even if Sylvie’s still mad — she didn’t need Emily’s help, and she didn’t want her idea — at least Julien and Luc offer to take Emily to lunch for an office debrief. This scene has two main points: Luc explaining that “it’s one thing to cheat on your wife with your mistress, another to cheat on your mistress with a young American,” and something about Emily stepping in dog poop, which is beneath all of us and is only in the service of Emily saying, “I’ve stepped in shit.”
It’s off to the gallery, where Emily meets Randy (or as Camille puts it, “Chicago, meet Chicago,” something I do not believe any French person would ever say) — ultimately she invites this Paul Rudd-lite to Savoir, where they’ve set up a sampling event. Randy is enchanté to meet Sylvie.
Credit to Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu for managing to fit so much self-satisfied malice into her look to Emily.
“So we have the head [Sylvie] and the nose [Antoine] — what does that make you?” PRL says to Emily.
It’s gross! The whole thing is gross. “The mouth?” Sylvie says.
“I thought she was the legs,” Luc says. Grosser! Grossest.
The sampling goes well. Antoine is very charming and French, and in an effort to keep us thematically square, explains that his newest fragrance, De l’Heure, has top notes of bergamot, middle notes of ylang-ylang and lavender, and base notes of indole, “which, surprisingly, has the same molecular compound as merde.” Are we all 12? I don’t understand this focus.
Emily: “Did he just say — ”
Luc: “Shit.”
Julien: “Your specialty.”
Antoine: “Like in life, one has to balance the sweet with the —”
Luc: “Stinky?”
In an effort to keep this conversation going (why!), the group decides to reconvene at dinner — “I’m up for anything with a Michelin star,” Randy says helpfully. Julien says he’ll put it together, but Sylvie, for apparently no particularly reason but vengeance, assigns the task to Emily, “who knows all about Paris.”
After a little tête-à-tête with Antoine (who assures her that his gift of lingerie was for Emily, not for him, Sylvie sets Emily the impossible task of booking a reservation at the “impossible” Grand Véfour. Emily thinks she has it worked out — she “went online every five minutes until there was a cancellation,” only to be told on entering the restaurant that she has booked the wrong night: She has booked 8/11. But it’s 11/8. “Wonderful,” the maître d says. “We’ll see you in three months.”
This is totally ridiculous, dumb-scaping of Emily, who would never make this mistake in a million years, and also why is everyone in heavy coats if it’s August??
Anyway: Emily spins it as quickly as she can, saying that they’ll return to this terrible, in-demand restaurant in three months — but for now, they’re going to Gabriel’s restaurant. Her neighbor predictably saves the day (“Super bon!” Luc says). Antoine will stay at Lavaux, Randy will have his attorneys contact Antoine’s, and Sylvie, reassured that Emily’s lingerie-bearing friend is not, in fact, Antoine, offers her some advice: Embrace the mess! Emily, thus motivated, goes back and kisses Gabriel. She smooches and runs back out the door, to discover Antoine and Sylvie mid-makeout — and Camille, on her way into the restaurant. Where she’s meeting up with her boyfriend. Gabriel (“Do you two know each other?”)
“I told you,” Camille says. “Paris seems like a big city but it’s really just a small town.” Truer words never spoken!
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