Altar Egos (17 Mar. 2004)

Micheal has a one-night stand with a woman named Maggie Lizer. He has a guilt-trip after learning she is blind, but not so much after he discovers that she's the prosecuting attorney ... See full summary »

Director:

Jay Chandrasekhar

Writers:

Mitchell Hurwitz (creator), Barbara Feldman

Stars:

Jason Bateman, Portia de Rossi, Will Arnett

Cast

Episode cast overview, first billed only:
Jason Bateman	...	Michael Bluth
Portia de Rossi	...	Lindsay Bluth Fünke
Will Arnett	...	Gob Bluth
Michael Cera	...	George-Michael Bluth
Alia Shawkat	...	Maeby Fünke
Tony Hale	...	Buster Bluth (credit only)
David Cross	...	Tobias Fünke
Jeffrey Tambor	...	George Bluth Sr.
Jessica Walter	...	Lucille Bluth
Julia Louis-Dreyfus	...	Maggie Lizer
James Lipton	...	Warden Stefan Gentles
Amy Poehler	...	Bride of Gob
Jane Lynch	...	Cindi Lightballoon
Michael Paul Chan	...	Judge Lionel Ping
Verda Bridges	...	Woman

Storyline

Micheal has a one-night stand with a woman named Maggie Lizer. He has a guilt-trip after learning she is blind, but not so much after he discovers that she's the prosecuting attorney against his family. Meanwhile, GOB gets married to a woman after a series of escalating dares, and tries to get a subsequent divorce.

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Genres:

Comedy

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Details

Release Date:

17 March 2004 (USA)

Filming Locations:

Stage 5, 20th Century Fox Studios - 10201 Pico Blvd., Century City, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Hurwitz Company, The, Imagine Television

Technical Specs

Runtime:

30 min

Did You Know?

Trivia

The wall in the courthouse is decorated with pictures of the Presidents, but the only ones visible in the shot are Reagan, Bush Sr., Bush Jr., and Nixon - all Republicans.

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Quotes

George Sr.: Next time this happens, I may not have a son in law to offer...
Michael Bluth: Well, I'm not...
[pauses]
Michael Bluth: OFFER?
George Sr.: Offer me counseling. He should have stayed a shrink.

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Connections

References Happy Days (1974)

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Soundtracks

"End Credits Theme"
Composed by David Schwartz

User Reviews

AD will restore your faith in television- and faith is a fact

Curse the recent trend in television of cutting 22-minute episodes down to 20 minutes. The two-minute deleted scene with Lindsay and Tobias meeting the principal is one of the best jokes to be dropped on the cutting room floor. Good thing we can see it on the DVD. But even without that scene, there's much good here. The character of Maggie Lizer, a supposedly blind attorney played by Seinfeld's Julia Louis-Dreyfus, doesn't get a lot of love from AD fans. This is her first of four episodes on AD. I've heard some people claiming her deceptions became tedious after a while. In this episode, Michael has a one-night stand with Maggie, without knowing that she is blind (or pretending to be blind) and that she is the prosecutor of his dad's trial.

Again, there's lots to recommend in this episode. We have an inept and perverted Barry, looking for prostitutes, neglecting his reading and making excuses. There is a ridiculously cruel mole/teeth joke. We have Michael in high school playing a Peter Pan lawyer, singing badly and kind of reflecting school plays. Despite her unpopularity, even Maggie results in some good material. There's the blind jokes which, as the narrator points out, leads to some good non-sequiturs. The Lucille breastfeeding joke is delightfully awkward and GOB and the narrator contradicting each other is fairly funny, exposing GOB as a liar. GOB gets married in this episode, to a woman played by Amy Poehler (Will Arnett's real life wife). In the process we get the earliest bit of foreshadowing of the seal storyline in season 2. Mitch Hurwitz once claimed the series was not planned out ahead of time, that they made it up as they went along. Some of his own actors didn't seem to believe him when he said that.

In short, this episode isn't the greatest of Arrested Development's first season, or close to being so. But it's still great.