Banter, Cajun Style on "30 Rock"

Oh, 30 Rock, I can always depend on you to lighten the mood any day and you didn't disappoint last night, with another delightfully over the top installment ("Secrets and Lies") that deftly juggled half a dozen or so plotlines while advancing the subplot about Jack and C.C.'s illicit affair.

With everything going on right now in Hollywood, it's easy to fall into a bit of a doom and gloom (albeit with some cautious optimism as talks between the WGA and AMPTP continue) but 30 Rock is always a beacon of hope in a schedule slowly being filled with more and more reality television. (Um, Baby Borrowers anyone? Didn't think so.)

What did I love about last night's episode? Liz catching Jack and C.C. passionately kissing in his office only to have him introduce to Liz as a business colleague named "Lakisha Gutierrez-Arafat," a moniker that will live on forever in infamy; Jack sending Jonathan to a "non-existent Italian bakery in Queens" as a diversion; Jenna's bitchy gay entourage and their use of the name Melissa as a toothy epithet; Tracy Jordan naming his kids Tracy Jordan Jr. and George Forman; how Liz's bra really was held together by Scotch tape; James Carville stealing candy from a vending machine and doing everything "Cajun style"; Jack's misogynistic allusion that women with ambition were like "dogs wearing clothes" and his greeting to a gathering of NBC execs included "token women." Oh and the throwaway line about Jenna having to get up at 4 am, go home, and then come in for a fake awards acceptance speech by Tracy via satellite.

The dinner party that Jack and C.C. threw--and only invited people of no influence or power, such as Kenneth the Page and Liz Lemon--was hysterical and went on for just the right amount of time. Having to sit next to Kenneth asking you questions about your most traumatic teenage experience while your boss makes googly eyes at his lover, "the most beautiful woman in the room," is my idea of torture, as much as I love Kenneth. Likewise, I thought the feud between Twofer and Frank, in which they dress up as OTT versions of each other, was a priceless subplot in its own right. Loved how Twofer's Frank hat said "Mom Expert," and how Frank put the Harvard cygnet pin on his crotch, not to mention, his description of his trip to fair Harvard.

My only problem with 30 Rock is that the TiVo-friendly series sometimes has too many hysterical asides, throwaway lines, and sight gags that it's impossible to recount them all here. (I know, high class problems.) The scene in which Jack and C.C. came out about their relationship was hysterical as it escalated from an uncomfortable silence when Jack identified C.C. as his "hippie-dippy mama" lover to hilarity as other execs made their own coming-out declarations about being gay, black, and, well, killing their wife. Loved C.C.'s apropos acknowledgment that she voted for Ronald Reagan in 1984. And the Shark Attack theme--begun by Tracy in his talk about his love for all things Pacific Rim and followed through on the fake satellite feed for all the "Pacific Rimmers" when he pulled down Jenna's top--had me rolling on the floor, especially when Jenna was more humiliated by Tracy not mentioning her by name than by her, er, wardrobe malfunction.

But then again, it's imperative that I love any series that has a producer present one of their stars with a fake award for Best Actress in a Film Based on a Musical Based on a Film (for Mystic Pizza: The Musical) that does in fact turn out to be a cookie.

30 Rock, I love you so much I want to take you behind the middle school and get you pregnant.

Next week on 30 Rock, the staff of TGS with Tracy Jordan celebrates their annual Luda Christmas party, Tracy finds his merriment derailed by a court-mandated alcohol monitoring bracelet, and Liz spends time with her parents and her brother Mitch (Andy Richter), who suffers from memory loss due to a decades-old skiing accident, and Jack receives a surprise visit from his mother Colleen.