What have I got myself into?
TV movie, first broadcast on 3 April 1993 as part of the second season of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles note . After the late-1990s re-editing, Scandal of 1920 is (chronologically) the twenty-first film in The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones.
In search of summertime employment, Indy goes to New York. He gets much more than he bargained for when he signs up as a stagehand at the Broadway revue show George White's Scandals. While the work is exhausting, what's really wearing Indy down is the fact that he also has three new girlfriends — singer Peggy, poet Kate and socialite Gloria — and is trying to prevent each of them from learning of the existence of the other two. His new friend George Gershwin is of little help, finding humour and — of course — song in Indy's predicament.
This episode contains examples of:
- The Alcoholic: Mack, the stage supervisor on George White's Scandals. Rival theatre impresario Florenz Ziegfeld uses this to his advantage by sending him a crate of booze on opening night, leading to him drinking himself unconscious.
- All There in the Script: The original script revealed some extra details about Peggy — that she's from Nebraska, her father runs an hardware store and she has four brothers.
- Artistic Licence – History: Although this episode is set in 1920, Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, which was not premiered until 1924, features heavily on the soundtrack. Gershwin himself even plays a few bars of it on the piano. Perhaps justified in that he's got a few chords in his mind which he thinks could be used for something.
- Bad Boss: Mack, Indy's supervisor, who drinks on the job and shouts a lot. In turn, George White is this to him.
- Bait-and-Switch: At play in the original Old Indy bookends to the second part, in which Indy goes to the theatre and is looking forward to the performance, while the critic sat next to him has already planned his negative review. By the end, the critic — having been impressed with Indy's story — declares that he's going to give the show a positive review, while Indy thinks the show was "crap".
- Birthday Episode: The climax takes place on Indy's 21st birthday.
- Blackmail: The unseen Florenz Ziegfeld, whose revue show Ziegfeld Follies is a more established rival to George White's Scandals, threatens to pull all of his advertising from the newspapers unless they give poor reviews to Scandals.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Indy's three girlfriends — Gloria's blonde, Kate's a brunette and Peggy's a redhead. Symbolised by there being a yellow ball, a black ball and a red ball on the pool table when Indy laments to George Gershwin about his dilemma.
- The Bus Came Back: Indy's friend in Harlem who may be able to help find him a job is Sidney Bechet, who Indy had previously met and befriended in Mystery of the Blues. Also returning is Ernest Hemingway, previously seen in Tales of Innocence and Mystery of the Blues, who's sitting behind the critics on opening night and threatens to beat up Alexander Woollcott when he keeps criticising the revue's shortcomings.
- Call-Back: This is not the first time Indy has worked in theatre. He even refers to that time he did so in Barcelona.
- Call-Forward: A couple of the dance routines on George White's Scandals may remind viewers of the dance sequence to "Anything Goes" at the start of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. And when questioned about his name, Indy quips that he named himself after the dog.
- Caustic Critic: Kate's friends in the Algonquin Round Table, a Real Life group of writers and critics in 1920s New York who got their name from the fact that they met for lunch every day at the Algonquin Hotel. Also, the critic sat next to Old Indy in the original bookend sequence for the second part, who has written his review before the show has even started, based on the gossip he's heard about what happened in rehearsals. Naturally, Old Indy is not impressed and proceeds to tell him a story...
- Chick Magnet: Indy, who attracts three lovely young women in short order.
- Cigar Chomper: George Gershwin, who has one in his mouth when he plays the piano, and when he plays pool.
- Continuity Nod: Sidney still has Indy's old alto saxophone, enabling Indy to jam with him again — with George Gershwin on piano this time!
- Continuity Snarl: A minor one, but when he 's dashing around New York between dates, Indy's tie randomly disappears and then just as randomly re-appears.
- Gift-Giving Gaffe: A variant, in that Indy inadvertently passes gifts from each of his girlfriends onto one of the others, which — when all three of them go to the ladies' toilet at the same time — is what leads to them finding out the truth.
- Historical Domain Character: In New York, Indy befriends George Gershwin and works for George White
. He also meets Irving Berlin, Ann Pennington and the critics of the Algonquin Round Table, namely Alexander Woollcott, Franklin Pierce Adams, Dorothy Parker, Harold Ross, Edna Ferber, George and Beatrice Kaufman and Robert Benchey. In addition, Sidney Bechet and Ernest Hemingway, both of whom Indy encountered in Chicago, return here — although Indy does not interact directly to the latter. - Indy Ploy: With the turntable bust, Indy — standing in as the stage supervisor — is forced to improvise and send Peggy out to sing her song as the finale to the first act, with George Gershwin accompanying her on the piano as none of the orchestra have the sheet music (what with the song having originally been pulled from the show's running order). It works, big time.
- Internal Reveal: At the post-opening night party, all three girlfriends find out the truth about Indy by seeing one of the others with gifts they gave to him — Kate has Peggy's handkerchief that she gave him (which he gave to Kate when she spilt a drink on her dress), Peggy has Gloria's watch which she gave to him (which he gave to Peggy to make sure she got to the theatre on time) and Gloria has engraved a line from Kate's poem which she wrote for him (and which he then quoted to Gloria, causing her to think it was his work) on her cigarette case.
- Mischief-Making Monkey: Bonzo, the monkey in evening dress who's one of acts on George White's Scandals, runs amok backstage on opening night, causing Indy no end of grief.
- Ms. Fanservice: Quite a few of the dancers, especially the ones in the opening number whose costumes get stolen and they have to perform with only their giant feather boas to cover their modesty.
- Musical Episode: The nearest the show got, with George Gershwin being inspired by Indy's tangled love life to come up with several songs.
- Noodle Incident: We never see the act that involves Bonzo.
- Not What It Looks Like: Not long after they first meet on the train to New York, Peggy (who has fallen asleep) wakes up to find what Indy on his knees right in front of her. She assumes the worst, but he's actually trying to retrieve an apple that has fallen on the floor and rolled between her feet, and is revealed to be telling the truth when it rolls back.
- Oh, Crap!: Indy has one of these when Peggy, having just got the singing part she wanted, hugs him just when Gloria is being given a backstage tour. Although amused by his predicament (in addition to using it as a source of musical inspiration), George Gershwin helps him out by discreetly ushering Peggy away. At the end, Indy and George have this reaction when they realise that Peggy, Kate and Gloria have gone to the powder room at the same time, where they inevitably find out the truth about Indy.
- Pie in the Face: Indy gets this at the end, when all three of his girlfriends find out that he's been cheating on them and plant his face in his own 21st birthday cake. Which everyone present finds hilarious.
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: When Gloria's father says he's got a feeling that the opening night is going to be a night to remember, he is not wrong — although he cannot possibly know that people will remember it as the night his daughter's boyfriend gets exposed as a three-timer.
- Two-Timer Date: In what verges on Refuge in Audacity, Indy gets Gloria to drop him off after their picnic at the restaurant where he's meeting Kate for lunch. Later, he pulls a three-timer date when he has dinner with Peggy, Kate and Gloria in the same evening, one after the other. The whole thing climaxes on opening night, when all three women are in the theatre for various reasons — Peggy's performing on stage, Gloria's the show's financial backer note and Kate's one of the critics.
- You Are in Command Now: When Mack drinks himself to unconsciousness shortly before opening night, George White promotes Indy to stage supervisor, leading to all sorts of scrapes and near-misses as he struggles to get performers to the stage and keep the show running.
- You, Get Me Coffee: This is just one of Indy's jobs when he becomes a stagehand at George White's Scandals.Mack: Your job is to do all the idiot jobs that only an idiot wants to do. Like make the coffee, run the errands, scrape the stage.
