chemguy76

Thank you for all the effort you put into your reports Roxanne. I compare your reports and the show to a book and the movie they make based on it. The little tidbits you include about the cast and actual tapings are what really makes your reports so great.

ennaxor

Thanks guys!

So I just got back from tonight's taping. I'm gonna start writing it all out now, and will have it up later tonight.

topherkraz78

I dont really cheat and look at the reports til after the airing but I appreciate the reports from Rox! She goes for fun I am sure but she helps us out too. But Roxanne if you cant make the one for Jan 25th I'm going for pilot season, taahm and tbbt.

ennaxor

Again, I ask if anyone shares this on other sites, please link back to this forum. Thanks.

Like the press release said, the title is The Boyfriend Complexity.

Scene 1 - Guy’s apartment

The four guys are sitting around the coffee table, looking through comic books. Raj says, you know who the bravest person in the comic books are? The guy who has to give (some superhero that I forgot her name) a bikini wax. Howard says no, it’s Captain America’s immigrant gardener who doesn’t have his papers. Leonard says that it’s the guy who has to use the bathroom after The Thing. Sheldon says that it’s the guy who has to give Wolverine a prostrate exam.

Howard (or maybe Raj?) then says no, it’s the guy who has his prostrate exam done by Wolverine. Sheldon says now that’s ridiculous, Wolverine has never shone any interest in ensuring the prostrate health of others.

The phone rings, Sheldon answers it, and says yes, the elevator is broken, you’ll have to take the stairs. Then he says yes, you can take them, pizza was invented in (whatever the year), and the elevator wasn’t invented until (later year), so for 300 years pizza delivery men had to take the stairs - so you can carry on that tradition.

He hangs up the phone, and Leonard gets up and says he’s gonna go get Penny while the delivery man spits in their food, and leaves. Raj asks something else that had to do with Wolverine getting a prostrate exam, which the guys dismissed.

Scene 2 - Hallway (pre-taped)

Leonard knocks on Penny’s apartment door, and Penny’s dad, Wyatt, answers it (late on Leonard just calls him Wyatt, so it seems like that’s his first name). Leonard’s confused, and asks if Penny’s there. Wyatt says, oh, you must be Leonard! Leonard says yeah, and Wyatt pats him on the back, and says nice to meet you, son. Leonard says that some context would be helpful. Penny comes up and introduces Leonard to her dad, and Leonard says context, good.

Wyatt asks if Leonard wants to come in, but Penny says no, he was just stopping by to say hi. And then she says, bye sweetie!, and wraps her arms around Leonard’s neck, gives him a big kiss, and then sort of pushes him backwards and closes the door.

Leonard said something else as he started to walk back to his apartment, but there was so much laughter that I couldn’t hear it.

Scene 3 - Guy’s apartment

Raj is stacking some comic books, and Sheldon asks him if he’s sure he has enough. Sheldon says that Raj will be watching the telescope for 12 hours, but he only has 7 hours worth of comic book reading there. And that’s including the difficulty Raj has with American comic-book idioms.

Raj turns to Howard and asks if that was racist, because it felt racist. Howard says no, Sheldon was saying that Raj was illiterate, not his race. Raj smiles, and says ok then. Then Raj tells Sheldon that Howard will be stopping by, and they’re going to play intergalactic battleship, and Indian Monopoly.

Sheldon says that he’s never liked the various versions of Monopoly, just the classics, regular and Klingon. Howard says that Indian monopoly is basically like regular Monopoly, only instead of dollars you have rupees, and instead of hotels you build call centers, and when you draw a chance card, you might die from some disease. And Howard tells Raj that, by the way, was racist.

It was HIARIOUS watching them try to get through this scene. On both of the first two takes, there was so much laughing from the audience after the “call center” line that the guys ended up laughing too, and they couldn’t finish the scene. And then when they tried a third time, it was supposed to start with Jim’s line, but he didn’t realize it, so on “Action!” all three of them were looking at their comic books, and no one was talking.

Then Leonard comes back in, and says you guys will never guess what just happened. Sheldon looks up and says that Leonard walked through a portal in the hallway that transported him five thousands years into the future, where he used the advanced technology to come back with a time machine, and now he’s going to take them all to the year 7010 to some place that had flying telepathic dolphins. Leonard says no, and Sheldon’s disappointed.

On one take, shortly after Leonard’s entrance, there was a clattering sound from the stage; something spilled or got knocked over or something. Johnny had been speaking, but he looked over and sort of jokingly asked, “Is everyone okay?”

Leonard says that Penny kissed him, and Sheldon asks why would they ever guess that? I think Raj asked what kind of kiss it was, and Leonard said it was a really big one, on the lips, and says how she’d introduced him to her dad, and then shut the door in his face afterwards. Howard asks if he’s sure she wasn’t going for his cheek, and he turned and she got his lips accidentally, cause that happens all the time with his mom. Leonard says no, it wasn’t definitely wasn’t that.

Then Howard says maybe she was trying to send him a signal - like this man isn’t really my father, and I’m going to do something really insane so Leonard will call 911. Leonard says it’s not insane, and that she used to kiss him all the time. Sheldon says that someone said the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over hoping for different results; so by that definition, Penny is coo-coo for Coco Puffs.

Leonard says something else about Penny, and Howard leans back in his chair and says something about how it’s good to hear the classics again, Leonard whining about Penny. Raj says oh, do the “Our babies will be smart and beautiful,” cause that always makes him laugh.

There’s a knock at the door, and Leonard gets up to answer it, saying he doesn’t know sometimes why he talks to them. Sheldon says if it makes him feel any better, they don’t always listen. It’s Penny at the door, who asks Leonard if she can talk to him out in the hallway; Leonard says sure, and goes outside with her.

On the second take when he shut the door, Johnny accidentally got his hands or fingers caught between the door and the frame. I couldn’t tell at first what had gone wrong, but Jim looked up and asked “Are you okay?” (I thought at first that maybe Kaley had tripped or something), then Johnny opened the door back up and shook his hand, to shot it had gotten hurt, but he said he was fine. A few people laughed, but Jim said something like, “It’s not funny when someone’s hurt.”

On the first take after this, Sheldon comments that they’re never going to get their pizza. Then later they went back for a quick pick-up, and changed it to Sheldon saying that he bet the pizza delivery guy went through the portal in the hallway.

Out in the hallway, Penny says to Leonard, so you’re probably wondering what that was all about. Leonard asks, the kissing thing? Not really, woman do that to him all the time. Penny says that she told her dad that they got back together, and Leonard asks why. She says that he’s the only boyfriend her parents have ever approved of, he’s a scientist, went to college, doesn’t have a neck tattoo, or outstanding warrant, or a baby… And Leonard asks, what kind of guys did you date? Penny shrugs and says just guys.

But she says that her dad kept asking about Leonard, how he’s doing, blah blah blah Leonard, so she finally told him that they’re back together just to get him off her case.

Then on a take they changed this line, and first Kaley said, quoting her dad, “I bet Leonard never tipped a cow over on itself.” They stopped her, and she was like, that was wrong? And she pointed to the audience, and said, “They laughed!” So they showed her the right line, and she was like, ok, I got it now. But when she tried again, she only got the first few words before messing up again, and Johnny held up his index finger and thumb (like, so close!). And he tried to tell her something, but she jokingly told him to shut up. On the third take she got it right, “I bet Leonard never tipped a cow over on himself.”

Leonard was smiling as Penny talked about how much her parents liked him, and then he leans back against the door and asks how they got back together. Penny just asks, what? And he asks if she apologized, if she had to woo him. Penny crosses her arms and says no, she whistled and he came running. Leonard shook his head and says he doesn’t think so. Penny asks why it matters, and he says that if they fake-got-back-together, that’s not how it fake-happened.

Penny asks if he’ll just go along with it, and Leonard basically asks so you want me to help trick your dad… with kissing and stuff, cause that sounds good to him.

Then Penny’s dad comes out from Penny’s apartment, and Leonard quickly grabs Penny and starts to kiss her. Penny’s only half kissing him back, and then sort of trying to push him away from her, and saying, not in front of my dad!

But her dad says no, that’s fine. He tells Leonard that he was going to take Penny out for steak, and asks Leonard if he’d like to come with them. Penny quickly says no, he can’t he has work. Leonard says yeah, he does… but he can blow that off to spend time with her, cause that’s the kind of boyfriend he is. And then he goes in to kiss her again (both of these are long kisses), and Penny’s basically the same as the first time, half-heartedly putting on the show for her dad, but trying to get Leonard to stop at the same time.

They did the scene a few times, and once between takes Johnny looked up onto the audience and waved and said, “Hi Mr. Cuoco!” And Kaley laughed, and said something about her dad. A little later Johnny and Kaley were pointing up into the audience, showing Keith where Kaley’s dad was sitting.

Scene 4 - Some science office

Howard and Raj are playing battleship. Howard guesses B7, and Raj says miss. Howard says that B6 was a hit, and B8 was a hit, part of his spaceship has to be on B7! Raj says not if it has a hole in the middle. Howard asks what kind of spaceship has a hole in the middle, and Raj says a donut/bagel shaped one.

Then Bernadette comes in. Raj whispers to Howard, who tells him that he invited her. Bernadette asks where the telescope is, and Howard tells her that it’s in Hawaii, but Raj can control it from there. Howard shows her TV screens where they’re watching to see if the star dims, which would indicate that it has a planet circling it. Bernadette says so basically they’re just watching the TV screen waiting for something to happen, and Howard says that he did the same thing when they rented The Notebook.

Raj gets up and whispers to Howard, and Howard says yes, (some actress name) is a legend. Then Howard tells Bernadette that she better open the wine, before he ends up with swimmer’s ear. So Bernadette walks to the back of the office to pour the drinks, and Raj quietly tells Howard that he can’t drink, he’s on the brink of a potentially big scientific discover.

Howard tells him that Galileo drank all the time while making discoveries. Raj asks how Howard knows that. Howard says that he was Italian, it’s probably true. Raj asks if everything Howard says has to be racist. And I think it’s here that Raj asks why when he said that the sunglasses made Howard’s nose look big, he was being racist, but Howard’s comments aren’t racist; Howard says it’s cause what he says is funny.

Raj is still upset that Howard invited Bernadette, but Howard says that she’s his girlfriend, and Raj needs to bond with her, like he did with Howard’s mom. Raj says that he can’t stand Howard’s mom. Howard says yeah, but she stopped calling you Slum Dog Millionaire, and Raj says yeah, that was good.

Bernadette comes up with the three glasses of wine and hands them each one. Right before they take a drink, she says wait!! Then after a second, never mind, it’s fine. Howard asks what that was about, and she says that she was working with penicillin-resistant gonorrhea, and was trying to remember if she’d washed her hands.

On the first take, the guys both looked weary of their drinks, and Raj was watching Howard, waiting for him to take a drink before he drank out of his cup. On the second take, Raj had already taken a sip, so then he spit it back into his cup after Bernadette’s explanation.

Scene 5 - Car

The actual scene was taped yesterday, but they reenacted the scene for us by setting up chairs for the car. Penny’s dad was driving, Leonard was in the passenger seat, and Penny was in the back. Basically Penny’s dad was telling Leonard about some of the idiots Penny had dated in the past. One guy was trying to turn farm waste into useable energy; Leonard said some people actually do that, and Penny said, see, Leonard says it’s real! But then Wyatt said yeah, but this guy was just mixing manure with water and putting it in his mom’s car. And there was another guy who wanted to get beer pong into the Olympics. Penny says he was joking about that, but Wyatt says that the petition looked real.

Leonard’s laughing along with Wyatt, while Penny’s just annoyed in the back. Wyatt says that it’s good that she finally found herself a keeper. And then Leonard looks back at Penny and says, you hear that? I’m a keeper.

And then Kaley pointed forward, and said something like, “Big speed bump ahead!” and all three of them jumped up in their seats. Guess she really likes those speed bumps, haha.

Scene 6 - Office

Howard is moving his piece for Monopoly - he passes go and gets 2000 rupees, but then he stops when he gets to the golden cow, and sort of laughs about that. Raj asks Bernadette if she can tell her boyfriend to stop making fun of cows, and she says that it’s no use, once he gets on a joke he doesn’t let it go.

Raj says yeah, like his haircut joke. Bernadette nods, and asks Raj, “Did you get a haircut?” And Raj says “No, I cut all my hair!” Bernadette laughs, but then turns to Howard and assures him that it’s still funny. Then Raj and Bernadette talk about how Howard always gets the same fortune from fortune cookies, and Bernadette imitates Howard opening and reading the fortune; on the first take it was, “Confucius says you are about to eat a fortune cookie,” then it was changed to, “Help! I’m trapped in a fortune cookie factory.”

Howard says ok, that’s enough making fun of him. Raj says right, let’s make fun of his mom! So then Raj imitates Mrs. Wolowitz, yelling something about her feet I think? And then Bernadette imitated her (doing a REALLY good job!), asking Howard for help cause she got stuck in the bathtub again.

Scene 7 - Hallway

Penny’s unlocking her apartment door, and Wyatt asks Leonard if he’s sure he doesn’t want to come in for a nightcap. Penny says no, Leonard has to get up early for work in the morning. Leonard says that he could go in later, but Penny says that his career is too important. Wyatt tells Leonard, behind every man there is a nagging woman, and Leonard says, don’t I know it!

Wyatt tells Leonard goodnight, and heads in, and Leonard walks up to Penny expectantly and says goodnight, sweetie, and tells her he loves her. Penny’s dad is watching them from inside the apartment, so Penny says that she loves him too, and Leonard kisses her again.

As they’re kissing, Sheldon walks up the stairs with a laundry basket and sees them, says something like “Friggin’ frack, not this again,” and goes into his apartment.

All these scene with Penny were done so Kaley was didn’t really have to move around. During some of the earlier ones, they brought a chair over for her to sit on between takes. And then during this one, she sat down on the stairs between takes. Johnny sat down next to her a couple times, and after the last take they stayed there and were talking for a while before finally getting up.

Scene 8 - Office (pre-taped)

Raj is on the phone, talking to the people in Hawaii, telling them they need to reposition the telescope… to some actress’ house. He breaks out laughing, and hangs up the phone. Howard and Bernadette are watching from the couch, and Howard says that it probably wasn’t a good idea to open the second bottle of wine.

Raj basically ends up whining about how he can’t ever get a girl, and he hasn’t kissed anyone in over a year. Howard asks what about that girl at Comic Con? And Raj says that he made that up, and he makes up stories all the time. Raj sits next to Bernadette on the couch, and she tells him that he’s a great guy, and there are a lot of girls out there who would kiss them, he just has to find them.

Raj looks at her, and then starts to move in for a kiss. Howard, seeing what’s happening, leans across Bernadette (in sort of slow-motion) to try to stop it. But Raj ends up grabbing Howard’s face instead of Bernadette’s, and kisses him, not realizing it until he opens his eyes, and then I think they were all just kinda in shock.

Scene 9 - Guy’s apartment

Leonard’s working at his computer when there’s a knock at the door. It’s Penny, who asks him if he knows what she’s been doing for the last hour. He smiles and asks, doodling Mrs. Leonard Hofstadter in notebooks? She says no, listening to her dad go on and on about how great Leonard is. Leonard says, well I am a pretty great guy. Penny asks why he’s making his so difficult, and I think Leonard acted surprised that she thought it was difficult, and says that he’s having a lot of fun.

But then he gets a bit more serious and asks what she wants to do, and if she wants to go over and tell her dad that they’re not really dating. She says no. He asks her what she wants to do then, and she says she doesn’t know. He asks, shouldn’t you have figured that out before coming over here? She says maybe.

Sheldon comes into the room, saying that he’d like to tell them he’s happy that they’re back together, and he will once he figures out how to say it and sound genuine about it. He says that he’s been working on updating the roommate agreement with some of Penny’s annoying personal habits in mind.

Penny says “Oh my god, what personal habits?” And Sheldon holds up a paper, telling her he has a list. And FYI, overuse of the phrase “Oh my god,” is number 12.

Penny starts to tell him that they’re not really dating, but Leonard interrupts her, asking if she really wants Sheldon in on it. Sheldon asks in on what, is there some sort of plot underfoot? Penny says no, not plot, no feet, everything’s fine, and asks what Sheldon was saying about her personal habits?

Sheldon says that that’s a discussion for him and Leonard, not him and Penny, since Leonard’s the one who signed the roommate agreement, and will have to pay fines for any of Penny’s transgressions. Leonard asks, fines? And Sheldon says yes, he’ll need to set up an account, and shows Leonard where to sign.

Scene 10 - Guys apartment, next morning

Leonard and Wyatt are playing a fishing video game. Wyatt gets a bite, and Leonard sort of briefly guides him through catching it. Wyatt comments how they’re really biting a lot, and Leonard says yeah, that’s what happens when you set it on easy.

Wyatt’s phone rings, and it’s Penny. He tells her he got up early and didn’t want to wake her, so he went out for breakfast, and then ran into Leonard on the way back, and how he’s fishing with him, on his couch. Leonard leans over and says loudly, “Hi sweetie, I love you!”

Then Wyatt gets a little serious as he’s listening to Penny, who’s telling him the truth. He hangs up the phone and looks at Leonard, who’s uncomfortable, and then suddenly is all, “Hey, so there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.”

Scene 11 - Penny’s apartment

Leonard and Penny are sitting on her couch, both looking kind of ashamed, as Wyatt’s walking around, saying how disappointed he is that Penny lied to him. Leonard tries to tell him that, for the record, he didn’t think it was a good idea, but Wyatt tells him to be quiet and he’ll get to him later.

Wyatt tells Penny that he thought they were past all the lying, when she’d told him that the bag in her underwear drawer was potpourri, and the pee stick in the bathroom was to check for diabetes. (Leonard looked up at her in surprise at the second one, like, really?) And he basically tells her that he’s hurt she couldn’t just tell him the truth, and he’d always be proud of her no matter what. (They only did this scene once, so I can’t remember the dialogue quite so clearly.) He tells Penny to get dressed, and they’ll get lunch before his plane leaves, so she got up and went to her room.

(Kaley was hopping the whole way, and then after the scene finished they told us that it would all be fixed in the editing, so of course you wouldn’t see Penny strangely hopping to get to her bedroom.)

As soon as Penny’s gone, Wyatt jumps to the couch to sit next to Leonard, and grabs the front of his jacket, and says “Please don’t give up on her!” Leonard asks, what? And Wyatt says that he’s tired of the white rappers, and the guys who wear their baseball hats backwards, and he wants to have grandkids that don’t live in a house with wheels. Leonard tells him that he’s not so sure things are meant to work out between them, but Wyatt makes him promise that he’ll try.

And then Wyatt says that he’ll give him a little extra help, and then yells loudly something like, “Now get out of here, I don’t ever want to see your face again!” Leonard whispers, oh yeah, reverse psychology, nice! Wyatt hurries Leonard to get him out of the apartment, and as Leonard leaves he yells Wyatt, “I’ll add you on facebook!”

Scene 12 - Guys’ apartment

Leonard enters the apartment, and Sheldon comes into the living room from the hallway, holding a stack of papers, saying that he was up all night, but he’s finally finished updating the Penny sections of the new roommate agreement. Leonard tells him oh, that’s actually not necessary, they broke up again.

Sheldon throws the stack of papers into the air so they go flying everywhere, and asks Leonard if he ever thinks of people other than himself.

They did this twice, and on the second take one piece of paper landed balanced on Jim’s shoulder against his head. Of course the audience loved it, and finally Jim cracked a smile. But then he pulled himself together, and finished the scene, though the paper fell (I think he might have sort of brushed it off).

Then the director wanted them to put the paper back on Jim’s shoulder (Jim was like, you’re putting it back??), and have him finish the scene with the paper there. They finally got it to stay, and Jim said, “I can’t act with this there!” But he did, of course.

Scene 13 - Caltech cafeteria

Sheldon and Leonard are eating, and Raj joins them. Leonard asks how it went with the telescope last night. Raj just says same old same old, look through the telescope and see stars, big whoop. Leonard is surprised, and says that Raj was waiting months for the telescope. Raj snaps, what, are you writing a book?

Sheldon says that he has an idea for what happened - Raj accidentally made contact with an alien race last night, and is now being forced by the government to keep it a secret. Raj insists that nothing happened, but Sheldon says that that sounded forced, and says “We’re not alone.”

Howard then comes up, says hi to Leonard and Sheldon, and then an awkward hi to Raj. Leonard asks Howard if he got to play with Raj’s big telescope last night, and both Howard and Raj jump in their seats, saying of course he didn’t play with his telescope, and then Howard and Raj were telling each other to shut up. They all go back to eating, but then Raj looks up at Howard and says, “I cant believe you didn’t call me this morning.”

dmr316

I wanted to say thanks for the taping report because with Penny's father debuting as an on-screen character, I thought maybe we'd finally find out their family name but it seems like the "Bob" mentioned by Penny at the end of Maternal Capicitance (Season 2, Episode 15) must have been the name that Penny's mother calls him?

lenaguffi

Thanks Roxanne! I'm so loving where it's going And all the kissing.... When does this episode air???

Emdancer

Thanks Roxanne!!! Cannot wait for this!! And I'm just saying now that as soon as this episode airs and it's out in the open - we must add Wyatt as an honorary LP shipper on the LP thread

You know what I think is interesting though? In previous episodes where her dad is mentioned, he comes off as kind of an ass - like he doesn't really care about what happens to her since she is not a boy - but he seems like he is really sweet in the report. The way the way they have described him before, I would have never guessed he would like Leonard - but I'm glad he does

same old story

Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Is all I have to say about this. But thanks so much for taking the time to type it all up.

lclc

Thanks Roxanne!

Finally, a LP centric episode. Worth the wait

carl1970

I agree. He loves and is proud of Penny and wants the best for her. Penny always gave us the impression that he really didn't care for her, which we now know is not true. I wonder if this is just more of a lack of detail and sloppy writing of the writers.

Thanks Roxanne. Was this episode one of your favorites for this season?

lclc

double post

carl1970

No, I saved you

lclc

Thanks Carl

ennaxor

Next week, on the 18th.

YES, Wyatt is definitely an honorary shipper!

He still has a bit of a rough edge around him... Like, I could totally see him as a guy who would have wanted a boy instead of a girl. But based on how he talked to Penny at the end, I kinda got the impression that they'd finally managed to move past that all, or maybe Penny had just been making a bigger deal of it than it really was.

Carl, it definitely was one of my favorites. Not just because of the LP focus, but it seems like the writers have finally realized that they can't just keep continuing with the Sheldon Show.

But in regards to how LP was handled, I really liked Leonard's confidence in dealing with Penny... Especially his arguing about how they fake-got-back-together, because I know when some of us have talked about when they do get back together for real, we don't want to see Leonard just go running back.

Emdancer

That's part of what I am looking forward to also. This is the first episode in a long time that Sheldon is a supporting character to the other storylines going on. I love Sheldon as much as the next person, but it gets old seeing the show totally based around him all the time. Plus I always love Raj and Howard scenes - they are always hysterical.