Drop Dead Diva – Grayson’s Anatomy

Ending the first season on a spectacularly high note, Drop Dead Diva’s finale dealt with no less weighty issues than: Are we destined to have one true love?  Are our lives predetermined by destiny?  Or is it all simply a matter of fate? These were the questions delicately and quite humorously addressed and, unfortunately, left hanging in this episode.  For Deb (Brooke Elliott) had begun to wonder about her life as Jane and whether it meant that she must live the life old Jane carved-out, or if she can change her life and live as a new Jane.

Fresh off her inadvertent date with Grayson (Jackson Hurst) in the prior episode, after Tony (David Denman) had canceled at the last minute due to work and Kim (Kate Levering) had broken up with Grayson, we got a glimpse into Grayson’s inner thoughts as he awoke from a dream about nearly kissing Jane.  The expression on his face clearly showed his confusion about the dream and what it meant.

But, in Jane’s world, things are going smoothly with Tony (David Denman) who thoughtfully brought Jane lunch at the office and invited her on a romantic getaway to Napa.  Grayson could only watch in the background contemplating how he felt about Jane.  Later Grayson inadvertently admitted to Stacy (April Bowlby) that he was having trouble sleeping because he had been dreaming about Jane.  Predictably, Stacy told Jane about Grayson’s revealing disclosure and that put Jane in a quandary:  does she continue to pursue the relationship with Tony or take the time to find out whether Grayson feels something for her?

In the end, Jane made her decision.  It was time for her to live her life as “new Jane” and no longer as “old Jane.”  She is not Deb anymore and she is not Jane either.  Thus, she needs to figure out who she is as the “new Jane.”  This meant no clinging to the past and wishing for things to be as they had been with Grayson.  It was time to put the past in the past — and Tony promised a new future.  However, just as Jane made that firm decision, there was a knock at the door and low and behold if it wasn’t a new romantic entanglement:  Jane’s husband, Ethan (Devon Gummersall).  Talk about a major cliff-hanger?!

Paralleling Jane’s dilemma, we watched Jane struggle with a case involving an aging minor-league baseball player, Eric Hayes (Bryce Johnson), who had undergone rotator cuff surgery only to find out the surgery had been botched and it left him unable to play baseball anymore.  In a huge display of faith, Parker (Josh Stamberg) invited Jane to be first-chair with Kim acting as second chair on the case.  While Terri (Margaret Cho) and Jane wanted to credit the star-treatment to the “partner pen” that Terri had gotten for Jane, it was a smart move for Parker to allow Jane such an opportunity to shine.  Despite the typical bickering and tug-of-war on legal strategy regarding whether to pursue the sloppy doctor’s history or the injured ballplayer’s background, the case was ultimately a slam-dunk victory to the tune of a $15 million settlement.

But it was a shallow victory once Jane realized that she had been duped into helping defraud the doctor’s malpractice insurance carrier.  It had been Dr. Dumont (Alicia Coppola) and Eric Hays’ plan all along to retire young and rich.  They had carefully concealed their affair so that even Jane was not suspicious until that one slip up by Eric when he mentioned that he would be taking a few weeks off to relax at the Kona Coast in Hawaii after receiving the settlement money.  That was when Jane remembered that Dr. Dumont had a home on the Kona Coast and then dug up the credit card receipts to verify the affair.  With the evidence staring her right in the face, Jane immediately took it Parker and Kim to share the bad news, “This whole case was a scam and we just helped them steal $15 million.”

But to Jane’s dismay, Parker rebuked her and said, “Forget the money.  If word gets out we turned on our clients, we’ll have no clients.  You’ll say nothing because you’re not allowed to – attorney-client privilege.”  Faced with Parker’s unyielding stance, Jane said in horror and astonishment, “So everyone gets to be ethical but me?!”  Contemplating her predicament, Jane later told Terri, “If my career goes up in flames, yours does too and that’s not fair.”  However, surprisingly, Terri said, “Six years ago, I took this job, yes – because I believed you were going places – but now I’m working for you because of who you are, not where you’re going.  Do what you have to do.”  Backed with this unexpected support, Jane played a reverse scam of her own on the wily Dr. Dumont to make her believe that Eric had only used her so that he could get the money and then cut her out of the deal.  Thus, Jane was able to get a full
confession from her on tape – a tape which Jane determinedly put in the mail to the District Attorney’s office along with a note for Parker.

This was a make or break point for Jane.  Does she turn her back on the fraud committed with her unwitting aid, or does she do the right thing?  In the end, she just could not live with it and did the right thing.  She had to expose the fraud – even at the cost of her law license.  So just like with Grayson, she had to let go.  She had to let go of her life as Deb and her life as old-Jane.

With both her career and love-life hanging in the balance, it remains to be seen how the second season will resolve these dire predicaments.

WHAT WORKED:

Back-dropping the episode was another legal case involving a model who was fired after a lingerie company discovered she was a cancer survivor.  Upon first discovering this deplorable treatment, Jane vowed to “make them cry.”  But it fell to Grayson and Stacy to be the legal champions while Jane was tied up on the medical malpractice case.  Thus, there were some delightful comedic moments with Stacy trying to conquer the mind-bending legalese, but in the end it was Stacy’s insight that helped them prevail.  Employing some sexy black lingerie worn by the model as she disrobed on the stand, Grayson good-naturedly asked, “So who’s thinking of cancer now?”  Clearly, no one was thinking about cancer after that!  It was a clever way to provide some levity and make a point that women are beautiful no matter what they may have gone through or experienced.  It was a classic “Drop Dead Diva” storyline to emphasize women-empowerment.

GIVING CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE:

“Grayson’s Anatomy” was written by Alex Taub and Jeffrey Lippman and directed by David Petrarca. Drop Dead Diva stars Brooke Elliott, Brooke D’Orsey, April Bowlby, Ben Feldman, Margaret Cho, Jackson Hurst, Josh Stamberg, and Kate Levering. Drop Dead Diva airs Sundays on Lifetime Television.