Stage Fright

From Dollhouse Wiki

Stage Fright
Season 1, Episode 3

Air date	February 27, 2009 (US) June 2, 2009 (UK) June 23, 2009 (AUS)
Written by	Maurissa Tancharoen & Jed Whedon
Directed by	David Solomon
Production no.	1APK04
Dollhouse Episode Guide
Previous "The Target"	Next "Gray Hour"

"Stage Fright" is the third episode of Dollhouse. It was written by Maurissa Tancharoen and Jed Whedon and directed by David Solomon. It originally aired on February 27th, 2009 on Fox.

[edit] Premise

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Echo provides protection to Rayna Russell, a pop star, by becoming her backup singer. Rayna has a very obsessive fan who wants to kill her, and Sierra gets imprinted as Rayna's number one fan to capture his attention. Ballard's investigation, meanwhile, takes a wrong turn when Lubov sends him into a trap which Paul barely survives. Lubov himself turns out to be an active of the Dollhouse, Victor.

[edit] Engagements

**Engagements**
Active	Client	Alias	Personality	Mission

Echo	Bill 'Biz' Zarella	Jordan	Bodyguard	Protecting Rayna Russell from an overzealous fan.
Sierra	Bill 'Biz' Zarella	Audra	Devoted fan	Being a distraction for the fan.
Victor	In-House	Lubov	Russian mafia informant	Misleading Paul Ballard.
November	In-House	Mellie	Paul Ballard's neighbour.	Sleeper active; will act in the Dollhouse's interest in extreme circumstances.

[edit] Cast

[edit] Main Cast

[edit] Recurring Roles

[edit] Guest Stars

[edit] Background Information

[edit] Production

"Stage Fright" was the fifth episode produced, with filming taking place in October, 2008. The scenes depicting the concert were shot at "The Music Box".

[edit] Writing

Kimberly Cole, who wrote Rayna's songs in the episode and played a backup-singer, said about working with Joss Whedon: "Actually, the funny thing is he wrote the script but his brother and his partner from the Sing Along Blog were working on this episode. So I got to work with him a little bit and then his brother. They were totally awesome. It’s so exciting being a part of something with so much enthusiasm because they have so many fans. I thought it was awesome."^[1]

[edit] Choosing the Music

Andrea von Foerster, music supervisor on Dollhouse, chose Kimberly Cole's song "Superstar (Smash It)" for this episode. Cole was added to the cast later on: "The story is that they actually first chose my song ‘Superstar (Smash it) which is off the EP. We did that one hit song because that was the one I performed on stage. So they ended up choosing my song and that was so exciting. And then from there they actually booked me as an actor on the show."^[1] Jean-Yves "Jeeve" Ducornet produced and wrote all songs in the episode (including "Freedom").

[edit] Reception

[edit] Critics

" More teething trouble for Dollhouse as the stalker storyline really fails in all departments. "

--The TV Critic Review

" My favorite moment in the series so far was Echo’s slight shake of the head at the end of episode three. It was so delightfully understated and raised so many questions. It presented so delicately the moral vacuum that the Dollhouse really is. "

--GeekDad's Review

[edit] Ratings

"Stage Fright" averaged a 2.7/5 rating/share, a 1.6/5 in the 18-49 demo and a 2.0/5 in the 25-54 demographic. 59.26% of the audience was in the 18-49 demographic. The episode was watched by 3,614 million viewers Live, 4.181 million viewers Live+SD and 5.280 million viewers Live+7. Including 7 days of DVR viewing showed an increase from 1.61 to 2.19 in the demo (a jump by 36%). Overall "Stage Fright" had 1.666 million DVR viewers. 31.6% of all viewings of "Stage Fright" happened via DVR, that's the third greatest percentage of DVR viewing for broadcast TV shows of that week.

The quarter-hour breakdown:

Time Period	Rating/Share	Rating/Share (18-49)
9:01 PM-9:15 PM	2.8/5	1.6/5
9:15 PM-9:30 PM	2.6/5	1.6/5
9:30 PM-9:45 PM	2.6/5	1.6/5
9:45 PM-10:00 PM	2.6/5	1.6/5

[edit] Trivia

Adelle uncorks a bottle of 'Johnnie Walker Red Label' which is the least expensive of the company's brand and doesn't actually come with a cork. This brand comes with a screw top to keep the cost low.

Biz refers to the Mickey Mouse Club where stars such as Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera started their careers.

Topher refers to Rose Hovick, the mother of Gypsy Rose Lee and June Havoc with the line "She'll be fine, Mama Rose".

[Britney Spears] is referenced again with Jordan's line "You are having a breakdown. Not a shave your head and flash your junk, wacky phase." This refers to the star's very public breakdown in 2007.