"OTDR" is the first segment of the seventh episode of the second season of Kiff. It is the seventy-seventh segment overall.

Synopsis

The Chatterleys and Barry try to get ready for a big event.

Plot

At the Chatterley residence, Kiff, Beryl, Martin, and Barry are getting ready to attend an exclusive fancy gala event. After a quick check with Kiff to confirm that their preparations for the night are complete, Barry declares that they are "OTDR", meaning "out-the-door ready". As the Chatterleys and Barry are about to leave for the event, Martin notices that he is missing a cufflink, so he goes upstairs to get one. While waiting for Martin, Beryl decides to put the dishes away and Barry decides to watch some TV, frustrating Kiff, who wants to make it to the gala on time. Beryl accidentally drops a dish, so she goes to the garage to get a broom.

Martin finds his cufflink and returns downstairs, but Beryl is still looking for the broom in the garage, so he joins Barry on the couch to watch Smoldering Cove. The show is interrupted by a breaking Table Town News report warning that a severe thunderstorm will be blowing through Table Town in the next hour. As the gala is an indoor–outdoor event, Martin has to retrieve an extra umbrella for Barry from the basement. Beryl returns from the garage, having failed to find the bloom, and goes upstairs to retrieve her ski gloves so she can safely pick up the broken dish pieces from the floor by hand. While Beryl is upstairs, Martin returns from the basement.

Kiff's frustration increases as Beryl and Martin each get distracted with accomplishing random tasks while the other is away. Just as everyone is finally ready to leave, the landline phone starts ringing. Kiff orders everyone to stay put while she answers the call, which is from Glarbin, who puts on Kiff on hold before he can explain his reason for calling. Despite Kiff's command, Martin ends up going upstairs to apply some deodorant, Beryl tries to finish putting the dishes away, and Barry sits back on the couch to watch TV.

Barry tunes into the shopping network and decides to order some Chubbles Wubbington commemorative coins. Wanting to save his cellphone's battery power, he attempts to place his order via landline, forcing Kiff to explain to Barry, who does not know how landline phones work, that he cannot make a call while she is still on the line. Martin accidentally locks himself in the bathroom, prompting Beryl to go back to the garage to retrieve a screwdriver to unlock the door. Glarbin finally returns and explains that the phone company simply wanted to thank the Chatterleys for being one of only two households in Table Town to still have a landline phone. Realizing that the call was worthless, Kiff angrily yanks the phone from the wall.

Beryl returns from the garage, unable to find the screwdriver as well. Barry then recalls that both the screwdriver and the broom have actually been in Kiff's room the entire time, as earlier that day, he attached the screwdriver to the end of the broom in order to reach a bird perched on a branch sticking out of the house and adjust the screws on the bird's glasses. After taking care of the dishes and freeing Martin, the Chatterleys and Barry are ready to leave again, but Barry notices that Kiff now has a tear in her dress, which Beryl points out must have occurred while Kiff retrieved the broom and screwdriver from her room. Kiff staples the tear, but not before pushing the couch toward Beryl, Martin, and Barry to pin them against the wall, and furiously declaring that they have lost their "walking-around privileges".

After Kiff repairs her dress, the trip to the gala is once again delayed when Martin sees the Pone with his new girlfriend Cherry Berry and refuses to leave the house, not wanting to engage the two in small talk. Kiff, now even more irritated, quickly resolves the impasse by dialing the Pone's house, the only other home in Table Town to still have a landline phone, which succeeds in getting him and Cherry inside. Reluctant to anger Kiff any further, Beryl and Martin stop Barry from pointing out that Kiff now looks disheveled and has the disconnected landline phone wrapped around her. The four finally leave, and afterwards, the camera pans over the now-wrecked living room, then the kitchen, revealing that their tickets to the gala are still pinned on the fridge.

Cast and characters

Voice credits

• Kimiko Glenn as Kiff Chatterley
• H. Michael Croner as Barry Buns
• Steve Little as Glarbin Gloobin
• Lauren Ash as Beryl Chatterley
• James Monroe Iglehart as Martin Chatterley
• Eugene Cordero as The Pone

Additional voices

• Lauren Ash as Sally

Appearances

Locations

• Table Town
  • Chatterley residence
    • Kiff Chatterley's room

Trivia

• Opening sponsor: Letterman's Alphabet Magnets.

Continuity

• Barry wears his tuxedo for the first time since "Blooper Quest".
• In the Table Town News report on the storm, the lower third headline reads "Yikeseola! A storm!"
• The hold music that plays during Glarbin's phone call is a muzak version of "Totally Table Town" from the episode of the same name.
• Kiff executes a squirrel attack by leaping at the couch and headbutting it toward Barry, Beryl, and Martin.

Errors

• In the title card, Kiff's ear notch is not flipped.
• When Kiff turns her head to Barry, Beryl's eyelashes are missing.

Production

• In an October 2023 interview, Kiff co-creator Lucy Heavens alluded to the episode as "one of our most recent scripts" and explained that its premise was inspired by series art director Niko Guardia, "who lives in New York and had come to stay with us in L.A. and asked, 'Are you OTDR?' We were like, 'What's that?' And he said, 'Out the door ready.' Then it became a thing with Nic and I asking, 'Are you OTDR?' We took it to the writers' room, and they all had OTDR stories. That idea came from someone who wasn't even in the writers' room."^[2]
• In storyboarding the scene where Kiff walks on all fours while returning from stapling her dress, James Sugrue was asked to use a similar scene from the 2017 film The Square as a visual reference.^[3]

Gallery

Click here to view the gallery for OTDR.

Videos

Production

Kiff - OTDR Animatic By James Sugrue

Side-by-side comparison of the episode's animatic and the episode itself^[3]

References