Rickrolled and Reunited — Plus, Marion Cotillard Weighs in on Celine’s Big Shock

No one in my life cares that this week’s The Morning Show opens with a bonkers musical number involving Yanko, backup dancers, stock footage of New York City and a metric ton of confetti… so thank goodness for you guys, because I MUST DISCUSS IT.

There are far more plot-propulsive beats in the hour, and we’ll get to those in a minute. But first, I need you to understand that Yanko the Weatherman does this very odd spoken-word performance while wiggling his hips to Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”… while women in form-fitting black dresses shake it around him… and images of the Manhattan skyline are projected behind them… culminating in a tableau in which Yanko is down on one knee, ring box in hand, asking his girlfriend (wait, what?) Ariana to marry him. Did I mention this is all happening on the set of The Morning Show? And it’s not even the real thing — just a rehearsal for the segment in which he’s planning to pop the question, live on the air?

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It’s madness. I love it. I’ve said it before, but when this show chooses to go bananapants, it’s at its best. And kudos to Nestor Carbonell for fully committing to the awkward, funny, bizarre bit.

Too bad the proposal never actually happens, because Yanko finds out — moments before air, mind you — that his former love, Claire, is in town. Keep reading for the highlights of “Love the Questions,” then make sure to see what Marion Cotillard thought of the big bombshell Cory drops on Celine at the end of the hour.

* Alex’s dad shows up at her apartment, livid: The student journalist that Alex talked to a few episodes ago now is alleging in her story that Martin plagiarized his book, and he blames Alex. She says she’ll reach out to the reporter, Justice, to see what she can do. The student says they’ll take the allegation out of the story… if Alex will provide a field producer job at UBN. Alex thinks about it but ultimately refuses. When she tells Martin that she couldn’t get the story changed, he’s cutting: “More fool me for hoping you could come up with anything more consequential.”

* Everything about Wolf River has been wiped from the UBN archives. Chip swings by UBN to fill Bradley in on what he’s found — a lawyer representing the class-action lawsuit against the chemical company died after a series of negative stories about him ran on Eagle News, and then then the story dried up — and runs into Alex while he’s there. He tells her a bit about the story, and she’s irate that Bradley went behind her back. As she lights into Bradley on set, Yanko hears. “Claire’s in town?” he says, still clearly interested. Still, he plans to go through with the proposal, until a plane in peril supersedes everything the show had planned for the day. “The plane, if it crashes, America — they’re going to want to see something positive,” he pleads, to no avail. Everyone runs around in a frenzy as they track the plane. Chip helps by finding someone to talk about jets on the air. Alex is in the control room the whole time. When the aircraft lands safely, everyone rejoices. Turns out, Ariana knew about the proposal plan the whole time… and she rolls with it, after the show, when Yanko decides not to go through with asking her.

* After she’s done yelling at Bradley, Alex gives her two weeks to get something concrete and on-the-record regarding the story. But Bradley needs her help to get info from Eagle News anchor Ashley Andrews regarding the stories about the dead lawyer. So in exchange, Bradley calls and tells her (with Alex’s permission, though Ashley doesn’t know that) that Alex is sitting on a story about Extinction Revolt. “I so hope this is worth it,” Alex says when Bradley hangs up the phone. It is: The files that Ashley sends make it look like Cory had his fixer send the dirt on the lawyer to Eagle News. Bradley is shocked. But when she sees Cory at the end of the episode, she says nothing.

* Cory spends some time with Celine and realizes that she wants to be board president and CEO of UBN. “Even I didn’t try that,” he says with awe and respect. “Tell me what you have on Stella,” she demands, promising him everything he wants in return. He refuses, at first. But after a run-in with Chip, in which Cory realizes that he really needs his production deal in order to “Stella and Miles are having an affair.”

I spoke with Cotillard, who plays the French board member, about whether she thought Celine had any inkling of her husband’s infidelity prior to Cory’s blurting it out. “That was a big question that I had,” she said. “At some point I decided that she had, that she was suspicious. And then I changed my mind.” She laughs. “I thought no, she cannot imagine that this bond that they have, that this love that they’ve had for 10 years, the fact that she gave up a lot to be with him — and also the fact that she believes in her own power — could lead to this affair. And I wanted her to be shocked. And then I thought, she might not be suspicious, but she might feel something not specific. So that was what I decided in the end.”

When Celine gets the news, Cotillard continues, there’s a lot of anger… but you might be surprised at where it’s directed. “She is devastated,” she explained, “but I wanted her to be mad at herself for feeling but not really knowing. Because she loves to be ahead… And the fact that she didn’t see it totally coming, I thought it was interesting that she would, in a way, be more affected by the fact that she’s mad at herself than the real story that is happening.”

Now it’s your turn. What did you think of the episode? Hit the comments with your thoughts!

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