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Original Air Date: April 6, 2008
Brooklyn, 1986
Eager to attend a sold-out Run-DMC concert but lacking the $200 to buy hot tickets from a guy in the local barbershop, CHRIS signs up for MR. OMAR‘s (Guest Star Ernest Thomas) Black Funeral Directors’ (BFD) scholarship program because he thinks he’ll get the $250 payout immediately. Yet, Mr. Omar informs him after he’s already signed the paperwork that the money won’t be forthcoming until Chris completes the program all about death and bereavement.
Since he already has $100 saved, Chris then tries to find someone to borrow half of the ticket money from until he completes the work for the scholarship. After a bit of fruitless searching, he asks his father, lying that the money is for books, and JULIUS loans it to him.
Chris is glad to have the tickets and invites his best friend GREG to come with him. Unfortunately, another bigger problem soon arises: Mr. Omar informs Chris that he won’t finish the program until Tuesday, although the concert is the day before, and he doesn’t care if Chris has something else scheduled then.
Meanwhile, ROCHELLE goes to see a doctor after she pulls a muscle in her arm when she swings it back to bring her belt down on DREW‘s butt. The punishment was because Chris’ younger brother ignored his mother’s instructions not to throw balls in the house, and he broke a $60 lamp as a result. Rochelle ends up milking her injury for all its worth while her arm’s in a sling for a week, and Drew and TONYA end up with a long list of chores they have to complete during her “recovery.”
Chris quickly learns that the scholarship program is more about Mr. Omar getting cheap labor than learning about the business of being a funeral director. But, Chris does everything asked in order to receive his scholarship money.
At the same time that he’s working hard, Tonya decides not to follow her father’s instructions when he has her fill up paper coin holders with quarters to be redeemed for paper cash at a bank. Instead of putting forty quarters in each roll, Tonya only inserts 39 because the final roll is neater that way. Consequently, when Julius goes to the bank to exchange coins for cash, he learns he only has $97.50. And, of course the missing $2.50 drives him nuts.
The day of the concert arrives, and Chris arranges to meet Greg at Madison Square Garden at 7:30. That way, he can stop by Mr. Omar’s to make sure he does everything the man wants in order to keep his scholarship. Yet, with just one minute left before closing, a woman whose husband recently died (Guest Star Anna Maria Horsford) arrives to leave a tie for her husband’s burial. She proceeds to talk Chris’ ear off for so long, he misses the concert. Still, despite being annoyed at first, Chris ultimately realizes that helping her feel better was worth it.
At home, Julius is concerned Tonya has been stealing again because of the rolls of quarters that came up short. He reluctantly asks her about it, and Tonya immediately tells him she took a quarter from each roll, and she’s started a fresh roll with them to fill up. Even when Julius, feeling guilty for having automatically assumed his daughter was stealing from him, tries to give her the money as a reward for helping her mother, Tonya refuses to accept it.
Rochelle is experiencing child problems, too, and she finally stops pretending she’s injured when Drew and Tonya won’t stop repeatedly call her for help with the smallest things. Fortunately, she’s not there when Mr. Omar finally gives Chris his scholarship — a $250 certificate for books, not $250 cash money. It’s hard to tell who’s more pissed about the news: Chris, who did all the work, or Julius, who loaned his son $100.
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