Dressed to Kill – Director: Sudz Sutherland/Writer: Jessie Gabe
This one starts with an adoring Toronto crowd waiting to greet Coco Chanel as she arrives at her hotel. But there’s someone who’s not such a fan of Coco and takes a shot at her with a rifle. Later, she gives the cops shit for not being able to find the shooter and when Mary overhears that, she suggests to Coco that she might know someone who can help her. A local gossip columnist called Lipstick uses the incident as fodder for her column, but Coco is more concerned with finding out who wants her dead, so she hires Frankie.
Coco says she’s in Toronto to do a fashion show for the owner of Eaton’s department stores. She introduces Frankie to her two companions, Philippe Leduc (a business associate) and Edmund Robinson (a financial backer).
Both men served during the War and seem to have a rivalry thing going on; looks like they’re both hot for Coco. Frankie gets Trudy to go undercover as a seamstress for Coco, where she runs into an old friend (Dot), who’s been making Trudy’s dresses for years. She doesn’t get along as well with the woman in charge (Ruth), who seems like a no-nonsense taskmaster. Frankie and Mary check out the crime scene and figure the shot came from a building across the street. Dot warns Trudy about Coco being a strict boss and Trudy connects with Ruth by pretending to agree with her about corsets being more feminine than the new androgynous look. Dot tells her that Ruth had a corset shop, but it went out 
of business when Coco introduced her new look. Frankie and Mary check out the building (where Mary literally runs into a flower delivery guy) and find the room the sniper used. Frankie finds the shell casing and a hiding spot under the floorboards. But the gun isn’t there and when Mary finds flowers in the garbage, they realize the “delivery man” was actually the shooter, picking up the rifle he stashed after taking the shot at Coco. Frankie and Trudy compare notes and Frankie saves Coco’s life when someone sets her collection on fire.
Almost dying doesn’t faze Coco, who insists her team make all new dresses in time for the show. Coco is very exacting and Dot shows Trudy how the
dresses need to be stitched. Dot also mentions she had a big order on tap with Eaton’s but it got cancelled suddenly. At the police station, Mary tries to get a look at the mug book so she can search for the shooter, but the desk sergeant is hogging it. Frankie asks Coco about Philippe and Edmund and Coco admits she’s banging both of them. Coco doesn’t think it’s a big deal and both the men agree, but there’s obviously a rivalry between them for her affections. Both of them take credit for Coco’s success, but she says she made it on her own. She also 
prefers to gloss over some of the more intense parts of her past, telling a happier story than the truth. When Lipstick writes another gossipy article, Frankie figures someone near Coco is feeding her info. Flo tells Frankie she can get a message to Lipstick by leaving a note in a dead drop, so Frankie asks to meet her. Turns out Lipstick is actually Nora, Frankie’s mom. Nora shows her a note from the seamstress who’s been feeding her the dirt and Trudy recognizes the handwriting as Dot’s.
Dot tries to deny it, but the note is pretty damning. She admits she wants to take Coco down a peg or two (and says Coco is probably the reason Eaton’s cancelled her big order), but denies starting the fire or hiring someone to
kill Coco. Trudy points out that Dot’s line is ready-to-wear while Coco’s is custom, so they wouldn’t really be in competition. Coco denies having Dot’s order killed and suggests Philippe might have done it, since he dealt with Mr. Eaton. Trudy figures out that the burnt dresses might have been fakes and Flo confirms it. Frankie and Trudy discuss the motive and wonder if Philippe might’ve had Dot’s order cancelled so he could sell copies of Coco’s dresses. Frankie has Nora pretend 
to be a buyer named Ambrosia who’s looking for some Chanel copies. At the station, Mary has to fast-talk Detective Grayson to get access to the mug book. Nora gets Philippe to give up the location of the knock-off dresses and Frankie and Trudy go to check them out. They find the knock-offs … along with the originals, which Philippe obviously stole.
Coco isn’t happy about Philippe’s betrayal (especially since he’s disappeared), but insists on going ahead with the show. Frankie wants to stick close, so she offers to model one of the dresses. Mary finds the shooter
(Silace Baker) in the mug book. Philippe appears up at the fashion show and is obviously pissed off that Coco got her originals back. Frankie’s not exactly a natural model, but when Ruth shows up with a gun, Frankie jumps in front of Coco and takes the bullet … which turns out to be a paint pellet. Mary tells Frankie about Baker and mentions he was in the same unit as Edmund, so Frankie figures Edmund hired Baker to shoot Coco. They find Edmund and Philippe pointing guns at each other and asking Coco to choose between them. Philippe admits he stole the dresses to ruin Edmund’s investment and Edmund says he hired 
Baker to shoot Philippe. Frankie convinces them their rivalry is only hurting Coco and they give up the guns. Coco isn’t impressed and decides not to rely on men so much. Dot admits she fed Lipstick all the gossip and Coco says she loved the free publicity and will recommend Dot’s line to Mr. Eaton. Frankie gives Nora a Chanel original to pay her back for her help and Nora can’t help showing it off, which pretty much confirms to Trudy that she’s Lipstick.
This is a pretty good episode, bringing in another real-life character with
Coco Chanel (played really well by French actress Romane Portail, who played her again in La Garçonne). It’s nice to see Nora helping out again and we see how dedicated Frankie is when she tries to take a bullet for Coco (since she had no way of knowing it was just a paintball).
Noticeable Things:
- Frankie mentions a “little black dress”, which seems to inspire Coco …
Favourite Quotes:
- “Perhaps if they loosened their belts, some more oxygen would reach their brains.” Coco’s view on men.
- “If there’s something I’ve learned over the years, Miss Drake, it’s that I can always trust a woman in pants.” Coco telling Frankie why she’s willing to hire her.
- “Oh, Coco, you really have done some revolutionary things with fashion.” Mary admiring Frankie’s paint-stained dress.