AllMovie

This episode could well have been mistaken as an "answer" to the Robin Williams movie Moscow on the Hudson, were it not for the fact that the "answer" came three years before the "question." When a Russian ballet troupe performs in Phoenix, the troupe's towel boy Treplev (Robert Peirce) chooses to defect--by hiding in Mel's storeroom. Will Mel (Vic Tayback) be able to use his chili to prevent Treplev from returning to the Land of Borscht?