Wash Dry Story

"Wash/Dry Story" is a Season 7 episode of Rugrats.

Characters Present

 * Tommy
 * Dil
 * Chuckie
 * Phil
 * Lil
 * Kimi
 * Angelica
 * Stu
 * Didi
 * Howard
 * Betty
 * Charlotte
 * Colleen
 * Timmy
 * Terry
 * Todd
 * Ty
 * Teddy
 * Jonathan

Synopsis
''When Stu inadvertently turns off the neighborhood water supply, the Rugrats and family go to local coin operated laundromat. There the Rugrats meet up with a gang of young "rebel" babies, and what follows is a musical a la "West Side Story".'' - Description from Klasky Csupo

Plot
While Stu's working on a sprinkler system in the front yard of his house, the kids are all inside with Didi, Betty and Charlotte. Kimi's playing with Superthing and Angelica's Cynthia doll by pretending to marry them, but then Angelica comes in and gets mad at Kimi for playing with Cynthia. Meanwhile, Stu ends up accidentally terminating the water system for the entire neighborhood, which makes Didi unable to do the laundry---Charlotte finds it strange that Didi does laundry, while Didi finds it strange that Charlotte doesn't.

Charlotte takes Angelica home while Didi and Betty take the rest of the kids to a local laundromat---Charlotte forces Jonathan to take her family's laundry to the same laundromat that Didi and Betty go to. When Didi, Betty and Jonathan get to the laundromat, the kids mistake the washing machines for TVs and start playing around in the laundry carts that are at the laundromat.

Didi and Betty end up running into Colleen McNulty, who explains that she comes to that laundromat every Wednesday with her sons, who're often playing in the back room of the laundromat. Tommy, Chuckie, Kimi, Phil and Lil run into the McNulty brothers when they go into the back room, and Tommy asks Timmy if he and brothers would like to play with them. The McNulty brothers, and the two groups of kids get into a standoff.

Teddy McNulty sees Angelica's Cynthia doll, which had accidentally fallen into Jonathan's laundry bag when he was at Charlotte's house, and falls in love with it. Kimi tells Teddy that he can't have the doll, but the McNulty brothers insist on the whole "finder's keepers, loser's weeper's." The two groups of kids get into a fight over who should get to keep Cynthia, and Timmy says the only way to decide it to go into another back room for a "tumble," which Chuckie wonders what it is.

Meanwhile, back at Charlotte's house, Angelica's looking for her Cynthia doll and is getting more and more frantic when she can't find her. Charlotte realizes that Cynthia must've fallen into Jonathan's laundry bag, and she and Angelica drive to the laundromat so Angelica can get Cynthia back. Kimi overhears Jonathan talking to Charlotte and Angelica on his phone, and tells the others that Angelica's coming to the laundromat to get Cynthia. When she tries taking Cynthia away from Teddy, they get into a tug-of-war over the doll until they both let go of the doll and Cynthia flies into the washing machine that Betty's putting her laundry into.

Teddy, Kimi and the others get sad when they see Cynthia in the washing machine, and worry that she'll probably be ruined once she gets out. But then Betty comes and presents a perfectly fine (but now clean) Cynthia doll, which the kids are happy about. She gives the doll to Teddy, and still refuses to let Kimi have it. But just then, Angelica comes into the laundromat and rushes to the back room to get Cynthia. Kimi finally takes the doll from Teddy, but initially, Angelica thinks that Kimi was the one who had taken Cynthia in the first place.

But the Lil and the boys come to Kimi's defense and explain to Angelica that Kimi had saved Cynthia from the McNulty brothers. Angelica (reluctantly) thanks Kimi for saving Cynthia, and leaves the laundromat. Tommy, Chuckie, Kimi, Phil and Lil end up playing with the McNulty brothers in the laundry carts.

Songs

 * This Is Our Place (sung by Tommy, Chuckie, Phil, Lil, Kimi, Timmy, Terry, Tood, Ty and Teddy)
 * Oh Cynthia (sung by Teddy)
 * Someplace (sung by Tommy, Chuckie, Phil, Lil and Kimi)

Trivia

 * Charlotte doesn't do her own laundry--Jonathan does it for her in this episode.
 * When Didi and Betty are talking to Colleen at the laundromat, Colleen tells them "watch out for the rinse cycle on Number 12" and she kicks washing machine-Number 4.
 * This episode is a parody of the musical, ' (which itself was basically a modernized, musical version of Shakespeare's ').
 * This is the last episode to feature an appearance by Timmy McNulty and his brothers, though they would reappear in Jimmy Neutron's Nicktoon Blast and the storybook Back Off, Bully Boys!
 * After July 30, 2001, this episode appeared in place of "Falling Stars", with that episode appearing with this episode's sister episodes ("Bad Shoes" and "The World According to Dil and Spike") since 2005. This pairing is retained in DVD releases and on Paramount+. Curiously, DirecTV lists the episodes with their original partners.
 * The music used in one of the songs the babies sing is reminiscent of "Stray Cat Strut" by the Stray Cats and others are similar to West Side Story 's "Maria" and "There's a Place For Us".
 * This is the second musical of the series after "Music".
 * The last time this episode aired on Nicktoons is August 22, 2021.

Quotes
Chuckie: Do I gots to tumble? Maybe I can sit while you all tumble!

Gallery
The gallery for this episode can be found here