MovieChat Forums > The Cable Guy (1996) Discussion > How Did Ernie "Chip" Douglas/R...

How Did Ernie "Chip" Douglas/Ricky Ricardo(The Cable Guy) Meet Steven?


The film starts with Steven having called the cable company and set an appointment to have cable installed. Then Chip shows up and we the viewer are led to believe he is a cable technician. Later in the film it is made clear that Chip did not work for the cable company.
My inquiry is, how did Chip:
1)Know Steven called the cable company?
2)Make sure the actual technician didn't show up before, after, or while he was there?

Was he intercepting Steven's call in a manner similar to how he taps into the phone line while up the telephone pole? That is the only thing I can think of, but wouldn't Steven recognize his voice on the phone(especially because of the lisp)?

Seems like it might be a goof, but I could be missing something.

Thoughts, ideas?

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I kinda wondered that myself. I am guessing he used a phone tap, figured out his address, then called the real cable guy and cancelled. He was a former cable guy, so maybe he kept some equipment.

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yeah, but he also states that he looked up his cable info & saw the former address & that his girlfriend was on the bill for a different address,
so he needed access to see confidential cable subscriber infos, which he couldn't glean from tapping phone calls up on the telephone poll

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lol.

He preselected Steven to be his victim. Just because he liked Mathew Brodrick aka Danke Schoen.

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