bottle episode

[ bot-l ep-uh-sohd ]

noun

1. an episode of a television series set in a single limited or confined location, such as a hotel room or a broken elevator, and often using only a few regular cast members, sometimes undertaken as a cost-cutting measure or as a creative challenge.

Word History and Origins

Origin of bottle episode¹

First recorded in 2000–05; perhaps modeled on ship in a bottle or to bottle up

Example Sentences

I did a bottle episode and then I was writing a mockumentary the next time.

From The Daily Beast

It seems a small matter to us now that Charles Dickens should have been ashamed of the blacking-bottle episode of his boyhood.

From Project Gutenberg