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By Marc Peyser
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The awards won't be presented until Sunday, but it's already clear that this will be the year of the Desperate Emmy. For starters, the ceremony is desperate for a laugh. This year the show features something called Emmy Idol, in which TV stars will sing--are you ready for this?--theme songs from "Green Acres," "The Jeffersons" and others. Since Hollywood can't make TV viewers laugh with it, it's apparently decided to let us laugh at it. Some of the performers, such as Megan Mullally, are acclaimed singers; others, like Donald Trump, less so. And then there's William Shatner, who will team with mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade on the theme to "Star Trek." If all that's not surreal enough, viewers will likely watch "Desperate Housewives" win best comedy, which is strange given that it isn't a sitcom--unless you giggle at stories about murder, adultery and prescription-drug abuse. Then again, what choice is there? "Arrested Development" is wonderfully clever, but the only people watching it are TV critics. "Will &Grace" hasn't been Fresh &Funny since last century.
Fortunately, the fall season starts in full on the day after the Emmys, and, shockingly, there are some genuinely good sitcoms about to bloom: a family show, a romantic comedy and a picaresque heart warmer. Why is this happening at last? Hard to say--crime-drama burnout, reality-show overload or maybe comedy's ancient Rule of Three, which no one really understands. Perhaps it's best not to overthink it, especially considering what E. B. White said: "Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it."
The sitcom with the most buzz is UPN's "Everybody Hates Chris"--the title alone is reason enough to love it. The show was created by comedian Chris Rock and is based on his adolescence in ' 80s Brooklyn as the only black kid in an all-white middle school. Rock narrates each episode, and much of the show's charm comes from his trademark hyperbolic exasperation projected onto pint-size problems like middle-school bullies and tough-loving parents. "Everybody Hates Chris" isn't revolutionary--in fact, it's as warm and gooey as apple pie, with some sharp cheddar melted on top. But there's something to be said for an all-American family comedy, especially since it's the only new show this fall that parents and kids can happily watch together.
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CBS's "How I Met Your Mother" also features a voice-over and a taste for nostalgia--maybe the way to make a successful comedy is to pretend you're back in a time when sitcoms were still funny. It opens with two kids sitting on a couch as their dad (Bob Saget) narrates the story of his courting their mom. The show is told primarily in flashback, but the clever thing about "Mother" is that, at least initially, we don't meet Mom. What we find instead is one part romantic comedy and one part ensemble show about dating and mating in New York--kind of a cross between "Mad About You" and "Friends" before they became cloying. The cast features the delightfully goofy Alyson Hannigan ("Buffy") and Neil Patrick Harris, who plays the unctuous lothario to perfection. He has finally banished the ghost of Doogie Howser for good.
It's dangerous to pick the best new show of the year--that's almost always a one-way ticket to cancellation--but here goes. NBC's "My Name Is Earl" is the most original sitcom since "Arrested Development" (despite the fact that "Earl" also features voice-over narration and flashbacks). Earl (Jason Lee) is a petty thief and major jerk who, as luck would have it, wins the lottery. Also as luck would have it, he gets hit by a car moments after he scratches off his $100,000 ticket. While in the hospital, Earl is introduced to the notion of karma--via a "Carson Daly" show, of all things--so he makes a list of the 200-odd people he's screwed over and gets started doing right by each of them. "Earl" is that rare network show that embraces contradiction: it's formulaic and quirky, scruffy and smart, crass and sentimental. Of course, the whole thing would fall apart if it weren't for the marvelous Lee, who leads Earl on his unlikely journey of trailer-trash redemption and is both believable and adorable every step of the way.
With so much good sitcom karma in the air, it's hard to resist dissecting the frog, and wondering aloud why TV comedy has suddenly been reborn. Greg Garcia, who created "Earl," says he thinks it's all a happy accident. "I say it's a coincidence," says Garcia, whose pilot script was turned down by every network before NBC bought it. "I just do the show that I think is funny and hope other people feel the same way." But some things have changed in recent years. The networks have become more patient with promising but unusual shows, such as NBC's "The Office," because profits from DVD sales have alleviated some of the financial pressures that come from slow-building programs. What's more, the comedy drought itself has fed the revival, like a forest fire that clears the ground for new growth. "The fact that most shows haven't been very successful lately has given networks no other option but to take risks," says Mitchell Hurwitz, creator of "Arrested Development." "After two decades of post-'Cosby Show' success, the rhythms became predictable. You need surprise in comedy." And the biggest surprise of all--the sitcom is back.
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