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January 7, 2005
review: "Committed"
NBC's new show, Committed, left me wishing I'd done anything else with my half hour. I could have cleaned my toilet, I realized. I could have walked the dog, brushed my teeth, stared stupidly at a hole in the carpet--anything. Instead, I'm left with the gaping hole in my head that was this show.
Tom Poston, by far the best part of the show, is wasted; so is his character, a dying clown who lives in the closet of one of the main characters. Why the show isn't about him is beyond me. I would love to have heard the pitch sessions in which they described all the characters and relegated the most interesting one (why is he a clown, why in the closet, why a pie fight by mail?) to a 60 second segment, and that's it. He's there for flavor, but he steals the show and leaves the rest of it looking like a horror/formulae.
I'm not kidding about his being underused. He's the most veteran comedian on the show. Take a look at the summary for the next episode, from NBC's site:
LOST IN LOVE--After several months of dating, Marni (Jennifer Finnigan) realizes she has never set foot in Nate's (Josh Cooke) apartment. Marni invites herself over to his place and Nate, in a state of panic over his crazy, pack-rat apartment, decides to turn off all the lights so she can't see the mess. Marni's curiosity over what Nate is hiding gets the best of her, so she breaks in the next day with Tess (Tammy Lynn Michaels). Elsewhere, Bowie (Darius McCrary) discovers the true meaning of the Chinese symbol that he had tattooed on his arm. Tom Poston also stars. TV-14
Notice the "Tom Poston also stars"? That's it. "Oh, yeah, umm... Tom Poston does appear on your screen at some point too."
And why the TV-14 rating? I couldn't figure that one out. Other than a mild joke using the phrase "get busy" (apparently the show is set five-years-ago?) and manhandling a crippled man, what made this a TV-14 show? Go ahead and re-read that last sentence. Yes, a crippled man get's manhandled. Oh, and it's even funnier because he's black. Wacka-wacka.
The rest of the cast is forgetable. The male lead channels romantic-comedy Ben Affleck most of the time. The female lead is annoying, and not in a George Costanza "I can't stand him, but have to watch him" way. Just in a "I can't stand her voice" way. The supporting characters were, oddly, the strongest part--clearly doing their best with absolutely NOTHING. Notice how I went to the trouble of looking up all the actors names. (cough.)
There was one very funny element: the laugh track. It was so poorly done that the drop-off to the laughter was easily noticed. It was like hearing a busload of people having a party as it drives past you. That made me laugh.
The rest of the show did not. It made me wish that Arrested Development was on two times a week. Wait a second, I have AD Season 1 on DVD. THAT'S what I should have done with that half-hour!
Posted by sferrell at January 7, 2005 9:23 AM
Comments
Um, I'm a little unclear about one thing ... did you like the show or not?
Posted by: mferrell 
at January 7, 2005 10:43 PM
