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 Accidentally On Purpose

(October 2nd, 2009. - Editor)          Jenna Elfman, Grant Show, Jon Foster, Ashley Jensen, Lennon Parham and Nicholas Wright star in the half hour situation comedy Accidentally On Purpose, airing Mondays on CBS.

Jenna Elfman is Billie, a single woman who finds herself "accidentally" pregnant after a one-night stand with a much younger guy, and decides to keep the baby, and the guy.  A newspaper film critic, Billie is barely surviving a humiliating breakup with her charming boss, James (Show), who's still trying to resume their relationship.  Suddenly expecting a child with her "boy toy", Zack (Foster), Billie and Zack make an arrangement to live together platonically. Billie's party girl best friend Olivia (Jensen), and Abby (Parham), her conventional, younger married sister, eagerly look forward to the new addition and offer their own brands of advice and encouragement.  But when Zack and his freeloading friends, including Davis (Wright), start to turn her place into a frat house, Billie isn't sure if she's living with a boyfriend, a roommate, or if she just has more than one child to raise.  

            One of the hardest things to do on television is to create a premise for a sitcom that contains the right balance of familiar territory and new ground. Play it safe and the audience is quickly bored. Go too far to the extreme and you run the risk of entering into territory that either offends your audience, or just isn't interesting to them. This effort leans toward the latter. The idea of a single woman in her 40's, living out of wedlock with the younger father and planning to keep her baby from that relationship, is not going to appeal to the family audience that will be watching in the 8:30 time slot this show has been given by the network. The adult topics being discussed here will have the family audience reaching for the remote.

            The other obvious issue I have with this effort is the star. Jenna Elfman has plenty of experience as a supporting actor, but it is an entirely different thing to be the person who is expected to carry the weight in a situation comedy. The pilot episode introduces us to a more serious character. A more controlled person. That's not the character her audience wants to see. We want the freaky, fun, lighthearted person. Not the responsible, grounded one. That's not were the comedy is.

            Co-stars Grant Show and Jon Foster both deliver strong characters, for a drama. But neither have the lines or the delivery to bring much to this comedy. Both are two-dimensional stereotypes, not people. And not funny.

            I like the idea of Jenna Elfman on TV again and comedy is the right place for her to be. I'm just not sure this comedy is the one for her. Either they find a way to retool this effort so it displays Elfman's comedy talents, or it will be gone.

 

- Editor

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