‘George & Leo’ Falters Despite Newhart
Bob Newhart is still funny.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that his latest comedy, CBS’ “George & Leo,” premiering at 9:30, has all the markings of a show going nowhere.
Newhart co-stars with Judd Hirsch (“Taxi”) as mismatched in-laws. Newhart plays George Stoody, a mild-mannered Martha’s Vineyard bookseller. His quiet existence is shattered by the arrival of Leo Wagonman (Hirsch), his daughter-in-law-to-be’s estranged father.
Wagonman is an ex-mobster on the run from some Las Vegas hoods. He’s Jewish, obnoxious and overbearing. The stereotype is hardly flattering.
Anyway, he’s trying to work his way back into the heart of his daughter (Bess Meyer) on the eve of her wedding to George’s son (Jason Bateman).
It’s so conventional that Newhart’s arid humor isn’t nearly enough payoff.
The premiere has its moments - especially George and Leo’s first meeting - but when it’s over, you’re left wondering where this odd-couple comedy could possibly be headed.
And what could CBS be thinking, scheduling this one-note show between frisky “Cybill” and Steven Bochco’s hard-hitting “Brooklyn South”?
Highlights
“Full Circle With Michael Palin,” KSPS at 8: The British actor (“Monty Python’s Flying Circus”) embarks on a 50,000-mile tour of the Pacific Rim. This is a witty and informative follow-up to his “Around the World in 80 Days.”
This 10-part chronicle is great fun for any armchair traveler.
“Cybill,” CBS at 9: The season premiere flashes back to the court of King Henry VIII, where Cybill (Cybill Shepherd) lived a previous life. President Grover Cleveland also shows up in this wacky episode.
“The Accident” (1997), NBC at 9: Every high school student in America should watch this fact-based drama - not because it is that good, but because of its sobering message about drunk driving.
Bonnie Root stars as a teenager who drinks and drives and kills her best friend.
Kids feel immortal. This film will make them feel a little less so.
“Football,” ABC at 6: The Philadelphia Eagles (1-1) take on the Dallas Cowboys (1-1).
“Affluenza,” KSPS at 9: America’s “epidemic of shopping, overwork and debt” is explored in this hourlong special. It examines the roots of excess and “how we can find a cure for this depression-causing, purse-pilfering disease.”
“Michael Hayes,” CBS at 10: David Caruso (“NYPD Blue”) gives series television another go as a New York City cop turned federal prosecutor.
In the premiere, a mob informant has been granted immunity in return for court testimony that will nail a mafia don. But Hayes is incensed when he learns the informant will walk away from the unsolved murder of a young woman he investigated as a cop nine years earlier.
The episode reminds me of “Law & Order,” although the script falls apart in the last half-hour. Nonetheless, CBS needs a show with a little more grit than “Murder, She Wrote,” and this could fill the bill.
The series moves to its regular night and time Sept. 23 at 9.