Face it. Sitcoms have nothing at all to do with life. Ask a comedy writer about the accuracy of “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and wait for the tirade. Talk to any blended family about the wacky hijinx of the Brady Bunch. Don’t even get ship-wrecked tourists who made radios out of coconuts started on “Gilligan’s Island.”
That’s why Judd Apatow is so alarming. Every show the man has worked on that wasn’t obvious fantasy or sketch comedy (“The Critic” and “The Ben Stiller Show,” respectively) has been deadly accurate. First came “The Larry Sanders Show,” a send-up of a late night talk show and its chaos backstage that was so well-written that star Garry Shandling actually appeared to be funny on the show. Many actually thought the show was not a parody.
Apatow’s next series was his masterpiece: “Freaks and Geeks,” a brutally, tragically funny show about high school. The writing was witty, convincing and bleak. The cast looked like actual high school students. They had acne, no fashion taste, and bad haircuts. The show rarely had a happy ending: The geeks never got the girl, the entire group had their fake IDs confiscated, relationships never worked out right. Of course the show flopped. When has the public ever wanted the truth?
This year, Apatow has returned with another series, the collegiate “Undeclared.” It has much of the same writing team, a few members of the cast, and a slightly less honest view of the world than “Freaks and Geeks.” That’s understandable: “Freaks” was a labor of love that ultimately failed. Apatow is aiming for something resembling longevity with his new show, and the excellent dialogue and strong acting are definitely well on the way to breaking Apatow’s dubious streak. Every show besides “Larry Sanders” that Apatow has helmed has been cancelled before the end of its second season.
The series focuses on Steven Karp (Jay Baruchal), and his suitemates Lloyd (Charlie Hunnam), Marshall (Timm Sharp) and Ron (Seth Rogen) and their relations with Lizzie (Carla Gallo), Rachel (Monica Keena) and Tina (Christina Payano).
In the Sept. 25 debut, we lived through Steven’s first day of college. Steven was short and unpopular in high school, but managed to grow seven inches before the start of college. He confidently lets his best friend know that he will be popular in college, “new and improved.”
Apatow reminds us of his skill straight away in showing Steven’s arrival in the dorm. Without dialogue, Steven is shown walking down a hall, looking awkward, speaking half-words and nodding his head frequently. Brilliantly and subtly, the show’s writers make a simple point: College isn’t that different from high school in its social hierarchies.
To put it mildly, the other plot line doesn’t work as well. Rachel, billed as a prominent character in the series, was woefully underused in the first episode. All we can discern about her so far is that she’s a) cute and b) unbearably upset about leaving home.
The character of Lizzie, her roommate, is better developed as the girl who’s still attached at the hip to an older boyfriend back home. It might not be funny in real life, but it works here.
Lizzie’s characterization is also where the series loses some of its authenticity. In the first episode — which also served as the pilot — she ends up having sex with Steven “for fun” and to spite her jealous boyfriend. Nice to imagine, but it’s doubtful most Northwestern students could relate. The entire scene felt forced, more the fantasy of a freshman who never got attention from the opposite sex (Apatow, anyone?) than the bleak reality of the first night in a dorm. The set up was unconvincing and way out of left field.
One other device took the show away from Apatow’s normally accurate eye: Steven’s father Hal, played by singer/songwriter Loudon Wainwright III (father of singer/songwriter Rufus Wainwright). Hal drops two bombshells on Steven and the audience: One, that his wife has just left him, and two, that he’s coming to Steven’s first dorm party to drown his sorrows. This is conventional “zany” sitcom fare, and it fails miserably.
If Hal continues as a major character, appearing as the crazy dad who keeps showing up to push his mid-life crises on his son, the series will suffer. Apatow’s memory is his greatest strength, which is why his portrayals of youth are so dead on most of the time. He has never been a 50-year-old going through a divorce, and it shows.
“Undeclared” doesn’t live up to the legacy of “Freaks and Geeks,” but it is funny, and that ought to count for something. Here’s hoping Apatow finally has a vehicle that will get a chance to live beyond its first season. nyou
