Oh, how I wanted to love Hot in Cleveland (Wednesdays, 10:00 PM ET, TV Land, DISH 106.) Developed with Betty White in mind even before she re-catapulted to stardom at the age of 88, the traditional three-camera, “filmed before a live studio audience” sitcom scored its highest ever ratings when it premiered on TV Land last week.
And there’s nothing wrong with traditional sitcoms. I grew up on ‘em. They were among the first television shows to make any kind of social impact. There is only so much hand-held fakey- shaky camera work the world can withstand. They are entertainment comfort food. But it really helps if the show is, you know, funny.
In the first ten minutes, there are first class vs. coach jokes, incredibly coincidental technical difficulties, and Wendie Malick in an enormous hat.
Then it gets worse.
The premise is a tale of a trio of LA fish in Cleveland waters, and I’m sorry, it’s ghastly. But then it’s not really the premise that’s the problem–I’m quite a fan of a television show involving an orbiting janitor and his robot friends, myself–it’s… well… everything.
The laugh track shrieks. Frasier‘s Jane Leeves acts from her impressive legs, Valerie Bertinelli acts from her suspiciously smooth cheekbones, and Wendie Malick seems lost without the hat, which vanishes (along with any plausibility whatsoever) after the first act.
In all, the show is stolen– the theme song from How I Met Your Mother, the cast construction from Golden Girls, White’s potty-mouthed Grandma from the persona she’s been cultivated for the past several years, the jokes from 1968. It is a criminal waste of talent and potential.
But here’s the bright spot. (Even Small Wonder had a bright spot. It was, eventually, canceled.) Hot in Cleveland was developed before White Mania hit first the Super Bowl ads, then Facebook. Introduced to Golden Girls reruns between classes, college students formed a sort of cult around the cast, and White, it’s sole survivor, is enjoying a career renaissance. As I watched footage of her laboriously making her way down the stage steps of Saturday Night Live, it provided a moment of great hope: Maybe life really does begin after 80.
