FOR LOPEZ, HIS NEW TV SHOW - AND LIFE - IS ALL ABOUT FAMILY.

Byline: Jerry Rice  Staff Writer

GEORGE LOPEZ is a family man in more ways than one.

There's his real family, his TV family on his self-titled sitcom, and this weekend he'll be doing the family thing at Disney's California Adventure during the ABC Prime-time Preview Weekend. He will be joined by 60 members of the network's family of stars, including Jim Belushi (``According to Jim''), Bonnie Hunt (``Life With Bonnie''), Dylan McDermott (``The Practice''), Al Michaels (``Monday Night Football''), John Ritter and Katey Sagal (``8 Simple Rules ...'').

``Television is so competitive now that any advantage you can get, you've got to take,'' Lopez says of the event. ``If it takes going to California Adventure, shaking hands and promoting (the show), then that's what we've got to do.''

Besides shaking hands, Lopez will be doing the stand-up comedy that made him famous and impressed actress Sandra Bullock (more about that later). Lopez and other celebs will answer questions from park guests, participate in a Parade of Stars and might even be your seatmate on Soarin' Over California or the Grizzly River Run.

The Anaheim theme park hosted a similar blowout in April with stars from ABC daytime dramas including ``All My Children.''

What the ABC Prime-time Preview Weekend amounts to is an opportunity for the No. 3 network to promote its fall lineup of new and returning shows. Ratings for Disney-owned ABC have plummeted since the quick flameout of pop-culture phenomenon ``Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.''

``We all want ABC to get back to where it was,'' Lopez says. ``Nobody is down because CBS is doing a lot better than ABC. It's like the start of a new season for a team. And the team is ready to go, to compete against the other teams.''

As far as teams go, ``George Lopez'' is a television rarity in two areas: It features a Latino cast, and it's a sitcom built around a blue-collar family.

The show stars Lopez as a former assembly-line worker who has been promoted into a management job at a Los Angeles airplane parts factory. He has a wife (Constance Marie) and two precocious children (Masiela Lusha and Luis Armand Garcia). Belita Moreno (``Perfect Strangers'') plays his mother, who also works at the plant and conveniently lives next door.

Behind the scenes, the executive producers include Bruce Helford (co- creator of ``The Drew Carey Show'') and Hollywood's own girl-next-door, Bullock.

After the actress expressed an interest in producing a TV sitcom, Lopez's agent talked Bullock into catching one of his routines last year and a deal was all but finalized that night.

The show is loosely based on Lopez's 18 years' worth of stand-up routines, and the story lines borrow heavily from his real life. Lopez is a native of Los Angeles and grew up in Mission Hills, attending San Fernando High.

In the season ahead, for example, Lopez's character learns that his father is alive - something his TV mom had lied about.

``I confront her about that, and we deal with whether I want to find him, and what I would do if I found him,'' Lopez says.

In his own life, Lopez was 2 months old when his father walked out on the family - and to this day Lopez doesn't know his whereabouts.

``There's something different about being raised by a man and being raised by a man who's actually your father. There's a huge difference,'' says Lopez, who learned much of what he knows about being a dad from his grandfather.

Lopez, 40, who has been married more than a decade and has a 6-year-old daughter, has no qualms about injecting so much of his personal life into the sitcom, which returns Oct. 2 for its first full season.

No fakery here

``One of the things I've been critical about in seeing other shows is that they're fake,'' he says. ``You can go from `I Married Dora' to a family that wins a lottery and moves to Bel-Air. All that stuff is phony to me. So having an opportunity to do my own show, I wanted to keep it as real as possible.''

With that show, Lopez joins a growing list of stand-up comics who have made the jump to prime-time television. Recent ones include Tim Allen (``Home Improvement''), Drew Carey (``The Drew Carey Show''), Paul Reiser (``Mad About You''), Ray Romano (``Everybody Loves Raymond'') and Jerry Seinfeld (``Seinfeld'').

``Through the years in the clubs, they hammered out their shows,'' Lopez says. ``For an executive to think of a show like those would take years. (Those comedians) were emotionally invested in their projects, which were their lives, then the executive comes along and goes, 'That guy who talks about the tools is hilarious, let's build (a show) around him.'

``I didn't think I had a show in me, but the more I started to talk about my childhood, my past, it started to turn itself into a show,'' he adds.

The sitcom that came out of Lopez's life debuted March 27 to some harsh critical jabs but positive audience reaction, winning its time slot with the 18- to 49-year-old age group that advertisers covet. The season wrapped with three more episodes - including one featuring a cameo by Bullock as an accident-prone worker at the plant.

``George Lopez'' will return to the same 8:30 p.m. Wednesday spot it held at the end of last season. But there now seems to be a different atmosphere at ABC - one that appears to have a lot more riding on the success of the network's prime-time lineup. TV critics have been pontificating about ABC's ratings woes much of the summer. And on Monday, USA Today ran a lengthy business cover story under the headline ``Coming TV season could seal ABC's fate.''

But that's not Lopez's battle.

``I don't feel any pressure whatsoever,'' he says. ``That may sound funny, but I don't feel any added pressure being that I'm a Latino, or less pressure because of my time slot.''

The reason, he adds, is simple: ``Family is most important. Above work, above money, above everything. I learned that from my wife. Before, she would say, 'What's more important, a new Porsche or your family?' I'd go, 'A Porsche.' But I've moved over to family. I realize family is the most important thing.''

ABC PRIME-TIME PREVIEW WEEKEND

Where: Disney's California Adventure, Ball Road at the Santa Ana Freeway, Anaheim.

When: Saturday and Sunday beginning at 10:30 a.m. and continuing into the evening.

Who: Stars scheduled to attend include Jim Belushi, Drew Carey, John Davidson, Jeff Davis, Andy Dick, Dan Fouts, Bonnie Hunt, Keith Jackson, Kathy Kinney, Michelle Kwan, George Lopez, Dylan McDermott, Al Michaels, John Ritter, Eric Roberts, Katey Sagal and Damon Wayans.

Tickets: For Southland residents, adults get in for $35 and children 3 to 9 get in free as part of a special offer through Sept. 3. Regular admission is $45; $35 for children 3 to 9.

Information: [phone]; www.disneyland.com or abc.abcnews.go.com

George Lopez speaks out

On ``George Lopez,'' the show: ``There are scenes that will probably make you cry. You don't see that in a half-hour, man. In a half-hour show, you've got 22 minutes (not counting commercials). Nobody gets emotionally invested in TV anymore. And I think the people that watch this show could possibly get invested emotionally. I think they might like it, they'll like the story lines, they'll like the characters. They could get hooked into this thing.''

On his character: ``I'm not trying to beat anybody over the head with a Latino hammer, saying, 'Notice us; we're important.' I'm just a guy and these things happen to him in his life. None of them, if you read the scripts, have anything to do with being Latino.''

On racially diverse casting: ``I don't think numbers are important. I think quality is important. That new show, 'CSI: Miami' (on CBS): I just got back from Miami and everyone there is Cuban. To see David Caruso as the lead, with his fair skin, that dude with the heat wouldn't last a day in Miami. But to have only one of the characters a Latino is an insult to Miami. It ought to be called 'CSI: Des Moines.' In the Miami I saw, that David Caruso guy would be Cuban.''

If he wasn't doing comedy: ``I'd probably work at Home Depot or something like that. I'd be one of those guys who sits behind a desk and fills out paperwork. I wouldn't be a grunt guy. I'd probably be one of the guys that they'd say, 'Go see George and he'll get you hooked up so you can rent that saw.' ''

On ABC bringing back the 8 p.m. family hour: ``We're getting back to the importance of family. Maybe 9/11 had a lot to do with it. It put us back in touch with our own mortality, for one thing. It put us in touch with what's important to each and every one of us. And it's family that's most important.''

On the possibility of a Major League Baseball strike: ``If they strike, baseball's done. I don't know if they even know it's at that point. (Commissioner) Bud Selig is a guy who doesn't even care about baseball. I don't know what they've got to do to get it back, but (the players) make too much money, the teams are losing money, fans are losing interest. If they go on strike for money, it's done.''

- J.R.

CAPTION(S):

photo, box

Photo:

Comedian George Lopez said he didn't think he had a TV show in him - but then realized he'd lived one.

Box:

George Lopez speaks out (see text)