JUST A 'REGULAR JOE'.Byline: David Kronke TV Critic IF A TITLE like ``Regular Joe'' doesn't tell you pretty much everything you need to know about a sitcom's serious lack of comic invention, then consider this exchange opening the first episode: ``Excuse me, boss, did I miss something at the last staff meeting?'' ``I doubt it - we don't have a staff meeting.'' And if the audience guffawing at this wan jape as if at gunpoint doesn't tip you off to the level of unrelenting blandness operating in ``Regular Joe,'' then we'll let Judd Hirsch's first line of the show serve as auto- criticism: ``I don't think it's funny.'' Daniel Stern stars as Joe - hence the title! - a regular - again, hence the title! - working-class widower who lives with his TV-style irascible i·ras·ci·ble adj. 1. Prone to outbursts of temper; easily angered. 2. Characterized by or resulting from anger. [Middle English, from Old French, from Late Latin father (Hirsch), his TV-style wiseacre wise·a·cre n. Slang A person regarded as being disagreeably egotistical and self-assured. [Alteration by folk etymology from Middle Dutch wijsseggher, soothsayer teenage son (John Francis Daley of ``Freaks and Geeks'') and daughter (Kelly Karbacz), who's a TV-style earnest single mother and college student. Let's see, did we miss any family-sitcom cliche on the home front? No - so let's move on to Joe's hardware store, where pop and son also work (saves on the casting), along with a colorfully TV-style antagonistic minion min·ion n. 1. An obsequious follower or dependent; a sycophant. 2. A subordinate official. 3. One who is highly esteemed or favored; a darling. (Brian George, channeling Hank Azaria's Apu on ``The Simpsons''). Tonight's episode essays the family's financial woes - Joe's daughter needs money to go to Columbia, while his son wants a raise for his services at the store. A future episode concerns Joe's fears of re-entering the dating world and his son's fear of driving. When a sitcom opens with such tired and tiresome plots, there's not much hope for the future. At least Stern isn't as overbearingly desperate to be lovable as he was on his previous short-lived sitcom ``Danny.'' But when Joe's jabbering jab·ber v. jab·bered, jab·ber·ing, jab·bers v.intr. To talk rapidly, unintelligibly, or idly. v.tr. To utter rapidly or unintelligibly. n. Rapid or babbling talk. and cutesy cute·sy adj. cute·si·er, cute·si·est Informal Deliberately or affectedly cute; precious: a cutesy boutique for children's fashions. babbling babbling Neurology Quasi-random vocalizations in infants that precede language acquisition. See Lalling stage. with his grandson is repeatedly played for laughs - and when the audience shrieks with hysterical laughter when Joe spits on his slacks while ironing them - things are still pretty overbearingly desperate. REGULAR JOE - One and one half stars What: Standard-issue family sitcom. Where: ABC ABC in full American Broadcasting Co. Major U.S. television network. It began when the expanding national radio network NBC split into the separate Red and Blue networks in 1928. (Channel 7). When: 9:30 tonight. In a nutshell: Cliches abound; laughs don't. CAPTION(S): photo Photo: (color) Judd Hirsch, left, and Daniel Stern are irascible father and, yes, regular-guy son in ``Regular Joe.'' |
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