Stacking the Comedy Pilots: A Pilot Inspektor Preview

Following yesterday's discussion of my personal favorites from the current crop of drama pilots up for consideration for the 2007-08 season, I'm today turning my attention to this year's comedy pilots.

I do have to say that things are looking pretty grim for comedies this year. Sure, the TV landscape is surprisingly lush at the moment with quality comedies like The Office and 30 Rock, but this year's comedy pilot scripts were, at best, sub-par. Which isn't to say that there weren't a few gems glistening among the wreckage (Area 57, pictured, wasn't one of them). So which comedy pilot scripts did I like best? Let's find out.

The Return of Jezebel James (FOX): What can I say? I loved it. It's a return to form for Amy Sherman-Palladino, revisiting the multi-camera set-up of her days as a scribe on Roseanne, and a female-driven comedy that crackles with wit and depth as it tells the story not of an unbelievable close mother and daughter, but an estranged pair of sisters (Parker Posey and Lauren Ambrose) brought together when the older, more responsible sister, Sarah (Posey), asks her impulsive sib, Coco (Ambrose) to carry a child for her. Plus, Scott Cohen turns up as Marcus, Sarah's debonair, if commitment-phobic beau. Quippy repartee, Parker Posey, and Amy Sherman-Palladino? I am so there.

The Middle (ABC): I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed reading this script, a family comedy about a middle-class family living in Middle America. I had presumed that it would probably be a boorish According to Jim-style comedy but instead, it's a thoughtful and funny look at a lovingly eccentric family, seen through the eyes of Frankie (Ricki Lake), the Hecks' harried mother and wife , who is pulled in twenty different directions at once, when she starts a job as a car salesman. From there, she ends up walking down a deserted road in a Superwoman costume after pulling a Thelma & Louise that goes, well, a little awry. You fill in the blanks.

Back to You (fka Action News) (FOX): I'm still hoping that the title reverts back to the original Action News, which perfectly sums up the series, instead of the current title, which vaguely reminds me of I'm With Her or another generic comedy title. In any event, I thought that the script, from Steven Levitan (Just Shoot Me) and Christopher Lloyd (Frasier), crackled with comedic potential, giving us some neurotic, if fully formed, characters that I would enjoy spending one night a week with. (A review of the original audience run-through can be found here, before some eleventh hour recasting.) With a formidable cast, including the likes of Kelsey Grammer, Patricia Heaton, Fred Willard, and Ty Burrell, and an interesting milieu, this is the comedy to beat this season. Taut, witty, and soulful, it leapt right off the page.

Sam I Am (ABC): This season's comedy pilots were all about quirkiness, but few were able to pull off their conceits. Not so with Sam I Am, which intriguingly blends a mystery plot with its funnies. The plot: a female psychiatrist (Christina Applegate) suffers amnesia following an accident and retains no memory of her life as an evil, embittered soul. Trying to solve the mystery of what happened to her and who she was (not a nice person as she discovers), she learns that she's cheating on her boyfriend and her parents (including Jean Smart) are in fact insane. Look for Gilmore Girls' Melissa McCarthy to pop up as a childhood friend of Samantha's and Jennifer Esposito as her current worst best friend.

Deeply Irresponsible (FOX): Could be FOX's hope for a Malcolm in the Middle replacement, about a family of overachievers disrupted by the arrival of their boozy, irresponsible grandfather (Brit actor Tom Conti), who views his youngest grandchild Brian as the only one he can save from a miserable life of drudgery. The casting of the kids (Macey Cruthird and Nathan Gamble) is crucial here, but I'm definitely tracking this one.

Zip (NBC): If you couldn't already tell, I'm more of a fan of quirky comedies rather than the middle of the road ones. This is sort of The Riches as a straight comedy, about a family of con artists, lead by get-rich-quick-scheme planning dad Trip (Rob Huebel), dreaming of the good life in Beverly Hills. It's offbeat, funny, and the characters are memorable but it might be just a little too out there for NBC to place on the fall lineup, which is a shame, as we could do with a few more intelligently written comedies out there.

Danny & Noah (aka Untitled Kohan & Mutchnick) (CBS): This was towards the bottom of my script pile so I only recently got around to reading it (after the painfulness of Cavemen and its brothers in awfulness) and was somewhat pleasantly surprised by it. Written by Will & Grace creators Max Mutchnick and David Kohan, it's about two writers (Brian Austin Green and Jay Mohr)--one gay, the other straight--who are longtime best friends attempting to write another book after a best-selling trilogy and the long-suffering assistant (Jessica Capshaw) who tries to keep them in line. It's cute without being pretentious and hopefully lacks the ability to stunt cast the guest star of the week.

And there you have it. There were a few that I tried really hard to like but just couldn't get behind (The Thick of It and Mastersons of Manhattan, for example) and others that were so bad that I couldn't get them out of my mind (Cavemen, Dash 4 Cash). I did like the script for Fugly but, sadly, just can't get behind the casting choices that the network has made.

Which comedy pilots are you excited about? And which ones are you hoping make it onto the networks' respective fall scheduled?