I Feel Your Pain, I Feel Your Shame: Showtime Orders Marc Wootton Comedy

Is it just me or is Showtime suddenly really hip?

Besides for Weeds and their amazing comedy pilots United States of Tara and the untitled Edie Falco comedy (all top-notch and likely to earn series stripes any day now), Showtime just scored major points in my book by signing a deal with brilliant British comedian Marc Wootton (My New Best Friend, Nighty Night) for a six-episode comedy series.

Under the deal, Wootton will develop and star in a new alternative comedy series in which he'll interact with everyday folks; rather than order a pilot, the pay cabler has taken the unusual step of giving a blind series commitment to the untitled project. Hell, Showtime entertainment president Bob Greenblatt called Wootton "the new Sasha Baron Cohen," praise indeed.

Anyone who has seen Wootton knows that this is a wise move on Showtime's part. His BBC series, High Spirits with Shirley Ghostman, is one of the most underrated and sadly undiscussed great series of the last five years. (Don't believe me? Take a look back into the Televisionary archives for a review of Shirley Ghostman from two years ago... She knows what I'm talking about.)

It might be a random bit of news that made an Anglophile like myself positively gleeful, but I can't bloody wait to see what Wootton develops. If it's even as half as funny as Shirley Ghostman, we're due for a hilarious, painfully funny comedy series that will have you gasping for air. Showtime execs, pat yourself on the back: you've done well.

In other comedy programming news, Showtime announced that it had renewed sketch comedy series Tracey Ullman's State of the Union for a second season of seven episodes, scheduled to return in 2009.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Ghost Whisperer (CBS); Most Outrageous Moments/Most Outrageous Moments (NBC); Friday Night SmackDown! (CW; 8-10 pm); 20/20 (ABC); Are We There Yet? (FOX; 8-10 pm)

9 pm: Moonlight (CBS); Dateline NBC (NBC; 9-11 pm); Duel (ABC)

10 pm: NUMB3RS (CBS); 20/20 (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

8 pm: Sarah Jane Adventures on Sci Fi.

On tonight's episode of the Doctor Who spin-off ("Eye of the Gorgon, Part Two"), Sarah Jane and the kids battle against the Gorgon and her sinister flock of nuns after Maria's father is turned to stone. Afterwards, it's Part One of "Warriors of Kudlak," in which Sarah Jane and Maria investigate the disappearance of a young boy that leads them to link his disappearance and those of several other missing children with a series of storms.

9 pm: Doctor Who on Sci Fi.

Season Four of Doctor Who continues tonight with "The Fires of Pompei," as the Doctor and Donna travel to ancient Rome but find themselves in Pompei just before what the Doctor calls "Volcano Day," also known as the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which--you know--wiped out the entire city.

10 pm: Battlestar Galactica on Sci Fi.

On tonight's episode ("The Road Less Traveled"), the crew of the Demetrius--led by wayward warrior Kara Thrace--encounters much tension as they continue to search for Earth, based on Starbuck's fleeting remembrances and visions.

Showtime's "State of the Union" Finds Me in a State of Confusion

I'll be honest upfront: I heart Tracey Ullman.

That said, I was really looking forward to Ullman's new series, Tracey Ullman's State of the Union, which launches on Sunday on pay cabler Showtime. I had loved Ullman in all of her television incarnations: The Tracey Ullman Show (which in turn spawned The Simpsons) and HBO's wacky and lovable Tracey Takes On, in which she performed a variety of recurring characters in episodes based around particular themes (greed, crime, the environment, etc.).

So when I was given a screener for Ullman's latest by the good folks at Showtime, I was giddy with excitement... a feeling that quickly faded once I actually watched the first episode of State of the Union. Since then, I've watched the premiere installment again, trying to parse some meaning into the twenty-something minutes of painfully creaky sketches and unfunny celebrity skewerings.

I'm not sure what Ullman's intent was when she set out to do State of the Union. Sure, it was to tell the story of a day in the life of America and I hoped that she's bring some of her insider/outsider and British/American sensibilities to the table. Instead, these sketches, for the most part, seem woefully dated (Dina Lohan) and not incisive or insightful enough.

It also doesn't help that there seem to be far too many characters jockeying for screen time. When Ullman pulled this shtick in Tracey Takes On, it worked because each of the characters that Ullman played had heart as well as the feeling that they were not only three-dimensional characters but could actually be real, living people. Here, they appear on screen for a few seconds before seguing into yet another sketch that only last another thirty seconds or so. One of the more interesting and original characters, a farmer's wife whose husband is perennially on another Iraq tour (when he's not using his prayer mat in the barn), is given short shrift when she's reduced to the merest punchline.

Another problem is that there seems to be a lot of repetition going on here. Do we really need to see Ullman--in one episode, no less--playing three different kinds of television reporters, none of whom are particularly interesting? I love that Ullman can transform herself into a variety of characters, but here they feel stock rather than unique and the parade of TV news ladies is distracting and monotonous. Skewering one "celebrity" in an episode is enough but to shoehorn Laurie David, David Beckham, Arianna Huffington, Tony Sirico, and Dina Lohan into a 20-odd minute installment is overkill.

But the biggest issue I had with State of the Union is that I couldn't read its shifting, confusing cues. A storyline involving an overworked Bangladeshi worker was downright depressing but, when presented next to an obscenity-laced Tony Sirico (spot-on impersonation) still cashing in on Paulie Walnuts even as he's meant to be playing an Inuit fisherman and an Indian pharmacist who turns her latest stick-up into a Bollywood musical extravaganza, it creates a little bit of an internal conflict. Am I meant to be laughing at these people? (But it's not funny enough for that.) Am I meant to look at this as a serious diatribe about the state of America today? (But it seems rather shallow and dated.)

Ultimately, I wasn't sure what to make of this series, which fails to be neither clever, sharp, or witty enough to sustain my attention and which seems overpopulated by a cast of characters already skewered numerous times by other comedians and television comedies. I'm happy to see Ullman back where she belongs on television but, in car-obsessed America, this is not the right vehicle for her to be driving.

Tracey Ullman's State of the Union launches Sunday evening at 10 pm ET/PT on Showtime.

A Sneak Peek at "Tracey Ullman's State of the Union"

Showtime's new comedy series, Tracey Ullman's State of the Union may not launch for over another month, but that doesn't mean you can't celebrate Presidents' Day in style with the reigning British Queen of Comedy.

To that end, a sneak peek at Ullman's new sketch comedy, in which she tackles the state of America, Dina Lohan, Suzanne Sommers, and a cast of hundreds in her own inimitable way.



Tracey Ullman's State of the Union launches March 30th on Showtime.