Television writers, like all writers, are usually at their best when they're writing what they know.
Which explains a couple of things. First, why so many TV shows are about TV.And, second, why "Almost Perfect" is the best new comedy of the season. (It debuts Sunday at 7:30 p.m. on CBS/Ch. 2.)
Much of that can be attributed to the fact that the show's lead character, Kim Cooper (Nancy Travis), is a TV writer/producer of TV's hottest cop show who's trying to balance her extremely hectic, demand-ing career with her personal life - which includes the guy she just met, an assistant district attorney (Kevin Kilner).
Any similarities between Kim and Robin Schiff, who co-created and co-executive produces the show, are strictly intentional.
"Certainly, I'm drawing on my life experience of trying to juggle these two things, just like the guys are bringing in stuff from their own lives."
And those guys are two of the best in the business - co-creators and co-executive producers Ken Levine and David Isaacs have resumes that include "M*A*S*H," "Cheers," "Wings," "Frasier" and "The Simpsons."
"It's really a show about how two people who have equally demanding careers they love negotiate having a relationship at the same time," Schiff said. "Part of the conflict of the show will be whose job comes first, whose life is more important, and how do you compromise to make the relationship work?"
What Schiff, Levine and Isaacs have brought together certainly looks like another winner. Travis and Kilner are both great - sparks fly when they're together.
And the supporting cast is also superior. Chip Zien, Matthew Letscher and David Clennon ("thirty-something") play the other writers on the fictional show that Kim heads.
"There are elements of the characters that are in us," Levine said. "The Gary character - Chip Zien - I think is a little bit our alter-ego. . . . He says the nasty, angry, irreverent things that we wish we could say."
And then there's Clennon's character, Neal - a rather mysterious, rather odd fellow. As strange as he is, he too is inspired by a real person. Schiff said that when she was developing the show, she had lunch with a friend who had been a writer on "Hill Street Blues."
"He said it was a lot of kind of neurotic, Walter Mitty guys with allergies who got their aggressions out writing that show," Schiff said. "But he said there was one guy who . . . no one really knew. Had he been a mercenary? Was he sleeping in his office? It was the guy who knew all about the guns, came up with all the morbid stuff. And that was the original idea for the character."
But not the only basis for him. Neal was also "somewhat inspired by a writer that we knew who worked on `The Simpsons,' actually, who was kind of a real enigma," Isaacs said. "Most comedy writers are pretty neurotic and (use) fast patter. And he just pulled up in his old Mustang every day and smoked his Camels and was hysterically funny in a very quiet, sort of laid-back way."
And those are just a couple of examples of how real life - or, at least, real behind-the-scenes television life - creeps into "Almost Perfect."
"One of the things that's fun for us about writing this show is we're all bringing in stories from our lives and really drawing on what does it feel like to have a relationship that's important to you but you have this other thing that's pulling at you," Schiff said. "And we're having a lot of fun because it's something we know about."
As for Schiff, she's living the life that the character Kim portrays on TV.
"I feel I'm managing, but it's really hard," Schiff said. "My husband and I have to negotiate our schedules. . . . We really have to set aside time to be together."
BROTHERLY LOVE is the most surprising show of the year.
The new sitcom, which is headlined by Joey Lawrence and his two younger brothers, sounded like a throw-away. A bit of fluff for the younger set.
But that's not the way it turned out. "Brotherly Love" is a pretty darn good little show.
(It previews tonight at 6 p.m. before moving to its regular time slot Sunday at 6 p.m. on NBC/Ch. 5.)
And it's the only new half-hour comedy on any network that your local television editor will allow his children (ages 8, 4 and 4) to watch.
Joey Lawrence stars as Joe Roman - the elder half-brother of his two real-life younger brothers, 7-year-old Andy and 15-year-old Matt. The story is that when Joe was 5, his father left his mother and Joe rarely saw the man again. But the father went on to remarry and have two more sons.
As the series opens, the father has been dead for about a year. Joe comes looking for his share of the inheritance, only to discover that the family auto garage isn't doing so well, and his stepmother, Claire (Melinda Culea of "Knots Landing"), doesn't have the money to give him.
What he also finds is a family. His younger brothers could use a man around the house, and so could Claire.
The chemistry among the Lawrence brothers translates onscreen very well, and Culea plays her role just right - she's compassionate, caring, sharp-witted and funny.
Overall, the pilot plays out the family issues very well without slopping over into sentimentality.
Not that "Brotherly Love" is perfect, by any means. Young Andy can be exceptionally annoying. (Smaller doses of him wouldn't hurt.) And the supporting role of the dimwitted auto mechanic (Mike McShane) was just too dim-witted to believe.
But, again, "Brotherly Love" is something you can sit down with the entire family and watch. And get a few laughs along the way.
There aren't many shows like that on network television anymore.
MINOR ADJUSTMENTS, on the other hand, tried to do what "Brotherly Love" has done - create a comedy that both parents and their kids can watch.
Unfortunately, it failed on both counts.
On the one hand, it's just plain dumb. The sort of silly junk that ABC programs on Friday night - insipid, schmaltzy and totally unbelievable.
On the other hand, some of the references are a bit too adult and sexual in nature for the younger set.
("Minor Adjustments" previews Saturday at 6:30 p.m. before moving to its regular time slot on Sunday at 6:30 p.m. on NBC/Ch. 5.)
The premise here is sort of "Father Knows Worst." Rondell Sheridan, another - you guessed it! - stand-up comedian, stars as a child psychologist, husband and father of two. He's the man who's supposed to have all the answers, but (of course) he's often outmatched not only by his wife but by his kids as well.
And those kids are yet another infestation of sitcomitis smart-mouthbraticus. They're wise beyond their years, mouthy and generally unbearable.
"Minor Adjustments" proves how hard it was for "Brotherly Love" to succeed as well as it does.
JOHN GRISHAM'S THE CLIENT was a really good book and a good movie - the best adaptation of Grisham's fiction to date.
It's not a particularly good TV series, however.
As a matter of fact, the show's two-hour premiere - which airs as the CBS Sunday Night Movie (8 p.m., Ch. 2) - is very weak. Jobeth Williams is adequate as the main character, attorney Reggie Love, who specializes in cases involving kids. (And Polly Holiday is a delight as her mother.)
But the plot comes across as a slight variation on the book and the movie, and it's booooring.
There is some hope, however. "The Client" plays much better as an hourlong series, if the first such episode is any indication. That episode, which airs Tuesday at 7 p.m. on Ch. 2, breaks some of the chains that tied it to its predecessors. And the story, while by no means break-neck, is considerable better paced and more compelling.
Actually, it plays much like an episode of "In the Heat of the Night."
Unfortunately, it's horribly mis-scheduled. Unless "The Client" gets out of that early time period, it won't be around for long.