I know, I know — you're saying to yourself, "Oh, boy. Norm Macdonald has another sitcom. And on Fox, of all networks. Yuck."
Well, that's what I was saying before I watched "A Minute with Stan Hooper," which premieres Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. on Ch. 13. And I was wrong.
This is one of the funniest comedy pilots of the year. And it shows promise of becoming a very funny show.
Macdonald goes against type to play the everyman surrounded by craziness. And he's darn good at it. He plays Hooper, an Andy Rooney-ish figure on a "60 Minutes"-ish show who provides everyman commentary every week. Only, as "Stan Hooper" begins, he and his wife, Molly (Penelope Ann Miller) have decided to foresake the Big Apple for a big chunk of cheese — they move to the small town of Waterford Falls, Wis., looking for the simple life and a bit of anonymity.
Well, maybe not the anonymity. There's a very funny scene in the pilot in which Stan insists he doesn't want to be treated any different and is thoroughly disconcerted when his new neighbors don't because they don't have a clue who he is.
What they discover is that small-town inhabitants can be just as sophisticated and just as crazy as urbanites. They do get a great house at a great price, but it comes with an attitudinal butler, Gary (Brian Howe), they have to keep. And the local cheese baron, Fred (Fred Willard), isn't happy because his son and heir, Ryan (Eric Lively), wants to foresake the family business to be Stan's cameraman — and ends up moving in with the Hoopers, along with his girlfriend (Reagan Dale Neis).
As for the Peterson boys, Lou (Garret Dillahunt) and Pete (Daniel Roebuck), who own the local diner/gathering place, well, they're not quite what Stan thinks. But to say more would be to give away the episode's punchline.
It's not that we haven't seen this before — "A Minute with Stan Hooper" is very much an update of "Newhart," the 1982-90 sitcom that cast Bob Newhart as a big-city guy who moved to a small Vermont town populated by characters who were, well, characters. And it's not exactly a coincidence, "Newhart" creator/executive producer Barry Kemp co-created and executive produces "Stan Hooper," along with Macdonald.
Kemp insisted that any similarities were "not by design" but allowed that, "There are probably, inevitably, some kind of similarities."
Macdonald, for his part, said he and his partner (and another executive producer), Lori Jo Hoekstra, loved "Newhart," as well as "Coach" (another Kemp creation). "And we said, 'Barry Kemp would be a great guy. A genius at this sort of thing.' We didn't think we could get him . . . but we went to him, and he seemed to share the exact sensibility that we did."
Not that having a show a lot like "Newhart" is a bad thing. That was a great sitcom. And, as Kemp said, "Sometimes what was new 20 years ago is somewhat new again."
The surprise, perhaps, is that Macdonald is so great in it. And that a show that could be a big success, say, on CBS's Monday-night schedule has found its way to Fox.
E-MAIL: pierce@desnews.com