In Barren and Politicized Television Landscape, Viewers Judge ‘Night Court’ Funny

Four decades after the original appeared during a golden age of sitcoms, NBC’s “Night Court” sequel is resurrecting the genre. In a dark, nihilistic entertainment landscape dominated by politics, could this be the show that unites Americans and gives us all something to laugh at as a nation?The first three episodes, according to Nielsen, garnered higher ratings than any network comedy in four years, averaging 6.6 million viewers. That’s a drop from the premiere’s 16 million, which carried the burden of introducing all the characters and offered few laughs.The original focused on a Manhattan municipal court judge, Harry T. Stone — Harry Anderson — and court officers with quirks alongside character actors as petty criminals. Anderson passed away at 65 in 2018, and as an example of his beloved status, YouTube’s “Red Letter Media” posted a wordless homage by actor Rich Evans, weeping in character as superfan Mr. Pilinket.Judge Stone’s daughter Abby, Melissa Rauch, wears the robe now. Of the original cast, only John Larroquette — District Attorney Dan Fielding — returns. The comedy veteran lands the pilot’s only jokes, though you wouldn’t know it by listening. The chuckling is said to be from a studio audience but sounds like the hated ’60s laugh tracks.If the revival has a weakness for fans of the original, it’s that canned feeling. The set-ups and punchlines are often too wordy and polished. Nobody looks like they’re working the swing shift, tired, sloppy, and unkempt. The gritty 1980s credits of the first series are gone, too, replaced by slick modern graphics — and, of course, there’s no smoking.What carries the show is a cast who, with genuine likability, seem to be having fun. In the pilot, Ms. Rauch is at first a caricature of a nervous, moody, too-talkative urban professional — and it’s unavoidable that every time she invokes her father, it’s a reminder that Anderson left us too soon.However, this “Night Court” does something rare in contemporary sitcoms by fleshing out its central character with a backstory as a recovering alcoholic, explaining her desire to offer second chances to the farcical refuse of humanity that finds themselves before her bench.Mr. Larroquette’s attorney is now a widower working below his potential as a process server, and the new Judge Stone must coax him back to the law, this time as a public defender. Lacretta Nicole continues the tradition of a spunky bailiff, Donna “Gurgs” Gurganous, but avoids all the clichés of a single black woman.The district attorney, played by India de Beaufort, can’t measure up to the original’s Markie Post, but give her time. Kapil Talwalkar delivers the shy, eager-to-please clerk who’s also willing to be somewhat in the background rather than chew the scenery.That the show has actors who let others get the laughs is to its credit. “Comics are a dime a dozen,” the legendary Lou Costello said when insisting his partner, Bud Abbott, take 60 percent of their earnings. “Good straight men are hard to find.”All of this makes the show a throwback that doesn’t lean on nostalgia alone, as does the fact that none of the punchlines have anything to do with contemporary figures or issues. The only sign of ideological influence is the lack of diversity among the accused. They are 13 white men, two white women, and someone in a dog costume.One character at first seems to be of Italian descent, Vincent Graziano, but that turns out to be the alias of an undercover officer seeking to infiltrate, of course, the mafia. Speaking of policemen, they are all Black except one from internal affairs — the dreaded Rat Squad — but these are small nits to pick.The new “Night Court,” like its predecessor, is content to be a sitcom not a platform, nostalgic but charting its own course. Its jokes aren’t nasty digs at somebody’s expense, crude sex barbs, or alienating political jabs that become dated soon after airtime. Creators Dan Rubin and Reinhold Weege have given Americans something to laugh at together — provided viewers withhold judgment until after the first few episodes have adjourned.

In Barren and Politicized Television Landscape, Viewers Judge ‘Night Court’ Funny

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