So I’m really looking forward to that.
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Likewise, “THE GRINDER” continues the handsome-actor nostalgia, showcasing Rob Lowe’s good looks and comedic timing with a new twist on the family comedy genre.
Off-screen, it’s a totally different story for the former child star and teen heartthrob who had never met before being cast. For example, rather than settle into the typical lawyer procedural grooves, the show mines them for humor using Lowe’s character and his Hollywood-only reference points – big closing arguments, refusing to settle, etc. – and plopping them into a real courtroom. We’re really happy with the show, so far. The Grinder has one of the most sitcommy plotlines now on TV. This was a tone I hadn’t seen before. Say you go into cardiac arrest in the middle of a restaurant, and two tables down is Noah Wyle. There haven’t been any talks about it yet, but anything’s possible.
Despite sporting this year’s worst title, Fox’s new sitcom “The Grinder” (7:30 p.m., Ch. 13) gets off to a nice start.
It’s Savage who grounds the whole thing, though, as he gets more and more exasperated by Lowe’s character’s shenanigans and hijinks.
Vanity Fair: So how did you end up on a show like this? His childhood roles in All That, The Amanda Show and Drake and Josh gained him a pretty large following of his own. He sent me the script for the pilot, and I was like, “Oh, my god, this is fantastic!” He’s a great guy and an incredibly talented writer. “The good news about it was he was just like any other actor, which is what you want”, Lowe said of working with his son. At the opening of the pilot, we see a montage of scenes from the show’s final episode that encapsulates a few of the best clichés of the genre.
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The writing needs a jolt, though, if The Grinder is to share the hour with Grandfathered. Jimmy always gave women the line that he would give up everything he’s worked for to have a family, but now that it’s actually happening, he’s starting to believe it himself.
Judging by how numerous tables are occupied, Jimmy has a full house. I really went into this excited to work with these people, and now I get to do that every day. Lowe and Savage in The Grinder have clearly learned how to work off of each other in a nicely timed and very amusing way.
Is there a chance Danica McKellar might guest star on the show, and would you be into that? There are countless classic comedies with awful pilots (both Friends and Seinfeld have nigh-unbearable first eps), and just as many that have entire early seasons that are truly garbage (like the opening frames of Parks & Recreation). He just seems to make everything better. I don’t think there are plans, but I think we’d be lucky to have someone like Danica on the show. Stamos plays restaurateur Jimmy Martino, an energetic, somewhat fretful human tornado who, when we meet him, is plucking a gray hair from his head as though it were a tick. It has set up a solid foundation with a likable family and an engaging case-of-the-week premise. But so does Stewart: a wife (Mary Elizabeth Ellis), kids, a steady job and a home. That’s exactly what I tried to do, and it feels authentic because it kind of is.
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It’s amusing, it’s warm and a deceptively good lead-in to the other new Fox comedy, “The Grinder“, which has nothing to do either with a type of sandwich or a gay hookup app.
