A hit and a half

By Maria Elena Fernandez

May 24, 2004 12 AM PT

Times Staff Writer

It doesn’t use hand-held cameras for edgy quick-cuts. It doesn’t rely on improvisation or an offbeat narrator or embody layered, ironic story lines. And it has no media hype. But even without the trendy, state-of-the-art innovations of some of its competitors, “Two and a Half Men” has what most comedies are clamoring for: viewers.

With “Friends” and “Frasier” gone and the sitcom given up for dead by some network executives and pundits, CBS, with a little help from Charlie Sheen, is trying to prove that the genre’s traditions still have the power to lure millions of viewers, advertisers and an afterlife in syndication.

And they may be right. “Two and a Half Men” has placed in the top 20 shows all year (thanks in part to being positioned between two hits), attracts more than 15 million viewers each week, and ranks as the No. 3 comedy, trailing only “Friends” and “Men’s” lead-in, “Everybody Loves Raymond.” Buzz has been harder to come by.

“We can’t even get a TV Guide cover,” quips Sheen, its star.

But at a time when the television industry is embarking on sweeping changes that include year-round original programming and more reality shows than ever, the “Two and a Half Men” crew is among the comedic minority that can afford to relax a little. Especially costar Jon Cryer, who said he was in “four shows that tanked” before landing on “Two and a Half Men.”

“This is the first summer of my career that I’m not stressed out waiting to hear about a show,” Cryer said. “I can take my son to see the redwoods.”

Still, nobody’s suggesting that sitcoms are a growth industry, certainly not on the order of “reality” programming. For the past few years, as comedies struggled, networks ordered fewer and fewer each season. So when the six networks announced their fall lineups in New York last week, only 16 comedies -- out of 70 pilots in contention for prime-time slots -- made the cut. Last fall, ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox broadcast 24 comedies (compared with 46 in fall 1993), devoting considerably more attention to unscripted shows that particularly attract 18- to 34-year-olds, one of the groups most coveted by advertisers. “We want to be in the comedy business, but when you look at the threshold of comedy as of late, inarguably, it’s the toughest genre to crack right now,” said Jordan Levin, the WB’s chief executive officer.

A review of the audiences for the season’s top 10 comedies shows helps explain why. According to Nielsen Media Research data, at least half of the viewers of traditional sitcoms, such as “Two and a Half Men,” and “According to Jim,” are 50 and older and live in middle American cities, such as Cincinnati and Pittsburgh.

Even the “Friends” juggernaut averaged only 6 million viewers a week between ages 18 and 34 this season.

But CBS executives, who can boast that five of the top 10 comedies are on its network, think they can still milk some life out of a form that others have all but given up on. “Still Standing” finished its freshman season as the top new comedy last year, and “Two and a Half Men” followed in those footsteps this year -- leaving edgy and offbeat comedies such as Fox’s “Arrested Development” in the dust.

CBS Chairman and CEO Leslie Moonves said his competitors are quick to declare the genre dead because “they haven’t had a hit in years. It’s much easier to denigrate the form than to say a show didn’t work.”

So CBS will continue to play it straight when it plays for laughs. The comedies it picked up for fall are “Center of the Universe,” a family-oriented show starring John Goodman -- veteran of the archetypal ‘80s and ‘90s sitcom “Roseanne” -- and “Listen Up,” starring Jason Alexander.

“Our shows are a tad bit unsung, but they show that relatable situational comedies, when they’re funny, can do well,” said David Stapf, CBS’ senior vice president of current programs.

Peter Roth, president of Warner Bros. Studios, which produces “Two and a Half Men,” echoed that notion, saying the show “is not a high-concept show or a groundbreaking idea, but it is a relatable show.”

“Whether it’s a single-camera show or not, what’s important to the audience is the characters. And these are characters that people across the board can relate to.”

Clearly, “Two and a Half Men” has benefited from an ideal time slot, sandwiched between ratings powerhouses “Raymond” and “CSI: Miami,” two shows routinely in the top 10. But even being scheduled between hits does not guarantee success. On NBC’s “Must-See TV” Thursdays, all of the friends in the world were never able to boost “Coupling,” “Inside Schwartz” or “Jesse” when they aired between “Friends” and “Will & Grace.”

And in the same time slot on CBS, “Becker” followed “Raymond” for four seasons but never developed the stand-alone potential that “Two and a Half Men” already has.

Even in its infancy, “Two and a Half Men” beat “Raymond” three times -- once during February sweeps -- indicating it has the best chance of any new sitcom to succeed in off-network syndication, which is where the big bucks lie. The first-season finale airs tonight.

“Two and a Half Men,” is the story of Charlie Harper (Sheen), a decadent bachelor whose life changes when his repressed brother, Alan (Cryer), and 10-year-old nephew, Jake (Angus T. Jones), move into his Malibu beach house. Jake is obviously the “half” in the title and the show’s “stealth weapon,” as co-creator Chuck Lorre calls him, but the comedy lies in that none of the men in the show are emotionally whole.

As comedies go, “Two and a Half Men” is straight-up sitcom, taped before a live audience and enhanced with a laugh track. It’s the type of show producers avoided in recent years, opting to forgo live tapings to make shows like “Scrubs,” “Malcolm in the Middle,” and “Arrested Development” visually feel closer to movies.

The goal is to grab younger audiences who are trading sitcoms for reality, choosing to get their laughs from “My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance” and “Average Joe” instead of “According to Jim” and “King of Queens.”

Lorre’s ‘own personal war’

Perhaps nobody has wrestled with the format more than Lorre, who experienced nothing but success within its structure -- writing for “Roseanne” and later creating “Cybill,” “Grace Under Fire” and co-creating “Dharma & Greg” -- and had nothing but flops outside of it. In fact, before “Two and a Half Men,” Lorre, who has a multimillion-dollar development deal with Warner Bros., developed a string of shows that never got on the air. One was an interactive show in which the audience voted on an ending; another was an adult comedy called “Slightly Damaged People” about two alcoholics, a movie star and a cop, who fall in love.

“I’ve had my own personal war with the sitcom format,” Lorre said. “I’ve tried to do different shows that threw out the format. But I’ve concluded that there’s nothing wrong with the form. Fundamentally, it’s theater. The only difference is we get to do ‘Take 2’ if an actor forgets his lines. If you’re doing it right, there’s no situation. It’s a story.”

For Sheen, it’s another story. Famous for his work in film and infamous for his party-animal days, Sheen is now the star of a show that Lorre says was written just for him.

In his private life as well as in the sitcom where he plays an endearing womanizer who tries to do the right thing, Sheen has gone mainstream.

“Maybe, finally, I can be in on the joke and not be the punch-line,” he said. “I am no longer a standing portion of the [Jay] Leno monologue. It’s a relief.”

For the role of Jake, the 10-year-old who manages to open his uncle’s heart, only one child actor was tested: Angus T. Jones, who read with Sheen and instantly got the part.

“Charlie is a world-class actor, and Angus is there with him beat for beat,” Lorre said. “He’s doing a lot better work than a lot of adults on television. Most kids are props, and the scenes they’re in are dreadful. But we get to write for Angus. He’s very much of a featured player.”

A scene with Angus at the end of the first act of the pilot sealed the deal for Sheen. When Charlie Harper realizes his nephew is a babe magnet at the supermarket and tells him, “Wow, you’re even better than a dog!” Sheen knew he wanted to be part of Lorre’s creative universe.

“That’s when I knew this was going to be something special,” he said. “It had edge, and it had heart.”

Lorre, who says his mission is not to write jokes, agrees that sitcoms work only if the characters become people viewers want to spend time with.

“Both [co-creator Lee Aronsohn] and I understood the tortured divorced man that Alan Harper was about to become, and we wanted to explore that,” he said. “It’s a story about two men who become more fully realized and whether they can make a difference in a boy’s life or does that dysfunction get passed on? It’s not about jokes.”

Although “Raymond” draws more than 17 million viewers and is set to inherit the No. 1 sitcom mantle from “Friends,” it’s entering its final season, with just 16 first-run episodes planned. Once it’s gone, the top comedy crown will be up for grabs. Lorre is hoping “Two and a Half Men” will build on its record and step up as the next family show that captures the mass audience the way “Cheers,” “Seinfeld,” and “Raymond” were allowed to: one episode at a time.

In the meantime, the cast and crew must bear critics drooling over unconventional comedies like Fox’s “Arrested Development,” which ranks 120 out of 199 shows with viewers in the Nielsen ratings. “Two and a Half Men” has won a People’s Choice Award and received initial critical acclaim but hasn’t become a media darling.

“Those shows don’t have the limitations that sitcoms have,” Cryer said. “I used to be that guy who always said, ‘I’m an artist, and all that matters is that I perform my art every day to my best ability.’ But now I’m ratings man! After four failed series, you pay attention to these things. We got an audience really fast, which I never experienced before. When we beat ‘Raymond,’ there was champagne flowing on the set.”

But it’s more than the large overall viewing audience that prompted industry insiders to say that “Two and a Half Men” is the only new sitcom with the potential for syndication. These observers point to the show’s strong male lead characters and male-driven story lines, noting those are the two determining factors for station groups.

“There’s nothing left in the pipeline except ‘Two and a Half Men’ this year,” said a prominent television agent who asked not to be identified. “With all of this reality on TV and the dearth of sitcoms that do well, there’s nothing left to sell.”

Worrying about such things seems pointless to Sheen, who admires Cryer’s ability to decipher Nielsen ratings but wants no part of the process. Sitcoms, he says confidently, are not going anywhere.

“You can still go to the ice cream parlor and order vanilla, chocolate and strawberry,” he said. “How long have those been around?”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Newcomer maintains an audience

CBS’ ‘Two and a Half Men’ finishes the season as the most watched new comedy, and third most watched overall behind ‘Friends’ and ‘Everybody Loves Raymond.’ It isn’t quite so successful with the elusive viewers ages 18 to 34 that networks and advertisers crave. With ‘Friends’ and ‘Frasier’ now finished, here’s a look at the top 10 comedies going into the fall season.

Who’s watching comedies

(In millions of viewers)

1. ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’

Viewers ages 18 to 34: 2.41 million

Total viewers: 17.56 million

2. ‘Two and Half Men’

Viewers ages 18 to 34: 2.14

Total viewers: 15.27

3. ‘Will & Grace’

Viewers ages 18 to 34: 4.70

Total viewers: 15.26

4. ‘Still Standing’