(Sept. 8, PDI Entertainment)
By Oliver M. Pulumbarit
The American sitcom “Friends With Better Lives” has
familiar, even typical comedy trappings, in that Caucasian buddies hang out a
lot and yak about their relationships, sex lives, and their elusive search for
happiness/perfection/the one.
The 30-something spouses Bobby and Andi (Kevin Connolly and
Majandra Delfino) seek to rekindle the sexual spark in their years-long
relationship.
Bobby’s pal Will (James Van Der Beek) is recovering from his
divorce from his high school sweetheart, while Will’s female wingman/frenemy
Kate (Zoe Lister-Jones) is a successful single woman who secretly longs to get
hitched.
Their ex-model friend Jules (Brooklyn Decker) has a new boyfriend,
Lowell (Rick Donald), an Aussie hippie who’s so in love with her that he
proposes to her just weeks after their romance started.
The half-hour series is created by Dana Klein, former
supervising producer of “Kath and Kim” and “Friends,” which explains the
ensemble comedy’s wacky, relationship-centric dynamics.
The interesting cast members—Delfino from “Roswell,”
Connolly from “Entourage,” Van Der Beek from “Dawson’s Creek,” etc.—form an
appealing, attractive group, mostly tried and tested for this type of
semi-chaotic endeavor.
The humor, however, is predictable. “Friends” practically
opened the floodgates for this type of comedy and excelled, although it got
pretty repetitive throughout its decade-long run. “How I Met Your Mother”
similarly used the rom-com/dating formula and milked it thoroughly (and ended
rather polarizingly). There are bits of both in “Friends With Better Lives,”
but there are also touches reminiscent of “Sex and the City” and—though it
doesn’t get as weirdly lewd—“Two and a Half Men.”
It establishes its more risqué “branding” early on with
scenes like Jules eating a bacon cheeseburger sensuously after tiring of her
beau’s vegetarian dishes, and Will attempting in vain to escape from bed after
being kinkily tied with Christmas lights by a partner. The sequences aren’t
laugh-out-loud funny, but they’re strategically placed, and elicit their share
of snickers. Episodes don’t get a lot of ’em, but they do have some moments.
A standout character is the initially snooty and seemingly
unlikable Kate. But her high-and-mighty demeanor is made distinct by
Lister-Jones, who consistently provides meaningful vulnerability and
sensitivity during otherwise unmemorable scenarios.
(“Friends With Better Lives” airs Wednesdays, 7 p.m. on ETC .;
and Mondays, 8 p.m. on Star World.)
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