Sitcoms Online Photo Galleries - Parker Lewis Can't Lose

Parker Lewis Can't Lose aired from September 1990 until August 1993 on Fox.

Suburban Santo Domingo High School was the setting for this youth-oriented comedy. Parker Lewis ( Corin Nemec) , a junior, was what every teen wishes he could be in school-bright, popular, resourceful, and cool. Despite his penchant for subverting the rules -usually with the help of his " best bud" Mikey ( Billy Jayne), and Jerry ( Troy Slayten), the nerdy sophomore genius who idolized him-Parker never seemed to get caught. No matter the situation, as he always said, it was " not a problem." He was a constant thorn in the side of autocratic principal Grace Musso ( Melanie Chartoff), whose goal was to get him expelled. Helping Ms. Musso was student Frank Lemmer ( Taj Johnson), her ominous " special obedience couselor." Also featured where Larry Kubiak ( Abraham Benrubi), the giant, hulking dumb jock with the voracious appetite; Parker's bratty younger sister Shelly ( Maia Brewton), who delighted in ratting on him; and Nick ( Paul Johansson), the cool counterman at the Atlas Diner who dispensed sound advice. Martin ( Timothy Stack) and Judy ( Anne Bloom and later Mary Ellen Trainor) were Parker's oblivious parents. Parker's dad, owned a video rental store.

When the series premiered on Fox it was considered a clone of NBC's Ferris Buellar, which had premiered ten days earlier. Both starred hip high school students who managed to get around all of the rules. But Parker's extensive use of unusual camera angles and video special effects , as well as TV monitors everywhere at school and home, gave the series a unique, almost surrealistic cartoon look. It survived, while the all too realistic Ferris was gone from the NBC lineup before Christmas.

New episodes were aired during the summer of 1992, as with the case with Beverly Hills 90210, it delt with summer vacation. These new episodes heralded a number of changes. The title had been shortened to Parker Lewis, there was less emphasis on odd camera angles and surrealistic qualities , and several new characters were added-Annie Sloan ( Jennifer Guthrie), Parker's serious love interest; Coach Kohler ( John Pinette), who was infatuated with Principal Musso; and Brad Penny ( Harold Pruett), a tough dropout who was hostile to everyone, especially Parker. During the series' final run in 1993 Jerry had skipped from sophomore to senior and Mikey was working after school as a waiter at the Atlas Diner , which had been bought by Coach Kohler.

A Review from USA TODAY

TV PREVIEW/BY MATT ROUSH

'Parker' is 'Ferris' with heart

Parker Lewis. Ferris Bueller. A teen by any other name would smell the same.

Parker Lewis can't Lose is shameless in its cloning of Ferris Bueller's Day Off: hip-dude lead, nerdy best friend , snotty sister, belligerant principal. You've seen it before . Last week, actually, on NBC's obnoxious ripoff that got rights to the actual Ferris character.

Parker Lewis comes much closer to getting it right, though. While its attitude starts off too smug-'school, a totally bizarre concept,' Parker says in an enevitable voice-over commentary-there's a giddy sense of the absurd that keeps it from being a total turnoff.

Wildly exaggerated sound effects and imaginative casting ( especially the delicious Melanie Chartoff as the principal) help make Parker seem less predictable , and more amusing, than it deserves.

And as Parker, Corin Nemec ( I Know My First Name is Steven) has a softer edge and sweeter smile than NBC's feeble Ferris ( Charlie Schlatter).

He's no less an operator, with his own Ticketron outlet and video gadgets that in the pilot allow him to play Cyrano by remote. But he's easier to take, maybe because he doesn't seem to believe his own publicity. " We're getting an education and business is good," he simply states.

While the show is unquestionably, as Parker would say a " no brainer," it's not necessarily a teeth grater. Will it do anything for Fox when it moves to 7:30 EDT/PDT, a companion to True Colors? In this situation, Parker Lewis might not win.

A Review from Entertainment Weekly

TV Review
PARKER LEWIS CAN'T LOSE!
FOX, PILOT SUN., SEPT. 2, 9:30-10 P.M.; SUNDAYS, 7:30-8 P.M., THEREAFTER

B-By Mark Harris

For an unfunny movie, John Hughes' 1986 teen comedy, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, has enjoyed remarkable staying power; this fall, it's the official basis of an NBC spin-off and the unofficial source of this Fox rip-off. Plot point for plot point, Parker Lewis and Ferris Bueller are leading parallel lives: They're both supercool high school students with shrill sisters, oblivious parents, nerdy, girl-shy best buddies, and venomous, buffoonish principals. But, perhaps because the movie doesn't offer much to steal in the way of wit, Parker Lewis transcends its source. It's loose and goofy where Ferris and its television counterpart are smug and smarmy. Facing the prospect of ''92 billion hours'' of lower and higher education, Parker (Corin Nemec) has made himself a small-time racketeer in the world of Santo Domingo High-he's a cheating aid, an illicit Ticketron outlet, and a . cheerful danger to those around him. Parker's up-front materialism is the show's least appealing aspect, expressed in lame aphorisms (''Either you work for the system or you make the system work for you'') that sound like Risky Business leftovers. Happily, greed takes a backseat to Parker's better qualities: He's a gadgeteer (one of his better inventions is a device that offers pleasurable electroshock incentives) and a cutup, but not a rich brat (for more on rich brats, see Ferris Bueller). And the show's writers have wisely surrounded him with a gallery of well-played, amusingly cartoony high school types: bully Larry (Abraham Benrubi), a wall of flesh who sometimes forgets and spells his own name with one r; Principal Musso (Melanie Chartoff, most recently the therapist on Newhart), who keeps a picture of a skull on her wall and shrieks, ''Find me someone to expel!''; and Jerry (Troy Slaten), a jittery ninth-grade lackey who calls Parker ''sir'' and makes himself available for drudge work at a moment's notice. The first week's plot, in which Parker and his best friend clash over the affections of a girl, couldn't be more stale, but Nemec, a talented teen actor who starred in last year's miniseries I Know My First Name Is Steven, coasts easily over the script's duller moments. Ironic glosses on high school life are hard to pull off-last season's prematurely scrapped Marshall Chronicles was a good try. If Parker Lewis can resist the temptation to turn its hero into a nerve-grating smart-ass, it might deserve a chance.B-

For a Parker Lewis Can't Lose Site go to http://www.angelfire.com/tv2/parkerlewiscantlose/

For another Parker Website go to http://www.geocities.com/santodomingohigh/

For more on Parker Lewis Can't Lose go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parker_Lewis_Can't_Lose