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The George Wendt Show aired from March until April 1995 on CBS.
George and Dan Coleman ( George Wendt, Pat Finn), were unmarried brothers who co-hosted a radio call-in show " Points and Plugs," from the office of their auto repair shop in Madison, Wisconsin. Although they did provide useful information to callers, they also spent time musing about relationships, including what they considered the eternal triangle-a man, his woman, and his car. Dan, the impetuous younger brother, often got himself into situations that necessitated George's bailing him out, something that had been going on since they were kids. They had 3 other auto mechanics working for them-Finnie, Fletcher, and Libby( Brian Doyle-Murray, Mark Christopher Lawrence, and Kate Hodge).
A Review from The New York Times
More Progeny of 'Cheers'
By JOHN J. O'CONNOR
Published: March 9, 1995
"The George Wendt Show," Wednesdays at 8, is inspired by a radio show, "Car Talk" on National Public Radio, on which the brothers Tom and Ray Magliozzi offer automobile tips. The brothers are consultants for this television series. Contracts being slippery, NPR gets nothing.
The television brothers, working out of a garage in Madison, Wis., are George and Dan Coleman, played respectively by Mr. Wendt and Pat Finn, both veterans of the Second City comedy troupe in Chicago's. Their weekly radio show is called "Points and Plugs." Listeners complain that they talk longer to women. Ten years older than Dan, George has spent much of his life keeping his happy-go-lucky kid brother out of trouble. Mr. Wendt, who has a genius for suggesting that he is really almost pained to be in the scene he's playing, gets his laughs like clockwork, helped by an obviously comfortable relationship with Mr. Finn.
But so far, the show looks like a concept is search of development. The first episode got the car-talk business out of the way quickly and spent most of its time making cracks about the brothers growing up Roman Catholic and being educated at St. Gabriel's. George recalled "those nights I woke up screaming." Dan spoke about "destroying a small boy's self-esteem" and Sister Mary Borgnine lifting him off the floor by his eyebrows. Long gone, evidently, are the days of "Going My Way" sentimentality.
Next week: A car buff invites the brothers to her cabin hideaway. Automobile tips, it seems, aren't everything.
An Article from Entertainment Weekly
Published on March 10, 1995
Pop Culture News
BEYOND THE NORM
'CHEERS' ALUM GEORGE WENDT BELLIES UP TO THE CAR IN HIS OWN SITCOM
Sure, everybody knows his name. Not to mention his deadpan delivery, his ability to hoist a frothy brew, and the batch of brown curls topping his world-weary head. For 10 seasons, viewers knew George Wendt as plain old Norm, the guy permanently planted on Cheers' corner barstool. But does everybody know that Wendt can actually walk? ''Apparently he has knees that bend, and we're looking forward to using them,'' says Peter Tolan, executive producer of The George Wendt Show, premiering March 8 on CBS. Not that Wendt's new role will be a huge departure from the, um, norm. ''I don't think they're gonna notice much difference other ( than the fact that I won't have a beer in my hand,'' says Wendt. ''I'm not a chameleonlike character actor. I'm not somebody who comes off differently with each role.'' In other words, Wendt is a Norm-like kind of guy. ''He watches football, likes having a coupla beers and hanging out,'' says Tolan. ''I met him in Chicago and when I asked him where he was staying, he said, 'My mom's house.' '' Sitting in his trailer at CBS' Radford Studios, dressed in shorts, a black T-shirt, and Nikes, Wendt, 46, describes himself as a prototypical slacker. (He got kicked out of the University of Notre Dame, and his location trailer contains a stash of CDs that includes Pearl Jam, Gutterball, Bob Mould, and Hole.) His voice low, his pace slow, he admits that for a long time after Cheers he had difficulty reading scripts: ''The timing was wrong. It felt like the body wasn't cold yet, or the divorce wasn't final.'' He still isn't completely convinced he should star in another sitcom, but he was overcome by the nagging feeling that it was time to get back to steady work. Not that he seems exactly comfortable with the attention. Mention the title the network has chosen for his new series and Wendt rolls his eyes. ''That's probably the weirdest thing about all this,'' he says. ''I can't tell you how weird that feels.'' Wendt also has to get used to serving a bigger piece of the sitcom pie. ''Now that he's the star, he has to set the tone,'' says coexecutive producer and former Cheers producer Dan O'Shannon. The series revolves around two brothers and is loosely based on Tom and Ray Magliozzi and their Boston-based National Public Radio call-in show, Car Talk. After NBC passed on the original pilot in 1994, the show's locale was shifted to Madison, Wis. (Wendt wanted to get away from Boston), the radio angle was played down (it was thought too Frasier-like), and the role of Wendt's brother, originally played by Dan Castellaneta (the voice of Homer Simpson), was recast with TV newcomer Pat Finn, 29. ''We wanted to make this about the relationship between a much younger brother and an older responsible one,'' explains Tolan. Wendt first saw Finn in Chicago when the young actor was in a Second City production directed by Wendt's wife, Bernadette Birkett. (The couple, who married in 1978, now live in L.A. with their five children-two from her previous marriage.) Wendt says of his costar: ''He's so funny. He can't not be funny. And although we don't look like each other, we look like we could be | brothers.'' That's just the beginning. Both actors hail from the Windy City, have devout Catholic mothers (''I tease him that my mom's holier,'' says Wendt), worked on soda trucks, caddied, and began their acting careers on the Second City stage. When it's suggested that both also lack pretense, Wendt mumbles, ''I would never say that but I might nod.'' The first time Finn went to Wendt's house for dinner, they dined on pizza and watched a Marquette basketball game. ''He's like an older brother,'' says Finn. ''He's the senior and I'm the freshman.'' Despite his easygoing style, Wendt is probably more worried about his new series than he lets on. The flailing CBS hopes for a Wednesday-night ratings boost, but Wendt says he'll be happy if ''the audience can have a laugh and go along for the ride.'' Then again, if the show fails, he adds with a sigh, ''I'll take it as a sign.'' Wendt would probably be just as happy watching TV as starring on TV. So would Norm.
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