Poster: Clint Eastwood Fan
(see this users gallery)
Get A Life aired from September 1990 until June 1992 on FOX.
This sitcom centered around the life of a 30-year-old paperboy who never really quite grew up.
Chris Peterson ( Chris Elliott), lived in an apartment over his parents' Fred and Gladys' ( Bob Elliott, Elinor Donahue's), garage in the community of Greenville. He made his living as a paperboy for the Pioneer Press. This job suited him perfectly because he was more interested in acting like a kid than an adult!
His best friend Larry ( Sam Robards), an uptight junior executive along with his wife, Sharon ( Robin Riker), and two young children, Amy and Bobby ( Taylor Fry, Zachary Benjamin), lived next door. Sharon who disliked Chris intensely because of his childish ways - (like crawling through her bedroom window at all hours of the day and night), said it all when she told him " You're 30, you still live with your parents, you're losing your hair, and you're stupid." None of this seemed to bother Chris who floated through life with eternal optimism, incredible naivete, and a remarkable facility for avoiding responsibility.
At the start of the 1991-1992 season, Chris moved into an apartment in the garage of retired Gus Borden ( Bryan Doyle-Murray), while Larry, unable to cope with the verbal abuse he received from his wife, ran away from home.
The character that actor Chris Elliott played in the show was a version of a character he had created on Late Night with David Letterman. Chris' real-life father, Bob Elliott of the comedy team Bob and Ray, played his cynical, bath-robe-clad father on Get A Life..
A Review from USA TODAY
TV PREVIEW/ BY MATT ROUSH
' Get a Life'
If Chris Elliott ever gets a life, Fox will really be introuble. The gonzo network has a goofy smash with Get a Life, the sole bright spot among Fox's nine new fall shows.
A celebration of letting life pass you by, by grabbing the brass ring only if it's in a Cracker Jack box, Get a Life exploits the David Letterman crony's benign brand of lazy laissezfaire. Oblivious to the real world, and proud of it, he's compared to an overgrown Dennis the Menace , but is closer to Calvin of Calvin & Hobbes.
" Did it ever occur to you that I'm happy being an idiot?" asks this 30 year old paperboy, living atop his retired folks' garage ( his real dad, comedian Bob Elliott plays dad). When not dreaming of bad celebrity guests on The $ 25, 000 Pyramid , he's busy luring his nerdy buddy ( Sam Robards) away from wife, kids and work.
His misadventures are blissfully strange , his tone sarcastic but not wounding. It's like he grew up on Fox sitcoms but didn't take them to heart.
An Article from USA TODAY
Published on March 8, 1991
Chris Elliott finds 'Life'
By Jefferson Graham
USA TODAY
HOLLYWOOD-On Fox's Get a Life , Chris Elliott plays a 30-year old paperboy still living with his parents. In Elliott's estimation , he is just plain weird.
But don't get the wrong idea about the sitcom's star/producer and occasional writer, " He isn't me at all," says Elliott . " I'm relatively normal."
The off-screen Elliott is married with two young daughters. One of the girls happens to be a Sound of Music fanatic who insists on listening to My Favorite Things and Do-Re-Mi every night before going to sleep.
Hardly the sort of tunes you'd expect Life's Chris to listen to. Fox came to Elliott last year, asking him to adapt his nerdy Chris character from Late Night With David Letterman, for a sitcom. It's Fox's highest-rated new show of the season , airing Sunday's at 8:30.
" I'm an odd commodity and a different sort of face than you ever see in prime time," says Elliott. " I couldn't imagine any network running a show like this."
But Fox is and suddenly , Elliott is a hit at playgrounds, where his daughters ' contemporaries , mostly 7-year olds , hound him for his autograph.
" Before people knew me , but it was because of Dave," says Elliott . " Now they know me for my show, Suddenly a whole new group of people are watching me. I've been signing a lot of kids' hands lately."
Just a few weeks ago, Eliott made his return appearance to Late Night, this time as a guest instead of a character. " It was a little odd...like going back to your old school."
But he still hasn't been able to convince Letterman to make an appearance on Life-too much of a time commitment would be required.
Elliott, who grew up on '50s and '60s sitcoms , calls Life a "really weird hybrid" of Dobie Gillis, Dennis the Menace, Father Knows Best, Green Acres, Gilligan's Island and The Andy Griffith Show.
" I don't see anything else like it on TV . That was our goal; I think we've realized it."
Elliott's father co-stars in his series. Bob Elliott of the legendary Bob and Ray radio team, play Chris' perpetually robe-clad dad.
" He works for me now," says Elliott. " And I always have to remind him of that."
Elliott has three more episodes of Life to complete this season, and is awaiting word from Fox on renewal, which seems assured. He plans to spend the summer in New York and at his country home in Connecticut where he'll be able to break in his new driver's license.
In case you're wondering, Elliott, the tv paperboy, doesn't ride a bike. He doesn't even own one.
|
