Sitcoms Online Photo Galleries - Simple Life: Judith Light and Brett Cullen

The Simple Life aired from June until July 1998 on CBS.

Not to be confused with the Paris Hilton reality show of the same name, this short-lived sitcom revolved around Sara Campbell ( Judith Light). Sara had built a financial empire around her reputation as America's foremost authority on living a relaxed country lifestyle-this despite growing up in Queens and living most of her adult life in a fancy Manhattan townhouse.Now she had decided to take her own advice, and moved her family and TV show, The Simple Life, to a small farm in upstate New York. With her were her acerbic mother, Muriel (Florence Stanley), who didn't believe Sara could survive in the country, and her slacker daughter, Freddi (Ashlee Levitch), who hated being away from the big city. She turned the farm's barn into a TV studio, to the consternation of Luke ( Brett Cullen), the farm's hunky foreman , who was raising his late sister's two kids, Will and Charlotte (Ross Malinger, Eliza Dean). He was bemused by how ignorant Sara was about real country living and found her alternately irritating and appealingly vulnerable. Greg ( James Patrick Stuart) was Sara's obnoxious British producer, and Melanie, Jeff, and Nick ( Sara Rue, Jeff Blumenkrantz, Vasili Bogazianos) worked on the TV show.

This was CBS' second attempt to parody Martha Stewart ( whose own series Martha Stewart Living was distributed by CBS) during the 1997-1998 season. The first, Style & Substance, had aired briefly early in 1998 and returned in the time period vacated by The Simple Life after its cancellation.

A Review from The New York Times

TELEVISION REVIEW; You Can Take the Girl Out of the City . . .

By WILL JOYNER
Published: June 3, 1998

How difficult is it to find the simple life these days? About as difficult as it is to come up with a situation comedy that's fresh, smoothly paced and cleverly written. You'll find abundant proof of this in ''The Simple Life,'' a forgettable new show that CBS is mercilessly sending into the early-summer void tonight at 8:30.

At the center of this clunker is a reasonable premise that is made to feel tired from the start. Sara Campbell (Judith Light of ''Who's the Boss?'') plays a Martha Stewart-like figure, ''America's authority on achieving a relaxed, homespun life style,'' who realizes the many ironies of her situation and decides to move herself and her television show from Manhattan to a farm in upstate New York. Trailing her are an assortment of frenetic studio types as well as her mother, Muriel (Florence Stanley), who is reluctant to leave Queens, and Sara's daughter (Ashlee Levitch), who vies for attention by flunking out of college after college.

Representing the not-so-simple virtues of rural ambition and industry is Luke Barton (Brett Cullen), the foreman of the farm Sara has purchased. He owns a prize bull, and the tenor of the humor in ''The Simple Life'' is quickly defined when his first encounter with Sara turns into a misunderstanding over the term ''stud service.'' (Reinforcing this tone is a desperately contrived guest appearance by Fran Drescher of ''The Nanny.'') Cultures proceed to clash predictably as Sara tries to rediscover herself and her loved ones amid the kitschy empire she has created.

Running throughout the first episode are echoes of estimable sitcoms of the past, from ''The Andy Griffith Show'' to ''The Beverly Hillbillies'' to ''Green Acres' to various ''Lucy'' incarnations. What's especially sad here is how faint those echoes are and how ill-equipped, despite a perfectly capable cast, ''The Simple Life'' is to improvise upon them.

THE SIMPLE LIFE
CBS, tonight at 8:30
(Channel 2 in New York)

Robert Sternin, Prudence Fraser and Pam Norris, executive producers and writers; directed by Pam Fryman. A production of Montrose Productions in association with Tri-Star Television.

WITH: Judith Light (Sara Campbell), Brett Cullen (Luke), Florence Stanley (Muriel), Ashlee Levitch (Freddie), James Patrick Stuart (Greg), Ross Malinger (Will), Eliza Dean (Charlotte).

For the Official Website of Judith Light go to http://www.judithlight.com/

For the Official Website of Brett Cullen go to http://www.brettcullen.com/

For the Official Website of James Patrick Stuart go to http://www.jamespatrickstuart.com/