Sitcoms Online Photo Galleries - That's My Bush: TV Guide Cover

That's My Bush aired from April until May 2001 on Comedy Central.

Politics sometimes look like a sitcom, and this unusual series took that idea to its extreme by portraying real-life incombent George W. Bush and those around him as amiable bumblers in a sunny White House. George ( Timothy Bottoms), a neat, mild-mannered man who looked like the real thing, tried earnestly to deal with such hot button issues as abortion, gun control,drugs, and the environment, but always managed to make things worse though his own ineptitude (pro-and anti-abortion advocates turned a White House dinner into a cake throwing melee, Charlton Heston showed up to pick a fight over a ban on guns, George accidentally got high at an anti-drug event, etc.). First Lady Laura ( Carrie Quinn Dolin) was a little more sensible but mostly wanted him to pay more attention to her; sneaky political strategist Karl ( Kurt Fuller) kept pushing him into issues he couldn't handle; sexy but dumb personal secretary Princess ( Kristen Miller) offered ill-advised advice; and saucy, seen-it-all White House maid Maggie (Marcia Wallace) weighed in with regular put-downs. Adding to the nonsence, "next-door neighbor" Larry ( John D'Aquino) dropped in to chat and help George put in an illegal cable hook-up.

In the last episode George was forced to resign, moved to a small, trashy apartment and tried becoming a pro wrestler, bartender and teacher.

That's My Bush marked the first time a fictional TV series was based on a real, incumbent president-and one of the few ever to portray a contemporary public figure. It lasted only two months, being canceled due to low ratings. The series was put together by South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and was in development prior to the 2000 election, the plan being to portray either Bush or Al Gore, whoever won the election. One can only imagine a sitcom based on a Gore White House-or what this one would have looked like if it had lasted until the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

An Article from The New York Daily News

AMBUSH TIME ON TV SHOW SWIPES AT 1ST FAMILY JUST FOR LAUGHS
By ERIC MINK DAILY NEWS TV CRITIC

Saturday, March 31th 2001,

President Bush has promised to change the tenor of politics in America.

Comedy Central apparently wasn't listening.

The cable network that features "The Man Show" and "Ben Stein's Money" gave a peek yesterday at its newest offering, "That's My Bush!"

The show, from the minds that created the rude cartoon "South Park," features Timothy Bottoms as the President, Carrie Quinn Dolin as Laura Bush and Kurt Fuller as presidential adviser Karl Rove.

Scenes from the controversial series, which airs Wednesday night, feature a White House maid likening the First Lady to "an expensive high-class hooker" and Bottoms flatulating in the face of a man about to die of lethal injection.

In another jarring parody, the leader of the anti-abortion movement is depicted as a 10-inch-tall unsuccessfully aborted fetus.

A White House spokesman told the Daily News yesterday that he was not familiar with the show. But after hearing descriptions of several scenes, he didn't laugh.

"This is part of what comes with being a high-profile public figure," the spokesman said. "We trust the American people to make the right decision as to whether [the material] is appropriate and whether to watch it."

Final versions of the show's first two episodes became available for screening yesterday.

"This is not a personal attack on the President or the First Lady," said Tony Fox, senior vice president of Comedy Central. "It's a parody of the situation comedy form."

The show is the creation of Trey Parker and Matt Stone, who wrote and produced the animated "South Park" hit series and the Oscar-nominated musical film "South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut."

Unlike those shows, however, "That's My Bush!" is not a cartoon.

Fox said Comedy Central's audience - typically, 18-to-34-year-olds - is "used to the kind of shows we put on the air and has come to expect material that's a little more provocative."

He acknowledged that some lines, scenes and situations in the new comedy were provocative and that some people might consider them tasteless.

"Hopefully," he said, "viewers will think it's surprising, different and funny, as much as they might recognize a tasteless moment."

Although each episode incorporates a public-policy issue - abortion and capital punishment in the first two shows - Fox said they are secondary to elements that parody the trite sitcom form.

"I think the juxtaposition is funny," Fox said.

Neither of the first two episodes includes appearances by actresses playing the Bush family's 19-year-old twin daughters, although Parker and Stone have indicated the characters will appear in future shows.

A Review from The New York Times

TELEVISION/RADIO; 'That's My Bush': A Raucous Leap Into a New Era

By CARYN JAMES
Published: April 1, 2001

THE new show by the creators of ''South Park'' has a theme song so bouncy and generic it could belong to any old series on Nick
at Nite:

He's the president in residence

He's kind of in charge,

He's got the whole country sayin'

That's my Bush!

And just before the song gets to its final wail, a ''Woa-oh-oh'' straight from ''The Jeffersons'' (George and Louise, not Thomas and Sally), the lyrics shift smoothly from a phrase often heard in life to the show's upbeat, exaggerated title:

I can't believe he's actually in the White House . . .

That's my Bush!

The last time we had a president widely considered to be not so bright, it was during the Reagan years and things were different. Cable had not yet pushed the boundaries of what mainstream television comedy could do; presidential candidates were not courting Jay Leno or doing Top 10 Lists with David Letterman. And even the most savage ''Saturday Night Live'' spoofs of a bumbling Reagan had a gentler tone, if only because Ronald Reagan enjoyed an immense amount of support -- the kind that George W. Bush cannot claim after the narrow, contested election.

With ''South Park,'' Trey Parker and Matt Stone helped create today's anything-goes atmosphere, but in their first live-action series, ''That's My Bush!'' (which makes its debut Wednesday at 10:30 on Comedy Central), they are up to something more than irreverent dumb-George jokes. The series, which takes the shape of a family sitcom starring George, Laura and their wacky White House staff, is loaded with pointed, hilarious satire. It does not attack the actual president, though, so much as it goes after the vapid, entertainment-driven world of presidential politics itself. When campaigns are so entangled with television and pop culture, it's a short but brilliant leap to envision the White House as a sitcom set.

On the simplest level, the show works as a raucous parody that sends up the hokey conventions of the sitcom genre. This fictional George (played by the unexpectedly funny Timothy Bottoms) is a bumbling father like Homer Simpson, or Hal on ''Malcolm in the Middle.'' Homer works at a nuclear power plant, and George holds the power to start a nuclear strike, but both would have trouble feeding themselves without help from their smarter wives. George is the president as doofus Dad. And who, after all, is more of a national Daddy figure than a president?

But after the informal, scandal-ridden Clinton years, what could seem more retro and hollow than putting the first family on a pedestal? ''That's My Bush!'' is a satire of hero worship itself; it is the anti-''West Wing'' and the first true post-Clinton comedy.

Its creators have gone out of their way to say the show is not political, but they're the ''South Park'' guys; we're not supposed to take what they say literally. It is true, however, that the series is not ideological. The concept, in place long before the election, was to spoof the first family whether that meant going after Bushes or Gores. The show's production and its original debut date of Feb. 28 were delayed because of the post-election tussle.

But the series is not divorced from politics. George tackles issues like abortion and gun control, treating them as superficially as the typical sitcom or 60-second campaign ad does. What, the series make you wonder, is the big difference between these approaches?

This politically astute criticism is embedded in so much hysterical humor that the series never seems weighty. References to classic sitcoms are everywhere, beginning with the mock opening credits that introduce the characters, some more linked to reality than others. Besides George and Laura there is the fictional Maggie, a smart-mouthed maid who looks like the heroine of the 60's comedy ''Hazel'' and is played by Marcia Wallace from ''The Bob Newhart Show.'' There is a next-door neighbor who keeps barging into the house for no reason; he is named Larry (John D'Aquino), like the neighbor in the second ''Newhart'' series. (''Hi, I'm Larry, this is my brother Darryl, this is my other brother Darryl.'') And there is Karl Rove (Kurt Fuller), a balding right-hand man who keeps the Oval Office from chaos and, of course, has the same name as the real president's adviser and campaign mastermind.

The show even has its own tag line. Echoing Ralph Kramden's unmistakably loving refrain in ''The Honeymooners'' -- ''To the moon, Alice'' -- the unseen studio audience joins in whenever George smiles and affectionately says, ''One of these days, Laura, I'm going to punch you in the face!'' George and Laura (Carrie Quinn Dolin as the exasperated but ever-tolerant wife) then kiss.

George has problems Ralph never did, though. In the opening episode he decides to hold an abortion summit, certain that leaders on both sides will resolve their differences over a fondue dinner. ''I'm a uniter,'' he says, reciting a familiar real-life line. But he has already scheduled a romantic dinner with Laura, complete with a mariachi band playing the themes from ''Jeopardy'' and ''Sanford and Son.'' He ends up racing frantically between the two dining rooms, changing his jacket and tie in between. They are identical ties and jackets, but he changes them anyway.

In the middle of the frenetic slapstick, we see that the abortion rights leader is a fat, butch feminist; and that stereotype pales next to the portrayal of the antiabortion leader, Felix Harris. Before Felix arrives, Karl prepares the president. Felix's mother had tried to have him aborted and failed, so he never developed fully. He also ''hates to be canceled on,'' Karl warns. Felix turns out to be so bizarre that he is played by an animatronic puppet the size of a baby, dressed in a diaper. His eyes are shaped like E.T.'s, and, like so many politicians, he has a conspicuous comb-over. This is the funniest, most outrageous and inventive scene in the episode, every bit as loony as getting political opponents together over fondue. ''That's My Bush!'' begins with a touch of realism, then vaults into the absurd, leaving behind some scathing observations about the inanity of politics.

Next week, Karl announces another typically ludicrous sitcom plot when he tells his boss, ''Mr. President, I know your frat brothers are coming to visit, but we need to discuss the death penalty agenda!'' There is bound to be trouble when Karl hires an improvisational comedy group to stage a fake execution that George's buddies can watch. George does a little dance and administers a fake (or so he thinks) lethal injection himself.

Family sitcoms always end with little lessons. ''Killin' is wrong, Laura!'' George whines in the death-penalty episode, not because the show takes a stand on capital punishment but because that's the kind of reversal television comedies make.

Like the movie musical ''South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut,'' this series walks the line between straightforward entertainment and parody, and Mr. Bottoms is perfectly in synch with its tone. He resembles the president and, without trying to impersonate him, suggests Mr. Bush's enunciation. Yet he also displays the flapping arms and slapstick mania of the sitcom father. Talking to Laura, George can look like a petulant child, an abashed child and a wheedling child, everything but a wise child.

Though ''That's My Bush!'' is the first new series to leap into the Bush era, the same old shows are already beginning to look different. The liberal President Bartlet played by Martin Sheen on ''The West Wing'' used to seem like an idealized version of Bill Clinton; now he seems to exist in a parallel universe.

And even ''The West Wing'' has acknowledged that the most revered heroes are not perfect. A recent episode about presidential pardons was not directly linked to any of Mr. Clinton's disputed decisions; it was a morality tale about becoming disillusioned with father figures. The president's aide Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe) is asked to help get a pardon for an Alger Hiss-like character once accused of spying for the Soviet Union. Sam, who had always believed the man was innocent, learns he was guilty. With neat television symmetry, Sam is also dealing with the discovery that his father had been cheating on his mother for two decades. The pardon application never reaches the president's desk, keeping the Bartlet character safely idealized. But when ''The West Wing'' acknowledges that heroes are flawed, it's clear that the tone of the country has changed.

Meanwhile, the late-night comedians and ''Saturday Night Live'' are filling time with more stupid-George jokes, waiting for an event that will define this administration. ''That's My Bush!'' is ahead of them, with its up-to-the-minute sense that hero-worship is the funniest joke of all.

A Review from the SF Chronicle

Brainless "Bush"
White House satire from "South Park' creators takes the low road
John Carman, Chronicle TV Columnist

Wednesday, April 4, 2001

No matter what happens to "That's My Bush!," Timothy Bottoms tonight assures himself of as long as eight years of steady work.
Bottoms, who was in "The Last Picture Show" and "The Paper Chase" and not much of note since, is a dead ringer for President George W. Bush.

There are times in this strange White House comedy from the makers of "South Park" when Dubya himself seems to be lending witlessness to the show.

Then Bottoms gets that fool's gleam in his eye, looks at Laura Bush (Carrie Quinn Dolan), and delivers his "That's My Bush!" tag line: "Oh ho ho. One of these days, Laura, I'm gonna punch you in the face!"

For the record, it's a sort of lovey joke between George and Laura. Please address all letters on the topic of spousal punches to the face to Larry Divney, president and chief executive officer, Comedy Central, 1775 Broadway, New York, NY 10019. We are unable to handle queries here.

Its "South Park" creative ties could provoke suspicions that "That's My Bush!" is ever so slightly tacky.

In fact, the show isn't one whit less tasteful than its title.

Laura is parading around the White House living quarters in her new red dress as tonight's premiere opens. She catches the attention of the White House's veteran housekeeper, Maggie (Marcia Wallace).

"Wow, look at you, Mrs. Bush," Maggie says. "You look like a hooker."

The show's first words, unminced. George makes his entrance a moment later, saying, "Good mornin'. Wow, there she is. How's my beautiful girl?"

With that, he brushes straight past Laura and embraces their pet spaniel.

Series creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker are aiming for a wide-open comedy with an exaggerated sitcom feel. The elements are dusty -- the dimwit husband, the mishaps leading to mischief, the revved-up laugh track, the sassy supporting player (Wallace), the blond bimbo secretary (Kristen Miller) and even a wacky neighbor (John D'Aquisto), who maybe lives at 1601 Pennsylvania Ave.

All that's missing are the kids. Stone and Parker deny reports that they planned to depict presidential daughters Barbara and Jenna as lesbians. In real life, the daughters are off at college. They haven't been cast and aren't even mentioned in "That's My Bush!"

If you can imagine "That's My Bush!" outside its presidential context, you'll see a show that's loud, dumb, predictable and overly tethered to physical shtick. George even gets a cake in the face tonight.

All that is what makes the show bad. "That's My Bush!" is to pointed farce what Muni buses are to rapid transit.

What makes it so weirdly inviting is the obvious. It's about the first family in residence, for heaven's sake. And Bottoms looks uncannily like a president who's a natural target because his intellect is not, shall we say, universally trusted.

Tonight, he's in a classic sitcom quandary because he has promised to have dinner with the attention-starved Laura, but has another commitment.

That's a summit dinner for leaders on both sides of the abortion issue. The anti-abortion guy -- here we go again with the savory standards of Stone and Parker -- is an aborted fetus who is all of about 8 inches tall.

Anyway, Dubya tries to split the difference and finds himself running back and forth between rooms at the White House, expending more energy than humor.

Next week's show is more politically acute. Dubya's beer-guzzling frat brothers from Yale come to visit, and he plans to impress them by taking them along to an execution.

It's supposed to be a fake execution, before the real one. But things go haywire with George administering the lethal injection.

That second show also introduces us to presidential flatulence humor. What ever could have delayed Stone and Parker for an entire week?

Once the public's initial curiosity ebbs, "That's My Bush!" figures to drop off the comedy radar screen and disappear long before the administration itself.

Punched in the face, you could say, by its own feeble satire. The real deal could prove funnier.

An Article from The New York Times

TV NOTES; Not Your Bush Now

By JIM RUTENBERG
Published: August 8, 2001

''That's My Bush!,'' the Comedy Central spoof on the White House of George W. Bush, has turned out to be a one-term show.

Comedy Central announced last week that it was canceling the program. But consistent with the politics it spoofs, the network still called the show a success. In the end, Comedy Central said, it was the economics that killed ''That's My Bush!''

The show was produced by Matt Stone and Trey Parker, the creators of ''South Park,'' and was staged as a classic -- now passé -- sitcom with an exaggerated laugh track, satirically inane dialogue and straightforward camera angles.

The show depicted Mr. Bush, played by the comedian Timothy Bottoms, as a bumbler who often had to rely on his wife, Laura, played by Carrie Quinn Dolin, to bail him out of trouble. (For instance, in one recent episode, she persuaded the president to ask his beer-guzzling college fraternity brothers to finally move out of the White House before they could severely damage his presidency.)

The show also carried the high price of a half-hour sitcom, which was too expensive for Comedy Central to continue to pay, especially in an economic climate that is so short of advertising dollars.

Though Comedy Central executives said they was quite pleased with the program's average audience of 1.7 million, they said the continuation of production depended on the show's getting an audience much larger than that. Comedy Central's other new program, ''Primetime Glick,'' the mock talk show starring Martin Short, has a smaller audience of 1.3 million. But its lower costs warranted its renewal for another season, Comedy Central said.

Bill Hilary, Comedy Central's executive vice president, said that although he would have liked to have seen ''That's My Bush!'' proceed for another season, he had his doubts about how long it could have lasted beyond that.

When Mr. Bush was finally inaugurated, Mr. Hilary said, ''people were like, 'What's it going to be like.'''

He continued, ''Now it almost feels as if nobody cares either way.''

He added: ''Nobody wants to lampoon him anymore. After a year or two, it might have lost the edge.''
JIM RUTENBERG

For the Official Site of That's My Bush go to http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/thats_my_bush/index.jhtml

For more on That's My Bush go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That's_My_Bush!

To listen to the theme song go to http://www.televisiontunes.com/Thats_my_Bush.html