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ONE SEASON WONDERS: Arsenio

On Wednesday, I take a look at shows that lasted one season or less. Here's a look at Arsenio!

ARSENIO













March 5, 1997 - April 23, 1997
7 episodes
ABC

Starring: Arsenio Hall, Vivica A. Fox, Shawnee Smith, Alimi Ballard and Kevin Dunn
Created by: David S. Rosenthal

Plot: Michael Atwood (Hall) is a TV sports host based in Atlanta recently married to high powered attorney Vivian (Fox). Vivian's aimless younger brother, Matthew (Ballard), also lives with them. Rounding out the main cast is Michael's co-host and friend, Al (Dunn), and Vivian's best friend, Laura (Smith).

Brief Pilot Review:
This pilot seemed like a fairly realized show for a mid-1990s sitcom pilot. I'm a little surprised it didn't succeed. Arsenio Hall and Vivica A. Fox are the definite strong points of the pilot. They have an easy chemistry with each other and work well in the format. While Hall is tamed a little bit by being in a conventional sitcom format, it's clear he feels comfortable performing in front of a live audience and he settles into his role quickly. Fox is also a natural on screen. I think it was a good choice to make them a recently married couple. The pilot explored the early days of marriage as they try to navigate their newly intertwined lives plus they were both very successful in their careers which was still not that common for black-led sitcoms at the time other than The Cosby Show. 

The supporting cast wasn't quite as strong and none of those scenes played as well as the scenes between Hall and Fox. Alimi Ballard was OK and probably could have been a more annoying role in the wrong hands, but Shawnee Smith was super annoying and stuck out like a sore thumb with her acting abilities or lack thereof. The writing for the series was decent and not as forced as some other sitcom pilots of the era. I think it probably could have done a little more with an introduction into the workplaces of both lead characters, but I get that they were trying to focus on the central relationship in the show so I understand why they structured the pilot the way they did.

What Went Wrong:
One of the most popular trends of the 1990s was giving sitcoms to stand-up comedians. ABC leaned the most into that trend with shows like Roseanne, Home Improvement, Grace Under Fire, Ellen and The Drew Carey Show, which were all hits at the time Arsenio launched. Arsenio Hall seemed like an obvious personality to build a show around. His hip syndicated cable talk show The Arsenio Hall Show had been a big hit with younger viewers in the early 1990s. Adding in Vivica A. Fox, fresh off her role in summer blockbuster Independence Day, seemed like another feather in the show's cap. Although the show was held until midseason, which was sometimes a sign of trouble in those days, it was given a prime slot behind the surging The Drew Carey Show.

The series was an early attempt by the newly formed company DreamWorks to break into television. Reviews were mixed to negative for the show. Variety said the show was "so busy mining gender and familial stereotypes that it forgets to give its characters genuine emotions" and "good-natured but laughless." Entertainment Weekly lamented that there was none of the sass that made Hall's talk show so popular. The series received a fair amount of promotion but it couldn't break through. It wasn't a complete bomb because of its timeslot but it didn't show any signs that it would be able to fly on its own so it was cancelled after just seven episodes. Hall has continued to be a media presence but still hasn't been able to recapture the success of The Arsenio Hall Show in the years since.

Tomorrow: A look at Season 10 (Part 2) of Happy Days!
Next Wednesday: A One Season Wonder look at Moloney!
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