A few years removed from leaving "LAte Night with Conan O'Brien" and having compiled a tidy string of movie roles behind him,lovable everyman Andy Richter got his own show,this one,which ran during the Spring and Winter of 2002,and what a show it was.
Andy played...well,he played himself,only not really himself:a guy named Andy Richter(stretch!)who worked at a large corporation in his hometown of Chicago. He was single,living comfortably and aspiring to be a writer of short stories. He had his own foibles,fancied an attractive co-worker named Wendy(Irene Malloy),who--of course--has to be girlfriend of the handsome,seemingly vapid Keith(JAmes Patrick Stewart), shared an office with a morose sort named Byron(Jonathan Slavin) and has a lady boss named Jessica(Paget Brewster,for efor whom I'm always happy to see working)for whom he once dated. Much of the show's plot is fueled by Andy's thoughts and fantasies,hence(besides dry irony)the title of the show. This show(As mentioned by another reviewer)eschewed much of the conventions of standard sitcoms,choosing to take a quirkier,first-person approach to narrative and,as per my own personal pet peeve,there was NO LAUGHTRACK!! To me,laugh-tracks should be relegated to the same dusty old warehouse that keeps other outdated stuff like Iron lungs and Victrollas! They really have little usage in sitcoms anymore(although they don't necessarily hurt a show, some examples:"Seinfeld" or "King of Queens").
Fox,of course,didn't see the qualities of this odd gem of a show. They saw the Luke-warm ratings numbers of the show,put it on hiatus over the Summer,bringing it back that Fall and then canning it a few weeks into the New Year. After considering what they did to this show,I'd say the network probably was being CHARITIBLE with another favorite of mine,"Arrested Development",when they let it ride for three full seasons. Of course,the real insult to injury where Mr.Richters was concerned was that not long after this show was pulled,he was back with the network in the considerably more gimmicky and vapid show about a husband and wife dealing with snotty kids(I think it was called "Quintuplets" or something like that),which managed to get AT LEAST a full season of play. He and this show deserved better. As such,it appears that many of those involved in "Andy Richter Controls..." seem to have moved on to better projects. If this show comes out on DVD(And I don't see why it shouldn't or won't),the eps are definitely worth a look if you didn't catch it(and there's a good chance you might've not)during its run.
Andy played...well,he played himself,only not really himself:a guy named Andy Richter(stretch!)who worked at a large corporation in his hometown of Chicago. He was single,living comfortably and aspiring to be a writer of short stories. He had his own foibles,fancied an attractive co-worker named Wendy(Irene Malloy),who--of course--has to be girlfriend of the handsome,seemingly vapid Keith(JAmes Patrick Stewart), shared an office with a morose sort named Byron(Jonathan Slavin) and has a lady boss named Jessica(Paget Brewster,for efor whom I'm always happy to see working)for whom he once dated. Much of the show's plot is fueled by Andy's thoughts and fantasies,hence(besides dry irony)the title of the show. This show(As mentioned by another reviewer)eschewed much of the conventions of standard sitcoms,choosing to take a quirkier,first-person approach to narrative and,as per my own personal pet peeve,there was NO LAUGHTRACK!! To me,laugh-tracks should be relegated to the same dusty old warehouse that keeps other outdated stuff like Iron lungs and Victrollas! They really have little usage in sitcoms anymore(although they don't necessarily hurt a show, some examples:"Seinfeld" or "King of Queens").
Fox,of course,didn't see the qualities of this odd gem of a show. They saw the Luke-warm ratings numbers of the show,put it on hiatus over the Summer,bringing it back that Fall and then canning it a few weeks into the New Year. After considering what they did to this show,I'd say the network probably was being CHARITIBLE with another favorite of mine,"Arrested Development",when they let it ride for three full seasons. Of course,the real insult to injury where Mr.Richters was concerned was that not long after this show was pulled,he was back with the network in the considerably more gimmicky and vapid show about a husband and wife dealing with snotty kids(I think it was called "Quintuplets" or something like that),which managed to get AT LEAST a full season of play. He and this show deserved better. As such,it appears that many of those involved in "Andy Richter Controls..." seem to have moved on to better projects. If this show comes out on DVD(And I don't see why it shouldn't or won't),the eps are definitely worth a look if you didn't catch it(and there's a good chance you might've not)during its run.