New Shows Have An Old Look Fox And Cosby Are Back In Solid Sitcoms, But Most Of The New Crop Looks Bleak At Best

No wonder the industry foresees ABC’s “Spin City” as one of TV’s few new fall hits. The Tuesday-night comedy’s title and gallows humor hit painfully close to home.

As Mike Flaherty, New York’s deputy mayor, star Michael J. Fox greets each crisis with a double take and a slap to the forehead. Then, no more Mr. Nice Guy. When his boss insults the gay community in the pilot episode, Flaherty asks a heterosexual flunky to “come out” publicly for appearances’ sake. Failing that, he bribes a pesky gay activist with a job. “Now do I get a new set of steak knives?” is the smirky reply.

Gift-wrap mine. To a TV fan with the unfair advantage of preview tapes, the new shows of the 1996-97 season, which officially begins Sept. 15, already seem a remarkable exercise in spin. It’s not that the networks are putting the best face on an almost unrelievedly bad new-show schedule, as was the case with last year’s season full of false “Friends.”

Among pilots for 40 new series on six networks, several are solid, if unexceptional: CBS’ “Cosby”; ABC’s “Townies,” a moody extended-adolescence comedy; NBC’s “Men Behaving Badly,” which amusingly milks every cliche implied by its title. (The struggling new WB and UPN networks do not have affiliates in the Inland Northwest.) But what rankles is that even the best new shows are so simple-minded in their attempt to staunch the hemorrhaging of the networks’ prime-time audience share to cable television.

(Item: Basic cable’s 41 percent share of the prime-time audience in the week of Aug. 12 was its highest ever, thanks in part to the Republican Convention. ABC, NBC and CBS had only 37 percent, the first time their combined audience share had ever fallen below 40 percent.)

Once again, a TV Guide will be as necessary as an electric socket to watching TV, as half the prime-time schedule jumbles, amid new shows and new time slots for returning shows.

“There used to be a clear definition, network by network, of what programming you could expect,” says Valerie Muller, executive vice president of De Witt Media, a New York ad buyer.

Given the competition, nobody knows what constitutes a hit anymore. Sometimes it’s star power, sometimes it’s the time slot, and sometimes it’s a disaster in the news.”

The result: Only seven of the 42 shows that premiered last fall are on this year’s prime-time schedule.

Among the new titles, quality exists here and there but seems beside the point.

As in “Spin City,” the networks’ chief strategy this season is to recast proven stars in roles that are, in key cases, rejiggerings of shows that made them bankable on competing networks a decade ago.

Amid cable’s relentless growth, each network is trying to recapture (or, for top-rated NBC, expand) their traditional audiences with familiar formulas. Think of it: The can-do cynicism of Fox’s “Spin City” character would be admired by Alex Keaton, the Republican whiz-kid-on-the-rise he played on NBC’s “Family Ties.”

Then again, there’s Bill Cosby, whose “The Cosby Show” once preceded “Family Ties” on Thursday nights on NBC. His new Monday-night “Cosby” supposedly is based on “One Foot in the Grave,” a dark British comedy about growing old.

Yet in its casting and comic texture, “Cosby” more closely resembles the comedian’s old NBC hit, only this time, he’s moved out of upper-middle-class Manhattan in deference to grittier ‘90s economic realities.

Instead of dreading life’s end, the characters of the new “Cosby,” which again casts Phylicia Rashad as Cosby’s wife,- dread the end of life as they once knew it. The new CBS show plays almost as if Dr. Cliff Huxtable had fallen on hard times and in so doing lost a bit of his own identity, as have many viewers who have lost jobs in recent years.

Awakening from a bad dream in the opening scene of the pilot, the new Cosby, whose character is named Hilton Lucas, falls out of bed.

“You’re not dead, Hilton, just downsized,” Rashad reassures him.

In recasting stars who once perfectly captured the mood of viewers, no one has gambled as boldly as have ABC and CBS, where Cosby reportedly will earn $1 million per episode. Of course, ABC and CBS are especially troubled networks.

Under pressure from new owner Disney, ABC is suffering a crisis of confidence after falling from its top ratings perch. CBS is trying for the second consecutive year to turn around its No. 3 status and is premiering 10 new shows, more than any rival.

Many, like “Cosby” with its 60-ish star, are intended to appeal to CBS’ traditionally eldest TV audience, which was alienated by last year’s disastrous attempt at youth-oriented shows like “Central Park West.”

“Welcome Home” is, in fact, CBS’ new slogan. But the networks all know it won’t be enough for familiar faces to roll out the welcome mat.

In a troubling sign for the season, prime time’s most-anticipated new series - “Cosby” and NBC’s flagship Thursday comedy “Suddenly Susan,” starring Brooke Shields - have replaced supporting casts.

CBS also recently announced that “Ink,” a Monday night newspaper comedy starring Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen that’s key to the network’s schedule, would miss its Sept. 16 premiere because the first several episodes were judged below par.

Perhaps the now-scrapped pilot of “Ink” too bluntly referred to this season’s network TV dilemma.

While in bed one night, Danson’s character channel surfs. In disgust, he quickly clicks off his TV set as the theme song from “Cheers,” which made Danson famous, begins: “… The place where everyone knows your name….”

Indeed, the networks seem to agree that it is crucial for everyone - at least, in the desired 25-to-49-year-old demographic - to know the names of its new series stars, as opposed to the past two seasons, in which many new comedies with little-known stand-up talent flopped. Thus, Rhea Perlman, another “Cheers” veteran, stars in CBS’ new sitcom “Pearl.” Shields stars in “Suddenly Susan.”

Eighties brat-packer Molly Ringwald stars in ABC’s “Townies.”

Two other classes of new shows also glom onto tried-and-true formulas.

One is dramas based on the paranormal and inspired by the success of Fox’s “The X-Files.”

Fox’s paranormal crime drama “Millennium” is even scheduled in the old Friday 9 p.m. “X” slot.

NBC has scheduled a block of paranormal shows for Saturday night: “Dark Skies,” “Pretender” and “Profiler.” None of these shows’ pilots is terrible, but each - most disappointingly, “Millennium” - proves that “The X-Files” occupies a Twilight Zone of inspired writing and cult appeal that is difficult to duplicate.

Elsewhere, the networks’ reach for the familiar has led to ripoff. Lifting big-screen concepts (as will happen with “Dangerous Minds” and “Clueless,” both on ABC), is an old strategy, albeit one that rarely works (remember last season’s “The Client”?).

But this year, the networks are also dusting off rivals’ failures. NBC will air ABC’s “The Jeff Foxworthy Show” Monday nights.

Expect other holdovers from last season - ABC’s “The Naked Truth” and NBC’s “JAG” to appear in somewhat different form on NBC and CBS, respectively, midseason.

These re-debuts say almost as much as their brand-new shows about the networks’ audience pitch.