Lateline

1990s tv sitcom

Late night news show Lateline uses talents of the best people in the profession to deliver the latest news. But when you take a peek to the other side of the cameras...

Series created by Al Franken, comedian and Saturday Night Live writer, who later became politician and is currently (2017) US Senator. He used his insight into media and politics as a fuel for this sitcom, he used cast full of talented people (f.e. Miguel Ferrer, Megyn Price, Robert Foxworth), he used active politicians (f.e. John Kerry) and famous people to make cameos and yet the final result was simply horrible.

First of all the scripts were just poor - judging on the pilot episode it is very hard to believe that Lateline was given a chance to even be considered by any network. I guess Franken’s past as the comedian was one of the factors behind it, but even comparing the pilot episode to pilots of other sitcoms Lateline looks rather horrible. The test season of additional 5 episodes was not showing any improvement in quality - with only few main characters that were not that impressive themselves the show seemed really dry and lacking pace. For some unknown reason after hiatus Lateline returned for full season in 1999, but was abruptly cancelled after only 6 episodes, which left 7 finished episodes unaired (they are now available on DVD).

Lateline was certainly not the first sitcom that showed the backstage of TV station (f.e. Murphy Brown or Mary Tyler Moore Show did it with success), nor first to show the backstage of politics and media (Spin City, Drop the Dead Donkey), but for some reason everything went wrong with that particular production. The writers were experienced, the cast was well chosen, yet all of the episodes (including those previously unaired) are average at best. It is really hard to point out an episode that would be better than the others - it all seems to be just mushy office life scenes. Lateline was a wasted chance for creators and a dark spot in bios of the cast.

Rating	4.0
Funny	3 / 10
Entertaining	2 / 5
Characters	2 / 5
Nonrepetitive	3 / 5