Madman of the People

I was looking through a bunch of old, unlabeled videotapes I found and came across an episode of this show. In the interest of research (in other words, I was bored) I watched it. I found it to be a well-acted sitcom with a potentially interesting "sit" which was missing only one important element: it wasn't in any way funny. Dabney Coleman was fine as usual, though his character was rather toothless. The other performers were just OK, except for the lone standout: an unusually spirited (and against-type) performance by Amy Aquino. Overall, the show was a big bore--its quick death was no injustice.

I only watched one episode of this show. It aired during the summer "burn off" period of 1995. It was not terrible, not great, nothing that would have kept me glued to the TV if it had stayed on NBC's regular schedule for longer than it did.

But Madman Of the People is linked in TV history with a show that will be remembered for as long as this one will be forgotten. When MOTP was slotted on NBC's 1994-1995 schedule, it had the 9:30PM EST spot between SEINFELD and a freshman drama called ER. Guess what show took that 9:30 spot and went on a blockbuster run that only ended 20 hours ago?

FRIENDS.

Let me put it this way: NBC made a very good call that time!