THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, March 21, 1996 TAG: 9603210051
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: LARRY BONKO
LENGTH: Medium: 84 lines
AS A VIRGINIAN, I don't know if I should laugh or cry about the NBC sitcom ``Boston Common,'' which premieres tonight in the cushiest time slot on TV - at 8:30 between ``Friends'' and ``Seinfeld.''
It's nice to have a show on the air in which the main characters hail from Virginia. It's been a long time since ``The Waltons.'' And ``Boston Common'' is better than about 75 percent of the other sitcoms on TV.
But does NBC have to give us a Virginian who is Gomer Gump?
``Boston Common'' is about the Pritchett kids of Gladys - it's near Lynchburg on Route 501 between Rustburg and Naruna - who relocate to Boston when sister Wyleen (Hedy Burress) enrolls in college. Brother Boyd (Anthony Clark) tags along, looking for work as a handyman.
When you put two country bumpkins in the midst of Ivy League academia, do I have to tell you what happens? Lots of jokes about eating at Stuckey's and working at the Tastee Freeze.
Student to Boyd: ``Your family's history is so lush.''
Boyd: ``Actually, not all of them.''
Before long, the student and her friends at Randolph Harrington College begin studying Brother Bo and reacting to him as if were the last surviving member of ``Hee Haw.''
How about giving us an example of Southern mythic folklore found on the Virginia side of the Appalachians, they ask Bo. No problem.
When dining, says Bo, members of his family often say quaint little things such as, ``You touch that last biscuit and I'll stick this fork in your neck.''
What will mom and pop Clark in Gladys, and Clark's brother, a welder at Newport News Shipbuilding, think of that? They have been warned to expect a blue-collar ``Seinfeld,'' Clark said just after he taped the pilot episode.
You can't really fuss at NBC or some producer who has never been south of Manhattan for exploiting Virginians in this fashion. This is Clark's doing.
He's a Virginian who lived on a tobacco farm in Gladys, which is in Campbell County, until he was 16. Clark eventually left for school Emerson College in Boston.
``Boston Common'' is his life.
The former stand-up comic makes no apologies for Gumpifying Virginians who live near Lynchburg.
``Anybody who says my character isn't the real thing should come to a Clark family picnic,'' he said. ``I am not pumping up my character to be anything that I am not.''
At 29, he's getting his first big break in prime-time TV. But Clark has been paying his dues for seven years. He's appeared in six feature films, taped specials for Home Box Office, did stand-up for Jay Leno and David Letterman, and even worked on Broadway.
He's a tall, nice-looking guy with excellent timing - precisely the type producers are looking for when casting sitcoms.
``I had been offered copycat scripts, formula sitcoms that were not right for me,'' he said. Clark didn't get excited about doing a sitcom until he and a friend from college put together the ``Boston Common'' pilot.
They think they have a hit, and perhaps they are right. Clark is at least as engaging as the dudes on ``Friends.'' Co-star Burress is fun to watch as Wyleen, despite the annoying rural accent she's chosen. You want to believe it when the girl from Gladys says that one day she'll be so educated that she will be ``advising giant companies on important matters.''
In the five episodes to come this season, Bo will get the best of the students and professors who have confused Gladys with Mayberry and condemn the handyman for accepting the ``patriarchal bourgeois order.''
``Eventually, the viewers will see that I am the smartest guy around with a small-town, rocking-chair philosophy that's sharper than anything the Ivy League has to offer,'' Clark said.
He's Virginia to his roots. Co-star Hedy Burress isn't.
She's from Decatur, Ill., and was cast as Wyleen less than a year after arriving in Hollywood. When she heard that she was in a sitcom scheduled between ``Friends'' and ``Seinfeld,'' Burress fainted.
I'm afraid the Clark family in Gladys may do the same when they see their college-educated son showing New Englanders the uncouth business of leg wrestling.
This week, he's making it Virginia's No. 1 export. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
Anthony Clark stars in NBC's new ``Boston Common,'' which airs
tonight at 8:30, between ``Friends'' and ``Seinfeld.''
by CNB