The Comedians, "Pilot"

At this point, comedians playing a slightly fictional version of themselves are as much a sitcom cliché as single-camera and the laugh track (a point highlighted by the fact that this show is playing lead-in for Louie). Same goes for the mockumentary style which has become so common. The Comedians does both, so it’s not breaking any new ground in style or structure. But so what? All that matters is that it gets laughs, right?

A similar notion is addressed in the opening of last night’s premiere. Having just finished the pilot of their sketch show-within-a-show, the fake Billy Crystal and Josh Gad are in a heated argument backstage over a joke the latter made that was not in the script. It’s not that the joke didn’t go over well, which it did, but Crystal felt it compromised the integrity of the sketch, while Gad was simply going for laughs. At the end of it, the show’s director—Seinfeld scribe and Borat director Larry Charles playing himself (also in reality directing several episodes of the series)—gets fired.

If that sounds like the prelude to some exploration on the nature of comedy, it’s not, at least not yet. From there we flash back to the initial meeting of Gad and Crystal, and forward to after their pilot taping as they and their staff work to find a new director. Several other moments seem like jumping-off points to explore the craft of being funny, through the disconnect between Crystal and Gad. But the episode never does. Maybe future episodes will, but for now, the clash between the two leads (Crystal is so old and uptight, Gad is so awkward and inexperienced) in itself is all we get.

So, is it funny? Well, partly yes, partly no. There are a lot of pop culture references, but they seem less about humor than winking at the audience by mentioning Gad and Crystal’s previous work they might have seen. The final twist of the episode’s main plot might have been pushing the envelope in years past, but here it’s hackneyed and a little obvious. And the only fake sketch we see (a riff on Crystal’s When Harry Met Sally…) looks like it’s intentionally trying to be so bad it’s funny, but fails and is just bad.

On the other hand, Crystal and Gad have something like the opposite of chemistry. Scenes between them are realistically awkward and volatile, the type of comedy that’s undeniably funny but makes even the viewer feel almost embarrassed watching it. Their rapport, or lack thereof, makes the episode lightweight, enjoyably painful cringe comedy. For the long-term life of the show, however, it wouldn’t hurt to add something more than that, as too much of this type of humor with nothing else might make it seem closer to tragedy than comedy.