the it crowd

Does anyone really need another cop drama with procedural elements? NBC seems to think so. Personally, I would be all for a moratorium on all new dramas that feature cops, doctors, or lawyers. But I suppose if you they are going to create yet another of these shows, hiring David Shore, the creator of House, and adding Famke Janssen as the lead is a good place to start. Adam mentioned the show back in October. It still doesn't have an official title, but the addition of Janssen is a good sign that things are moving along. Or a bad sign, if you've had your fill of cops.

In other casting news at the peacock network, Rocky Carroll (Chicago Hope) has signed on to play the corporate boss in the pilot of The IT Crowd. A remake of a UK comedy, the show also features Joel McHale, Richard Ayoade, and Jessica St. Clair as the hapless IT team at a major corporation. The original was very funny, but you can flip a coin on how this is going to turn out. It's a tricky bit of business updating these shows for the American audience. Having Ayoade reprise his role as Moss can't hurt though.

There's not much information yet, but NBC is close to securing three new comedies set to air sometime next season. The first, I'm with Stupid, which I mentioned last month, is a re-tooling of a British series about a man who befriends a boy in a wheelchair and lives in a home for the disabled. The project is being helmed by directors Peter and Bobby Farrelly, along with Ben Silverman, who helped develop both The Office and Ugly Betty for American audiences.

Kath and Kim is based on an Australian series about a divorced mother and her daughter. Nancy Pimental, a former writer for South Park and a former co-host on Win Ben Stein's Money, penned the adaptation and will serve as executive producer with Silverman. The series, along with I'm with Stupid, is being developed for the Farrelly brother's Reveille production company.

Today marked the online premiere of the new U.K. Channel 4 sitcom, The IT Crowd. I'm an IT guy myself, so the curiosity overcame me, and I had to watch this first episode. In fact, if the premiere episode is any indication of what to expect, I may just keep on watching it. I just hope they keep providing them online, or I may be out of luck.

I really hate working in IT. Don't get me wrong, the work is challenging (when I get a chance to do that and not paperwork) and the people I work with are interesting, but all and all, it's a dreary experience, especially in the corporate world. Why? Because we're the red-headed stepchild of the corporate world, that's why. While people are on the upper floors, wearing their suits and starched Polo dress shirts, making deals and pushing the business along, the scruffy tech guys are holed up in a basement -- or noisy and cold datacenter -- isolated from the rest of the company except for the angry phone calls that cascade in when a middle manager can't get his or her e-mail. And there are usually no.... women.... anywhere. No one to flirt with, no one to discretely ogle as she walks down the aisle, nothing. It can get to be quite depressing.

So I'm intrigued by the announcement of a new sitcom on the UK's Channel 4. Called The IT Crowd, it focuses on three IT workers that toil away in the dingy basement of an elegant office bulding, being scorned and abused by the go-getters and high achievers that work above them, literally and figuratively.