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Conan Controls Richter’s Universe
There’s no air date set yet. But based on the pilot episode, Conan O’Brien and Andy Richter are hopeful that their second collaboration will be as memorable as the first.
Thursday, January 18, 2007 at 3:05 PM
By Shelley Gabert
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Maury Phillips/WireImage.com
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Partying last night in Pasadena with the TV critics
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The closest a talk show sidekick has come to a hit TV show is Ed McMahon with Star Search. But Andy Richter, guest starring tomorrow night as a “normal guy” who befriends Monk (Tony Shalboub) on the mid-season premiere of the USA Network hit, is still hoping to change all that.
While it’s true that Quintuplets gave birth to a very short run and the more innately hilarious Andy Richter Controls the Universe was never allowed to find its audience, there is little doubt that Richter has all the tools to become a beloved staple of American living rooms. His current TV guest star arc, which began with a certain Christine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) picking him up at the local Whole Foods to satisfy her carnal needs, is a reminder of that.
But what distinguishes Richter’s latest attempt at TV immortality, the upcoming NBC comedy series Andy Barker, P.I., is that one of its producers is none other than Conan O’Brien, his 1993-2000 hijinks partner. Richter stars as a struggling CPA who, when mistaken for a private detective who used to occupy his storefront office, ventures off into a double life.
“I do have sort of a survivor's syndrome,” Richter admitted during a Television Critics Association panel discussion attended by FilmStew. “That is, I cannot enjoy or like anything that I'm involved in because it will just get murdered. Someone will just not let it happen.”
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Mark Sullivan/WireImage.com
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O'Brien, with wife Liza
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“It does seem that there was an inverse proportion of my enjoying something and its chance for success," he added. “Usually, if it wasn't that great of a time, it's like 'You're aces.' But with this show, I went into this thing like, 'I like this. This is really good. This could be great.' And I found myself not enjoying myself, not allowing myself to enjoy it, and I just finally thought, 'Well, whatever happens, happens, and all we can do is make the show that we're going to make and a good show.'”
“I feel like this is the best primetime work I've ever done."
O’Brien, whose producer career began in 1987 with the before-its-time fake news show The Wilton North Report, also has a good feeling about this one. “To me, Andy has always been one of the most likable presences that I've seen on television,” he suggested. “I've always responded immediately, and I know other people have as well. And I think in this case he's the heart of the show. I think you believe in this person."
O'Brien feels the timing may be especially right for Richter’s NBC effort (Richter’s two previous attempts at series TV were on Fox). "We have to go back to what worked for us in the beginning, shows like Seinfeld that maybe didn't click for us right away, but we believed in them,” he mused. “We thought, 'Good cast. Funny idea. There's something happening here. Let's stick with it.'”
“I think NBC has shown with programs like The Office that they clearly knew they had something that was quality, even though initially it didn't light up the night sky,” O’Brien added. “They gave it time to grow. That experience has helped NBC to realize that's probably a good policy moving forward right now. So I do think this is maybe a good time for us to slide in with a show like this."
Among the show’s other producers is Jonathan Groff, a former head writer for Late Night with Conan O’Brien. “We liked this sort of solid character idea,” he recalled. “It literally was probably like 40 minutes and we sort of said, 'There's elements of Bob Newhart in this.' And then, we went, ‘Are we talking about Andy?' And we sort of basically looked at each other and pretty much reached for the phone."
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