‘CAVANAUGHS’: GOOD COMPANY

It’s the usual grim, slim field. Only two comedy series have surfaced this season that aren’t mostly humorless or tired echoes of other echoes.

One is Garry Shandling’s sensationally funny and inventive sitcom-parody within a sitcom on the Showtime pay-cable channel. The other is “The Cavanaughs,” arriving at 9:30 tonight on CBS (Channels 2 and 8), replacing “Designing Women,” which has been bumped to 9:30 p.m. on Thursdays.

The week is young, though, for coming Friday are two other new sitcoms, the unpreviewed “Dads” and “Gung Ho” on ABC.

Pinch me. “The Cavanaughs” seems almost too good to be true.

The setting: The Boston home of a working-class Irish-Catholic brood.

The family: Pop Cavanaugh (Barnard Hughes), a stubborn veteran of Democratic politics; Pop’s daughter, Kit (Christine Ebersole), who is back home after a long absence as a showgirl; Pop’s son, Chuck (Peter Michael Goetz), an intuitive widower with four kids; Mary Margaret (Mary Tanner), Chuck’s shy, mousy teen-age daughter; Chuck’s son, Chuck Jr. (John Short), a show-biz-is-my-life priest; and Chuck’s bratty twin sons.

The premiere: Kit astonishes everyone by returning home for the wake of Pop’s best friend.

The verdict: Thumbs up.

Directed by John Pasquin and written by producer/creator Robert Moloney, “The Cavanaughs” is full and rich as well as funny. Moloney’s characters are flawed, yet likable and worth caring about. They have verve and dimension. They have pasts. They have intelligence, but don’t always behave intelligently.

This is one of those bold TV comedies whose characters aren’t obvious and, as a bonus, have the smarts to get their shoes tied in the morning.

The direction is crisp, the writing sharp, literate and eclectic. Over two episodes, Moloney makes comedic hay from dropping such names as Leopold and Loeb, Eve Harrington, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dylan Thomas, Bob Dylan, Eugene O’Neill and Walter Mondale.

Kit seemed to have abandoned the family years ago, much to Pop’s dismay. She shows up tonight and slowly, warily edges toward rapprochement with her still-angry father at a wake that becomes the episode’s satirical centerpiece.

Chuck: Don’t worry. Everyone’s having a miserable time.

Pop: That’s the spirit.

Or. . . .

Chuck (to a guest): Hey, Dennis, why don’t you sing something?

Dennis: What?

Chuck: It doesn’t matter. We just need the gloom.

A future episode has Pop being flattered and charmed by a pretty young film student who wants him in her documentary for shabby reasons. This half-hour is weaker than the premiere, yet far heartier than most TV comedies and full of brawny dialogue:

The student: Do you live alone, Mr. Cavanaugh?

Pop: Yes--with my immediate family.

You’d think from watching “The Cavanaughs” that Moloney was a Bostonian drawing on his own experience, when, in fact, he’s a Los Angeles-bred actor-turned-producer. He makes a hotshot debut here with his first series, whose executive producer is Leonard Goldberg.

Having a superior cast helps, for in lesser hands, Mohoney’s characters might have become overly sentimental and limp cliches.

Hughes is wonderful, finally getting a TV role befitting his talent, lifting Lovable Curmudgeon to heady highs and crafting the screen’s most endearing brogue-speaking Irishman since Barry Fitzgerald. The luscious Ebersole is perfect as the brash-but-vulnerable Kit, hinting at feelings that run deeper than her wisecracks. And Goetz delivers quality time as Chuck.

No celebration yet, for this “Danny Boy” could go flat. Like some fast-starters, “The Cavanaughs” may peak early and fold. Perhaps the two episodes made available for preview aren’t typical, moreover, and CBS is airing an Edsel disguised as a Rolls.

Optimistically, though--and keep your fingers crossed on this one--the luck of the green will prevail.

“Would you be wanting some company?” Pop asks Kit. From “The Cavanaughs,” always.