TV Reviews : ‘Kids’ Starts on High Note, Goes Downhill

Nell Carter sings the theme for her new CBS comedy series, “You Take the Kids.”

After that, it’s all downhill.

Premiering at 8 tonight on Channels 2 and 8, “You Take the Kids” is set in Pittsburgh’s inner city, where piano-teaching Nell Kirkland (Carter) and her school-bus driver husband Michael (Roger E. Mosley) live with their four kids--Raymond (Dante Beze), Lorette (Caryn Ward), Peter (Marlon Taylor) and Nate (Trent Cameron)--and Nell’s nagging mother Helen (Leila Danette).

The series has black characters, black dialogue and all-purpose stereotypes. For example, Raymond, the playboy brother, wears dreadlocks; Peter, the studious brother, wears glasses, and Helen, the elderly mother-in-law, is confused. So much so that she thinks Eydie Gorme and Idi Amin are related--a terrible gag that the show grinds into the ground.

Actually, the premiere is about as funny as Idi Amin, with 14-year-old Lorette stuffing her bra with socks to impress a boy--another gag that’s beaten to death--and Mother Knows Best weighing in with: “This guy should like you for who you are, and he can’t if you don’t like who you are.” Blah blah blah.

Meanwhile, Helen changes her mind. She thinks it’s Emilio Estevez who’s related to Idi Amin.

No, you take the kids, and the rest of the family too.