TV REVIEWS : ‘Good Life’ Tries to Sell Sitcom Family

So inbred is the sitcom field that familiarity is the fuel that now drives most of these half-hour series, and you’d swear that moldiness is a prerequisite for getting many of them on the air.

“The Good Life” doesn’t fall quite into that category. Nor, however, does this new NBC comedy series (on Channels 4, 36 and 39) even approach freshness. Instead, the first two episodes, at 8:30 tonight and 8:30 Tuesday (the show’s regular time period) try to sell viewers yet another of those forgettable sitcom families that enter and exit prime time by revolving door. This one comes from Jeff Martin, whose credits include “Late Night With David Letterman” and “The Simpsons,” and Kevin Curran, whose pedigree includes both the Letterman show and “Married . . . With Children.” Obviously, they’ve had better days.

Living the “good life” here is John Bowman (John Caponera), who works in an office at a security products warehouse that he shares with his bachelor friend, Drew (Drew Carey). Tommy the dim dock foreman (Monty Hoffman) drops by too. On the home front, John’s wife, Maureen (Eve Gordon), stages bad community theater at a church. Their younger son, Bob (Justin Berfield), chirps cutespeak . Their 12-year-old daughter, Melissa (Shay Astar), spews cynicspeak . And their earnest 15-year-old son, Paul (Jake Patellis), tonight announces he’s following the lead of his new girlfriend and converting to Buddhism. The very mention of this at once rattles his parents and produces some pretty wretched Buddha jokes.

For much funnier sitcom accounts of parents coming of age along with their kids, try ABC’s “Roseanne” and HBO’s “Dream On.”

Prime time’s latest transferee from stand-up comedy, Caponera is likable enough as a hard-working, not-too-bright lug who at times resembles a lower case Al Bundy. And Gordon’s Maureen is nice enough too. It’s just that none of this--not even attempts to do some creative things with Drew during the ending credits--is very funny. And Tuesday’s episode, in which Maureen shocks everyone by staging a nudie play titled “Cycle of Womanhood,” is worse.