Even a nostalgic guest turn can’t help a lackluster ‘Parkers’

“The Parkers” on UPN has long been a case of different strokes for different folks. Once the highest-rated sitcom among African Americans, it also drew harsh criticism a couple of years back from director Spike Lee, who said the stereotypes in it weren’t much different from those in the minstrel shows he skewered in the film “Bamboozled.”

Now stuck in the doldrums of its fourth season and rightfully trumped in the Nielsen ratings by programs such as ABC’s “My Wife and Kids” and Fox’s “The Bernie Mac Show” and “Cedric the Entertainer Presents,” “The Parkers” can only hope that a little TV nostalgia will give it a boost tonight at 8, with a guest turn by Gary Coleman.

Not surprisingly, the onetime darling of “Diff’rent Strokes” who always wanted to know what his older brother Willis was talkin’ about, is portraying himself. Since his signature show ended its run in 1986, Coleman has played Coleman on “Married ... With Children,” “The Simpsons,” “The Hughleys” and “My Wife and Kids” -- not to mention having appeared in the TV courtroom of Judge Mills Lane, who ordered him to pay an autograph-seeking fan $1,665 for hospital bills resulting from a fight at a Hawthorne store.

Tonight, Coleman moves in as a neighbor to Nikki (Mo’Nique) and Kim Parker (Countess Vaughn), the mother-and-daughter duo around whom this “Moesha” spinoff revolves. He is happily working in a community theater production, until Nikki intervenes with plans to revive his career through a cable-access talk show that is ill-conceived at best.

Unfortunately, pretty much the same can be said of “The Parkers,” with its lackluster writing and, oh yes, those stereotypes, which might be redeemed if this were incisive social commentary rather than broad comedy. But how much can anyone expect from a series about a mother and daughter in college together that virtually never shows them attending class or studying?

In fact, it would seem that the truly learned one here is Coleman, who can take the money from his guest appearance and run.