NBC gives an early second season renewal to the Night Court revival
The series has been granted a renewal after airing only four episodes, to strong ratings
Aux News Night Court
When looking at the scheduling decisions made by major networks and streamers, it often feels like you’re watching a series of extremely expensive games of chance all play out at once. Nobody actually knows what’s going to hit, so why not green light five more dating reality show? A drama series about a doctor with anosmia. A gritty modern-day take on The Three Musketeers. Hell, why not reboot Night Court, of all things, while you’re at it?
And the especially weird thing about this process is that sometimes these random prognostications are right, as when NBC did, in fact reboot Night Court, and it was not only (eventually) pretty funny, but also popular, with Variety reporting that the Melissa Rauch and John Larroquette-starring series is currently bringing in something like 25 million viewers per episode.
So it’s not entirely surprising tonight to see the news that the network has now renewed the series for a second season, ensuring that Judge Abby Stone (Rauch, playing the daughter of the late character played by the also-late Harry Anderson) will continue to rule over her nocturnal hall of judgment. This, despite the show having only aired four episodes so far, with the renewal landing early in its life cycle and suggesting the network has a pretty hefty vote of confidence in the freshman series.
In addition to Rauch and Larroquette, the new Night Court also stars India de Beaufort, Kapil Talwalker, and Lacretta, filling other various members of the court. (De Beaufort plays the prosecutor, with one of the twists of the new series being that Larroquette’s former prosecutor, Dan Fielding, is now serving as a public defender.) The series was developed by Dan Rubin, who previously worked as a producer on Netflix’s Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.
56 Comments
So is Larroquette the only living member of the original cast? I’d be depressed as hell.
Richard Moll and Marsha Warfield are alive.
Richard Moll hates Dan Laroquette due to his multiple Emmy wins. It’s pretty funny.
Looks like Roz and Bull are still going.Some of the actors from the first couple of seasons seem to be alive but retired from the business.Has anyone spoken with Yakov Smirnoff?
Yakov is still around. He’s still a stand-up in his very own 2,000 seat theater in Branson. He’s been on various podcasts over the years too. Also, he has a PhD now in psychology and global leadership from Pepperdine.
Yakov Smirnoff has Branson money now.He ain’t showing up for some piddly TV show.
Yeah, I just looked him up. He seems to be doing surprisingly well. What a country!
Good lord, no!
Well, this guy showed up every now and then.
“That’s right. It’s us.”
Didn’t John Astin also play a recurring character on Night Court?
Yes, Harry’s father.
Astin has now outlived the entire cast of The Addams Family and most of the Night Court cast.
We may need to find some more “Data” on what he’s up to.
We may need some more “Data” on what he’s up to.
Ke Huy Quan doesn’t have time for your nonsense.
I keep hoping they’ll somehow work him back in.
He’s busy playing 6 different Soongs in Picard.
I know a full costume shot wouldn’t bear this out, but in that photo it looks like he’s auditioning to play Han Solo.
Data shot first
The only thing more popular than the new Night Court series? The new SPR3 music video! It just came out last night!!!
Is this a bit?
I just don’t get the popularity. I could not find it funny at all. All I can imagine is that Melissa Rauch is leveraging a lot of Big Bang Theory love. But kind of nice that they are still making multi-cam sitcoms dirercted by James Burrows.
I have to agree, I’m shocked this is apparently doing well. Night Court was my favorite sitcom growing up, hands down, so I’m the perfect audience for this. But the first episode was irredeemably awful.
The first one has to do some exposition, so that probably harms it. But the second episode was no better I thought.
It’s pretty rough so far. de Beaufort and Lucretta are playing way too broad. Talwalker’s character offers nothing of interest yet. The laugh track feels more fake than usual. Rauch’s take doesn’t quite fit; maybe if she dials back the cheeriness…?Larroquette is still perfect, and the only reason I keep watching in the hopes they figure it out.
Maybe that level of Kimmy Schmidt-style cheeriness is what is working for a lot of people. I’m far too jaded and cyncial for it though.
Kimmy Schmidt had a constant edge of black comedy underlying it all, though, mixed with some surreality. I think that made a big difference.
Agree on all this, and the laugh track does it now favors. I actually think it would be funnier if I didn’t have tyhat fake laughter elbowing me constantly going “eh? EH?”
I just assume everyone who complains about laughtracks is pretty easily swayed by others.I’ve never seen what the big deal is. I go see stand up and never once have I thought… “I’m being manipulated!!!” when other people laugh at a joke I didn’t laugh at.
It’s pretty bad. The show feels like John Larroquette hanging around a bunch of amateur actors.
I agree. I gave it 3 episodes and I didn’t laugh once.
Yeah, I watched the first three episodes and they were all equally dire, no jump in quality at all. There is no depth to any of the characters whatsoever, they’re just cardboard cutouts of people. Everyone’s just too fucking nice, also, the old Night Court had a bit of bite to it, this is toothless.
So this is what the Reddit comments kept vaguely referring to.
I…don’t get it? Are they suppose to tell jokes too?
This is a one off, they usually dissect shows and movies with a good insight in the creation process, AND consider the fun factor.
I hope they bring back more of the original cast. It was weird to only have one guy come back.
Uh, so I guess you don’t know that the actors for Harry, Christine, and Mac have all died, huh?Only Bull and Roz remain. And Billie, who nobody remembers from the first season. The actor who played Dan’s lackey Phil is alive, but Phil the character is dead.Status unknown: Quon Le, and Art the janitor. If not dead, they appear to be retired.
Denice Kumagai was on “Gilmore Girls” and started a theatre company after IIRC.
Yeah that’s what I meant. I know most of the main cast is dead
So when you wrote that you “hope they bring back” in the present tense, I guess you mean you’re hoping they can bring them back from them from the dead?
Fright Court
Didn’t they have the same guy play Phil’s twin brother? Or did he die too?
Wikipedia says yes, the same actor played Phil’s brother. I don’t think the brother character died. I’m not sure there’d be much interest in him though.
I loved Billie. I thought she should have continued longer.
Don’t forget Brent Spiner and his worm farm.
I hate to break it you, but…
Why? It’s brutally terrible. 5 min is too much time to spend on this terminally unfunny reboot.
Still waiting for the Riptide reboot.
I’m going to hold out for Simon & Simon.
25 million? Is that right? A quick search of TBBT numbers (a watermark for sitcom big numbers in the recent past, coincidentally starring Rauch) showed an average of about 20 million for the highest watched season. I liked original Night Court well enough, but… damn.
If it was 2.5 million, I’d believe it; the highest rated (non-sports, fiction) series in 2022 got about 10 million viewers (7-day average for the entire 2021-2022 season). For this show to get 2.5 times that seems… implausible. The exact measurement is vague but the Variety article implies that 25 million people have watched it total so far, across all platforms, which is possible if they count people who watched it for some minimum threshold (3 minutes?) before shutting it off in disgust. I don’t know how much they’ve been promoting the show.
The continued average ratings will probably be a fraction of that amount.
Good lord. Fine. Whatever. Sure.
It’s shit. You can just come out and say it’s shit.
It won’t be the same without Mel Torme.