SETTING UP SHOP
Judd Hirsch’s introduction to “Superior Donuts” came via special delivery.
“What happened was they sent me a box of doughnuts,” the 81-year-old actor explained. “I was doing a play in the Berkshires and a dozen doughnuts comes in the mail and I, whoa, I’ve never been, you know, asked to do a play because they sent you ... a gift. Uh, that’s the way it turned out.”
In the half-hour CBS workplace comedy, which has its time period premiere tomorrow at 9 p.m., and is based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Tracy Letts, the veteran “Taxi” actor stars as Arthur Przybyszewski, a change-resistant old curmudgeon who owns and operates the title doughnut shop in a Chicago neighborhood that is rapidly gentrifying.
With a cast of regulars around him that includes an ambitious new African-American employee (Jermaine Fowler, “Friends of the People”), a Chicago cop (Katey Sagal, “Sons of Anarchy”), a Muslim aspiring real estate magnate (Maz Jobrani, “Better Off Ted”) and a Caucasian guy who holds down a number of odd jobs (David Koechner, “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy”), the opportunities for topical humor are many. But as series executive producer Garrett Donovan told a recent gathering of journalists in Pasadena, Calif., the emphasis will be more on humor and less on topicality.
“This isn’t going to be an issue of the week show,” he said. “We will talk about issues if it comes up organically, but we’ll also do stories about dating and about different flavors of doughnuts and things.
“Our approach is, too, we focus a lot on who these characters are,” he continued. “And to the extent we’re going to look at cultural issues and issues in the news, it will be through the lens of the characters. For example, on the gun story that we’ll be doing coming up, it’s the effect that a gun has on our characters’ lives. And not a political kind of thing. In fact, we’re never going to say or try to say the word Democrat or Republican, to keep it out of the political realm and to make it more just, like, issue based.”
“There’s different points of view,” Sagal added. “I play a cop and what is that particular point of view? And there’s Jermaine, who’s the black kid on the street. I mean, there’s lots of them on the street and then there’s Maz and he’s got his Muslim idea. It’s sort of everybody’s point of view.”
Still, if there is a story in the news that has comedic possibilities, the series won’t shy away, no matter the potential controversy.
“Everything that’s present tense is up for grabs in this country, and that’s what makes great comedy,” Hirsch said. “If you don’t do it, it looks like you’re hiding. That would be crazy. There’s so much material in that. By the way, we’re in Chicago. Isn’t that funny? We’re in Chicago.”