‘Are You There, Chelsea?’ Review: Are You There, Funny?

Are You There, Chelsea? , “Pilot” – Original Air Date: January 11, 2012

Chelsea Handler is hilarious.

Obviously, that is a completely biased statement, but the comedian has a large enough fan base to spawn a late night talk show (Chelsea Lately), a faux-reality show (After Lately) and now a network TV sitcom, the subject of today’s discussion.

Handler’s crude, often sexual humor works well on Comedy Central and E!, as the audience for both networks are generally open to more adult subject matter. Her start on Girls Behaving Badly helped Handler find her fans, introducing them to her love of humiliation and fascination with all things off-color.

But when NBC picked up the sitcom version of Handler’s book, Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea, we knew trouble was afoot—since when was mainstream America all of a sudden ready to accept a vodka-swilling, blonde sex fiend with no filter? Then, when the network decided that perhaps America wasn’t ready for “vodka,” it became more apparent that the network wasn’t actually ready for Chelsea.

Are You There, Chelsea? is comical in terms of its title, as Chelsea does not appear as herself in the show. Instead, it stars Laura Prepon (That 70s Show) as Chelsea Newman, a character (loosely) based on Handler in her novel. Handler, then, appears as her own super-Christian sister Sloane, who in the first episode is pregnant. When Chelsea gets a DUI, Sloane is upset that her sister can’t drive her to the hospital.

It should be noted that back in May, a short pilot for the first episode premiered online, starring Prepon with an almost completely different cast, who were apparently replaced for “creative reasons.” Take that pilot, keep the jokes and replace a couple of the actors (Natalie Morales originally played Chelsea’s friend Ivory, but instead the producers decided to go with Ali Wong in the part, changing the name to Olivia), and you have a somewhat longer, somehow more mediocre version of the exact same thing.

Wong may not be a horrible actress, but she does not seem like the right fit against Prepon. The original character of Ivory was a strong female, much like the sitcom’s version of Chelsea. Ivory also appeared in the books. Maybe Morales/Ivory’s strength deterred them from that route, but with Wong in the role, it seems like Chelsea has nobody equal to her to help kick her down a notch. She becomes, in a sense, queen of her world.

At any rate, the show’s premiere basically introduces us to the basics. We see a much-too-bright sports bar, where Chelsea works; a brief stint of her praying to her god, Vodka, in jail; a new apartment with a quirky roommate (who seems to have lost some of her “quirk” from pilot to premiere); a fling with a redhead whose pubic region is a bit too much even for our slutty starlet… and a few character introductions along the way. In other words, it’s a half hour of pandering just to get us introduced to the cast and setting. That seems fair enough.

Prepon is a funny actress who does embody Handler well, but it’s Handler’s performance as her sister that really shines through, since she obviously knows her characters personally. The rest of the cast is forgettable, so far.

Chelsea has potential; for the most part, they stay true to the storylines in Handler’s book, even if they throw a few stories together in one and tame her for TV. Handler fans will obviously see the differences, but you can’t blame the writers for the network’s hack job at censoring what they can. Still, the show seems better fit for somewhere like HBO, where it could have gotten the Sex and the City treatment, compete with freedom to be lewd and outrageous (and the freedom to keep the “vodka”)—oh, and minus the horrible canned laughter at the jokes that have become too watered down.

The question, “Are you there, Chelsea?” is more fitting than it first seems—where exactly is Chelsea after all the network edits? How often will the real Handler show up? And of course, can she save her own show? The plot is there, itching to bust out of its network shell… but is there a creative way of getting down to it while pleasing NBC and not killing the spirit?

Are You There, Chelsea? airs on NBC Wednesdays at 8:30 p.m.

This article was originally published on AllMediaNY.com