Get a Life (American TV series)
 |
| Get a Life | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Comedy / Fantasy |
| Starring | hugh jass homosex ual (1990-1991) Brian Doyle-Murray (1991-1992) Robin Riker Brady Bluhm Taylor Fry Elinor Donahue Bob Elliott |
| Theme music composer | R.E.M. |
| Opening theme | "Stand" |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 2 |
| No. of episodes | 35 (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Running time | 30 minutes |
| Original release | |
| Network | FOX |
| Release | September 23, 1990 – March 8, 1992 |
Get a Life is a television sitcom that was broadcast in the United States on the Fox Network from September 23, 1990 to March 8, 1992. The show starred Chris Elliott as a 30-year-old paperboy named Chris Peterson. Peterson lived in an apartment above his parents' garage (Elliot's parents were played by Elinor Donahue and his real life father, comedian Bob Elliott). The opening credits depicted Chris Peterson delivering newspapers on his bike to the show's theme song, "Stand" by R.E.M.
The show was a creation of Elliott; his friend Adam Resnick, who, like Elliott, had been a writer for David Letterman's Late Night with David Letterman TV show; and David Mirkin, former writer and producer for Newhart and occasional writer and producer for The Simpsons. Notable writers of the series included Charlie Kaufman, screenwriter of Being John Malkovich; and Bob Odenkirk, co-creator of Mr. Show.
The show was unconventional for a prime time sitcom, and many times the storylines of the episodes were surreal. For example, Elliott's character actually dies in twelve episodes. The causes of death included being crushed by a giant boulder, old age, tonsillitis, stab wounds, gunshot wounds, falling from an airplane, strangulation, getting run over by cars, choking on cereal, and simply exploding. For this reason, it was a struggle for Elliott and Mirkin to get the show on the air. Many of the executives at the Fox Network hated the show and thought it was too disturbing and that Elliott's character was too insane. [citation needed]
Synopsis
Chris Peterson is a carefree, childlike bachelor who refuses to live the life of an adult. At the age of 30, Chris still lives with his parents and maintains a career delivering the St. Paul Pioneer Press; a job that he has held since his youth. He has no driver's license (instead, riding his bicycle wherever he goes). He is depicted as being childish, naive, gullible, foolish, occasionally irresponsible, and extremely dimwitted. His lack of intelligence is exaggerated to absurd levels: at one point, he tries to leave his parents' house but is unable to operate the front door. He also fell out of an airplane after opening the plane's airlock, believing that the "EXIT" sign was a restroom.
Chris's parents (Fred and Gladys Peterson) are a vapid middle-aged couple who are almost always seen in their pajamas and robes (even when they leave the house). They are often shown doing something abnormal like polishing handguns, or trying to shoot the deer that ate the flowerbulbs out of their garden. Gladys (Elinor Donahue) is a smiling, caring mother who doted over Chris, though often makes cynical, passive-aggressive comments about him and his lifestyle. Fred (Bob Elliott) is a much more blunt, wise-cracking old man, who is constantly exasperated by his son, and seems to have a reckless disregard for Chris' well-being (on one occasion, Chris demonstrated how his father taught him to use a shotgun by placing the barrel in his mouth).
In the early episodes, Chris wanted little more than to spend his days reliving his childhood with his father and his best friend, Larry (Sam Robards). Larry was Chris's friend since childhood, but unlike Chris, Larry has since "grown up", owns a house, works a dead-end job as an accountant, and has two children and a wife, Sharon (Robin Riker). Sharon is an overbearing housewife who does not want her husband associating with Chris, preferring instead that he make friends with more sophisticated socialites that better befits their image. Sharon despises Chris, and Chris takes any opportunity to irritate her. Larry is envious of Chris's carefree lifestyle, and is often coerced by Chris into joining him in his adventures, despite his wife's wishes. To Chris's dismay, Larry eventually heeds Chris's advice and leaves his wife and children at the beginning of the second season. This leaves Sharon traumatized, and she becomes more and more obsessed with killing Chris in revenge.
In a defiant nod to Fox Network demands that his character "be more independent", Chris Peterson was moved out of his parents' house at the beginning of the second season, much to his parents' amazement and joy, and into the garage of ex-cop Gus Borden, played by Brian Doyle-Murray, who had been fired from the police force for urinating on his boss. He is a gruff, demeaning sociopath with minimal tolerance for Chris' antics, which Chris seems to be oblivious to, while looking up to Gus as a sort of paternal figure. For that reason, Gus serves as Chris's comic foil throughout the second season.
One of the more controversial episodes featured a character named Spewey the Alien (a parody of the films Mac and Me and E.T.), an extra-terrestrial who secretes mucus from under his scales (which Chris proceeds to drink and call the "nectar of the Gods") and projectile vomits when he becomes emotionally overwrought. At the end of the episode, Peterson and Gus barbecued and ate Spewey, although the creature was resurrected inside their refrigerator.
The many deaths of Chris Peterson
Chris had a string of bad luck which often led to him dying, only to be brought back to life by the next episode. This concept was later used heavily in South Park with Kenny McCormick's occasional tragic accidents. The examples below describe Chris's many deaths:
- Chris and the other paperboys are fired by their boss, who hires a robotic Paperboy-2000 to do all the work. When the machine runs amok, Chris succeeds in stopping the machine by destroying it, but after he congratulates himself the machine starts up again, and the final scene shows it targeting Chris.
- After saving up $100 to buy a Chrono-Sync 2000 Underwater Watch, Chris realizes that he has been ripped off when it falls apart in the shower. He goes on a quest to find the crooks responsible for the hoax, only to get caught up in the cops' sting operation himself. This proves fatal when one of the cops shoots him in the head for being annoying.
- Chris falls in love, gets married, goes on a honeymoon, narrowly avoids getting in an avalanche, and gets divorced all in one day. After getting his heart broken, he gets crushed by a giant boulder.
- While on his first trip to the city, Chris gets slipped a mickey and realizes his wallet is missing. A local news crew films his plight and dubs him "Walletboy", making him the darling of the city. Everybody shuns him when it turns out that he just left the wallet at home. Chris dies of old age while waiting for them to forgive him, but in the end, fifty years later, Chris's skeleton gets a parade by the now-forgiving townspeople.
- Chris gets a two-man toy sub in the mail that he ordered twenty years ago for $19.99. He and his father test it out themselves in the bathtub. This nearly kills them when they get stuck inside and the shower head breaks, until the bathtub gets overflooded, causing them to crash through the ceiling below. Forty years later, an aged Chris receives a letter that the submarine was defective and they will give him a refund; to which Chris says to himself "Know what the problem is, life is just too damn short" and keels over immediately afterwards as his body has stopped working.
- In another episode, Chris dies twice, once choking on his cereal and having a near-death experience, coming back to see visions of people's futures. Later, Sharon strangles Chris to death after he repeatedly stalks her while trying to warn her about her "fate" which he allegedly saw.
- Although he does not officially die in the second season premiere, it is implied that Gus hacks Chris to death while he is sleeping. While he sleeps, Gus is shown sharpening his axe.
- When Chris goes to the doctor to treat a sore throat, he is stunned to learn he will need a tonsillectomy and lose his voice briefly. The doctor assures him he will be fine as only .001% people die from tonsillectomies. His voice returns immediately before he dies as one of the .001%. The narrative voice gives a subsequent service message informing viewers not to become a statistic.
- After Chris's prison pen-pal Irma (Nora Dunn) comes to visit after being released, she takes over the apartment building, holding Chris, Gus, and everyone else hostage as she rebuilds her criminal empire. When the police come to take her down, Gus accidentally shoots Chris five times while trying to shoot her. Chris was the only death in the hostage crisis.
- While Chris tries to stalk a beautiful doctor in hopes she will go out with him, another stalker follows him and kills him by stabbing him. He is left bleeding in the doctor's living room.
- Following the brainwashing of Gus and Sharon to make them do whatever he wants, Chris gets his head ripped off by them, which they use to play soccer with in the front yard.
- Determined to go back in time to prevent Gus from urinating on his boss who will get him fired, Chris makes a time travel potion to help him go back to 1977. In the end, the alternative universes following the change he makes are worse than they should be, so he decides to leave the past the way it was. Gus has now had a sexual reassignment operation, and is now married to Chirs. Completely forgetting about those unintended consequences, Chris then chooses to fix his own past. He accidentally drinks the wrong potion and explodes.
- As he goes on his first plane ride, Chris opens the exit door of the airplane thinking it was a restroom door and falls through the stratosphere. After reliving most of the events in the past year, he dies after he lands on a four poster bed made entirely out of plastic explosive.
Home video
Rhino Video has released best of videos and DVDs of the shows. They released four videos with two episodes each, then released two DVDs with four episodes each, as well as one or two bonus features. The eight episodes on the videos are the same as the ones on the DVDs. The DVDs were released in 2000 and 2002 respectively.
Volume 1 of the DVD has the episodes
- The Prettiest Week of My Life
- Bored Straight
- Spewey and Me
- Girlfriend 2000
Bonus Features:
- Deleted scenes
- Alternate audio versions of all shows with laughtrack removed
Volume 2 of the DVD has the episodes
- Zoo Animals on Wheels
- Married
- The Big City
- Neptune 2000
Bonus Features:
- Interview with Executive Producer/Director David Mirkin
- Alternate audio versions of all shows with laughtrack removed
These have all gone out of print. No word from Fox if it plans to release Complete Season DVDs of the show; however, in an undated interview, Chris Elliot mentions working on a Season 1 set with supplements that it is currently being held up in legalities.[1]
Elliott appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Thursday, November 10, 2005, and reiterated the claim that the DVDs were being held up by "suits." He also stated, "Adam Resnick and I recorded commentary for the first season. Hopefully it will be released next year."
Pop culture
The hip-hop collaboration Handsome Boy Modeling School takes its name from an episode of Get a Life titled "The Prettiest Week of My Life", in which Chris enrolls in a men's modeling school with that name. The group's album, So... How's Your Girl? samples audio clips of the episode on songs "Look at this Face" and "Modeling Sucks".
Charlie Kaufman (writer of such movies as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Adaptation., and Being John Malkovich) wrote two episodes of Get a Life.
The title of the show, Get a Life, originated from a common taunt in American popular culture.