Flying Blind

I remember this as the funniest sitcom ever (with the possible exception of Fawlty Towers). Hip, slick, witty and hilarious. Nebbishy Neal, a hapless wage-slave who lives with his parents, somehow wins the heart of hyper-It girl Alicia - the kind of girl who catapults around the world from one chic party to another, pursued madly by writers, artists, billionaires, Nobel-prize winning scientists (and four full-time stalkers who have got together to form a pop group which is very big in Sweden). His family are straight out of Neil Simon, her friends are from darkest Bohemia. Imagine a young Woody Allen dating one of the girls Carole Lombard or Katherine Hepburn used to play in those classic screwball comedies. Parker and Leoni are both adorable and hilarious and every one of the supporting characters and cast are great. The writing is genius.

The gods are jealous of perfection, so Flying Blind was cancelled prematurely, leaving those of us who'd come to love it in a state of grief and denial which has rendered bleak and futile our every waking hour since. If it's ever re-run do yourself a favour and check it out.

This was such a funny series that, when it was canceled, I was stupefied. There are a lot of second-rate (or worse) shows being made all too often these days (especially the sitcom genre) but this wasn't one of them. It was brash, irreverent, high-spirited and had all the ingredients for a very successful series. I laughed my way through every episode. It never, ever disappointed. And when fresh faces were needed on "Ellen", at least Clea Lewis (Tea Leoni's wannabe hangaround friend in this series) was spotted and almost stole *that* show too!

I was broken-hearted when Flying Blind was canceled after one season. I thought it was one of the funniest series ever. But now I've been re-watching it on YouTube, and I have to admit I don't love it quite as much as before.

The series involves a nebbishy accounts executive who inexplicably lands a gorgeous, fantastically hip woman perpetually followed around by a string of brilliant ex-lovers.

Like Neil, I was a nebbishy New Yorker in the early '90s, so the show represented my dream life of sex and art. How could I not love it?

The humor was very much Catskills comedy, and one of the fascinating features is the difference in delivery styles between Corey Parker and Tea Leoni. They both tell a lot of jokes structured like, "that's the biggest blank since my relative did blank at the blank," but whereas Parker does a Woody Allen impression (a good one), Leoni has this odd, shambling way of telling the same jokes. She is one of those rare comedic actors who sound like they're actually creating the joke as they go along, and while much of the series performance arts jokes seem less edgy than they did in the 90s, her delivery is still pretty unusual.

While I don't love the series as I once did, I still find it quite likable, and there are many excellent performers, including Micheal Tucci as Neil's father (their familial similarity comes mainly in how they tell jokes) and especially Clea Lewis as Alicia's overshadowed roommate.

While this is a far more conventional sitcom than I realized at the time, it actually does have a pretty good sense of the period. Alicia is an exaggeration of a real type, and at times she manages to capture that emotional instability that makes women like her far less appealing to older, wiser men like the me of today, who knows enough to run away.

Some fans may think my 7 star review is too low. If it's any comfort, my 23-year-old self would completely agree with you.

It is still one of the best sitcoms I have ever seen. Hip...funny...fabulous...witty...charming...gorgeous! I adore Flying Blind! Although it preceded both...I could best describe it as a mix of (the movie) Party Girl and Dharma & Greg. Perhaps that was the problem... it was too hip, to soon. Great cast...great writing...great premise...and a VERY bad decision in cancelling it!

The good news about being on Fox in 1992 was - no one was watching, and you could get away with things you'd never get to do on a major network. The bad thing about being on Fox in 1992 was that almost no one watched. Which was a shame. Those few that tuned in were well rewarded.

The writing was sharp (look at what the writers and producers went on to do), the acting was brilliant (look at the cast), with incredible comedic timing, the production was...well, they had an early Fox budget, but they did what they could.

Some years later, Dharma and Greg would do another uptight guy marries into a free spirit family story. And while it was successful, it is a pale imitation of Flying Blind.

There is no show that I'd like to see come out on DVD more than this one.