When it was announced that CBS had bought a Young Sheldon spin-off that concentrated on Montana Jordan and Emily Osment’s characters Georgie and Maddy, we weren’t that surprised. What did surprise us was the news that the show would be a multicam, studio-audience sitcom, which harks back to the format of The Big Bang Theory, the show Young Sheldon was spun off from. Sure, co-creator Chuck Lorre is a multicam impresario, but would it be strange to see these characters in such a different environment?
Opening Shot: George Cooper, Jr. (Montana Jordan) is sitting in the living room of the house where his wife Mandy (Emily Osment) grew up; he’s watching an episode of Frasier with Mandy’s parents, Jim and Audrey McAllister (Will Sasso, Rachel Bay Jones).
The Gist: Georgie and Mandy, along with their infant daughter C.C., are living with Mandy’s parents, and Mandy hates the arrangement. She’s tired of how critical her mother is, especially when it comes to her marriage to the much-younger Georgie. Georgie, ever positive, thinks that they’re in a good situation: He works for Jim at his tire store, they’re saving money, they have built-in babysitting.
The house is a bit crowded, though; Mandy’s adult brother Conner (Dougie Baldwin) still lives at home, making music that is in an undanceable time signature. Let’s just say that Conner reminds Georgie of his younger brother Sheldon (Iain Armitage), who’s now off at Caltech.
At the tire shop, Georgie is facing his own issues. He works in the front of the shop with Jim, which has not gone unnoticed by Reuben (Jessie Prez), the mechanic who’s been working there for nine years. Also, it hasn’t been all that long since his father, George Sr. (Lance Barber), died suddenly, and he tells Jim that being around him sometimes reminds him of being with his dad.
After a particularly tough exchange between Mandy and Audrey, Georgie confronts his mother-in-law about saying that their daughter might not be talking yet because of Georgie’s genes. The couple decide that they need to get a place of their own; at this point, they can afford a tiny, dingy trailer that rattles when the 6:10 to Lubbock speeds by on the nearby train tracks, something that Georgie’s mother Mary (Zoe Perry) and grandmother Meemaw (Annie Potts) find out when they come to visit.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Created by Chuck Lorre, Steve Holland and Steven Molaro, Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage is a spinoff of Young Sheldon, which itself was a spinoff of The Big Bang Theory.
Our Take: With Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage, Lorre and company return to the mutli-camera, live studio audience sitcom format that has been successful for the megaproducer for going on 30 years. Is it odd to see characters from Young Sheldon, which was one of Lorre’s few forays into single-camera comedy, interacting with each other accompanied by a studio audience and a laugh track? A little bit. But Lorre, Molaro and Holland are experts at staging effective multicams, so the transition feels less jarring than one might expect.
It’s hard for us to call Georgie & Mandy funny. But it is certainly sincere and heartfelt, so at least that’s a start. Having a heavy dose of Montana Jordan as the perpetually-sunny Georgie is going to be a lot to get used to, but as we see in the second episode, where he starts stressing out about things at home and with his sister Missy (Raegan Revord), Jordan does have the capacity to play Georgie as serious and grown up, even if Georgie himself isn’t even old enough to drink yet.
Osment handles the transition to multicam world like a pro, mainly because she’s had a lot of multicam experience — Mom and Hannah Montana being the two biggest examples. She can do the physical comedy and the somewhat-outsized reactions multicams require and make it look natural. Sasso and Jones are both experts in front of live audiences, and while their roles are pretty generic — doubting, passive-aggressive mom and the make-everyone-happy dad — they should be just fine as they expand their roles as Mandy’s parents.
Because the characters in Georgie & Mandy are already established, Lorre and company can dispense with their usual style of going broad to start as the writers find who the characters are and where in their personalities the laughs will come from. That certainly helps in the first two episodes, where the heartfelt parts have much more impact than the comedic parts.
Given the fact that Mandy and Georgie haven’t moved out of town, it’s inevitable that Georgie is going to interact with his family and that characters from Young Sheldon are going to pop up in episodes. What we hope is that Lorre, Molaro, Holland and their writers don’t use this as a crutch and, just like Georgie and Mandy on the show, let Jordan and Osment blossom as the leads of what is likely a Lorre sitcom that’s going to be around for at least five years.
Sex and Skin: It’s a network sitcom, so no.
Parting Shot: Over the baby monitor, we hear Georgie gushing over his daughter saying her first word.
Sleeper Star: Despite what we said about Young Sheldon-related guest stars, we want to see as much of Annie Potts as possible. She had the funniest line in the pilot, said as the train rumbles nearby.
Most Pilot-y Line: As a bit of a reference to the change of format, Georgie refers to Frasier as a “laughing show,” because you can hear the audience laugh. “Wonder Years, no one’s laughing. Is it funny? We’ll never know,” he says.
Our Call: STREAM IT. Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage has a leg up on most of Lorre’s sitcoms because it starts with characters we already know and care about. Because of that, Lorre and company can delve into the more emotional parts of their relationships and let the funny come when it comes. There were a few funny moments during the first two episodes, but we hope those laughs come more often as the show becomes more established.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.