New Showtime series shine > Promising `Linc’s,’ `Rude Awakenings’ debut Saturday

In the midst of rerun season, a few gems occasionally shine through.

A couple such shows debut Saturday on Showtime. Although not brilliant jewels yet, a little polish could help both to shine in the future.

First up is the ensemble comedy “Linc’s,” which debuts at 10 p.m. Set in a Washington bar that has resisted gentrification, “Linc’s” looks at race, politics and sex from an African-American point of view.

The focus and narrator of “Linc’s” is Russell A. Lincoln, played by Steven Williams (best known as Mister X on “The X-Files”). Linc is a black Republican, who often finds himself at odds with his more liberal patrons.

The barflies at Linc’s are multicaste, ranging from cab drivers and prostitutes to high-powered Washington insiders. The best lines belong to two frequent antagonists, lobbyists Eleanor Braithwaite Winthrop and Johnnie B. Goode.

Eleanor, played by “blaxploitation” queen Pam Grier (“Foxy Brown”), is a children’s-rights advocate who is married to a distant, white Georgetown professor. Johnnie, portrayed by veteran TV actor-director Georg Stanford Brown, is more mercenary. As Eleanor puts it, “You would lobby for the Devil himself. You would try to sell Hell as a vacation spa.” “Dry heat is good for the skin,” Johnnie ripostes.

The bar’s token white is Harlan Hubbard (played by Joe Inscoe of “I’ll Fly Away”), who is the chief of staff for an ancient Mississippi senator. The good ole boy comes to Linc’s for a taste of home — i.e. Southern cooking, blues and black women — and to reminisce about the way things used to be. “Come back from Beulah land,” an exasperated Johnnie says.

The executive producer of “Linc’s” is Tim Reid (best known as Venus Flytrap of “WKRP in Cincinnati”), and it is the first series to be shot at his New Millennium Studios in Petersburg, Va.

Given its pedigree and setting, comparisons are inevitable to Reid’s 1987 CBS series “Frank’s Place,” which was set in a New Orleans restaurant and offered a similarly composed cast. Although a critical darling, “Frank’s Place” died a relatively quick death in the ratings.

Although it has a gifted cast as well, “Linc’s” suffers because of its locale, our nation’s capital. With its “Big Easy”-generated ambiance, “Frank’s Place” had a whimsy and romanticism that is impossible to achieve in the deep-seated cynicism that is the District of Columbia. With political humor everywhere these days, viewers may have had too much, to the detriment of “Linc’s.”

And, as with “Frank’s Place,” “Linc’s” can be a bit jarring for its lack of a laugh track. Those who grew up with TV find themselves looking for their cue to laugh, and that’s missing. That’s not to say that “Linc’s” isn’t wickedly funny. Its writing is extremely sharp and topical.

What is missing, so far, is a strong chemistry among its characters. This isn’t “Cheers,” where everybody knows your name. At Linc’s, the principals tolerate one another, but certainly don’t seem like family. “Linc’s” is edgy, not homey, although that could change as the characters develop over a 13-episode run.

In other words, “Linc’s” is a nice place to visit, but not everyone will make it until closing time.

The second new offering is “Rude Awakening,” debuting at 11 p.m. Starring Sherilyn Fenn of “Twin Peaks” fame, the sitcom takes full advantage of being on Showtime, with quite a bit of profanity and sexual references. In the first two episodes, the “Rude” part certainly shows, and the series, if toned down, would be right at home with some of the trashy Fox TV shows.

Fenn plays Billie Frank, the former teen-age star of the nighttime soap opera “Emerald Bluff.” She’s down on her luck, and is working as a receptionist for B-movie producer Harve Schwartz (played by Richard Lewis of “Anything But Love”), whose claim to fame is such features as “Topless Lesbians on the Moon.” Secretly, her dream is to retake Hollywood on her own terms, this time as a writer.

Billie is an alcoholic who tends to wake up in bed with men that she can’t remember. Her friends stage a failed intervention, but after an OUI accident, she starts attending court-ordered sessions of Addictions Anonymous.

“Rude Awakening” has a colorful cast, led by Lynn Redgrave, who plays Billie’s alcoholic mother, Trudy, in full Ab-Fab mode (it’s nice to know that a member of Britain’s royal acting family can slum so convincingly). A frequent foil of Billie and Trudy is Tish (Corinne Bohrer), the strait-laced, born-again Christian who married Billie’s brother and whom Trudy refers to as a feminine body part. Among those characters at Addictions Anonymous are Billie’s hunky neighbor (played by Jonathan Penner of “The Naked Truth”) and his recovering drug addict lesbian roommate (portrayed by Rain Pryor, Richard’s daughter).

The sitcom was created by Claudia Lonow, herself a former teen star (“Knots Landing”) turned writer. As she serves as co-executive producer with four other, more experienced TV veterans, it’s obvious “Rude Awakening” should be considered a work in progress.

Now, “Rude Awakening” is walking a tightrope. Should it continue to mine alcoholism and promiscuity strictly for laughs, it will become as mundane as some of the dreck that is network sitcoms, offering cheap laughs at its characters’ pain.

But, should the series bring Billie through recovery to some form of stability, then it would actually perform something of a service for viewers similarly in need, offering a message of hope without preachiness.

So right now, let’s view “Rude Awakening” as a glass half full, not half empty.