Baby boomers have long been accused of discussing typical life experiences as if they were the first people ever to experience them. The generation is responsible for a plethora of movies and TV series in which self-absorbed characters whine about their problems dealing with their parents, forming relationships or raising kids when they still felt like kids themselves.
This generational navel gazing peaked (or bottomed out) in the late ’80s, with series like “thirtysomething” and movies like “Parenthood.” Within a few years, even the boomers had become tired of their complaints, and the pop-culture spotlight moved on to Generation X. (Who soon became tiresome themselves, but that’s another story.)
Though the new TV version of “Parenthood,” premiering tonight at 10 p.m. on NBC, adheres too closely to the boomer concerns of the 1989 movie, the TV-star-studded cast and good writing make the characters’ problems involving.
Though the premiere may not be novel enough to hook an audience, the hour is a quantum leap in both production and entertainment value from the former time-slot holder, “The Jay Leno Show.”
Tonight’s episode opens unpromisingly with a baby-boomer cliché: Adam Braverman (Peter Krause of “Six Feet Under”) goes jogging and discovers that his aging body isn’t up to it. The early appearance on the soundtrack of Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young” is also inauspicious.
In another generational-cliché moment, Adam argues with his father, Zeek (Craig T. Nelson), about how he’s raising his own son, Max (Max Burkholder). Though his hippie-ish nickname and long hair would suggest otherwise, Zeek is written as if he were a typical hard guy of the World War II generation. When Adam says that Max may be too sensitive for the pressures of Little League, Zeek says, “You were sensitive too. I cured you!”
Adam’s sister Sarah (Lauren Graham), a divorced mother of two teenagers, is forced to move in with her parents. Her rapid-fire dialogue and between-equals banter with her own daughter, Amber (Mae Whitman), are so reminiscent of Graham’s “Gilmore Girls” character, Lorelai, that one is surprised to learn that the part was originally taken by Maura Tierney (“E.R.”), who left the show for medical reasons.
The other sister, Julia (Erika Christensen), is a successful lawyer who worries that her young daughter favors her stay-at-home father (Sam Jaeger). As a classic New Yorker cartoon put it, I do think Julia’s problems are serious; they’re just not very interesting.
Finally, the other brother, Crosby (Dax Shepard), won’t grow up and has commitment issues, which worsen when his girlfriend threatens to artificially inseminate herself with donor sperm.
Despite their busy lives, the family members spend an improbable amount of time with one another. Those scenes, set in comfortable California locales, feel like less boozy outtakes from “Brothers & Sisters.”
Fortunately, most of the plotlines are handled with subtlety and insight. When Adam and his wife, Kristina (Monica Potter of “Boston Legal”), begin to learn that Max may have a serious developmental disorder, their discussions break down into denial and veiled accusations.
Sarah is set up on a date with a former boyfriend who turns out to have aged badly. The upshot is both funny and touching.
Cramming a lot of action into the hour, the premiere looks like the work of skilled professionals. Two of the executive producers are Ron Howard and Brian Grazer, the director and producer, respectively, of the original film. (Howard was also an executive producer of a short-lived 1990 TV version that’s mostly remembered, if it’s remembered at all, as the TV debut of the teenaged Leonardo DiCaprio.)
Baby boomers grew up in a time when primetime network TV, for all its flaws, at least looked expensive. Now that NBC has abandoned its experiment at cost cutting with the Leno show, one can’t help rooting for “Parenthood” to succeed, if only for nostalgia’s sake.
