Whitney (NBC) - Series Premiere: Synopsis and Review

Update: Together with 'Up All Night', 'Whitney' got picked up by NBC for a full season of 24 episodes.

It is an exciting Fall season for Whitney Cummings (‘Chelsea Lately’), as both of her comedy shows premiere. The first one is ‘2 Broke Girls’, of which she is co-creator and co-producer and which premiered a couple of days ago, and the second is ‘Whitney’, in which she also stars as the title character. ‘Whitney’ first aired September 19th on CTV in Canada and on September 22nd, it premiered on NBC on Thursday night at 9:30/8:30c.

The character Whitney Cummings (portrayed by Whitney Cummings) definitely doesn’t want to get married with her live-in boyfriend Alex Green (Chris d’Elia), although there is nothing wrong with their relationship. She just doesn’t believe in marriage, which is probably influenced by the three divorces her mother has had in her life.
Attending the weddings of all her friends makes Whitney feel insecure, though, about her relationship with Alex, and supported by her friends (a married couple, a bitter divorcee and a sex-addicted single guy; bit of a cliche bunch), she decides to spice up their relationship. Although she takes the role playing a little too seriously, her approach works good, until Alex hits his head and needs to be brought to the emergency room.

‘Whitney’ is a more traditional comedy, a multi camera sitcom such as ‘Seinfeld’, as opposed to single camera comedy series such as ‘30 Rock’ and ‘Modern Family’.
Whitney, the character, is definitely not an average woman. Her weird habits and strange personality make you feel sympathy for her. The concept of a comedy show revolving around this type of woman is not unique, though, it is reminiscent of ‘Miranda’ and ‘New Girl’.
Cummings is a successful comedienne, but writing and performing in sitcoms is really something else. The jokes are not always as funny as the (real life) studio audience seems to believe, but overall, ‘Whitney’ is just a sound comedy series that makes you laugh. Of course, the question is whether Cummings is able to keep this up, or even make some improvements, for an entire season.