The problem with Studio 60

I am really behind on my television watching--the NLCS put me back, and the World Series (even though I officially don't care) isn't helping matters. But last night the Series was rained out, so Gobo and I decided to catch up on some television. He refused to watch The Amazing Race (we're two weeks behind) and I wasn't in the right mindset for Lost (three weeks behind!), so we agreed on Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.

I was reluctant to watch it, just because I haven't been enjoying it all that much. But my only other option was Grey's Anatomy, and I haven't been into that lately either, so I decided Studio 60 was a decent option.

And in watching, I realized why I don't really like this show. The comedy sketches are not funny. The entire premise of this show is that this late-night live comedy show was sucking. But then Josh Lyman and Chandler Bing came in to make it all better, because they are super-funny and super-talented and can turn a show around.

Except it is impossible for the viewers to believe this, because we watch the sketches. And funny they are not. In the episode I watched the "best skit of the night," according to Josh and Chandler and apparently anyone whose opinion we are supposed to value, was a send-up of Nancy Grace, interviewing a teenager who had lost her cell phone. The most tedious three minutes of my life. I almost turned off the show because the skit was so tortuous.

I respect the show for wanting to show us that Chandler and Josh are funny, rather than just telling us. But in order to do that, they have to put something funny on the screen. And they are failing miserably.