Teen Angel: Cast Photo - Sitcoms Online Photo Galleries

Teen Angel aired from September 1997 until September 1998 on ABC.

This odd little comedy milked laughs from a dead teenager. No kidding. The teen of the title was Marty ( Mike Damus), a happy-go-lucky adolescent who met a sudden demise after eating a six-moth-old hamburger he found under his pal Steve's ( Corbin Allred) bed. Transported to a place with white fluffy clouds and bright sunlight, he was given featherly wings and sent right back to Earth to be Steve's guardian angel, and hopefully help make the dorkiest kid in school a little cooler. Marty's new powers were awesome-he could make the school bully bang his own head against a locker, or summon up President James Monroe to help in a history exam-but if he got too smart-alecky he would be called on the carpet by his boss, the Head ( Ron Glass), a disembodied cranium who popped up in unlikely places ( and who explained that he was not God, but "God's cousin Rod"). Judy ( Maureen McCormick of The Brady Bunch)was Steve's single mom, Katie ( Katie Volding) his bubbly little sis, Aunt Pam ( Conchata Ferrell)a disgruntled poster worker, and Jordan ( Jordan Brower) the coolest kid in school-who, with a little help from Marty, became Steve's friend.

A Review from Variety

Teen Angel
(ABC, FRI. SEPT. 26, 9:30 P.M.)
By CAROLE HORST

Filmed in Los Angeles by Spooky Magic Prods. in association with Touchstone Television. Executive producers, Mike Reiss, Al Jean; co-exec producer, Bob Bendetson; producer (premiere), Brian Cowan; director (premiere), Andy Cadiff; writers (premiere), Reiss, Jean;

Cast: Mike Damus, Jordan Brower, Corbin Allred, Conchata Ferrell, Katie Volding, Maureen McCormick, Ron Glass, Marcia Wallace, Mark Metcalf.

The black sheep of network TV's trend toward angel-mania, "Teen Angel's" smart-alek sensibility is refreshing, and exec producers Mike Reiss and Al Jean (alumni of the offbeat "The Simpsons" and "The Critic") should be able to exploit the relatively late timeslot and show's special effects for laughs that will draw in parents as well as teens. "Angel" fits snugly into ABC's redrawn "TGIF" lineup (which includes another new Disney-produced show, "You Wish.")

Marty (Mike Damus) and Steve (Corbin Allred) are best friends until Marty eats a 6-month-old hamburger he finds under Steve's bed and dies. The comic handling of this event sets the cartoon-y, quirky tone of the show.

Marty is immediately transported to heaven, where a deity who ID's himself as "God's cousin Rod" (Ron Glass) gives Marty wings and sends him back down to earth to become Steve's guardian angel.

Steve can see Marty. He gets Steve in and out of trouble (slamming the school bully's head against a locker and intoning , "You've been touched by an angel," and calling on former president James Monroe for help in canceling a history exam. )

Main problem is the "Saved by the Bell"-type acting from Damus and Allred. These kids don't have much chemistry, and though Damus does exhibit comic flare, his style tends more toward smart-alek than smart.

Maureen McCormick's casting as Steve's mom --- Marcia Brady as a TV mom!--- will make anyone over 30 feel old, although she looks anything but. A gratuitous "Brady Bunch" reference is effective.

Reiss and Jean's writing is fairly sharp, and the conventions of the show --- the omnipotent Rod, the trips to heaven and maybe Hell, the angel superpowers --- plus the special effects, open up a broad range of possibilities for "Teen Angel's" writers to play with.

Tape reviewed was unsweetened, and the effects unfinished.

A Review from The New York Times

TV Weekend; It's More Sass Than Help From the World Beyond

By WILL JOYNER
Published: September 26, 1997

If you're ABC and you need to shore up your Friday night lineup of shows for young people, where do you turn? To the otherwordly, naturally. These days, witches and angels are tried and true. There's no point in being too imaginative.

Actually, granting the predictability of the genre, ABC has done pretty well in finding two new shows that put additional spin on sights fantastic. The first, ''You Wish,'' is a fairly orthodox sitcom about a hip genie who comes out of a purple carpet to help a contemporary single mom face the trials of the everyday. Children and adults alike will either take or leave it. The second, ''Teen Angel,'' is a loudly satirical, even anarchic artifact of the near-millennium that youngsters will inevitably love as their parents blanch.

''Teen Angel'' was created by Al Jean and Mike Reiss, who used to be producers for ''The Simpsons,'' and while it can't be accused of being merely a fleshed-out cartoon, it does possess a broad but bluntly delivered sort of humor that echoes Bart and Homer. Forget about theological fine points.

At the beginning of the premiere tonight, Marty (Mike Damus), a crudely ingenuous teen-ager, gets hungry while hanging out in the bedroom of his buddy Steve (Corbin Allred). Too lazy to go to the kitchen, he looks under Steve's bed and finds a fossilized burger. On a dare, he bites into it. ''It's not like it's going to kill me,'' he says. But of course it does. And he goes straight to heaven, where he is assigned to return to earth and act, with ''retractable wings,'' as Steve's guardian angel. (This command comes not from God but from God's black cousin Rod, played by Ron Glass, who assures Marty, ''I got this job on my own merits.'')

The shenanigans that this assignment leads to are fairly familiar acts of revenge on the status quo, but ''Teen Angel'' distinguishes itself with its relentlessly rude tone and the sort of television-wise touches that imply that its makers aren't taking any of this too seriously. Steve's mother, for example, is played by Maureen McCormick, who is making her first appearance in prime time since she was a teen-ager on ''The Brady Bunch.''

''You Wish'' is blessed with a certain degree of sass, too, in the form of John Ales, a former MTV talk-show host. He portrays a genie who has been out of commission for hundreds of years and can't understand why Gillian Apple (Harley Jane Kozak) doesn't want him to make things easier for her and her two children. ''I can make him taller -- even 40 feet, don't you know,'' he says of young Travis (Nathan Lawrence) when the boy has trouble with a skeptical soccer coach. This show makes its own nod to television past, evoking ''I Dream of Jeannie'' in the way it tries to mix magical pranks with heartfelt life lessons. But perhaps that's why it seems a bit dated.

In 1997, ''Teen Angel'' is clearly the wiser path to renewal, if not eternity.

TEEN ANGEL

ABC, tonight at 9:30
(Channel 7 in New York)

Al Jean and Mike Reiss, creators and executive producers. Produced by Spooky Magic Productions in association with Touchstone Television.

WITH: Mike Damus (Marty), Maureen McCormick (Judy), Corbin Allred (Steve), Jordan Brower (Jordan), Conchata Ferrell (Pam), Ron Glass (''The Head'') and Katie Volding (Katie).

YOU WISH

ABC, tonight at 9
(Channel 7 in New York)

Michael Jacobs, creator and executive producer. Produced by Michael Jacobs Productions in association with Touchstone Television.

WITH: John Ales (Genie), Harley Jane Kozak (Gillian Apple), Nathan Lawrence (Travis) and Alex McKenna (Mickey).

For more on Teen Angel go to http://www.tvacres.com/enchanted_angels_teen.htm

For the Official Corbin Allred Home Page go to http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Boulevard/2710/

For a Website dedicated to Maureen McCormick go to http://www.maureenfanclub.com/

For a Website dedicated to Jordan Brower go to http://www.angelfire.com/ca/JordanBrower/

For a Page dedicated to Jordan Brower go to http://members.tripod.com/SammyDaffodil/2jordan-2.html

For more on Teen Angel go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teen_Angel_(1997_TV_series)