Patricia Heaton sees right sitcom chemistry in 'Back to You'

[Brian Damage]

Beverly Hills, Calif.- Although Fox's "Back to You" is set in Pittsburgh, Clevelanders shouldn't have a problem rooting for this new comedy. The high-profile rookie series reunites Bay Village native Patricia Heaton and Shaker Heights native Fred Willard, who shared screen time in memorable episodes of the long-running CBS situation comedy "Everybody Loves Raymond."

Created by "Frasier" executive producers Steven Levitan and Christopher Lloyd, "Back to You" casts Heaton as Kelly Carr, the top news anchor at a Pittsburgh television station. Her co-anchor from the '90s, Chuck Darling ("Frasier" star Kelsey Grammer), is returning to the station after an on-air tirade got him fired in Los Angeles. Willard plays ever-amiable sports anchor Marsh McGinley.

The station is hoping Chuck and Kelly can again find the on-air magic that took their newscast to No. 1 in the '90s. And Fox is hoping Grammer and Heaton can find some of the sitcom magic that made "Frasier" and "Everybody Loves Raymond" two of the genre's greatest success stories.



Still, Fox's entertainment chairman, Peter Liguori, stopped short of predicting that "Back to You" - which premieres at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 19, on WJW Channel 8 - would singlehandedly bring back the traditional half-hour sitcom filmed on a Hollywood soundstage before a live audience. That's how sitcoms from "I Love Lucy" to "Everybody Loves Raymond" were filmed, but the form has hit hard times in an era dominated by reality shows and crime dramas.

"I just frankly don't think any single show should be the savior of any particular form," Liguori told TV critics gathered for their semiannual press tour recently. " 'Back to You' is on our air because we think it's a funny show - that plain, that simple. Needless to say, Kelsey and Patty are fantastic actors within that form."

For Heaton, "it's not about whether there are cameras or an audience or whatever. What it boils down to is, is this character interesting to you and do you see five or seven years' worth of stories here? It's not the format as much as it is, do you want to explore these people's lives? Is it going to be fun?"

Heaton said that she and Grammer have the same agent, and the idea of a Patty-Kelsey sitcom was first kicked around two years ago.

"It just seemed right," said Heaton, who won two Emmys for playing Debra Barone in "Everybody Loves Raymond." "I just thought, 'Me and Kelsey together would be a lot of fun.' What can we do? We thought about college professors, and he'll be the dead, white, male writers professor and I'll be the women's lib professor, and we'll do something like that."

Nothing came of those talks, but then she was offered "Back to You" while appearing in the off-Broadway play "The Scene" with "Monk" star Tony Shalhoub.

"I was doing this play in New York for 600 bucks a week, and they said there's this sitcom, and I said, 'Yes! Whatever it is!' " said Heaton, 49. "But it was with Kelsey, and then I read the script, and it was really not only the funniest script that I had been offered, but the only one that I had been offered."


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