TV is the New Reading

‘Parenthood’

is pretty good

I really wanted to dislike this.

NBC Tuesday premiered its comic family drama “Parenthood” -- or, as I’d been referring to it up until now, “ ‘Brothers & Sisters’ with teen-agers.” Careful readers will recall my repeated pleas for that show to drown in its own schmaltz, and I was afraid “Parenthood” was just going to be Schmaltz Part II from the moment I first heard of it.

And to be fair it should be awful. You’ve got adult daughter and mother of two Sarah Braverman, played by Lauren Graham, newly out of work and moving back in with her parents. Her teenage daughter, Sydney, doesn’t feel like joining her and has a college-age boyfriend back home so you can see some tension building in that direction. And her son, Drew, wants to go live with his non-custodial rock-‘n’-roll roadie dad in Fresno.

Sarah’s sister, Julia, played by Erika Christensen, is the Type A driven success in the family. Despite the fact that her daughter plays favorites, preferring daddy to her, she does find fulfillment in her job as a lawyer.

She manages to get Sarah pretty upset with her, however, when she arranges a date with one of Sarah’s old boyfriends, who physically hasn’t aged all that well and as first impressions go, Sarah is incensed that Julia would set her up with a bald baristo.

As it happens, however, the guy is a sweetheart who actually kept the ring he’d given her as a gift lo these many years ago and she’d thrown back at him when they broke up. This led to an intimate moment that turned into an awkward moment when Drew walked in on them and he took off to live with dad.

Saving the show from being completely dominated by Sarah’s emotional rollercoaster is her brother Adam’s emotional rollercoaster. Adam, played by Peter Krause, is a guy who’s trying to be everything to everyone. He wants to be the best, most protective dad to his young son -- protecting him even from his easily agitated grandpa Zeek, played by Craig T. Nelson.

Even so, Adam knows there’s something wrong with his son. He’s not interested in baseball, wants to dress as a pirate every day and has a lot of trouble with social cues. The school counselor diagnoses Asperger’s syndrome.

After the diagnosis -- along with the ruling of the team that Adam not be allowed at the games following his outburst at the umpire the game before on a call against his son -- Adam was just willing to give up on his son, Max, taking part. However, Max wanted to stay involved. Despite his teammates’ rejection of him, he wanted to support his team. Also, he’d gotten a hit the game before. So Adam set his pride aside and took Max to the game, while he stayed in the parking lot.

Adam’s brother, Crosby, is in the music biz and seems uninvolved in the title of the show. His girlfriend is interested in starting a family and buys some donor sperm. He gets her to wait for him to mature a bit. Meanwhile, one of Crosby’s old girlfriends shows up on the doorstep with ... his son.

Welcome to parenthood.

Absolutely there’s a cheese factor. But I’m a huge fan of Peter Krause -- incidentally, his wife from “Six Feet Under,” Rachel Griffiths, is herself involved with ABC’s eerily similar “Brothers & Sisters” (I understand the NBC project is based on a film of the same name from many years ago).

It’s going to get too emotional too often. And far too much will be going on with all of these people every week to seem remotely real. But it is off to a good start and despite the fact it’s one more hour of television each week, I’m willing to give it a shot.

"Parenthood" airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. on NBC and for now is scheduled to encore during the Saturday evening lineup.

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