Greg The Bunny

By James Poniewozik

These satires take one premise--a naif enters the cutthroat world of TV--and give it two very different executions. On Greg a floppy-eared puppet lands on a kids' show whose furry cast members throw hissy fits and pop Percocets off-camera just like flesh-and-blood divas. Eugene Levy and Seth Green make fine foils, but it's their plush pals who will have you in, er, stitches. The show defies good taste and gets away with it, as when Greg falls under the sway of an Al Sharpton-like puppet-rights agitator. ("This is going to end with puppets rioting in the streets," Levy frets. "This is the Fozzie Bear verdict all over again.") But Wednesday, like its title, isn't clever enough to earn its self-satisfied tone. (We're spoofing TV! On TV!) Starring a wooden Ivan Sergei as an exec at the struggling IBS network, it is a rehash of Hollywood Babylon cliches. One "provocative" plot--should IBS air an execution for ratings?--is as old as TV itself. Producer Peter Tolan, who set the TV-satire standard with The Larry Sanders Show, should know better. Never send a man to do a bunny's job.

--By James Poniewozik