CBS upfront trailers: Murphy Brown has a new show, and Magnum P.I. has a... goatee?
Stephen Colbert and Candice Bergen added some spice to CBS’s upfront presentation today, with the Late Show openly mocking the president from the dais while the Murphy Brown star made meta-jabs from within a trailer for the revival. We have that preview and more in today’s installment of Trailer Happy Hour: Upfronts Editions. But Magnum P.I. fans be warned: there’s a lot less facial hair this time around.
For the much touted Murphy Brown revival, there’s an inside look of the show within the show, which Murphy (Bergen) says is needed in this era of “alternative facts and fake news.” Most of the cast is back, including Faith Ford as Corky, who lost her morning-show gig but none of her pep. It’s not the most rousing clip, but we bet whoever spliced in all the footage from the show’s original run got a bonus for finding a disparaging reference to “Donald Trump.”
We’ve been wondering how CBS would update Magnum P.I. for the 21st-century, and the answer is: ditch the comma in the title, and add a goatee. Jay Hernandez takes over for Tom Selleck as Thomas Magnum, who’s still a private eye, but is now sporting a patchier ’stache than his forebear. The trailer for the fall show is full of the gorgeous vistas and rad sportscars we’re used to seeing on the show, but the absence of that push-broom mustache is really throwing us. Still, we suppose it’s not quite as weird as seeing a clean-shaven Ron Swanson.
Jumping from Hawaii to Los Angeles, CBS also rolled out a first look at the new sitcom, The Neighborhood, which has the makings of a comedy about gentrification, even if the network wouldn’t use the term. Cedric The Entertainer stars as Calvin Butler, a middle-aged black man who feels his hard-won existence—a nice home and a good-looking family—is threatened when a white Midwestern family moves in next door. (Okay, so that might not be where the show is going with this, but it’s kind of obvious to us). There’s already been some reshuffling in the cast, as New Girl’s Max Greenfield has replaced Josh Lawson as the head of the Johnson family.
The trailer for Happy Together has jokes about landlines and Costo, but we’ll overlook those because we’re just happy to see Happy Endings’ Damon Wayans Jr. and The Carmichael Show’s Amber Stevens West back on our TV screens. In this new sitcom, they play a married couple attempting to rekindle their marriage, which will either be aided or thwarted by their houseguest, a heartbroken pop star played by Felix Mallard.
Speaking of stars of short-lived but delightful shows, Brandon Micheal Hall’s term as The Mayor might be over, but in his new series, he’s friends with God, which we think might count as a step up. Is someone catfishing Miles (Hall), an “outspoken atheist,” or is God working in mysterious, social-media ways?
Dick Wolf has fully taken over NBC’s Wednesday night lineup with his Chicago empire, but he somehow found time to help get a new drama about the FBI on CBS. Rookie Blue and Heroes’ Missy Peregrym plays Special Agent Maggie Bell opposite Law & Order’s Jeremy Sisto and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit alum Connie Nielsen (Peregrym, incidentally, has guest-starred on SVU). We assume they’re all special agents, given how serious this trailer looks.
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