Jeff Stein Interview

Jeff Stein was one executive producers and creators of the Mr. Belvedere TV show and Jaime Weinman of Macleans.ca spoke to him about the show and the upcoming DVD release.

Here is an excerpt of the article:

Watching the show again on Shout! Factory’s five-disc DVD set — which includes the first season of seven episodes (it was a mid-season replacement) and the 22-episode second season — I think the reason for the enduring cult appeal of Mr. Belvedere is the fact that it was one of the few family sitcoms of the era where the characters were dysfunctional and openly hostile, within the boundaries of the need to have everyone make up and learn something by the end of the episode. The character of the youngest kid, Wesley (Brice Beckham) was particularly popular with kids because he was an out-and-out brat, a self-described sociopath with destructive urges who is basically evil even when he tries to do the right thing. He really does seem like the prototype for Bart Simpson, especially when you learn in one episode that his parents had to get married because the mom was already pregnant.

Stein says that their approach to writing the show was that “since nobody at the studio or network level was interested in smart, we tried to make it as subversive as possible.”

Read the full article here:
TV On DVD: Notes On MR. BELVEDERE From the Executive Producer
http://blog.macleans.ca/2009/03/04/tv-on-dvd-notes-on-mr-belvedere-from-the-executive-producer/