Two and a Half Men
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Two and a Half Men | |
|---|---|
 The cast of Two and a Half Men |
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| Genre | Sitcom |
| Running time | 22 min/episode |
| Creator(s) | Chuck Lorre Lee Aronsohn |
| Starring | Charlie Sheen Jon Cryer Angus T. Jones Marin Hinkle Holland Taylor Melanie Lynskey Conchata Ferrell April Bowlby |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| Original channel | CBS |
| Original run | September 22, 2003–present |
| No. of episodes | 83 |
| IMDb profile | |
| TV.com summary | |
Two and a Half Men is an Emmy Award nominated television sitcom centered around a hip single bachelor whose lifestyle is interrupted when his newly separated brother moves in. Charlie and his nephew form an "unsuspecting bond" with each other. Two and a Half Men was the highest rated sitcom of the 2005-2006 season on American television. The title refers to two men (Charlie and Alan), and a "half man" or boy (Jake).
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[edit] Cast and characters
- Charlie Sheen, as Charlie Harper, a lazy-but-successful shlub
- Jon Cryer, as Alan Harper, Charlie's newly separated, socially inept brother
- Angus T. Jones, as Jacob David "Jake" Harper, Alan's son
- Marin Hinkle, as Judith, Alan's ex-wife
- Holland Taylor, as Evelyn Harper, Charlie and Alan's mother
- Melanie Lynskey, as their neighbor Rose, a sometime stalker of Charlie (starring Season 1, recurring afterwards)
- Conchata Ferrell, as their housekeeper Berta (starring Season 2-present, recurring previously)
- April Bowlby, as Kandi, Alan's young second ex-wife (starring Season 4 (ep. #82)-present, recurring previously)
Only Sheen, Cryer, and Jones have appeared (and been credited) in every episode. Guest stars so far have included Emmanuelle Vaugier as Mia, Ryan Stiles (who starred with both Sheen and Cryer in Hot Shots) as Dr. Melnick, Jane Lynch as the therapist, Jeri Ryan as Sherry, Martin Sheen as Rose's father, Denise Richards as Lisa, Richard Lewis as Stan, Teri Hatcher as Liz, Heather Locklear as Laura Lane. Also, Sean Penn, Elvis Costello, Harry Dean Stanton and Steven Tyler all appeared as themselves, among other guests.
[edit] Synopsis
Charlie is a successful and affluent bachelor in his mid-thirties who has a career writing advertisement jingles. Charlie resides in a large ocean front home in Malibu, California and is portrayed as a chauvinist womanizer. The plot begins when his uptight brother Alan becomes divorced from his wife Judith (whom he thinks may be a lesbian), loses his house to her and has to move in with his brother. His 10-year-old son Jake often stays for weekends and at other times.
A very peculiar character on the show is Rose, Charlie's zany neighbor and female stalker. We learn Rose had a one-night-stand with Charlie shortly before the show started and keeps entering his house through the patio in the most inopportune moments, expressing her ambition of obtaining Charlie, and often serving as a good albeit crazy friend and advisor. Although obviously troubled herself, Rose has stated a few times that she has a Master's degree in psychology.
In one episode, Rose's father, Harvey, (played by Charlie Sheen's real-life father Martin Sheen), asks Charlie of his intentions with his daughter after an apparent second one-night-stand between the two. Harvey then meets Charlie's and Alan's mother and has an affair with her, stalking her and popping in just like his daughter does. We then learn from Harvey's mother that "that's what happens when you marry a first cousin," explaining Rose's family's dementia soon after Rose revealing the one-night-stand was not real; they only woke up together.
Another important recurring character is Berta, the sarcastic cleaning lady with a ferine(?) tongue.
One of the show's main themes however is the mother-son relationship, whereby the Evelyn character (played by Holland Taylor) enters the picture as the hip, wealthy, early-sixties, many-times-divorced, slightly slutty, controlling mother of the brothers. Charlie and Alan attribute their life's problems to the dark manipulative force their mother manages to exert upon them even now, adding to the caustic humor of the show in the situations when depicting their vain attempts to escape her.
Another recurring theme in the show is the conflict of personalities between the two diametrically opposed siblings, the relaxed, good-life, woman-catching, commitment-phobic Charlie and the uptight self-conscious nerdy Alan. Alan can sometimes appear to be jealous of Charlie's lifestyle, and can sometimes try to stop Charlie's decisions. This also provides opportunities for comedy in the show, with Alan, having admitted defeat, saying comments such as 'it's like talking to a horny chimp', or 'it's like trying to talk Shakespeare to a Hershey bar'
[edit] DVD Releases
Warner Bros. has yet to release Two And A Half Men on DVD In North America, although Seasons 1 and 2 have been available in Europe.
| DVD Name | Ep # | Region 1 | Region 2 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Season 1 | 24 | TBA 2007 | September 12, 2005 |
| Season 2 | 24 | TBA | August 28, 2006 |
| Season 3 | 24 | TBA | TBA |
| Season 4 | 24 | TBA | TBA |
[edit] Program information
The show was co-created by executive producers Chuck Lorre (who previously co-created Dharma & Greg) and Lee Aronsohn.
The show debuted on Monday, September 22, 2003, at 9:30 p.m., EST/PST. In its third season, starting September 2005, it moved to Mondays at 9:00 p.m. (taking Everybody Loves Raymond's time slot).
[edit] International Broadcasters
[edit] Trivia
- One episode centers on a website called www.charlieharpersucks.com; as of 2006 this site still exists.
- Jon Cryer was Michael J. Fox's choice to replace him on Spin City. The role ended up going to Charlie Sheen.
- In the Family Guy episode "North by North Quahog" (the first episode of Family Guy that aired after Fox renewed it), this show is on the family TV, with a more literal take on its title: it shows the Harper brothers screaming in horror as another man, who is cut in half, pleads, "Kill me!"
- Jon Cryer was also a favorite to play the part of Chandler Bing from the hit sitcom Friends. He wasn't able to make it to the auditions, so the role was given to Matthew Perry.
- Each episode's title comes from a line of dialogue from that episode; for example, "Go Get Mommy's Bra". In at least one case the scene containing the referenced line was cut before the show actually aired.
- Won the 2004 People's Choice Award for Favorite New Comedy Series.
- TV Guide gave it "three-and-a-half stars out of four." It was the magazine's sole new show "Top Pick" for Monday nights in 2003.
- Charlie Sheen and John Cryer were both on (separate) episodes of Amazing Stories.
- This is the second series in which Charlie Sheen has played a character named "Charlie." The first was Spin City.
- Both Charlie Sheen and Jon Cryer were in Hot Shots!; Charlie Sheen as Topper Harley, and John Cryer as Jim 'Wash Out' Pfaffenbach .
- Sheen and Cryer each had parts in John Hughes movies in the 1980s: Sheen (in one of his first film roles) appeared as a criminal in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and Cryer appeared as "Ducky" in Pretty In Pink.
- In a 2006 episode, there is a future shot of Alan and Jake working in a movie theater. While they are talking to the future Charlie, there is a poster for "Saw 33" behind him.
[edit] Vanity cards
At the end of each episode, a message appeared on the screen for a brief moment, so that it is readable only to those who record the program (using a VCR or DVR, for example) and pause it. These "vanity cards" were written by producer and show co-creator Chuck Lorre, and express his personal views on a variety of subjects. A complete archive of his vanity cards is available at Chuck Lorre Productions. The vanity cards were first seen at the end of episodes of Dharma & Greg, also a Chuck Lorre Production.
