September 19, 1992 (1992-09-19) – May 2, 1993 (1993-05-02)
The Edge is an American sketch comedy television series created by David Mirkin that aired on the Fox Network for a single season from September 19, 1992, to May 2, 1993.
The show features sketches that revolve around original characters, such as a gun-toting All-American family and a cowboy known as Cracklin' Crotch. The series would also skewer pop culture. One notable episode spoofed TV sweeps by promising ratings-grabbing events such as a birth, a wedding, and a death.
Similar to other sketch comedy shows, such as The Ben Stiller Show, which premiered at the same time, the show adopted a format in which every episode would feature at least one multi-part sketch that would be divided into different segments that would play over the course of a single episode. For example, one episode featured interviews with the four swimsuit models of "Illustrated Sports" in which each interview segment would play at different points in the episode. Another episode featured a parody of Rescue 911 that showed the fictitious history and origins of 911 in a series of segments that were shown throughout the episode.
The series also features a running gag in which the entire cast would get killed off in various ways in each episode before the first sketch. One episode featured the cast getting hit by a bus; another had the set falling apart and crushing them; others involved explosions, decapitations, immolation, hangings, and impalement by arrows; one episode had the troupe being sucked into a vortex. In addition to sketches, Bill Plympton cartoons were used as bumpers between the sketches.
A sequence where Edd Hall, in voiceover, described what a celebrity, historical figure, politician, character from pop-culture (such as Mister Ed, Oscar the Grouch, ALF or Flipper), inanimate object or fictional person with an odd quirk was doing "RIGHT THIS MINUTE" (for example, "What a man with a nervous twitch who likes to attend auctions is doing RIGHT THIS MINUTE"). This would usually segue into the next sketch.
The members of a seemingly typical suburban nuclear family are actually all trigger-happy handgun carriers who are constantly firing their guns brazenly and recklessly at anyone they come into contact with, including each other.
A middle-aged housewife from Minnesota with a wholesome Minnesota Nice personality who would always clash with the raunchy and risqué situations she found herself in such as working at a phone sex line or at an escort service.
Two beauticians, who speak with stereotypical New York accents, are shown getting into wacky predicaments with their customers such as accidentally leaving solution on a customer's scalp for a prolonged period of time resulting in her death. Feather, would often attempt to tell an off-putting story or provide an elaborate description with unsavory details and would get interrupted by Charmaine saying the catchphrase, "Feather, don't take me there!"
Two dimwitted groupies of the band Guns N' Roses are frequently spurned by the band and are looking for ways to win their approval such as writing a song for them or by shipping themselves to Japan inside luggage in order to join them on their tour.
A troll, with an appearance inspired by the troll dolls, is depicted in a series of absurd situations, such as dating a human boy and being pitted against two home invaders à la Home Alone.
The marriage between Allen and Farrow in light of Allen's relationship with his stepdaughter Soon-Yi Previn is parodied in two sketches, one of which is a parody of the film Misery.
Production
The show was created by David Mirkin and Julie Brown; the two were in a relationship at the time.[1] It was developed for NBC following the failure of the pilot The Julie Show. NBC passed on the show, but it was picked up by Fox.[1]The Edge was canceled at the end of the 1992–93 U.S. television season by Fox.[2]
Music was provided by Steve Hampton (theme song composer), Stephen Graziano, B.C. Smith, and Christopher Tyng among others. Edd Hall provided the show's voiceovers.
Controversy
Producer Aaron Spelling threatened to sue the show over its lampoons of his TV show Beverly Hills 90210. He objected to its "completely tasteless" humor,[3] which included an impersonation of his daughter, an actress on the show, Tori Spelling exclaiming "I can do that because it's Daddy's show." The show's production company TriStar Television refused to apologise, while Mirkin responded: "The thing about these parodies is they don't hurt a show. It's only cross-promotion. The viewers who like the show always come back the next week. What's upsetting to me is it shows absolutely that Mr. Spelling has no sense of humor."[4]
According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, executive producer Mirkin was "forced off the show" due to this negative reaction of Spelling and others.[1] However, in 2012, Mirkin stated that he in fact left the series after refusing to accept a substantially reduced budget. The show's producers, Sony, failed to persuade him to stay, but he returned to the series to produce its final "Best Of" compilation.[5]
Howard Rosenberg of Los Angeles Times found The Edge to be "disappointing" and full of "mostly sophomoric sketches", though he did praise the premiere episode's closing skit noting the series "does save the best for last".[7] Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly was more positive in his review of the series, calling it "edgy" and giving the show a B− grade.[8]
Early ratings for the show were described as "respectable" by Variety.[3]
References
^ abcLovece, Frank (March 16, 1993). "Julie Brown Enjoys Living Life On 'Edge'". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. p. D-7.
^Zurawik, David (May 26, 1993). "Move to full-time schedule costs Fox some edge". The Baltimore Sun. Retrieved 2018-04-15. In addition to "Tribeca," other series Fox canceled yesterday are the critically acclaimed "Class of '96," "Parker Lewis," "Flying Blind," "The Edge," "Shaky Ground," "Sightings" and "Down the Shore."
