It's All Relative

It's All Relative
Created by	Anne Flett-Giordano Chuck Ranberg
Starring	Reid Scott Maggie Lawson Lenny Clarke Harriet Sansom Harris John Benjamin Hickey Christopher Sieber Paige Moss
Composer(s)	Bruce Miller
Country of origin	United States
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	22 (2 unaired)
Production
Camera setup	Multi-camera
Running time	30 minutes
Production company(s)	Storyline Entertainment Naturally Blond Productions Touchstone Television Paramount Television
Release
Original network	ABC
Original release	October 1, 2003 (2003-10-01) – April 6, 2004 (2004-04-06)

It's All Relative is an ABC sitcom about a man who dates the adoptive daughter of a gay couple, which forces their very different families to learn to coexist.

Overview

The show, created by Chuck Ranberg and Anne Flett-Giordano, premiered on ABC on October 1, 2003 and aired until it was cancelled, with two episodes unaired, on April 6, 2004. While the final two episodes produced were never aired in the US during the show's original run, they have been broadcast in the original run of the show abroad (such as in the United Kingdom and Ireland, where the channel Trouble, aimed at teenagers, showed the episodes), as well as in reruns.

Story

The story revolved around two rather different realities, in Boston, Massachusetts. In one corner, there was Mace O'Neill, the rather stereotyped character played by Lenny Clarke, a Boston Irish bar owner close to retirement who watches with dismay as his son falls for a girl with a rather unorthodox family history: she is the adoptive, and somewhat spoiled, daughter of an upper-middle class gay couple. The situation forces the character to come to terms with his homophobia although this aspect of Clarke's character was substantially toned down, not wanting to overtly rip off Archie Bunker from All in the Family (also an urban, prejudiced bar owner, albeit one from New York City instead of Boston) any more than they already had; producers were more interested in light comedy than social satire. In addition, the audience is introduced to the also stereotypical Irish American wife (Harriet Sansom Harris), who helps in the pub but is generally a traditional middle-aged housewife (but oddly has little problems accepting her soon-to-be daughter-in-law's parents), as well as the couple's tough-but-kind daughter (Paige Moss), who waitresses in the family's bar.

On the other side, there were Simon (Christopher Sieber) and Philip (John Benjamin Hickey), a same-sex couple who takes pride in how well they were able to raise their adoptive daughter. Here, the comedy came from the couple's difficulties in adjusting to their daughter's boyfriend's family, especially his father (Lenny Clarke), and most notably from Philip's notion that his daughter was dating someone "beneath her", both socially and culturally.

The first (and as it turned out, the only) season followed Maggie Lawson's and Reid Scott's characters romance as it evolved from a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship into engagement and, eventually, marriage. During this process, the two families strove to come to terms with the inevitability of being "joined" by their children's union, which would force both sides to revisit their preconceptions and prejudices.

Cast and characters

• Reid Scott as Bobby O'Neill
• Maggie Lawson as Liz Stoddard-Banks
• Lenny Clarke as Mace O'Neill
• Harriet Sansom Harris as Audrey O'Neill
• John Benjamin Hickey as Philip Stoddard
• Christopher Sieber as Simon Banks
• Paige Moss as Maddy O'Neill

Episodes

External links

• It's All Relative at the Internet Movie Database
• It's All Relative at TV.com