The Cleveland Show

The Cleveland Show
From left to right: Cleveland, Cleveland Jr., Donna, Rallo, and Roberta
Genre	Sitcom, Drama
Created by	Seth MacFarlane Mike Henry Richard Appel
Voices of	Mike Henry Sanaa Lathan Kevin Michael Richardson Reagan Gomez-Preston Jason Sudeikis Seth MacFarlane
Composer	Walter Murphy
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	23 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producers	Seth MacFarlane Mike Henry Richard Appel
Producer	Kara Vallow
Running time	22-23 minutes
Production companies	Person Unknown Productions Happy Jack Productions Fuzzy Door Productions 20th Century Fox Television
Original release
Network	Fox
Release	September 27, 2009 – present
Related
Family Guy

The Cleveland Show is an American animated television series that premiered on September 27, 2009, as a part of the "Animation Domination" lineup on Fox. The series was created by Seth MacFarlane, Mike Henry, and Richard Appel as a spin-off from Family Guy, which was also created by MacFarlane. The series is awful and rumors of its cancelation are ripe and abound.

Production

Conception

In the beginning of the series, Cleveland Brown and his son, Cleveland Brown, Jr., move from the fictional town of Quahog, Rhode Island to the fictional town of Stoolbend, Virginia.

Cleveland has kind of had enough in Quahog – he kind of realizes that he wants his own friends, his own sidekicks, his own stories. So he sets out to California to make it in a way that we'll have to keep a secret until the show starts, and then he ends up somewhere else, which we'll also keep a secret until the show starts. But he basically goes home – he goes to his hometown in Virginia and rekindles an old high school flame.

— Mike Henry

In the closing scene of the season seven Family Guy episode "Baby Not on Board", Cleveland mentions to Quagmire that he is getting a spin-off.

The theme song originally contained a line referring to Cleveland's "happy black-guy face," but this was replaced with "happy mustached face" to make the song more racially sensitive.

Debut

Cleveland officially left Family Guy, but MacFarlane has hinted that he may come back for occasional visits if necessary, as in the end of the episode Spies Reminiscent of Us, and has also hinted Family Guy characters will visit Cleveland in Virginia. The show, which was scheduled to debut in the beginning of 2009, premiered on September 27, 2009. In the Family Guy episode "Go Stewie Go," Cleveland made a cameo appearance when the neighborhood gathers to see Meg's boyfriend; he claims that "this was worth the 500-mile drive."

Due to the cancellation of Mike Judge's King of the Hill, the move of the American adaptation of Sit Down, Shut Up to Saturday nights, followed by its later cancellation, and the renewal of American Dad!, The Simpsons is now the only cartoon on Fox's "Animation Domination" line-up that was not created by Seth MacFarlane.

Crossovers with Family Guy

The Cleveland Show has occasionally crossed over with parent series Family Guy in several episodes:

• "Pilot" - Several Family Guy characters appear in the beginning when Cleveland and Cleveland, Jr. drive away from Quahog to start the show. They also appear at Cleveland's wedding to Donna at the end.
• "Spies Reminiscent of Us" - The missile fuselage crashes into Cleveland's new house in Stoolbend, restarting the bathtub gag, then Tim appears and says, "I don't get it."
• "Cleveland Jr.'s Cherry Bomb" - Loretta, Cleveland's ex-wive, makes a brief appearance in the number, "Straight Outta Stoolbend."
• "A Cleveland Brown Christmas" - Meg is illustrated in the opening credits and Herbert appears in a flashback.
• "Go, Stewie, Go!" - Cleveland made a brief return when everyone in Quahog gathered to see Meg's boyfriend Luke, saying, "This was worth the 500-mile drive."
• "Once Upon a Tyne in New York" - The Griffins are on a promo card for Family Guy that supersedes Lester about to use the "n" word.
• "Gone with the Wind" - Quagmire brings Loretta's coffin to Cleveland and a flashback shows the Griffins inadvertently causing her death with Peter smashing a brontosaurus skeleton into Cleveland's old house recreating the bathtub gag where Loretta dies from falling out and breaking her neck.
• "Brown History Month" - At the end, Rallo tells us to "stay tuned for an all-new, all-white Family Guy."
• "The Splendid Source" - In Virginia, Peter, Joe and Quagmire run into and bring Cleveland on their quest to find the source of the world's dirtiest jokes. Gus, Donna, Rallo and Cleveland, Jr. also make appearances.
• "You're the Best Man, Cleveland Brown" - Herbert appears at the beginning and Peter and Quagmire appear at the end congratulating Cleveland for making it through the whole season. Quagmire even asks Peter for his own show, but Peter says that Quagmire is a rapist.
• "Harder, Better, Faster, Browner" - Bruce the Performance Artist appears on the wrong show after Cleveland tells the family that Kenny West will be staying in their garage. Bruce also leads Cleveland to a supply of Snack Packs in his minivan.
• "Cleveland Live!" - The history of Family Guy is told at the beginning and Peter and Lois are sitting in the audience.
• "It's a Trap!" - Tim, Arianna and Raymond play Ewoks.

Cast and characters

See also: List of The Cleveland Show characters

Cleveland's newly introduced family includes his new wife in her early forties, Donna Tubbs Brown (voiced by Sanaa Lathan); Donna's teenage daughter, Roberta Correta Tubbs (originally voiced by Nia Long, but now voiced by Reagan Gomez-Preston); and Donna's six year-old son Rallo Tubbs (also voiced by Mike Henry). Cleveland Jr., who also appears in the show, is now fourteen and is more obese than in his previous appearances on Family Guy, and is now voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson.

See also: List of The Cleveland Show voice actors

The Cleveland Show has four main voice actors and two additional voice actors, some of which play several roles. Mike Henry voices two of the show's main characters, Cleveland and Rallo. The voice of Cleveland was developed originally for Family Guy by Henry after being influenced by one of his basketball partners in Virginia who had a very distinct regional accent. For the voice of Rallo, Henry has stated that he had originally created the voice over twenty years ago, when he had made a series of prank calls. In addition, Henry provides the voice of various recurring and one-time characters.

Sanaa Lathan voices Donna, the wife of Cleveland. In developing the character, Lathan said that the producers "wanted her to be educated, but to have some edge." Prior to voicing Donna, Lathan had only one other voice credit in a relatively low budget film entitled The Golden Blaze. In addition to the show, she also primarily worked as an actress in such films as Alien vs. Predator, Love & Basketball and The Family That Preys.

Reagan Gomez plays Roberta, the stepdaughter of Cleveland. Gomez has stated that she uses her own voice to portray Roberta, and that she herself gets mistaken to be a fifteen year old over the phone "all the time." Before Gomez was cast as Roberta, Nia Long had provided the character's voice during the first production season, before leaving to fulfill prior acting commitments.

Jason Sudeikis plays Holt Rickter, one of Cleveland's drinking buddies and Terry Kimple, one of Cleveland's longtime friends who now works with him at Waterman Cable. Sudeikis originally began as a recurring cast member, but starting with the episode "Harder, Better, Faster, Browner", he was promoted to a series regular.

Kevin Michael Richardson, a recurring guest voice on Family Guy, portrays Cleveland Jr., as well as Cleveland's next door neighbor Lester Krinklesac. In portraying Cleveland Jr., Richardson drew inspiration from a character named Patrick that he had played on the NBC drama series ER who was mentally impaired and wore a football helmet. For Lester, Richardson stated in an interview that being African American, he had "run into a few rednecks in [his] time," and decided to simply perform a stereotypical redneck impression for the voice of Lester.

Seth MacFarlane plays Tim the Bear, which MacFarlane admits is a "Steve Martin impression [...] a Wild and Crazy Guy impression".

Other voices include that of Arianna Huffington as Arianna the Bear, Jamie Kennedy as Roberta's boyfriend Gabriel Friedman, a.k.a. "Federline Jones", Will Forte as Principal Wally, Frances Callier as Cookie Brown and Craig Robinson as Freight Train Brown.

Main cast members
Mike Henry	Sanaa Lathan	Reagan Gomez-Preston	Kevin Michael Richardson	Jason Sudeikis	Seth MacFarlane
Cleveland Brown and Rallo Tubbs	Donna Tubbs	Roberta Tubbs	Cleveland Brown, Jr. and Lester Krinklesac	Holt Richter and Terry Kimple	Tim the Bear

Episodes

Main article: List of The Cleveland Show episodes

The show, which was picked up to air a first season consisting of 22 episodes, was picked up by Fox for a second season, consisting of 13 episodes, bringing the total number to 35 episodes. The announcement was made on May 3, 2009 before the first season even premiered. Due to strong ratings FOX picked up the back 9 episodes of season 2 which would make a 22 episode season and bring the total episode count of the show to 44.

On June 10, 2010 Fox ordered a third season of The Cleveland Show, even before airing season 2, as a plan of early renewals to deserving new shows. The Cleveland Show was the highest rated new half hour show in the 18-34 demographics.

Reception

Critical reception

Critical reaction for The Cleveland Show was mixed. Review aggregator Metacritic gave the show a score of 57 out of 100, with a user score of 3.4/10, suggesting "mixed or average reviews". Tom Shales of The Washington Post spoke very negatively about both the show and MacFarlane himself, describing him as "no better than the dirty old man hanging around playgrounds with naughty pictures or risque jokes as lures". Roberto Bianco of USA Today wrote a similarly negative review, suggesting that the easiest fix for its problem was "cancellation". John McWhorter of The New Republic called it "a patronizing mess" and "basically Family Guy in blackface". He added: "What isn't black in it is so shamelessly ripped off from Family Guy that it's hard to believe it's the product of creators who are usually so studiously 'post-' obvious stunts of the sort." However, Rob Owen of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette was more positive about the program, writing that although The Cleveland Show was "just as rude-crude" as Family Guy, it also had "more warmth" due to Cleveland being a more likeable character than Peter Griffin. Owen also praised the character of Tim the bear, stating that "Tim is by far the most amusing creation".

The Parents Television Council, a media watchdog group that has been critical of television programs produced by MacFarlane, has given The Cleveland Show a "red light" designation in the organization's Family Guide to Prime Time Television, for sexual and violent content, and for foul language. "True to form, this Family Guy spin-off is every bit as soul-sucking, nihilistic, infantile, and crass as its predecessor — the only difference being, this serving of filth airs a half-hour earlier, so even more kiddies can tune in!" the PTC stated in deeming the pilot episode its "Worst TV Show of the Week." Five other Season 1 episodes - including several repeat broadcasts - were named "Worst TV Show of the Week."

The show has a 5.6 out of 10 ("mediocre") on TV.com.

Syndication

Comedy Central picked up ABC's The Goode Family and FOX's Sit Down, Shut Up, and also showed interest in picking up repeats of The Cleveland Show at the time.

Recently, The Turner Broadcasting System has made a deal to syndicate The Cleveland Show's reruns on TBS and Adult Swim. The show is expected to air on Adult Swim at least during 2013.

The Cleveland Show also broadcasts in the United Kingdom on E4, in Ireland on 3e, in Brazil on FX at 10:30PM Sunday. It premiered on FOX Portugal June 5, 2010, airing two episodes at night. Also in Russia The Cleveland Show has been broadcasting on 2x2 since September 2, 2010, two episodes previously premiered on regular "2x2 Night of Animation" in "Oktyabr'" cinema on May 14, 2010.

Awards and honors

The show was nominated for Best New TV Comedy at the 36th People's Choice Awards.

Worldwide release

Country	Network	Premiere Date
United States	Fox	September 27, 2009
Canada	Global	September 27, 2009
United Kingdom	E4	February 1, 2010
Brazil	FX Latin America	April 25, 2010
Ireland	3e	February 21, 2010
Portugal	FOX Portugal	June 5, 2010
Denmark	JHM Network	June 23, 2010
Australia	Network Ten	December 2, 2009
Israel	Yes (Israel)	July 2, 2010
Greece	FX GR	March 2010
Hungary	Comedy Central	July 7, 2010
Russia	2x2	September 2, 2010
Italy	FOX	September 7, 2010
Spain	FOX Neox	July 19, 2010
Norway	TV2	August 13, 2010
Netherlands	Comedy Central	September 12, 2010

DVD release

Season 1 of the show was released in the US on September 28, 2010, and will be released on October 11, 2010 in the UK.

See also

• Family Guy (The Cleveland Show's parent show)
• American Dad

External links

• Official website
• The Cleveland Show at IMDb
• Template:Tv.com