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'Best Comedy of the Summer:' Writer, Viewers Praise 'Detroiters,' but Audience Slips

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July 14, 2018, 2:43 PM by  Alan Stamm


"We wanted the show to be a positive depiction of Detroit," says Sam Richardson (right), who stars with co-writer Tim Robinson. (Comedy Central photos)

Word spreads about "Detroiters," the second-season Comedy Central series earning intensely loyal buzz and a sweet national review this week -- though not yet an Emmy or impressive ratings.

The Ringer, a Vox Media culture and sports site, calls it "guffaw-inducing" and "the best comedy of the summer."

Some of the funniest scenes stem from wordless, physical, madcap comedy that seems almost improvised.

Viewers gush on Twitter after each half-hour episode starring creators and writers Sam Richardson and Tim Robinson, as a fresh sampling shows at the end of this post. New segments air at 10:30 p.m. Thursday through Aug. 16.


The half-hour sitcom's stars "are guffaw-inducing," a midseason review says.

In the new review, staff writer Ben Lindbergh of Manhattan says:

The series, which reached the halfway point of its second 10-episode season Thursday, centers on the bond between the on-screen Sam and Tim, two dimwitted but well-meaning partners at Cramblin Duvet, a local ad agency they inherited. . . . Richardson jokes that the duo’s "Detroiters" doppelgängers are "just smarter versions of ourselves." . . .

No show has embraced their city (or perhaps any city) more wholeheartedly than 'Detroiters,' right down to the title and theme song.

Alas, viewership is lower than in 2017.

The series averaged 366,000 real-time viewers each episode last season, when it ran from early February until mid-April. Now that it's shown during summer, an average of 262,400 people tune in each week midway through the current 10 episodes. (DVR viewing bumps up the figure, but isn't refelcted in this weekly tally.)

During a phone interview, the stars talk about their hometown and shooting on location: 

Despite the untimely end of Michigan’s film-incentives program shortly after the pair produced the pilot, Richardson and Robertson pushed for the show to be shot in Detroit, and the network approved the extra expense, understanding that the city was integral to the show.

"We felt like filming anywhere else, it would be untrue to what we were trying to accomplish with the show, and that's to show the city in its truth," Richardson says.

That truth includes occasional jokes about crime and poverty, as well as winking plotlines about economic renewal. . . .

"We wanted the show to be a positive depiction of Detroit," Richardson says. Although he and Robinson have pursued opportunities outside the city, the middling brains behind Cramblin Duvet wouldn’t dream of going national; they rejoice over repping the Michigan Science Center and fantasize about landing Little Caesars.

The New Yorker's conversation with the stars via conference call was a laugh fest as "Richardson and Robinson keep cracking up." That leads Lindbergh to muse:

If this is how much fun they have in separate places, joined by only a fuzzy phone connection while a stranger asks them questions and multiple PR people silently listen in, one can only imagine how much fun they have in person. . . .

The off-screen Sam and Tim seem to cherish writing a sitcom about their city as much as their characters relish shooting ads. . . . They deserve to keep doing it [for a third season].

It also clicks with ardent fans watching at home, a bunch of whom tweet this week:


Read more:  The Ringer

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