If you like The Office, check out 30 Rock

I was visiting a friend earlier this month and he had the first disc of 30 Rock: Season One that he’d rented from Netflix. I’d never seen the show before, so we watched a couple of episodes and I thought it was hilarious. I was thrilled to later find that if you are a Netflix subscriber, you can watch the entire first season of the show online.

This show was created by Tina Fey, who you may remember from Saturday Night Live. In the show, she plays a producer working on a TV show (yes, it’s a show within a show) that does sketch comedy and other things. There’s no doubt her time with SNL helped to inspire the creation of the series. Instead of it revolving around the sketch show, this show focuses on the wacky characters that work both in front of and behind the cameras to make it all work.

Tina Fey plays the main character as an overworked, somewhat nerdy, young woman who is so wrapped up in her work that she barely even remembers how to maintain a social life. She spends this entire first season going through some bad relationships, including one where the guy turned out to be her cousin! Fey is hilarious in this role and perfectly holds it all together. She’s quite easy on the eyes, too.

Former SNL player Tracey Jordan is the wild card of the show. He plays a former big time movie star who is so full of himself that he still thinks he’s a superstar even though he’s now working on a lame variety TV show. Jordan plays the character like a crazy person, and nearly everything he does on the show comes way out of left field. His unpredictability makes him a delight to see what happens next.

Alec Baldwin plays the executive who came over from kitchen appliances to run the show. As you might imagine, he knows absolutely nothing about TV or comedy, for that matter. He plays the part perfectly as a disconnected boss who wants to be involved with everyone, though he really has no idea what is going on. What he does know is people and how to manipulate them, and Baldwin is absolutely brilliant in this show.

The rest of the supporting cast is awesome in their role and everyone plays the key part. From the bubbly blonde with questionable talent to the overenthusiastic page with enough optimism to make you sick, it all just works. With the way it shows how much chaos ensues when putting together a show, I wonder how many of the quirky little events in this show were inspired by things Fey ran into while working on Saturday Night Live. I think it would explain a lot about why SNL hasn’t been that great in a long time.

If you like workplace comedies like The Office, then you should definitely check out 30 Rock. Even though it’s all about the inner workings of a television show, you really don’t have to be any kind of TV junkie to appreciate the humor behind having to work with eccentric co-workers, ignorant bosses, and egotistical golden boys who always seem to get their way. Like a good comedy with some basis in reality, it’s pretty easy to connect some of the conflicts on this show to situations in real life. I can’t wait to start watching the next season!