NBC’s About a Boy is yet to get its official verdict from critics and viewers, but so far, the outlook is good for the new NBC comedy. About a Boy stars David Walton as Will, an irritating 30-something manchild and Benjamin Stockham as Marcus, his 11-year-old new neighbour. When fate (and housing prices) pushes the two together, along with Marcus’ neurotic, controlling mother.

Benjamin Stockham, Cartoon Network's Hall of Fame
Ben Stockham stars in this NBC comedy as the aforementioned boy.

"Marcus really needs a dad and a man in his life and, through this sort of twist of fate, it's this ill-equipped 'child,'" Walton said in an on-set interview with USA Today recently.

"All Will really wants to do is watch TV, play video games, eat meat, go through his hedonistic routine. But there's an emptiness in that kind of life that is based in a lack of meaning," he explains." When this little boy comes along, it's annoying … but ultimately it's like carbonating these feelings of what's really important in life. And loving someone and family are way up there. In a way, this weird family is forming and Will doesn't even know it."

David Walton
David Walton makes the show sound like more than just a tweaked version of Two and a Half men.

About a Boy is based on the eponymous Nick Hornby novel, which also spawned a 2002 film starring Hugh Grant. Minnie Driver, who plays Marcus’ mother Fiona on the NBC series, thinks that while the main story hasn’t changed, the show takes a few risks as well. As for her own character, Fiona is as off-kilter as ever, just the way Driver likes it. “She’s a fragile character,” says Driver for the NY Daily News, and the fragility threatens to envelop her 11-year-old son. According to Driver, About a Boy is different from the average sitcom, in that it goes beyond the classic will-they-won’t-they dilemma, to explore deeper issues, like the relationship between a son and his father figure. The premiere of About a Boy will air after the Olympics Saturday night at 11 and then move to its regular slot at 9 p.m. Tuesdays next week.

Minnie Driver
Minnie Driver is especially fond of her complicated, unbalanced character.