CBS Rings 'Class' Bell Early

Zap2It.com | July 11, 2006

Jason Ritter on 'The Class'

New comedy swaps spots with 'How I Met Your Mother'

CBS has made a small tweak to its fall schedule, flipping the time periods of its new comedy "The Class" and second-year show "How I Met Your Mother."

The network had originally planned to move "How I Met Your Mother," which averaged a respectable 9.5 million viewers a week last season, from 8:30 to 8 p.m. ET. That would give "The Class" an established lead-in and also hammock the new series between "How I Met ..." and "Two and a Half Men," the most-watched sitcom on TV.

Instead, though, CBS has decided to move "The Class" into the 8 p.m spot and will keep "How I Met Your Mother" in the 8:30 spot. That will give the new show a little bit heavier burden of leading off the night against the likes of NBC's "Deal or No Deal" and FOX's "Prison Break."

"The Class" is an ensemble comedy from "Friends" co-creator David Crane and former "Mad About You" and "Half & Half" writer-producer Jeffrey Klarik. It will follow a group of former third-grade classmates who are reunited 20 years later when one of them (Jason Ritter, "Joan of Arcadia") throws an engagement party.

The show also features Andrea Anders ("Joey"), Lizzy Caplan ("Related"), Sean Maguire ("Eve"), Lucy Punch ("Ella Enchanted") and Jesse Tyler Ferguson.

It was the subject of a bidding war between a couple of networks during last year's development season; CBS ultimately won out by giving the show an early 13-episode commitment.