"Californication" Sells Hollywood, But Not So Well

"Californication's" anti-hero, Hank Moody, is well-named: "I'm disgusted with my life and myself, but I'm not unhappy about that."

Hank (David Duchovny) laments -- or is it boasts? -- to his agent, Charlie (Evan Handler), the one guy who'll put up with his abject behavior.

Hank is a once-serious writer undone by Hollywood. His acclaimed novel, "God Hates Us All," was transformed into an insipid romantic comedy, "Crazy Little Thing Called Love," and the experience ossified his creative juices.

It also destroyed his relationship with his girlfriend Karen (Natascha McElhone), who's now engaged to a stand-up (read that: rich but dull) guy, and might eventually alienate his tween daughter, Becca (Madeleine Martin), who is picking up a few vices of her own.

Now, Hank whores and boozes his way through life -- he gets four women naked in tonight's episode alone, and he has two simultaneously groping him at a dinner party next week, and that's not even counting the porn star who undresses for him. He even manages to mire himself into a situation that's transgressive even by pay-cable standards and makes post-coital vomiting with a Scientologist mildly amusing. Hey, it beats working for a living.

Even though the past few years are littered with such underperforming shows, Hollywood still hasn't figured out that the rest of the country just isn't that into shows about Hollywood. And even though Duchovny deftly conveys the wry confidence of a charismatic jerk who knows his wounded wit and good looks will allow him to get away with his bad behavior, one wonders how many viewers will, ultimately, buy into Hank and his issues.

In 2003, Showtime offered a similar series, "Out of Order," starring Eric Stolz and Felicity Huffman, and likewise gave a voice to Hollywood writers who, despite lives of comfort and easy sex, still managed to kvetch endlessly about how hard their lives were. It went nowhere with viewers whose lives actually were hard.

Though "Californication's" punch lines are punchier and its sex more copious, it may experience the same difficulties in locating an empathetic viewership outside L.A. County.

Two and one half stars.