10 Awesome Performances Trapped In TERRIBLE TV Shows
1. Ari Graynor - Bad Teacher
Though Hollywood is obsessed with adapting every moderately successful movie into its own long-running TV series, there are honestly far more offensive ideas than translating the hit 2011 Cameron Diaz-starring comedy film Bad Teacher into a show.
The short-lived 2014 series starred Ari Graynor as Meredith Davis, a gold-digging former housewife who poses as a high school teacher in the hope of finding a wealthy divorcée to marry.
It's a decent enough setup, yet not one which the show does anything interesting with, resorting to the most pat, predictable, sentimental sitcom storytelling while lacking the ribald R-rated edge that made the movie such a hoot.
The single saving grace is lead Ari Graynor - an extremely appealing actress who has cornered the market on playing sloppy trainwrecks over the years, yet hasn't ever quite received a mainstream project worthy of her skills.
Even so, she gives a full-throated and completely persuasive performance as Meredith, albeit one that's squandered on trash-tier writing in an overly sanitised adaptation of the film.
Had this been on a more permissive network like HBO or Showtime and secured the talents of more imaginative writers, it's easy to picture it having been a hit and propelling Graynor to sure stardom.