'WEEDS' LAMPOONS THE SUBURBS AS ITS POT THICKENS

"Desperate Housewives" may be in reruns, but our season of suburban
discontent continues with "Weeds" (10 p.m. Sunday on Show-time), a new
assault on those "little boxes made of ticky tacky," as that old lyric in
the show's opening track asserts.

Call this the highest of high concepts, pun intended. Quirky, ever
vulnerable Mary-Louise Parker is Nancy, a suburban wife in fictional
Agrestic, Calif., whose husband dropped dead while out for a jog with one
of their two young sons. In a scenario almost pining for the late '60s, she
turns to dealing marijuana to help pay the bills.

Even best friend Celia (Elizabeth Perkins) isn't aware of Nancy's sideline,
though Celia's philandering husband is one of Nancy's prime customers at
his weekly poker party. Another poker player is Kevin Nealon, Nancy's
accountant and a local city official with a penchant for pot, in one of his
better turns since "Saturday Night Live."

The slaps at suburbia are merciless, a little outrageous and sometimes
annoyingly condescending. Heylia (Tonye Patano), Nancy's wholesale
provider, is a sassy, sharp-tongued African-American woman who's merciless
in tweaking Nancy's white middle-class ways. "Weeds" doesn't shy from
stereotypes, but embraces them in its mission to craft an acerbic adult
cartoon.

There's a what-the-heck outrageousness too. Nancy's 15-year-old son and
Celia's daughter are dating, flirting with having sex, and when Celia
installs a hidden video camera to monitor their petting, her daughter finds
it and turns the tables, substituting a tape of her father doing it with
his mistress.

Perkins, who somewhat resembles Parker, is on hand to be her hardened,
virago-ish alter ego, the apotheosis of suburban cynicism and hypocrisy,
nicknaming her overweight 11-year-old "Isabelly." "Weeds" has been getting
buzz suggesting it's Showtime's best challenge so far to rival HBO's
generally higher quality.

Yes and no.

"Weeds" is better than some Showtime offerings, most notably the abysmal
"Fat Actress." But there's an uneven quality to the humor, and the snide
putdown of "Leave It to Beaver"-land is starting to get old. Some plot
details are muttered by the actors in tossed away asides, and at times, the
show, created by Jenji Kohan ("Friends"), moves along slowly.

But those who stick with the series will probably be glad a few episodes
in, when Nancy's amoral brother-in-law (Justin Kirk) shows up and Celia's
world literally and figuratively crashes down around her.

The players are top-notch, including Parker, an acquired taste thanks to
her mannerisms, but an actress with sublime instincts and deeply felt emotion.

Liquor was quicker and pot was not in Ogden Nash's day. Times have changed,
but it remains to be seen if the television public is ready for a soccer
mom pushing something a lot more provocative than a baby stroller.