Dylan McDermott is up in the air and Seth MacFarlane is in orbit in Fox upfront trailers

By Esther Zuckerman | May 15, 2017 | 11:12pm

TV Features TV

It was the Seth MacFarlane show at the Fox upfronts this year, as the Family Guy creator was enlisted to croon a tune (with a big band, of course) about advertising for the audience of ad executives. Later, the crowd at New York’s Beacon Theatre was treated to the trailer for his new series The Orville, essentially his very own chance to be the star of a Star Trek type show—only this one with more lazy jokes about how women don’t like it when guys leave the toilet seat up. The premise is that MacFarlane plays Ed, “nobody’s first choice” to captain an exploratory vessel who gets the job anyway. Once on board, he learns his first officer is his ex-wife (Adrianne Palicki). “Seth is a rockstar with our audience,” Fox TV CEO Dana Walden touted during the upfront. Indeed, it was clear that the network enjoys a flashy musical number.

Most Popular

Aside from the MacFarlane space hour, Fox is betting on another riff on a genre to be its half-hour breakout for the fall. Ghosted stars Adam Scott and Craig Robinson as a Mulder and Scully-type duo—Walden even referenced the X-Files during the event—who are recruited to work at an organization known as the Bureau Underground that deals with all type of spooky stuff. (And if this comedic odd couple doesn’t appeal to you as much as the actual Mulder and Scully, you’ll recall that Fox has already ordered more X-Files.)

Midseason, Fox is adding the awkwardly titled new comedy LA To Vegas, about the crew of a plane that makes that short yet rowdy trip. Walden’s co-CEO Gary Newman was extremely eager to praise Dylan McDermott, calling his work “one of the most surprising performances we’ve seen since Andre Braugher in Brooklyn Nine-Nine.” In other words, Fox wants to reassure that this dramatic actor is actually going to be funny. He plays a cocky, intoxicated deadpan pilot in the series from Adam McKay, Will Ferrell, and Modern Family’s Steve Levitan. We’ll see if by the time this premieres people are willing to laugh at delinquent airline employees.

And finally The Good Wife’s Matt Czuchry gets a new gig in The Resident, a drama about all the mistakes hospitals make. Czuchry stars as the brilliant but also “arrogant” lead, who, according to the official synopsis, “does everything in the most unconventional way possible.” Though there wasn’t a trailer available, Fox also teased the new Ryan Murphy-Brad Falchuk project 9-1-1, starring Angela Bassett, which will begin every episode with a 911 call, to really put you on edge.