Mad Tv

 ((Sat. (14) 11 p.m.-midnight, Fox) Taped in Los Angeles by QDE. Executive producers, Quincy Jones, David Salzman, Fax Bahr & Adam Small, Steven Haft; developers, Bahr & Small; producer, James Jones; director, John Blanchard; writers, Jonathan Aibel, Bahr, )

By PHIL GALLO

For the most part, debut seg misses the mark Mad magazine has hit in the bull's eye for four decades. Show starts with execs giving the greenlight but producers have yet to assemble a cast.
 

Belief here is that quality and tone of Mad magazine is transferable to small screen and any assemblage of actors can make the material work. Neither is true.

The beauty of the magazine has been its ability to poke fun at movies, TV and social mores quickly and succinctly; show has a general aimlessness, bits go on too long and sketches hit the mark only when the target is obvious, such as mishaps involving the Budweiser frogs.

Funniest seg involves "Gump Fiction" trailer (jumbling of "quarter-pounder with cheese" with "ways to cook shrimp" yields hysterical results). Thankfully, Klasky/Csupo's "Spy vs. Spy" shorts retain the bite of the printed material. Contest winner's five days on the road with Poison is two days too long. Tedious and unfunny characterizes the rest of the show. Three Kato Kaelin bits were not available on the review copy.

Power of "SNL's" early years rested in the hands of the players who also had a hand in the writing. That lack of overlap distances conviction in performances here -- rarely do the actors seem to believe that what they're doing is even funny.

Just goes to show that some things aren't meant to be exploited --"Mad TV" is to the magazine what "Trump: The Game" was to the financial world.