Television series

The New Adventures of Old Christine

Name: The New Adventures of Old Christine
Genre: Comedy, Family
Released: 2006
Cast: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Clark Gregg, Hamish Linklater, Trevor Gagnon, Emily Rutherfurd

The New Adventures of Old Christine turns divorce into an ensemble sitcom, all bright multi-cam energy and generous, big laughs. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is magnificently unglamorous as a gym-owner mom whose ex remains her best co-parent even as his younger girlfriend complicates every school pickup. It's warm rather than cynical, family-friendly but never toothless, and Louis-Dreyfus's physical comedy carries scenes that lesser writing might sink. Comfort viewing with a spine.

TVMaze rating

7.4

If you liked this

Grace Under Fire1993

Brett Butler's single mom raising three kids while getting sober is scrappier and rawer than Christine's world, but it's the same premise pulled from an earlier decade — a woman rebuilding her life on live-studio-audience terms, sharp-tongued and unbowed.

But Butler's real-life troubles overshadow the show now, and the early-90s multi-cam pacing feels creakier than Christine's slicker mid-2000s polish.

Everybody Loves Raymond1996

If you liked the amicable-ex dynamic, Raymond is the flip side — a marriage still intact but drowning in in-laws, proof that CBS could wring huge laughs from ordinary domestic friction for nine straight seasons.

But No divorce plot, no single-parent stakes — it's a married-couple show, so the central hook you liked here just isn't present.

The Middle2009

A less polished, more chaotic family comedy from the same CBS-adjacent lineage, where the parents are perpetually exhausted rather than witty — a nice companion piece if you want the mess without the zingers.

But It trades Christine's sharp one-liners for broader, gentler humor; if the wit was the draw, this plays much softer.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Veep2012

Louis-Dreyfus is the through-line: the same comic engine, rerouted from a big-hearted single mom into a monstrous, self-serving politician, showing the full range hiding inside that persona.

Same star, opposite instinct: Julia Louis-Dreyfus trades Christine's frazzled decency for Selina Meyer's bottomless, profane self-interest. Watching her comic timing weaponized for pure cruelty instead of warmth is one of TV's great actor showcases.

But It's savagely cynical about politics and people, with almost none of Christine's underlying niceness — a much colder, meaner kind of funny.

Grace and Frankie2015

Two women rebuilding independent lives after their marriages implode, twenty years further down the road than Christine — funnier about aging, sex and reinvention than almost anything else on television.

But It's Netflix-length and slower-paced, with none of the studio-audience snap; the tone is gentler, more contemplative than laugh-a-minute.

30 Rock2006

Swap the gym for a TV studio and you get another brilliant, self-deprecating woman running her own chaotic show — Tina Fey's writing is denser and weirder, but the comic engine of a woman barely holding it together is identical.

But It's single-camera and joke-per-second dense, a very different rhythm from Old Christine's warmer, slower multi-cam pacing.

How I Met Your Mother2005

A tighter ensemble comedy about dating, friendship and the long shadow of past relationships, with the same CBS mainstream comfort and a similarly big, generous laugh track.

But It's built around one long will-they-won't-they mystery rather than a self-contained family, so the shape of the show is quite different.

Malcolm in the Middle2000

Told from the kid's point of view instead of the mom's, this is the chaos of raising children rendered as gleeful anarchy — a useful contrast if you're curious how the same material looks from underneath.

But No studio audience, no laugh track, and a much more manic, single-camera style that some find exhausting rather than cozy.

Two and a Half Men2003

Same network, same era, same multi-camera bones, but filtered through bachelor chaos instead of a mother rebuilding her life — a useful measure of how differently CBS could play the same format.

But It's cruder and more leering than Christine ever gets, and it aged far less gracefully in the years since it aired.

One Day at a Time2017

This reboot centers a Cuban-American single mom juggling work, kids and an ex-husband's fallout, updating the exact premise for a different family and a sharper political edge.

But It leans further into serious topics — PTSD, addiction, coming out — so the comedy carries more weight than Christine's lighter touch.

Kramer vs. Kramer1979

Same fractured-family engine — a parent suddenly solo, an ex still tangled in the picture, a child caught between — played entirely straight instead of for laughs, decades before sitcoms softened it.

The dead-serious ancestor of every divorced-parent sitcom, this quietly devastating drama about a father learning to raise his son alone strips away the jokes and shows the raw material Christine's world is built to laugh at.

But There is no comic relief here — it's a sober, sometimes painful drama about custody and loss, nothing like Christine's brightness.

Bob's Burgers2011

Both shows run on a woman holding a chaotic small enterprise and a stranger household together through sheer generous will — Christine's gym and the Belchers' restaurant are structurally the same joke.

An animated family running a small, struggling business together, held up by a mother figure's stubborn optimism and a household of oddballs who love each other loudly — the same big-family warmth in a completely different format.

But It's animated, absurdist and musical at times — a much weirder, more surreal register than Christine's grounded live-action world.