Arrested Development

Arrested Development is a character-driven American television sitcom about a formerly wealthy, habitually dysfunctional family. The show sometimes incorporates devices used in documentaries with its use of narration, archival photos, and historical footage. Although set in Newport Beach and Balboa Island, California, Arrested Development was primarily filmed around Culver City and Marina del Rey.
The show was created by Mitchell Hurwitz. Ron Howard is an executive producer and the uncredited narrator. It has aired on broadcast networks around the world, including Fox in the United States, The Comedy Channel (Pay TV) in Australia, Global (original run) and CBC (syndication) in Canada and BBC Two in the United Kingdom.
Discussion which led to the creation of the series began in the summer of 2002. Ron Howard had the original idea to create a comedy in the style of hand-held cameras and reality television, but with an elaborate, highly-comical script resulting from repeated rewritings and rehearsals.[5] Howard met with David Nevins, the President of Imagine Television, Katie O’Connell, a senior Vice President, and two writers, including Mitchell Hurwitz. In light of recent corporate accounting scandals, such as Enron and Adelphia, Hurwitz suggested a story about a “riches to rags” family. Howard and Imagine were immediately interested in using this idea, and signed Hurwitz on to write the show.
he plot of Arrested Development revolves around the members of the Bluth family, who generally lead excessive lifestyles. At the center of the show is the relatively honorable Michael Bluth (Jason Bateman), who strives to do the right thing and keep his family together, despite their materialism, selfishness, and manipulative natures. His teenage son, George Michael (Michael Cera), has the same qualities of decency, but feels a constant pressure to live up to his father’s expectations, and is reluctantly willing to follow his father’s plans, which do not always agree with his.
Michael’s father George Bluth Sr. (Jeffrey Tambor) is the patriarch of the family. At times dictatorial, George Sr. goes to considerable lengths to manipulate and control his family. His wife, and Michael’s mother, Lucille (Jessica Walter), is equally manipulative, materialistic, and hypercritical of every member of her family, not to mention being a perpetual drunk. In particular, she has a tight grip on her youngest son Byron “Buster” Bluth (Tony Hale), who, as a result of his mother’s dominance and sheltering, is unstable, socially inept, and prone to panic attacks.
Michael’s older brother is Gob, played by Will Arnett. His name is an acronym for George Oscar Bluth II, and although pronounced Jōb, as in the Biblical figure, it is frequently mispronounced as Gŏb by various characters in the show. Gob is an unsuccessful professional magician whose business and personal schemes usually fail. He uses a Segway for transportation, and sometimes converses with others from it while stationary, as if it were a pulpit. Gob is used by his father to undermine Michael’s control of the family business. Michael’s twin sister Lindsay Fünke (Portia de Rossi) is flamboyant and materialistic, continually desiring to be the center of attention and attracted to various social causes, usually for a week or so. She enjoys being objectified, but also protests it. She is married to Tobias Fünke (David Cross), a discredited psychiatrist, aspiring actor, and “never-nude”, whose language and behavior have heavily homosexual overtones, which he seems totally oblivious to and is the center of much tongue-in-cheek comedy throughout the series. Their attention-starved but sweet daughter Mae “Maeby” Fünke (Alia Shawkat) is the polar opposite of her cousin George Michael—skipping school, cheating on homework, and stealing money from the family’s frozen banana stand business (which also happens to be managed by George Michael). The ever-rebellious teen, Maeby’s chief motivation is going against her parents’ wishes.