By ERIC GRIFFITH / Remember "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis"? If you do, congratulations -- but you're probably not in our demographic. Nonetheless, this '60s sitcom is relevant today because it was one of the first on television where the characters spoke directly to the audience. Which means that Fox's first new show of the season, "Get Real" (9 p.m. on Wednesdays), isn't doing something wholly unique when the characters break from the action, stare at the camera and tell you how they feel.

Although "Get Real" doesn't offer anything truly new, it does feature sympathetic family characters in sympathetic, quirky (albeit predictable) situations. The family is the Greens: 17-year-old valedictorian Meghan (Anne Hathaway), who is ready to skip college and rebel; 16-year-old Cameron (Eric Christian Olsen), who is rebelling already; 15-year-old geeky Kenny (Jesse Eisenberg), who wrestles with hormones and bullies; and the kids' conflicted parents.

Despite the pilot's concentration on Kenny and Meghan, the relationship between father Mitch (Jon Tenney, late of "Brooklyn South") and mother Mary (Debrah Farentino, who has starred in more pilots than even George Clooney) is the most interesting, as they try to salvage a crumbling marriage. When Mary's first scene turns out to be a sexual fantasy she's having about Mitch's business partner, you know things can only heat up or fall flat from there. Following such a progression is half the fun of a show like this.

With only two of the three kids addressing the camera in the pilot, the show was uneven; with all the tragically hip TV references and "Ally McBeal"-esque special effects, the breaking of the "fourth wall" seemed forced.

In the second episode, the program moved from gimmicky to more entertaining. Cameron went from sullen cameo to actual character as he dealt with fears that his parents may have given up on him. Same for the family's live-in grandmother (Christina Pickles, Monica's overbearing mother on "Friends"), who fears death after losing her husband. Meanwhile, "Get Real's" parents begin to put their marriage back together in a decidedly adult fashion, but the "adult" measures don't seem to work for them.

By the second episode, with every family member addressing the camera, the narrative gimmick was much more successful as a storytelling device.

If "Get Real" can keep its gimmicks in check as it continues to tell the Green family story, Fox may have a keeper on its hands.