#1 Pilot #2 The Getaway #3 Memories of Me #4 The Client
#5 Two Days in the Valley #6 Author! Author! #7 The Conversation
Producer Richard Doctorow, Producer Jon Hayman, Producer Amy Welsh, Produced by Suzy Mamann Greenberg, Co-executive producers Jeff Astrof & Mike Sikowitz, Executive Producer Ted Harbert, Executive Producer Peter Mehlman #1 Pilot: Aired Wednesday, March 24, 1999
Arthur first comes to L.A. to write a book about how awful it is and see his old college buddy, Robbie. He meets Lauren, a masseuse and process server, on the plane. When Arthur meets Jennifer Grey, he doesn't recognize her because of her nose job. Robbie gets invited to a party and set up with a girl because he didn't honk at a slow driver at a green light. He doesn't mention it was because his horn is broken. Shrug tries to come up with a cover story for why he has so much money, and says he works at a book store and gets paid $2,000 an hour.
Everyone's enthralled by a high-speed car chase on television. Jennifer is hoping it will end quickly so that Oprah won't be pre-empted because she has an American Express Card ad premiering during Oprah. Lauren hopes it will run long so that she won't have to take a test on the Lumbar region. Arthur can't believe that all of L.A. grinds to a halt for a high-speed chase.
Shrug is haunted by a lost love, and goes to an amnesiologist to get rid of the memory. Once he successfully forgets about her, he runs into her on the street. Arthur blows a blind date because he can't stop staring at models, but goes out on more dates so that he can meet John Updike. Jennifer insults a Harvard snob who tries to ruin her career, and she has to set him up with Laurie in order to ever work again. Robbie and his girlfriend agree to date even though she only likes him for his money and he only likes her because she's a model.
Arthur tries to avoid receiving a massage from Lauren so that he won't become just another client in her eyes. Shrug opens a detective agency to solve all those little questions about life. Jennifer sleeps with a guy on the first date because he saves someone's life, but then finds out that he actually is employed as a paramedic and saving lives is his job. She then realizes that he's the perfect man, but after she chokes at the restaurant and he saves her, she tries to take him home to bed, and she says he can't sleep with her anymore because now she's a client.
Arthur hunts down a woman in the valley who is suing the cafe over a medium-rare burger so that he can get his burgers the way he likes them. The TV execs who run Pay-per-Jew are having the Rabbi test-marketed for key demographics.
Arthur's visiting publisher is charmed by the L.A.'s celebrities and women, and tells Arthur he has to change the tone of his book. It doesn't take the publisher long, however, to crack the beautiful veneer of the city and realize that nothing and no one lives up to their promises. Lauren is upset when Arthur intimates that she is not as intelligent as he. Robbie is unhappy when his money-seeking ex-girlfriend dates a poor, goofy, silly-looking waiter. Shrug tries to record his autobiography, but cannot successfully work with an actor to read it.
L.A. is making Arthur think more about sex, and he is jealous of Robbie's casual sex life. Jennifer goes to a bar to confront a critic who gave her a bad review, but he avoids her and instead she ends up bonding with Lauren. Shrug, a jail-buff, visits his friend in jail.