ABC has finally give the much-anticipated family comedy from Eddie Huang a premiere date. “Fresh Off the Boat” will premiere on Wednesday, Feb. 4 at both 8:30 p.m. and 9:31 p.m. It will then premiere in its regular day and time on Tuesday, Feb. 10 at 8 p.m.
Inspired by Eddie Huang’s best-selling memoir by the same name, “Fresh Off the Boat” takes place in 1995. It follows 11-year old, hip-hop loving Eddie (Hudson Yang), who has just moved to suburban Orlando from D.C.’s Chinatown with his parents (Randall Park and Constance Wu).
The series will take the Tuesday at 8 p.m. slot that canceled “Selfie” once inhabited. It is always a challenging position at the top of the primetime hour as there’s no lead-in to help with viewership, but is a good slot for family-viewing fare.
Currently, NBC has “Parks and Recreation” in the same slot, which also includes Fox’s “MasterChef.” And “Boat” won’t have a new season of “The Voice” to contend with for a couple weeks. In the same timeslot, “Selfie” averaged a 1.1 rating in the advertiser-coveted 18-49 demographic and 3.8 million viewers.
Produced by 20th Century Fox Television, “Fresh Off the Boat” will be executive produced by Nahnatchka Khan (“Don’t Trust the B in Apartment 23,” “American Dad!”), who also wrote the pilot. Jake Kasdan and Melvin Mar also serve as executive producers with Huang serving as a producer.
The last time a broadcast network comedy was fronted by an Asian lead was on ABC, as well. Margaret Cho starred on “All-American Girl” from 1994-1995. The first show to have an Asian lead, however, was Pat Morita’s short-lived 1976 sitcom “Mr. T and Tina,” also on ABC.