the return of laughter; Joan Juliet Buck interviews Jason Bateman and welcomes back Larry David and Ricky Gervais.(Interview)

Byline: Joan Juliet Buck

Outside the Mercer Hotel, Jason Bateman was smoking a cigarette on a bench while a reporter scribbled his every word in a book. A pretty young Saudi woman sat down for her own cigarette, took note of what was going on, and asked him, "Are you famous?"

"Hmmmm. . . . Fairly," he answered.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Marc Jacobs," said Bateman.

"You are not!" she said. "I know Marc Jacobs; I saw him right here in this lobby on September 12, 2001!"

The misfire is one of Jason Bateman's comedic skills, used to perfection in his role as Michael Bluth, the only ethical member of the greedy, self-absorbed California real-estate clan of Arrested Development and therefore, in the current zeitgeist, a real patsy. "My character is an asshole," says Bateman, adding, "I enjoy the times when he postures as someone who's bulletproof." The show is written with madcap inspiration by Mitchell Hurwitz and narrated by the deadpan voice of one of its producers, the adult prodigy Ron Howard, who started off as Opie on The Andy Griffith Show in the sixties. The entire cast-from Jessica Walter as the chic and evil mother, Lucille, to Portia de Rossi as Bateman's sister; Will Arnett; Jeffrey Tambor; Tony Hale; and Michael Cera as Bateman's son, George-Michael-play their parts with a relish more often found in the theater of the absurd. "It's The Royal Tenenbaums shot like Cops," says Bateman.