Donny! was a comedy series airing on USA Network. It follows the adventures of Donny Deutsch, an egotistical, self-absorbed daytime talk-show host and his long-suffering staff.
This series includes examples of:
- Adam Westing: Actor Donny Deutsch is essentially playing, in his own words, "a more idiotic version of myself."
- Coming Out to Spouse: One episode opens with Donny interviewing two middle-aged couples where the husbands have only recently realized that they are gay.
- Digging Yourself Deeper: Donny does this constantly; his attempts to put out whatever scandal he's currently embroiled in usually causes him to get in even more trouble.
- Faux Yay: After being mistaken for a gay man, Donny tries to turn it to his advantage to get better ratings.
- Mission Control: Pam, Donny's long-suffering producer, spends much of the time trying to advise Donny on how not to make an ass of himself. He seldom listens.
- Mistaken for Gay: One episode sees Donny getting a little too enthusiastic about the topic of middle-aged men coming out of the closet and declaring that he wishes he could be as brave as them. Everyone mistakes this as a confession that he's a gay man, much to his chagrin.
- Mistaken for Racist: In "Boom Boom Abs!", Donny makes an ill-advised comment about his black guest's "black abs", resulting in people starting to wonder if he might be racist.
- One-Word Title: The show is simply titled Donny!
- Product Placement: Since the series is on USA Network, which relies on product placements to subsidize its shows, and since Deutsch is an ad man in real life, the obligatory product placements have been turned into a Running Gag where, Once an Episode, the action will suddenly stop so that Donny can shill whoever is paying the bills for this week's episode.
- Servile Snarker: Donny's staff can be pretty open about their contempt for him.
