{"id":798422,"date":"2026-08-02T01:35:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T01:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/798422\/"},"modified":"2026-08-02T01:35:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T01:35:10","slug":"before-breaking-bad-jonathan-banks-starred-in-a-forgotten-90s-sitcom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/798422\/","title":{"rendered":"Before Breaking Bad, Jonathan Banks Starred In A Forgotten &#8217;90s Sitcom"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>            &#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<\/p>\n<p>                                             &#13;<br \/>\n                                                    &#13;<br \/>\n                            &#13;<br \/>\n                        <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"gallery-image \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/intro-1784800470.jpg\" data-slide-url=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2224964\/breaking-bad-jonathan-banks-forgotten-90s-sitcom-fired-up\/\" data-post-id=\"2224964\" data-slide-num=\"0\" data-slide-title=\"Before Breaking Bad, Jonathan Banks Starred In A Forgotten '90s Sitcom: \" width=\"780\" height=\"438\" alt=\"Jonathan Banks as Mike Ehrmantraut in Breaking Bad (2008)\"\/>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>                    Ursula Coyote\/AMC<\/p>\n<p>Over the years, few actors have embodied the tough, straight-talking, no-nonsense archetype quite like Jonathan Banks. Banks appeared in ten seasons of two of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2173209\/best-tv-shows-21st-century-ranked\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">the best shows of the 21st century<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 four on &#8220;Breaking Bad&#8221; and six on &#8220;Better Call Saul.&#8221; Long before he stepped into the role that made him an icon, however, he courted laughs on a show that&#8217;s since been all but forgotten.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Fired Up&#8221; was a short-lived sitcom starring Sharon Lawrence as a pushy boss and Leah Remini as her sassy assistant. When both are fired from the company they work for, they decide to start a business as equal partners to make ends meet. Despite the talent involved with the show \u2014 including Banks \u2014 &#8220;Fired Up&#8221; was a complete bomb with critics. The ratings were initially strong, but a lot of that could be attributed to it being placed after &#8220;Seinfeld&#8221; on the schedule. Once that timeslot changed, the ratings tanked, and &#8220;Fired Up&#8221; was canceled after its second season.<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>                Jonathan Banks is no stranger to comedy<\/p>\n<p>                                             &#13;<br \/>\n                                                    &#13;<br \/>\n                            &#13;<br \/>\n                        <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"gallery-image \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan-banks-is-no-stranger-to-comedy-1784800472.jpg\" data-slide-url=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2224964\/breaking-bad-jonathan-banks-forgotten-90s-sitcom-fired-up\/\" data-post-id=\"2224964\" data-slide-num=\"1\" data-slide-title=\"Before Breaking Bad, Jonathan Banks Starred In A Forgotten '90s Sitcom: Jonathan Banks is no stranger to comedy\" width=\"780\" height=\"438\" alt=\"Professor Hickey celebrates his birthday in Community (2009)\"\/>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>                    NBC<\/p>\n<p>On &#8220;Fired Up,&#8221; Banks played Guy Mann, a bar owner who constantly hits on Sharon Lawrence&#8217;s character. He was a series regular on the show, appearing in all 28 episodes, and seemed to fit in well with his sitcom surroundings. That shouldn&#8217;t come as too much of a surprise, however, because this was far from Banks&#8217; first rodeo in the world of comedy. Earlier in his career, he had scored roles in several comedic movies, including &#8220;Airplane&#8221; and &#8220;Stir Crazy.&#8221; And this wouldn&#8217;t be the last time Banks went for the laughs, either.<\/p>\n<p>In between his time on &#8220;Breaking Bad&#8221; and &#8220;Better Call Saul,&#8221; Banks spent a season on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2192767\/best-tv-shows-like-community\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">the off-beat comedy show &#8220;Community.&#8221;<\/a>\u00a0More recently, he&#8217;s returned to the comedy realm as a voice actor on shows like &#8220;F is for Family&#8221; and &#8220;Kite Man: Hell Yeah.&#8221; Clearly, Banks is as comfortable cracking jokes as he is getting gritty; it might even be fair to say that, if it wasn&#8217;t for a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2061520\/breaking-bad-mike-ehrmantraut-wouldnt-exist-how-i-met-your-mother\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">scheduling issue with &#8220;How I Met Your Mother,&#8221;<\/a>\u00a0the world might well know him more as a comic actor than anything else.<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"&#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; Ursula Coyote\/AMC Over the years, few actors have&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":798423,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[88,92],"class_list":["post-798422","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=798422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798422\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/798423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=798422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=798422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=798422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}