Jason Lee answers questions from TV critics about his new show, "My Name is Earl."    Reuters

Greetings from the (former) House of Merv. In a show of solidarity with the other TV press, I'm wearing my nametag today. It's Day One, NBC. It's also Sunday morning at 9. So this better be good, whatever they woke up the whole hotel for.

Entertainment chief Kevin Reilly tells the TV press that he feels "a thirst for creativity" at NBC. That's because they're in fourth place. What's he gonna say? There's a thirst to be even less creative? In terms of what's next, he has four words for us: "My Name Is Earl."

It tested better than "Friends!!!" "Earl" stars Jason Lee as Earl, a lovable loser/petty criminal who wins the lottery and then, through a series of events, decides to seek out all the people he's wronged over the years and correct his karma.

The pilot has a hangdog, "Raising Arizona" charm; my one caveat would be that it at times feels dangerously close to looking and feeling like "Ed," that NBC show a few seasons back about a guy named Ed who worked cute as a bowling alley lawyer. That whole show was so cute it was like how your teeth hurt after eating too much Cap'n Crunch.

And then I see, ominously, in my NBC notebook that one of the executive producers in fact has "Ed" on his resume.

On the "Earl" panel at 11, the "Earl" cast looks like a blue-collared-up "Friends," although no one's denying the power of Jason Lee with a thick mustache (cross Tom Selleck with a Fu Manchu) and Jaime Pressly's blondeness. Series creator Greg Garcia is told that buzz among the press is that it's the best pilot they've seen this year. "How important is that, to have the critics behind you?" Garcia is asked.

He gestures toward the idea of important critical acclaim, but what sticks out is this: "It's a lot more important that I have the audience behind me."

I want to ask a follow-up ("To clarify, Mr. Garcia, does that mean you're saying none of us have to be here, exactly? Because I missed my power sculpt class this morning...") but now someone's asking Pressly (white blouse and black choker, jeans, heels, for those scoring at home) what it was like to model at 14.

The cast of "Earl," we're told, will be at the NBC stars party Monday night at the Century Club. This evening there’s a thing by the pool here at the Beverly Hilton with the cast of NBC's "Vegas," apparently, but I don't know: I'm picturing a crowd of middle-aged men around Jimmy Caan, Caan regaling them with "Godfather" stories, sockless in Italian loafers, the press brushing aside the periodic ash from his cigar as he gesticulates.