David E. Kelley could do no wrong in the 1990s. A lawyer turned screenwriter, Kelley was recruited onto the L.A. Law writing staff in the mid-80s by his future mentor Steven Bochco, with whom Kelley created Doogie Howser, M.D. starring the then-unknown Neil Patrick Harris. He then launched several critically acclaimed successes -- Picket Fences, Chicago Hope, The Practice and Ally McBeal -- but the 2000s saw him hitting a rough patch. After garnering strong ratings and a positive reception for most of its run, Ally McBeal struggled in its fifth season and was ultimately cancelled. Simultaneously, The Practice struggled in the ratings due to increasingly unrealistic storylines and Kelley's Boston Public failed to make any ratings impression at all. But the worst was yet to come.
Kelley's follow up to Ally McBeal -- literally so, since it took it's 9 o'clock Monday night time slot -- was another hour-long drama set in a law firm, less gritty than The Practice and more grounded than Ally. Starring Chyler Leigh, Gretchen Mol, and Kathleen Robertson as fresh-faced associate attorneys, with Giancarlo Esposito as one of the firm's partners, the show was supposed to spend as much time on the law as the friendship between the leads. Fox showed their support for Kelley by forgoing the pilot process and going straight-to-series. Girls Club premiered on October 21, 2002 -- and one week later it was cancelled.
While Boston Public and Chicago Hope were never top ten series, their steady ratings and numerous Emmy Award wins and nominations made up for that, and the mainstream popularity of Ally and The Practice made Kelley a bankable creator. But Girls Club finished last in its time slot among the six broadcast TV networks and was maligned heavily by Entertainment Weekly before it was swiftly given the axe.
In an Associated Press article, Kelley was quoted as saying the show's advertising misrepresented it as "Charlie's Angels in a law firm." Comparisons to Ally also might have affected its reception since it was another series about young female lawyers carving out paths in a male-dominated field by the same creator. More than anything, though, the two aspects that killed Girls Club were its baffling story choices and inconsistent tone.
The pilot episode jumped from one plot point to another without much (if any) setup, and the tone varied wildly across each of the three main storylines. Mol's character Lynne represented a man accused of murder in a bizarrely dark and underwritten thread while Robertson's Jeannie was involved in a case about a doctor passing out on a woman during a gynecological exam -- complete with wacky flashback. The best-defined character was Leigh's Sarah, but her unprofessionalism and homophobia made her continued employment the pilot's biggest surprise. Esposito managed to hold on to his dignity and bring something to a tissue-thin role, but that's hardly a shock when discussing the ever-versatile actor who'd go on to play Moff Gideon in The Mandalorian.
If there was a silver lining to be found, it was that everyone landed on their feet after Girls Club's short-lived misfire. Kelley returned to The Practice, which was restructured around James Spader's Alan Shore and led to the hugely successful spinoff Boston Legal. He's continued to be one of the most important names in television, creating or producing a number of other acclaimed and popular series including HBO's smash hit Big Little Lies.
Leigh joined the cast of The Practice in it's seventh season and spent several years on Grey's Anatomy before joining the Arrowverse as Supergirl's Alex Danvers. Mol and Robertson continued to appear in films and television series; the latter was the female lead in Murder in the First, the final TV series created by Bochco before his death in 2018. Esposito found a whole other level of TV stardom when he was cast as Gus Fring on Breaking Bad and its spinoff Better Call Saul, which is about to premiere its sixth season.
While Doogie Howser M.D. got a reboot and rumors of an Ally McBeal revival have swirled for years, Girls Club will almost certainly never resurface again. It's a curious artifact that proves even the most talented TV writers and producers can stumble now and again.