A reader writes:
Besides being unfunny, "Work It" is also not very original. "Bosom Buddies" in the '80s was very similar with the only difference being that they dressed as women because they couldn't find somewhere to live – the two lead characters moved into a women-only apartment building. Oh yeah, and it starred Tom Hanks.
Credit sequence above. Longer clip from the "Bosom Buddies" pilot here. Alyssa Rosenberg cheers "Work It"'s low ratings. She struggled to get through the first episode:
Work It‘s approach to revelation via gender-switching is particularly grating given that Up All Night is doing the same thing, with vastly more tenderness and perceptiveness. It’s particularly ugly to see Lee pretend to have been sexually harassed at his old job, telling his new potential boss at the pharmaceutical sales company where he goes to work that “The guys were always sassing me, or patting my fanny, or ogling my teats.” In pretending to understand female experience, he’s demonstrating his ignorance of it in a way that minimizes sexual harassment, making it cutesy and adorable.
The Dish 