A window into `House'

BEING a "House" fan is a bit like being friends with an addict. You have to put up with ridiculous behavior: a doctor who doesn't ever wear a surgical mask, milelong tapeworms, a season-ending shooting that is never mentioned again. There are also the inexplicable disappearances -- whenever "American Idol" needs a little extra legroom, "House" goes missing -- and all those lies -- everyone who thought House really had brain cancer this week please stand on your heads. But you remain an Avid Viewer for the same reason many people hang out with drunks and addicts: because, on top of their game, they are more fun than anyone you know.

This week's "House" will no doubt keep many of us codependents hooked for months. When a brain-damaged savant piano player loses the use of a hand, House, played by Hugh Laurie, is not only given license to figure out "where the music comes from," but also to decide what is more important: a small slice of real genius or a whole, but ordinary, life.

Many dramas lately seemed obsessed with themes, forcing the narrative threads to somehow coalesce into a meaningful take-away for the viewer. Like Oprah, only with beautiful TV stars. And "House" has occasionally fallen into that trap. But the theme of "Half Wit" (House's kind term for the young man) seemed to emerge organically from the story, which was ideally suited for House, who has already been established as a talented piano player himself.

Genius of any type is always interesting to contemplate, and post-"Rain Man" we all love savants, especially since this one gave us famous guest star Dave Mathews. (I can only hope that he is the first of a string; surely Laurie could call in chits with Emma Thompson and Imelda Staunton -- and what is Stephen Fry, the famous Jeeves to Laurie's Wooster doing on "Bones" when he should be on "House"?)

As the childlike musician, Mathews was wide-eyed with pathos and watching him do a four-handed jam with Laurie in the middle of a hospital room produced instant nostalgia for all those old musical variety shows of my youth. Why does no one play the piano on TV anymore? It's so darn sexy. (Trivia from the website: Mathews needed a hand double; Laurie did not.)