h2The Pianissimos/h2

IRV (dressed like limo driver, in black suit with white shirt and cap): I wasn't there the day Dr. Andrew Brown's life changed forever … [puts on very dark sunglasses] so fuggeddaboudit! [Turns and walks off set.]

NETWORK ANNOUNCER'S VOICE: "The Pianissimos" … coming up next.

[Cut to logo:]

"HMO.

Home Mob Office."

[Fade in slogan at bottom:]

"Whatta you lookin' at?"

[Opening visual: Oil refinery and other industrial sites, spewing fumes into cloudy sky, as seen through window of moving car, with "Woke Up This Morning" by A3 playing in background, as if on car radio.]

IRV'S VOICE: Everwood, New Jersey. Population 9,000 and stinkin'. Stuck in the no-man's-land between the New York burbs in the north, the Philly burbs in the south, the casinos and ghost towns on the shore, and the hills across the Delaware. Land of swamps and Superfund sites. Born to run my ass. This is where members of certain … families come when they need to, you know, lie low for a while. Or bury a few bodies. Look, broke cops are easy to pay off. br

[Cut to flashback of teenage Geraldo Abruzzi Jr. with father, in matching plaid pants, riding in golf cart driven by unidentified man in dark suit and sunglasses.] The Abruzzi family got squeezed out of Philly when bigger families -- and I don't mean with more kids -- cornered all their markets. Young Geraldo -- known as "Doc" like his father, because of their talent for "surgically removing" rivals -- tried to work his way into the New York rackets but never cut it … in part because of this man. br

[Cut to flashback of adult but beardless Andy Brunelli, in gray suit, stepping into limo guarded by men in black suits and sunglasses.] Andy "Fingers" Brunelli played a talent for trafficking in black-market medical supplies into ownership of the leading -- or at least best-connected -- medical waste disposal firm on the East Coast. And all that waste's gotta go somewhere. One rainy night, his wife was killed by a truck while driving to their son's piano recital. br

[Cut to scene of funeral.] The police said the crash was an accident … but "Fingers" had his doubts, so he abruptly packed up the kids and moved here.

[Cut to scene of "Doc" in second-floor window, looking down on Main Street.] Needless to say, "Doc" was none too happy to see him. His father had been "hit" years ago in New York, and his mother went to prison in a wave of federal prosecutions. She was due for release about the time "Fingers" arrived. This is the story of two families with something to hide … and something to prove. And maybe more. This is the story … of Everwood.

Opening credits: Piano arpeggio followed by melody -- not on violins, but on mandolin like in those Olive Garden commercials, with accordion blending into background. [Stereotype, you say? Yeah, we got your stereotypes … smack … right here, buddy!] Scenes of Main Street, still frames of characters, you know the drill. [Where's that friggin' ravioli anyway?]