Jennifer Lawrence's Short-Lived, Little-Seen Sitcom Is Streaming For Free

Depending on your media consumption habits, there's a very good chance Jennifer Lawrence came hurtling in out of nowhere as Ree Dolly, the 17-year-old center-of-gravity for a dirt poor Missouri Ozarks family struggling to keep fed and sheltered in Debra Granik's 2010 masterpiece "Winter's Bone." Ree is a survivor, and she's doing the best to teach her younger siblings how to withstand the elements and, most importantly, avoid the enervating grasp of meth that pulled her father under and destroyed so much of her community. Lawrence earned her first Oscar nomination for Best Actress as Ree, an award she would win two years later for her portrayal of the troubled Tiffany Maxwell in "Silver Linings Playbook."

I've only ever known Lawrence as one of the very best actors of her generation, but everyone's got to start somewhere. After all, Clint Eastwood did eight seasons as ramrod Rowdy Yates on the CBS Western drama "Rawhide," while a 16-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio's first step toward superstardom was as homeless teen Luke Brower during the last season of the ABC sitcom "Growing Pains." Lawrence's path to prominence was no different. She spent three seasons on the TBS sitcom "The Bill Engvall Show" between 2007 and 2009, which you wouldn't know unless you were a fan of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour veteran at the time. But now, you can watch a teenaged Lawrence find her footing as a performer by streaming the show for free (with ads) on Tubi.

As far as formula sitcoms go, "The Bill Engvall Show" is actually bearable. Engvall co-created the series with sitcom veteran Michael Leeson, whose credits include such television classics as "All in the Family," "Happy Days," "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and "Taxi." Engvall, a good-natured fellow who specializes in wry observational humor with a working-class bent, stars as Ben Pearson, a family counselor who, of course, struggles to understand his own family. Nancy Travis co-stars as his heroically patient wife, Susan, while Lawrence plays his lightly rebellious oldest daughter Lauren. The show carefully avoids third-wire issues, but when you've got such comedy assassins as Tim Meadows and Brian Doyle-Murray in your cast, laughs are easy to come by. It's a friendly, inoffensive sitcom, and there's nothing wrong with that.

So, if you're looking for something you can watch with your family that won't prompt tough questions about how babies are made or the Watergate break-in, "The Bill Engvall Show" might just treat you right. And, if nothing else, you will certainly get to see Lawrence working her way up to being a breakout star.