As if the premise of College Road Trip wasn’t already reminiscent of the first-season Sopranos episode “College” — the one where Tony takes Meadow to scope out campuses in New England and ends up garrotting a former associate — the cameos by Vincent “Big Pussy” Pastore and Joe “Big Gay Vito” Gannascoli suggest that somebody in Disney’s live-action department loves them some HBO.

Such distracting thoughts are a byproduct of watching a movie utterly bereft of invention or surprise — College Road Trip was made on autopilot, so why should I give it my full attention. To be fair, its treacly tale of an overprotective father (Martin Lawrence, 15 per cent less manic than usual) chaperoning his teenage daughter (Raven-Symone) to a meeting at Georgetown University — all the while trying to convince her to go to school somewhere closer to home — isn’t actively bad. It’s an 85-minute sitcom constructed out of telegraphed plot points, reaction-shot jokes and an obligatory musical showcase for former Cheetah Girl Symone, buttressed by a perfectly acceptable accept-your-empty-nest message. And it’s really, really boring, except for a few pop-up appearances by Donny Osmond, who skews his live-action Ned Flanders persona with gusto.