Even bad guys have to pick up the kids and take out the garbage.

Such is the life of Bobby Stevens, a criminal mastermind whose crafty skill at breaking, entering and taking has turned him into the go-to guy for international hotshots who just HAVE to have that priceless painting hanging in a well-guarded museum. But once he’s back home, he’s just a middle-aged man with a beautiful wife, a couple of cute kids and a mortgage in the L.A. suburbs.

The premise of “Smith,” premiering tonight on CBS, may not be all that original. After all, Andre Braugher played a similar character in last season’s sadly short-lived FX series “Thief,” and “The Sopranos” contrasts Tony’s bullet-ridden business with the vagaries of his family life. But the densely plotted “Smith” is rewarding on its own terms.

Ray Liotta is Stevens, the ringleader of a motley crew of sticky-fingered hotheads who come together every once in a while just to pull off a big job. There’s weapons master Jeff (Simon Baker, “Something New”), transportation chief Joe (Franky G, “Saw II,” “The Italian Job”), mistress-of-disguise Annie (Amy Smart, “The Butterfly Effect”), and her very English and very reckless sometime romantic partner Tom (Jonny Lee Miller, “Trainspotting”), who’s on parole from a previous legal misadventure.

Stevens claims he wants to get out of the business and rededicate himself to his wife (Virginia Madsen), his dull-as-dirt day job (sales, plastic cups) and his grand piano, on which he likes to play jazz. But his “middleman” – the person who matches the monied client with his special skills – is a well-heeled woman (played by Shohreh Aghdashloo, “House of Sand & Fog,” “24”) who keeps pulling him back in.

In tonight’s opening episode, Stevens and company are hired to pilfer a few pieces of art from a Pittsburgh museum. What sounds simple enough nearly becomes a disaster when things don’t turn out quite as desired.

Beginning at the start of the heist, working its way back to the planning, and then forward to the aftermath, the pilot of “Smith” is ingeniously complex, at least by general TV standards. This is the kind of show that you’ll want to watch twice just to make sure how all the plot points fit together.

Even the series’ name, the nebulous and ambiguous “Smith,” isn’t obvious, saying little of what the show’s about, another TV rarity. (“Smith” is the FBI’s code word for the leader of this gang of criminals that keeps outwitting them.)

Produced by John Wells – best known for backing such high-gloss TV projects as “ER,” “China Beach” and “Third Watch” and the movies “Far From Heaven” and “Party Monster” – “Smith” has a filmic quality. The finely shaded performance from Liotta helps with that impression. In fact, all of the major cast members are better known for their big-screen work, and they bring with them that level of sophistication.

Yet the elements that make “Smith” so smart and savvy could also keep the drama from attracting a large audience. Some viewers may have trouble rooting for a gang of hoods on a weekly basis, especially with the show’s dark thematic tone, spasms of violence and twisted timeline.

But for those going through “Sopranos” or “Thief” withdrawal, “Smith” is a godsend.