The high-concept sitcom is back, and the crazier the premise, the better
Tag Archives: Sitcoms
Why working-class sitcoms don’t work
Chuck Lorre meets the modern viewer’s aversion everyday working people
Michael J. Fox: Back with a future
TV’s comeback kid talks about sex, guns, Justin Bieber, and what Parkinson’s has given him
Fast-forward to the sitcom reruns
There is cash is in syndication, and some networks are speeding up production at the cost of quality
Five opinionated facts about Arrested Development
Jaime J. Weinman on the lesser known details of the series
Why mockumentary works
Sorry for another sitcom-theory post so soon after the last one, but a reader asked me if I had a specific post where I outlined why I think the mockumentary format is the modern version of the laugh track – or at least, as we saw on How I Met Your Mother last week, that it’s okay for a laugh-track show to turn off the track when they do a mock-documentary segment. I think I did write a longer post explaining this, but I can’t find it, so here is sort of a quick summary of my thoughts on the mockumentary and why it seems to work.
Laugh tracks in sitcoms are so retro
Single-camera shows, shot without an audience, are all the rage
The NBC sitcom counter-backlash
I see that Salon’s Willa Paskin has written an article about how Whitney has improved, thereby saving me from fearing I was going crazy. I had been telling people that it was one of the better new comedies of the season – a very backhanded compliment, admittedly, given what this season has been like – and getting genuinely horrified reactions.
Three stereotypes walk into a diner…
Are walking ethnic clichés better than no clichés in sitcoms?
Why old people are suddenly watchable on TV
Networks are discovering their most loyal viewers like over-60s like Ted Danson