“To the Moon”: Sitcoms

1. “To the Moon”: Sitcoms HUM 3085: Television and Popular Culture Spring 2014 Dr. Perdigao January 10, 2014

2. An Evolving Form • Mittell’s characterization of the six functions of television: 1. A commercial industry (grossing over $100 billion annually through advertising, cable fees, DVD sales, and other sources of revenue) 2. A democratic institution (informing American citizens through news and electoral coverage, governed by public policy regulations) 3. A textual form (distinct narrative structure and set of genres distinct from other media) 4. A site of cultural representation (mirror of our world, often distorted representation of national identity, shaping our perceptions) 5. A part of everyday life (part of our routines, conversations) 6. A technological medium (central screen for digital entertainment and information media in the home) (Mittell 2)

3. Periodization • The Classic Network Era • Origins in radio industry in the mid-1940s and lasting until the mid-1980s • Originally conceived as “radio with pictures” (Mittell 163), draws on cinema and live theater (163) • All programming presented by three national networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) • Television’s role as “the primary medium that defines American culture” established during this period (10) • The Multi-Channel Era • 1980s as traditional period, shift from domination of national broadcast networks to cable and satellite programming • New formats and strategies to target audiences • Fox and Univision emerged to compete with the Big Three • Remote controls and VCRs redefined viewing habits (11)

4. Periodization • The Convergence Era • Changing medium due to new(er) technologies: internet and video games • Alternatives to traditional programming (Mittell 11)

5. Sketching the Sitcom • Situation comedies—sitcoms (Mittell 248) • Emerged from radio industry of 1930s and 1940s (248) • Variety show—comedians doing monologues and skits, musical acts in vaudeville style (248): contemporary examples in The Late Show with David Letterman, The Tonight Showwith Jay Leno (earlier Johnny Carson), Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel Live! • Sketch comedy: stand-alone characters or situations changing from sketch to sketch: Abbott and Costello and The Bob Hope Show; Saturday Night Live (following Laugh-In of the 1960s and The Carol Burnett Show of the 1970s) • Radio shows adapted to new medium of television in the 1950s: Amos ‘n’ Andy (1951-1953), The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (1952-1966) as examples

6. Realism, Surrealism, and Hyperrealism • Realistic characters with plausible scenarios: The Cosby Show (1984-1992) and The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970-1977) or exaggerated performances/worlds: Married . . . With Children (1987-1997) and I Dream of Jeannie (1965-1970) (Mittell 248-9) • The Burns and Allen Show (1950-1958), It’s Garry Shandling’s Show (1986-1990), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2000-2011) as fictional series with variety show forms: play with monologue to audience and enacted scenes, sictocm and talk show, documenting the (fictionalized) real life of Larry David (249)

7. Love and Marriage • Sitcoms as domestic comedies or family sitcoms vs. workplace comedy (249) • Domestic comedies “generate conflicts from tensions between husbands and wives, as well as intergenerational battles, but they typically reaffirm the nuclear family and marriage as the stable foundations of American society” (249). • I Love Lucy (1951-1957), The Honeymooners (1955-1956), Burns and Allen (1950-1958), I Married Joan (1952-1955): all childless couples and their neighbors (249) • Shift in mid-1950s to families, parents and children: Father Knows Best (1954-1960), Ozzie and Harriet, Leave It to Beaver (1957-1963); I Love Lucy features little Ricky in the second season, matching Lucille Ball’s real-life pregnancy (249)

8. Broadening Horizons • Revisions with unconventional families but reaffirm “familial love and loyalty as beyond satire” (249). • Shift to unconventional families as revision of the typical nuclear family: The Brady Bunch (1969-1974), Diff’rent Strokes (1978-1986), Full House (1987-1995), Two and a Half Men (2003- ) (249)

9. Outside the Home • Workplace comedy focused on distinct sites: Taxi (cab company, 1978-1983), Benson (governor’s mansion, 1979-1986), Barney Miller (police station, 1974-1982), The Office (paper company, 2005-2013) • Office comedies based on media companies: The Mary Tyler Moore Show (television news, 1970-1977), WKRP in Cincinnati (music radio, 1978-1982), Murphy Brown (network news, 1988-1998), Sports Night (cable sports, 1998-2000), The Larry Sanders Show (network talk show, 1992-1998), Just Shoot Me (magazine, 1997-2003), 30 Rock (network comedy, 2006-2013) • Some sitcoms are both domestic and workplace comedies: The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961-1966), Newhart (1982-1990), The Facts of Life (1979-1988) • Domestic with workplace scenes: Bewitched (1964-1972), Frasier (1993-2004)

11. Spinning • The Honeymooners spinoff from The Jackie Gleason Show (1952-1959) • Stand-alone sitcom for one season (1955-1956) but considered a “classic” • Bus driver, sewer worker, and their wives in working-class New York • Poised before shift to family sitcoms in mid-1950s • Ideas about class, gender, marriage, family, the “American Dream” • The Flintstones (1960-1966) as “prehistoric remake of The Honeymooners” (Mittell 251) • The Tracy Ullman Show (1987-1990): The Simpsons (1989- ) • Diff’rent Strokes: Facts of Life

14. Experiments in Form • The fantasy sitcom emerged in the 1960s: Bewitched (1964-1972), I Dream of Jeannie (1965-1970), The Munsters(1964-1966), Mister Ed (1958-1966) (Mittell 251) • Dramedy, crossing genre lines of comedy and drama, emerged in mid-1980s; The Wonder Years as successful half-hour dramedy (252) • Comeback of dramedies in the 1990s: Northern Exposure (1990-1995), Ally McBeal(1997-2002), Desperate Housewives (2004-2012) (all one hour long), Sex and the City (1998-2004) (252)

16. Sketching the Sitcom • Cultural contexts of the series—socially engaged sitcoms, escapist programs, changing social mores and politics