As I’ve mentioned in yesterday’s post, I’ve been thinking about television of the past as a side effect of recording TV themes. Today, a few sitcom observations:
- Sitcom Openings. I’ve been doing my recording of themes by finding TV show openings on YouTube and capturing the audio. This means I’ve been watching loads of sitcom openings. You don’t see many of these today, except for really short sequences. In the past, these openings served two purposes: to provide the basic expositional setup (the best examples of this are any Sherwood Schwartz sitcom (think Brady Bunch or Gilligans Island) or a show such as The Nanny. The other thing they did was to introduce the cast. This typically involved having “funny scenes”, and then freezing on the actor smiling for the camera. Want a good example? Look at this opening from the second season of Angie. This is something you rarely see these days. If you have good examples of this style of opening, please mention them.
- Sitcom Focus. While on the van, I was thinking more and more about 80s and 90s sitcoms such as Blossom, Step by Step,Full House, &c. This was a style of sitcom where the focus was on the cute kids. These were everywhere in the 80s and 90s. Look at broadcast TV sitcoms of today. Generally, the focus is not on the kids, but on the interactions and reactions of the adults. Where have the kids gone? Their sitcoms have moved to ABC Family and the Disney channel, and off of Broadcast TV. Could this be why broadcast TV has lost the family audience (similarly, I’ll claim the P.I.s have moved to USA and TNT).
- Reaction Shots. One thing I’ve really noticed about sitcoms is the cinematography. Watch a sitcom closely. They are typically very stylized, especially the 3-camera ones. In particular, note that whenever someone gives a “laugh line”, there is typically a cutaway shot to another characters reaction. This is your signal that there was a joke and you should laugh. Seriously. Watch closely and suddenly you’ll see the reaction shot everywhere.
Lastly, I may be doing another round of TV Theme grabs. So what are your favorite TV themes?
