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Why Sitcoms Stopped Using Laugh Tracks - Cheddar Explains

  • 0:00 - 0:02
    This is a clip from the hit TV series,
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    "Parks and Recreation."
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    ...128 ounce option.
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    Most people call
    it a gallon, but they
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    call it the regular.
    Now let's see what
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    that same clip would
    be like if we added
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    a laugh track.
  • 0:16 - 0:20
    [rewind sound]
    ...128 ounce option.
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    [laughter]
    Most people call it
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    a gallon, [laughter]
    but they call it the regular. [laughter]
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    It seems so wrong,
    but for most of
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    television history, it was
    so right. [background laughter]
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    Over the last half century
    or so almost every
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    comedy on television had
    canned laughter, [laughter]
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    from "I Love Lucy"
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    to "The Big Bang Theory."
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    For some, the laughter
    is viewed as an
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    imposition. For
    others, a secondary
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    character you almost forgot was there,
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    until it wasn't anymore.
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    In recent years, the
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    laugh track has been
    used less and
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    less as sitcoms in
    general have
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    decreased in popularity.
    Let's break down
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    where the mysterious
    laugh box came from
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    and where it went.
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    Before television existed,
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    there was the ballet, the opera,
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    magic and comedy shows.
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    When you went to one of
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    these events, you were
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    experiencing the
    audience reactions in
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    real time.
    If something was shocking,
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    you could hear and
    feel the gasps echo
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    around you and
    similarly with laughter.
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    But then came the radio,
    the first ever
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    broadcast medium.
    Those communal
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    reactions disappeared
    as American
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    families gathered in their
    living rooms to be
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    entertained.
    Radio producers wanted
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    to develop a way to
    give people the live
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    experience at home.
    The first-ever laugh
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    track began with
    Bing Crosby's radio show.
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    Recording pioneer Jack Mullen
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    recalls the creation to "Channels of
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    Communication," a trade journal in 1981.
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    "The hillbilly comic Bob Burns was on the
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    show one time and through a few of his
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    then extremely racy and off-color folksy
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    farm stories into the show. We recorded
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    it live and they all got enormous laughs,
    [laughter]
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    but we couldn't use the jokes. So
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    scriptwriter Bill Morrow
    asked us to
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    save the laughs.
    A couple of weeks later, he
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    had a show that wasn't
    very funny and he
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    insisted that we put
    in the salvage laughs. [laughter]
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    Thus the laugh
    track was born.
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    Fast forward to the
    era of early television.
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    Comedies were filmed
    with a single camera
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    in front of a live audience.
    That meant
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    that each scene would be
    filmed multiple times, from
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    multiple angles, instead
    of the multi cams today, which
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    have multiple cameras
    capturing one take.
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    Those separate angles
    and takes would be
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    cut together and when
    that happened, the
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    laughter was inconsistent.
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    Audiences would laugh at the
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    wrong time, too loudly,
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    for too long and were simply unreliable.
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    In the late 1940s, CBS sound engineer
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    Charlie Douglas noticed those
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    inconsistencies and
    couldn't take it anymore.
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    If a joke didn't get
    a desired laugh,
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    he would insert
    one with the use
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    of a laugh track.
    This technique became
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    known as "sweetening."
    Douglas went so far
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    as to create a physical laugh box.
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    According to Ron Simon, curator of
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    television and radio at the Paley Center
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    for Media, the device was about three
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    feet tall, the shape of a filing cabinet,
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    very heavy and had slots for 32 reels,
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    which could hold ten laughs each. It was
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    officially named the audience response
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    duplicator, but it became known as the
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    "laugh box." At its best,
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    the "laugh box" could hold 320
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    laughs. Press them one at a time
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    and you get a similar laugh.
    [single laughs] Press
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    multiple keys at once [laughter]
    and a symphony of laughter would play.
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    Each key represented a
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    different age, sex,
    and style of laugh,
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    with a foot pedal
    regulating the length. [laughter]
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    The "laugh box" was mysterious though.
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    Since Douglas owned the patent and
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    created all of them, nobody outside of
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    him and his family
    members had ever seen the
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    inside of the machine. And when
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    Douglas wasn't around,
    the machine was
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    kept tightly padlocked.
    In an interview
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    with "TV Guide" in 1966,
    Dick Hobson said
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    if the laugh box should start acting
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    strangely, the laugh boys
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    wheel it into the
    men's room,
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    locking the door
    behind them so no
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    one can peek.
    I mentioned the name
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    Charlie Douglas and it's like Cosa
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    Nostra, everybody starts whispering.
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    It's the most taboo topic in TV.
    The first sitcom to
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    use the "laugh box"
    was the short-lived
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    series, "The Hank McCune Show"
    in 1950. [laughter on show]
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    The idea of recorded laughter
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    spread throughout Hollywood
    and by the 1960s
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    almost every single camera sitcom
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    was utilizing canned laughter. But it was
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    only Douglas that engineered the
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    laughing for everyone for almost a
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    decade. For $100 Douglas would wheel the
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    mysterious box to each studio on a dolly
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    and sit with the producers in a
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    screening room and
    decide what kind of laughter
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    and when. Eventually Douglas
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    hired a second-in-command to keep up
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    with the 100 hours of television he
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    needed to sweeten.
    And the rest was
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    history. Multicam sitcoms were
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    popularized in shows like "Friends,"
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    "Frasier," "Seinfeld" and
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    more incorporated canned laughter.
    [Sound of "Friends" in the background]
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    The actors and actresses would know to
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    hold for laughter, knowing that each
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    scene would be sweetened.
    [more sound from "Friends"] The Discovery
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    Channel documentary,
    the one that goes
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    behind the scenes,
    shows how it works.
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    [Sometimes the audience responds too big.]
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    If I went with the actual
    laugh, [laughter] that laugh
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    is still going through her next line
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    into his next reaction
    and that's, it's
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    five, six seconds.
    And in TV land that's
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    an eternity. [laughter]
    [Sometimes we have to put in
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    a laughter that is shorter.]
    [laughter]
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    It felt like comedies
    would be like this
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    forever. And then "The
    Big Bang Theory"
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    went off the air in 2019
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    and took with it one of the last
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    multicam sitcoms with canned laughter.
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    When we look at the television landscape
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    today almost, every single comedy is a
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    single-camera comedy and not a multicam
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    sitcom with canned laughter. You can
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    count on two hands how many multicam
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    sitcoms that use a
    laugh track are on TV
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    right now, and not to
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    mention those that went
    off the air this year [2020].
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    The use of the laugh track
    has almost disappeared
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    completely from the TV lineup.
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    So what changed?
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    Dead air in television
    used to be frowned upon
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    and shows would push
    for laugh tracks
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    whenever possible.
    [distant laugh track]
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    Bill Cosby claimed
    his first sitcom,
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    "The Bill Cosby Show,"
    that ran from 1961 to
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    1971, failed because
    he had insisted on
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    not using a laugh track.
    Not to be
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    confused with the
    very successful "The
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    Cosby Show" that aired
    in the 1980s and
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    did have a laugh track.
    And "MASH" fought
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    to not have a laugh track
    at all, but
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    they came to a compromise
    with the studio
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    They would use the canned
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    laughter, [laughter]
    but just not during the very
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    serious OR scenes.
    While we associate
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    the 80s and the 90s
    with the laugh track,
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    that was actually the
    time when single
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    camera comedies
    without canned laughter
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    started to take over.
    A key player in this
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    transition was HBO. Their shows
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    "Dream On" in 1990
    and "The Larry Sanders Show"
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    in 1992 ran without laughs tracks
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    and even garnered praise for doing so.
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    The airing of these shows
    proved that comedies
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    could exist, and
    exist successfully
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    without laugh tracks.
    Other studios
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    took notice and
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    began to follow suit.
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    Then came "Curb Your Enthusiasm,"
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    "Malcolm in the Middle,"
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    "Scrubs,"
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    "Arrested Development,"
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    "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia,"
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    "30 Rock,"
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    "The Office" and
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    the list goes on and on.
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    Writers and producers
    were excited by
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    the change, as it
    allowed them to stray
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    from the constant
    stream of punchlines
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    to explore character-based
    humor. Another
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    reason the laugh track fell
    to the wayside?
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    According to Mike Royce,
    the co-showrunner of
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    Netflix's "One Day at a Time,"
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    "I think one of the
    reasons why people
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    don't like laugh tracks
    is they don't like
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    to be told how to react. It's
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    an American thing:
    Don't tell me what the
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    [bleep] to laugh at."
    "T"he Big Bang Theory was
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    one of the last
    big sitcoms that used
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    canned laughter
    and even their creator
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    Chuck Lorre insisted
    that absolutely no
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    sweetening took place on any of his
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    series, which also include
    "Two and a Half Men"
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    and "Mike and Molly,"
    stating "I do not
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    and have never,
    sweetened my shows with
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    fake laughs.
    I've always thought it was
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    pretty hateful and
    a self-defeating practice."
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    For now, the laugh track lives
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    in a very strange state.
    It's used in very
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    few shows,
    but lives on in the
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    reruns of ever popular series like
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    "Friends," "How I Met
    Your Mother," and more.
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    Perhaps history might
    repeat itself and
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    we'll see a resurgence
    in multicam sitcoms
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    and the laugh track.
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    Until then, we can thank streaming
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    services like Netflix and Hulu for
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    keeping Charlie Douglass's
    legacy in our living rooms.
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    Thank you for watching.
  • 8:49 - 8:51
    Please be sure to like, comment and
  • 8:51 - 8:53
    subscribe to our channel and ring the
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    bell below. That way, you're notified
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    whenever we post a new video.
    [music ends]
Title:
Why Sitcoms Stopped Using Laugh Tracks - Cheddar Explains
Description:

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Video Language:
English
Duration:
08:57

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