Laughter In The Living Room: Television Comedy And The American Home Audience (Popular Culture and Everyday Life)

252 Pages·2004·0.94 MB·English

by  Michael V. Tueth

Laughter in the Living
Room: Television Comedy
and the American Home
Audience
MICHAEL V. TUETH
PETER LANG
in the Living Room
Toby Miller
General Editor
Vol. 8
PETER LANG
New York (cid:121) Washington, D.C./Baltimore (cid:121) Bern
Frankfurt am Main (cid:121) Berlin (cid:121) Brussels (cid:121) Vienna (cid:121) Oxford
MICHAEL V. TUETH
in the Living Room
Television Comedy
and the American
Home Audience
PETER LANG
New York (cid:121) Washington, D.C./Baltimore (cid:121) Bern
Frankfurt am Main (cid:121) Berlin (cid:121) Brussels (cid:121) Vienna (cid:121) Oxford
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Tueth, Michael V.
Laughter in the living room: television comedy and the american home Audience
/ Michael Tueth
p. cm. — (Popular culture and everyday life; vol. 8)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Television comedies—United States. I. Title.
II. Series: Popular culture & everyday life; vol. 8.
PN1992.8.C66T84 791.45’617—dc22 2004018131
ISBN 0-8204-6845-2
ISSN 1529-2428
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Die Deutsche Bibliothek lists this publication in the “Deutsche
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Cover design by Lisa Barfield
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of the Council of Library Resources.
© 2005 Peter Lang Publishing, Inc., New York
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All rights reserved.
Reprint or reproduction, even partially, in all forms such as microfilm,
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Printed in the United States of America
Tueth's v-viii-102 9/28/04 10:41 AM Page v
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Chapter1. They Also Serve Who Only Sit and Watch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Chapter2. A Night on the Town—at Home? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Chapter3. Survival of the Nicest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Chapter4. ... As Long as We Both Shall Laugh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Chapter5. Ozzie & Harriet and Rock & Roll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Chapter6. Looking Out the Picture Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Chapter7. Keeping It in the Family . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Chapter8. There’s No Place Like Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Chapter9. Playtime for the Grown-ups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Chapter10. Movin’ On Up? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Chapter11. Fun City . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Chapter12. Back to the Drawing Board . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Chapter13. Breaking and Entering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to express my deep gratitude to several of my colleagues for their
assistance and encouragement during the writing of this book: Gwenyth Jack-
away, Anahid Kassabian, Paul Levinson, Brian Rose, and especially Robin An-
dersen. The following students and former students also assisted in research
on various topics: Jonathan D’Agostino, Philip Frezzo, Catherine Grippo,
John Mann, Tim O’Leary, and Christopher Roddy. Jim Coughlin and Steve
Schoenig provided invaluable technical assistance and personal counseling
during my many attacks of computer-panic.
I would also like to thank the following institutions for providing a wealth
of information in the form of books, journals, videotapes, microfiche, and ma-
nila folders from their archives: the Walsh Family Library and the Gerald M.
Quinn Library of Fordham University, the Elmer Holmes Bobst Library at
New York University, The Cooper Union Library, the New York Public Li-
brary for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center, and the Museum of Televi-
sion and Radio in New York City.
Earlier versions of three of this book’s chapters have appeared elsewhere.
Chapter 11 was included in Journal of Popular Film and Television,Volume 28,
No. 3 (Fall, 2000). Chapter 12 was one of a collection of essays in Prime Time
Animation: Television Animation and American Culture(New York and London:
Routledge, 2003) edited by Carole Stabile and Mark Harrison. And Chapter
13 is included in Mary Dalton and Laura Linder’s volume, America Viewed and
Skewed: Television Situation Comedies,published in 2004 by State University of
New York Press.
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·1·
THEY ALSO SERVE WHO
ONLY SIT AND WATCH
T
he venerable character actor Edmund Gwenn is credited with utter-
ing on his deathbed, “Dying is easy; comedy is difficult.” Good com-
edy is indeed challenging, both for the performer and for anyone
who undertakes to analyze it. Comedy on television, for instance, to be fully
understood, deserves to be studied in the context of American social, religious,
and literary traditions. Each of these elements has helped to create the distinct
atmosphere that the comic writer or performer attempts to enter.
It might seem pompous and even hubristic to require a background in soci-
ology, literature, or religion to understand what is funny about Cosmo Kramer
tumbling through his neighbor Jerry’s door, or Lucy Ricardo getting bombed
on Vitameatavegamin, or Homer Simpson exercising a chokehold on his only
son. But these characters are products of their times in a medium which has
often been described as a “fun-house mirror” for the culture. Surely their con-
cerns and dilemmas touch on the basic concerns and values of their viewers.
Comedy’s fundamental nature is social, literary, and religious. It is a
uniquely social art form in its need to verify its effect with the unmistakable
response of laughter. Even though much of its patterns and techniques are
universal and timeless, it must speak in contemporary and recognizable words
and images to the society which it entertains, and the audience must certify its
success by chuckles, giggles, and guffaws. The characters and plots of televi-
sion comedy come from a venerable literary tradition as well. Lucy and Ethel,
Ralph Kramden and Ed Norton, and Laverne and Shirley can trace their
roots to the scheming servants of Roman New Comedy. Homer Simpson,
Archie Bunker, and Ted Baxter are all variations of the archetypal buffoon.
Gracie Allen, Mork from Ork, Radar O’Reilly, Woody Boyd, and Phoebe